Lets see if I can do this without getting booted off the island.

I am missing why a statue is an honor, but having a street, bridge, or town named after you is not.

Sounds like a semantics game to me.

In reply to pheller:

Very well put.

I'd further posit that putting up monuments to the politicians who (in the case of the Civil War at least, in modern day generals aren't typically on the battlefields...) were themselves far removed from the fighting but who were responsible for putting the military into the place of having to fight and be killed in the first place is even more inappropriate.

Also, the comments keep getting made that the only reason why someone would have fought for the south was to keep slavery. That is like saying that the only reason to vote for Trump was because you support him, completely ignoring that plenty of those votes were cast as votes against Clinton.

When the Union invaded the South, isn't it just as likely that some served simply to defend their homes? After Sherman marched through, how many joined up just to get fed?

Remember the hubub when Photobucket blocked all the pictures? They changed what everyone thought was the deal, arbitrarily and everyone either has to pay up or move on. How mad were people around here at Photobucket?

To those in the South it was just like that when the North changed the rules on slavery. Initially everyone had agreed with it was acceptable, north and south, when the country was founded. Later, after the entire economy of the south relied on it, the Northern states changed the rules, just like Photobucket, and destroyed the build threads for those in the South. Of course they were angry, and of course they told the North to berkit. At the time, there wasn't any reason to think that they couldn't just leave the union and pull a Calexit on the North.

They were defending their version of an abortion clinic in a state that made it illegal after they had been in business for a hundred years. From our perspective they were on the wrong side, but it wasn't so cut and dry then.

I'm done. I think the monuments that were erected locally should be changed at the discretion of the locals. I probably would have been behind putting them out of the public eye a bit myself. I hate Illinois and all other Nazis. I don't think I can dictate to another person who they choose to honor.

oldopelguy wrote: I was going to try one more time as a veteran to explain why it is wrong to just write off as a villain someone who served their country to the best of their ability just because their side lost, but I don't think it will change any minds. So I will just talk about a real life example that maybe someone will understand: We as a country fought for the losing side in the Vietnam conflict. By some of the opinions presented here that means we can never honor those who served, since we were on the wrong side of the war. Might as well call them all babykillers and deny them benefits too, right? How much of a scar did that treatment of our vets leave on the soul of our country? Sure, in Vietnam there are probably not a lot of monuments to soldiers who fought on the side of the south, but their sacrifices aren't negated by who won. And it is perfectly acceptable for people to be proud of the sacrifices their soldiers made on behalf of the people who they served. Same goes here, you don't get to demonize the soldier who does his best because of the motivation of the politicians who directed the course of the war. Am I a villain because I served during two wars, because you don't believe we should have been in those wars? Do you get to call me a criminal a hundred years from now because maybe by then Iraq will rule the world? How do I become evil because the world's sensibilities change? It's wrong to assign motivation, blame, and damnation to someone who served based on how you feel about the conflict now. It's particularly wrong for people who were conscripted to serve. The soldiers on both sides who fought and died bravely deserve to have their stories told.

Ok, so it may not be ok to call Lee a Loser.

But he did have a choice to fight on one side or the other of a very moral question style war.

And by that, he should not be put up on a platform as a hero. Just a person who served in a very deadly war.

SVreX wrote: I am missing why a statue is an honor, but having a street, bridge, or town named after you is not. Sounds like a semantics game to me.

I won't argue that it's an honor but I will argue that it's a lesser honor. A street / bridge / town is a useful thing that can be named after you. A statue of someone is an ornament that only exists to memorialize a person in some way, in the case of the confederate monuments, most of those are in an explicitly positive way.

GameboyRMH wrote:

pheller wrote:

Fletch1 wrote: In reply to KyAllroad: Start a ALT-Center group Stay safe!

I see just as many anti-nazi antifa stuff as I do anti-centrist stuff. It's like "you're either with us or against us". Is the left trying to mobilize more people by saying that even if you agree with them, that you aren't really doing it right unless you "punch a nazi".

That's practically the antifa's manifesto from what I understand. I like their cause but I don't like that their only tool is punching. I sometimes wonder if they're just another name used by the Black Bloc anarchists. They have a lot in common.

Their "cause" is anti-freedom of speech. If you don't agree with them they believe you should not be allowedto speak. They refuse to listen to any idea not their own. They are the epitome of everything they shout against and are completely blind to the hypocrisy. They, to me, are just as bad as the KKK, black panthers, ALt-right etc. All a bunch of myopic, narrow minded, agressive shiny happy people that can't see what they are doing and have done to the country.

