Avoid Memphis - Confederate statues coming down

Crimson1967

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I would love for a German to move here and fly a Nazi flag to honor his family members who fought in WWII, even though they never killed any Jews.

I bet he’d get plenty of support from the “it’s my heritage” crowd.


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Tidewater

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Speaking as a black woman who born and raised in Alabama but has lived in Memphis for 19 years, I agree with you 100 percent
Ma'am, I will never be able to walk a mile in your shoes.

Since I gather you and I are going to have different perspectives on the matter, and i appreciate thoughts of people with different perspectives than my own, I wonder if you might let me know what you make of Forrest's speech to an African-American fraternal organization in Memphis in 1875.
 

Tidewater

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Here is an interesting and related development.
Ivan Konev, a Soviet general from World War II was the general most responsible for liberating Czechoslovakia from Nazi occupation.
On the other hand, Konev was also the Soviet general who crushed the Hungarian resistance in 1956 and helped organize the crushing of the Czechoslovaks in 1968.
Needless to say, the Czechs have a nuanced perspective on Konev and plan on placing interpretive plaques on Konev's statue explaining the good and the bad Konev did.
The Russians are not pleased.
 

CharminTide

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I would love for a German to move here and fly a Nazi flag to honor his family members who fought in WWII, even though they never killed any Jews.

I bet he’d get plenty of support from the “it’s my heritage” crowd.
Nah. Germany owned its mistakes, and they passed those difficult reflections onto later generations. Much of the U.S. has avoided such reflection, instead replacing it with more comforting Lost Cause propaganda.
 

Tidewater

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Nah. Germany owned its mistakes, and they passed those difficult reflections onto later generations. Much of the U.S. has avoided such reflection, instead replacing it with more comforting Lost Cause propaganda.
I would be interested to hear your views on which provision of the US Constitution empowers the federal government to overthrow an elected state government and replace it with an appointed military governor. Or whether such an action would be genuinely democratic. That is the ugly flip side of the Union position, one the believers in the Treasury of Virtue dare not discuss.
 

CharminTide

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I would be interested to hear your views on which provision of the US Constitution empowers the federal government to overthrow an elected state government and replace it with an appointed military governor. Or whether such an action would be genuinely democratic. That is the ugly flip side of the Union position, one the believers in the Treasury of Virtue dare not discuss.
There are so many more enjoyable ways I'd rather spend my time than copy/pasting the same conversation we had last time.
 
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crimsonaudio

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I would be interested to hear your views on which provision of the US Constitution empowers the federal government to overthrow an elected state government and replace it with an appointed military governor. Or whether such an action would be genuinely democratic. That is the ugly flip side of the Union position, one the believers in the Treasury of Virtue dare not discuss.
Here's where I stand on that:
- the Union had no right to invade or attack the Confederacy, but
- just because the Union had no right to do this does not mean the Confederacy wasn't defend something that was also wrong.

I guess my point is that I don't really care if both sides were wrong, what we're talking about is a portion of our society that has been forced to look at statues revering people who might not have been slave owner, might not have even liked slavery, but still chose to support the side that, at least in part, did support the right for one man to literally own another.

And that's where I draw the line. Everything else is just philosophical discourse.
 

AUDub

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Give me ambiguity or give me something else.
Ma'am, I will never be able to walk a mile in your shoes.

Since I gather you and I are going to have different perspectives on the matter, and i appreciate thoughts of people with different perspectives than my own, I wonder if you might let me know what you make of Forrest's speech to an African-American fraternal organization in Memphis in 1875.
Supposedly even *gasp* kissed the cheek of the young lady - the daughter of one of the Pole-Bearers - that presented him a bouquet at the event.

Forrest was a very interesting figure. Very polarizing. Too many make the mistake of either accepting the hagiography associated with him or outright demonizing him, erecting a bastardized saint or demon rather than who the man actually was (or who he became later in life), as is the case with a lot of the names we’re familiar with from the time.

I still wouldn’t want a statue of him.
 
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92tide

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Supposedly even *gasp* kissed the cheek of the young lady - the daughter of one of the Pole-Bearers - that presented him a bouquet at the event.

