Statues & remembering the past

SteveG wrote: ^True, you don't have to be a liberal to view Trump as a bad president. But it helps.

^Good one.

Barry Goldwater to Bob Dole while expressing his disgust over the rise of religious intolerance in the republican party via Pat Robertson and Pat Buchanan:
"I guess we're the liberals of the party now"

Edited by Easy Money - June 15 2020 at 08:42

Re twseel: I'm probably not the best person to direct your question to, but when I try to think of a universally admired western icon; Abraham Lincoln probably comes the closest, after that maybe someone who used sports to advance society, someone like Jackie Robinson. A non-exploitative explorer such as Amelia Earhart also comes to mind. Here in Memphis we have statues to blues man WC Handy and Elvis that never attract any controversy.
Ultimately though, I really do think a statue is a waste of public funds that could be better spent elsewhere, and that is from a fiscally responsible conservative viewpoint.

As far as the other things you mention, a true and intelligent conservative approach to government has been undermined by phony con artists like hollywood donald and the people he attracts. If you want to understand what a fiscally responsible approach to government is, check out current Republican presidential candidate William Weld. Also, check out National Review, who coincidentally recently ran an editorial in favor of taking down jim crow era confederate statues.

Mostly I try to avoid simplistic labels and am willing to pick and choose my ideas from any approach. i prefer solutions to ideology. You may have noticed people on this site from many different ideologies uniting behind a concern that trump is a danger to the US and the world. You do not have to be a 'liberal' to realize what a truly horrible president he is.
Now back to the statues:

twseel wrote: Why is most of this thread about the American civil war? The issues are the same everywhere, everyone was an immoral scumbag as long as you just go back in history long enough with enough facts to know. The more we discover with empirical historical research, the more we have to conclude that even saints and scientists had dirt on them, offensive opinions, behavior that we wouldn't accept now...  I used to think it was stupid and reactionary to take these statues down but looking at the argument that the purpose of statues in practice is to set a symbolic moral example of 'good values', it actually makes a lot of sense to take down the high-praising symbols of them brave old warmongers. The main issue that gets the discussion so heated though, is of course that it's used as another token of polarization, where your stance on it supposed to be yet another indicator of which side of the big political battle you're on. As if we don't have enough of those yet... I'd say both sides should back off from the debate first and then we just let the local governments calmly get to replacing the old statues with new ones from contemporaneous celebrities or respected politcians, should be plenty of those that deserve statues (in the public eye) and plenty of people willing to make them I'd think.

The Civil War is paramount to understanding the racial situation in the US today, that's why it is such a hot topic in this thread and why there is the wide spread cry of having Confederate based statutes torn down. Simply put, following the Civil War, the US government was much more preoccupied with integrating the South back into the Union and healing the psychological war wounds of the side that lost than truly integrating blacks into US society. And the result of ignoring that integration of blacks is what you see happening now.

^ Amen, bro! If people have personal opinions on history, let them raise statues of history on their OWN property!

twseel wrote: Your response seems to point right to the problem I mentioned in my question in that a left-winger like you is so polarized against the right that you're clearly implying that you're against statues because of their current associations with the right wing, even if there's nothing necessarily inherently right-wing or conservative about the idea of putting up a statue for a respected figure.

Edited by The Dark Elf - June 14 2020 at 16:10

Easy Money wrote: ^ Take that money for the statue and give it to the Food Bank so they can do something useful with it. To borrow a quote from AA, I don't need statues to be happy.

Not saying I feel the need for any particular statues either myself but it's a pretty minimal amount of money and public space required to symbolically respect some hugely important and inspiring figures (like Obama?). Your response seems to point right to the problem I mentioned in my question in that a left-winger like you is so polarized against the right that you're clearly implying that you're against statues because of their current associations with the right wing, even if there's nothing necessarily inherently right-wing or conservative about the idea of putting up a statue for a respected figure. Although I could be reading too much into it of course... But then I've still seen this mindset elsewhere (not just in America of course).

dr wu23 wrote: And maybe we need to look at the bigger picture.......

Excellent video. Unfortunately there are those in the US and elsewhere that would say this is just propaganda for a one world government/new order. Very sad.

micky wrote: twseel wrote: Why is most of this thread about the American civil war?  ummm.. paid attention to the news recently...  anyone is free to post about what is going on in their country regarding hundreds of years of racism, systematic or otherwise, and more to the point... the statues placed to reinforce it

Now look, it's an interesting discussion but a lot of it just isn't about statues anymore whatsoever... Anyway, here is an America-focused question back for you all on the topic: who would be suited to get a statue of them placed today to replace the removed statues, now that the country is in such a polarized state? Maybe Obama could get a prominent statue somewhere eventually? And then will it be torn down again within a century or so because of his drone strikes in the middle east? Anyone else?

And maybe we need to look at the bigger picture.......