Much like in Germany after the fall of the nazi party, all monuments that were up were taken down. The defeat and then the disgrace of the nazi party demanded it! It was the right thing to do. There is little difference here in America with the confederate monuments. The confederacy declared their independence from the United States and then proceeded to fight a war to make it happen. Well they lost and their attempt to keep slavery as a right was defeated along with their aspirations to make a nation for themselves. So having these southern monuments dispersed around the south as a testimony to their attempt is anti-American and a reminder of the sedition the southern states took at that time.
There is another disturbing aspect of having those monuments up for children to grow up and admire. Feeding the deeply held belief that the south would have another run at seceding although having slaves this time would seem moot but who knows? Still like in Germany, when the architects of naziism where defeated their monuments were destroyed and their ideology was swept aside so that a new beginning could take hold and a Germany without naziism could emerge. Well we didn't get that done here in America and instead allowed for the defeated ideology of slavery and rebellion to be planted firmly in the minds of the southern population. We were wrong not to pull every monument down to the perpetrators of secession but we even allowed for new monuments to be erected and placed in public squares.
Enough! The southern states have to accept that the past is not always pretty and that their ancestors were not all in for America. If nostalgia for that history must be saved then let it be in museums. To perpetrate the myth that the south did not fight over slavery is against the laws of logic and common sense and does not heal our nation but instead stokes a flame of distrust. Our southern children need new heroes like the slaves who fought and won their freedom from an otherwise intolerable reality wherever slavery was practiced. Those should be the types of monuments that appear throughout the south, not monuments to the southern generals and politicians who fought against their own nation to protect slavery and keep the black race as equal to property.
There is another disturbing aspect of having those monuments up for children to grow up and admire. Feeding the deeply held belief that the south would have another run at seceding although having slaves this time would seem moot but who knows? Still like in Germany, when the architects of naziism where defeated their monuments were destroyed and their ideology was swept aside so that a new beginning could take hold and a Germany without naziism could emerge. Well we didn't get that done here in America and instead allowed for the defeated ideology of slavery and rebellion to be planted firmly in the minds of the southern population. We were wrong not to pull every monument down to the perpetrators of secession but we even allowed for new monuments to be erected and placed in public squares.
Enough! The southern states have to accept that the past is not always pretty and that their ancestors were not all in for America. If nostalgia for that history must be saved then let it be in museums. To perpetrate the myth that the south did not fight over slavery is against the laws of logic and common sense and does not heal our nation but instead stokes a flame of distrust. Our southern children need new heroes like the slaves who fought and won their freedom from an otherwise intolerable reality wherever slavery was practiced. Those should be the types of monuments that appear throughout the south, not monuments to the southern generals and politicians who fought against their own nation to protect slavery and keep the black race as equal to property.
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