Forrest was a very interesting figure. Very polarizing. Too many make the mistake of either accepting the hagiography associated with him or outright demonizing him, erecting a bastardized saint or demon rather than who the man actually was (or who he became later in life), as is the case with a lot of the names we’re familiar with from the time.

I still wouldn’t want a statue of him.
maybe if the statue was of him on his knees in a hair shirt rather than on the back of his trusty steed
 

Tidewater

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Here's where I stand on that:
- the Union had no right to invade or attack the Confederacy, but
- just because the Union had no right to do this does not mean the Confederacy wasn't defend something that was also wrong.

I guess my point is that I don't really care if both sides were wrong, what we're talking about is a portion of our society that has been forced to look at statues revering people who might not have been slave owner, might not have even liked slavery, but still chose to support the side that, at least in part, did support the right for one man to literally own another.

And that's where I draw the line. Everything else is just philosophical discourse.
You are right, of course.
The folks that erected these statues, however, did so after the Great Disfranchisements.
In 1861, southern voters had decided that they could no longer remain in the Union consistent with their safety. The federal government killed 260,000 of them and destroyed billions of dollars in non-slave property for making that decision and over-ruled the decision itself.
In 1865, the same southern voters had the temerity to send to Congress the same people they had chosen to lead them during the war. Despite explicit prohibitions against doing so, Republicans refused to seat them (because they were mostly Democrats).
Then, in the late 1860s, the federal government ordered the states to draft new state constitutions by electing delegates to state constitutional conventions, and ordered that anyone who could not take the ironclad oath could vote for delegates. The Confederacy had had universal white male conscription, so almost no citizens of those states could vote for delegates who would draft the new state constitutions.
That tends to stick in people's craws a bit. These statues were erected after the Great Disfranchisements (and I believe as a result of those events).
(This experience also had the unfortunate effect of teaching white southerners that if you do not like the results of elections, just disfranchise your opponents, something white southerners would adopt with relish over the next century, but that is another debate.)
 

MattinBama

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Supposedly even *gasp* kissed the cheek of the young lady - the daughter of one of the Pole-Bearers - that presented him a bouquet at the event.

Forrest was a very interesting figure. Very polarizing. Too many make the mistake of either accepting the hagiography associated with him or outright demonizing him, erecting a bastardized saint or demon rather than who the man actually was (or who he became later in life), as is the case with a lot of the names we’re familiar with from the time.

I still wouldn’t want a statue of him.
The biographies I've read on him are truly fascinating. His life and history deserve to be studied for sure (militarily and just in general) although I completely understand why African Americans would not want statues of him in their towns, despite his later speakings/feelings.

If Richard Spencer suddenly came out and said I've been wrong all this time I wouldn't want a statue of him up either.

I used to love the statues and was big on the romanticized version of the South but I'd be good with them being more relegated to museums and battlefield memorials. The history doesn't need to be swept under the rug but we in general have to stop living in the past on these issues and using things that happened 200 years ago to continue to divide the future.

With that said as long as there are people making money off of both sides of the argument it's never going to happen because people in general are dumb and the ones making money are happy to take advantage of that.
 

92tide

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You are right, of course.
The folks that erected these statues, however, did so after the Great Disfranchisements.
In 1861, southern voters had decided that they could no longer remain in the Union consistent with their safety. The federal government killed 260,000 of them and destroyed billions of dollars in non-slave property for making that decision and over-ruled the decision itself.
In 1865, the same southern voters had the temerity to send to Congress the same people they had chosen to lead them during the war. Despite explicit prohibitions against doing so, Republicans refused to seat them (because they were mostly Democrats).
Then, in the late 1860s, the federal government ordered the states to draft new state constitutions by electing delegates to state constitutional conventions, and ordered that anyone who could not take the ironclad oath could vote for delegates. The Confederacy had had universal white male conscription, so almost no citizens of those states could vote for delegates who would draft the new state constitutions.
That tends to stick in people's craws a bit. These statues were erected after the Great Disfranchisements (and I believe as a result of those events).
(This experience also had the unfortunate effect of teaching white southerners that if you do not like the results of elections, just disfranchise your opponents, something white southerners would adopt with relish over the next century, but that is another debate.)
great disenfranchisements? and here, i thought i had heard all of the lost cause spin.
 

CharminTide

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You never answered the question the last time I asked. That's why I asked again. You always duck this question because it undermines your position.
It really doesn't. But, again, since your tendency is to belittle those who disagree with you on this topic, I have no interest in wasting my time again. You're a fine poster on other subjects, but for some reason, not this one.
 

Tidewater

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It really doesn't. But, again, since your tendency is to belittle those who disagree with you on this topic, I have no interest in wasting my time again.
I would genuinely appreciate a counter-argument, an honestly held answer to the question. I really would. I have just never heard one, at least not one with any merit. I remain hopeful that someone will present one some day. Rather than hanging out in an echo chamber, I like being exposed to opinions with which I disagree.
And you still haven't answered the question. If you have wrestled with the question and come to a conclusion you are comfortable with, I'd like to hear it. My mind is open.
I'm not trying to belittle you personally. I have little patience with weak or sloppy thinking. If you said, "absolute belief in the federal government and whatever it does is an article of faith for me," then I could accept that position, as odd as it might be, because it is difficult to argue against a position which is based on faith. I doubt that is your position, however. But I cannot figure out what your position is.
 

crimsonaudio

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You are right, of course.
The folks that erected these statues, however, did so after the Great Disfranchisements.
In 1861, southern voters had decided that they could no longer remain in the Union consistent with their safety. The federal government killed 260,000 of them and destroyed billions of dollars in non-slave property for making that decision and over-ruled the decision itself.
In 1865, the same southern voters had the temerity to send to Congress the same people they had chosen to lead them during the war. Despite explicit prohibitions against doing so, Republicans refused to seat them (because they were mostly Democrats).
Then, in the late 1860s, the federal government ordered the states to draft new state constitutions by electing delegates to state constitutional conventions, and ordered that anyone who could not take the ironclad oath could vote for delegates. The Confederacy had had universal white male conscription, so almost no citizens of those states could vote for delegates who would draft the new state constitutions.
That tends to stick in people's craws a bit. These statues were erected after the Great Disfranchisements (and I believe as a result of those events).
(This experience also had the unfortunate effect of teaching white southerners that if you do not like the results of elections, just disfranchise your opponents, something white southerners would adopt with relish over the next century, but that is another debate.)
Again, all of that is fine, and I do understand that - I've never lived west of the Mississippi or north of Tennessee. I get Southern Pride, I honestly do.

But their motivation for erecting these statues, regardless as to how pure it might have been, doesn't really matter. What matters is they are statues of people who supported the Confederacy, of which one policy was that it was okay to own black people.

You're a smart guy, my point is simple - none of the historical stuff matters beyond what I just wrote, it's just philosophical masturbation.

If a statue of someone who supported the Confederacy (and therefore, by extension, slavery) offends my black brothers and sisters, tear it down.
 

Tidewater

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great disenfranchisements? and here, i thought i had heard all of the lost cause spin.
You're welcome. I made that up myself.
I am not sure what else you would call it. People voting in 1860 and the federal government stepping in to prevent by force the adoption of the policy they voted for would amount to disfranchisement. About a million southern voters were disfranchised that way. Post-war voters electing congressmen, and then the dominant northern party declining to seat those elected would amount to disfranchisement as well. To tell citizens outright that they cannot even cast a ballot is the next logical step, which was adopted in the later 1860s.
Later, white southerners telling freedmen that they cannot vote was reprehensible, but not unprecedented.
 

92tide

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You're welcome. I made that up myself.
I am not sure what else you would call it. People voting in 1860 and the federal government stepping in to prevent by force the adoption of the policy they voted for would amount to disfranchisement. About a million southern voters were disfranchised that way. Post-war voters electing congressmen, and then the dominant northern party declining to seat those elected would amount to disfranchisement as well. To tell citizens outright that they cannot even cast a ballot is the next logical step, which was adopted in the later 1860s.
Later, white southerners telling freedmen that they cannot vote was reprehensible, but not unprecedented.
it's got a nice ring to it. i guess the term could also be used for the millions of slaves that lived and died in the u.s. and all of the black folks who suffered under jim crow and the after effects.
 

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