SVreX wrote: I am missing why a statue is an honor, but having a street, bridge, or town named after you is not. Sounds like a semantics game to me.

Both sets are an honor- but there is a definite difference.

A street, bridge, town, etc. has a purpose and a reason to exist beyond just being a monument to whoever it is named after. If a street weren't named Lee Street, it would be named something else- and would still be a street. Similarly, a building named after someone would still be able to serve the purpose it was constructed for regardless of what it was named.

However- a statue exists solely as a tribute to whoever (or whatever) the statue is of... it serves no other functional purpose other than as a monument.

EDIT: As usual, my tendency to be overly verbose has GameboyRMH beating me to the punch.

SVreX wrote: I am missing why a statue is an honor, but having a street, bridge, or town named after you is not. Sounds like a semantics game to me.

I may be off, here. But some context is required.

MTN pointed out there Washington and Lee University. This is a post Civil War work, and the time he was there, it was more likely that Lee was trying to unify after what happened, as well as add a lot to the university as a whole. IMHO, the name change of that is appropriate.

On the other hand, post 1950 statues that hail him as a hero to the country are misplaced.

All of what you say is an honor. The real question is "what honor" are they being named after.

In reply to alfadriver:

I question applying modern morality to a person who lived 150 years ago, when the country as a whole was still trying to define that morality.

Bobzilla wrote: Their "cause" is anti-freedom of speech. If you don't agree with them they believe you should not be allowedto speak. They refuse to listen to any idea not their own. They are the epitome of everything they shout against and are completely blind to the hypocrisy. They, to me, are just as bad as the KKK, black panthers, ALt-right etc. All a bunch of myopic, narrow minded, agressive shiny happy people that can't see what they are doing and have done to the country.

here's what is interesting to think about- if minorities were actually treated fully on an equal basis, the Black Panthers would have never existed.

Given history, though, the rest would.

Blanket calling all of them myopic and narrow minded isn't exactly correct. Nor can you equally claim that the people fighting FOR equal rights are doing harm to the country.

That is the core issue minorities have when our president says "all sides".

GameboyRMH wrote:

SVreX wrote: I am missing why a statue is an honor, but having a street, bridge, or town named after you is not. Sounds like a semantics game to me.

I won't argue that it's an honor but I will argue that it's a lesser honor. A street / bridge / town is a useful thing that can be named after you. A statue of someone is an ornament that only exists to memorialize a person in some way, in the case of the confederate monuments, most of those are in an explicitly positive way.

But you are measuring it by your knowledge and perspective today, after a hundred years to think about it. That's an unreasonable standard.

Someday, our children's children may ask why we made such a big deal about bronze statues of people dead a hundred years, but turned a blind eye to human trafficking (aka slavery) going on directly under our noses today.

Our own honorable intents and efforts may one day be scorned.

In reply to alfadriver:

Equal-rights, all for and will support with my dying breath. "punch a nazi" where they loosely define "nazi" as anyone that doesn't agree with their narrow world view? Nope.

The Black Panthers are as racist a group as the KKK. Both are wrong. Both need kicked in the nether regions.

Ian F wrote: In reply to alfadriver: I question applying modern morality to a person who lived 150 years ago, when the country as a whole was still trying to define that morality.

I don't. It's not as if there weren't moral issues with slavery 150 years ago, or even 250 years ago. It's just people somehow justified it for money. Especially when people are pointing out that people like Lee didn't like slavery, and given a choice, he decided to part with the US and fight for the confederacy. That was real time, apparently.

Also-- Some seem to be defending the antifa groups. Not the legitimize protesters but the anarchist turds. They are baseball bat carrying, knife wielding, bike lock swinging, police horse stabbing thugs who hide behind masks. They ARE as bad as the right wing turds. Both sides need to be flushed down a toilet.

I've always suspected there are groups of 'professional' protester for hire, who travel around the country to attend whatever political rally that may be going on and then protest for whoever is paying the bills on either side.

Bobzilla wrote: In reply to alfadriver: Equal-rights, all for and will support with my dying breath. "punch a nazi" where they loosely define "nazi" as anyone that doesn't agree with their narrow world view? Nope. The Black Panthers are as racist a group as the KKK. Both are wrong. Both need kicked in the nether regions.

They may be as racists as the KKK, but my point is that they would not exist is rights were just equally given. The KKK would, since they formed even as tiny amounts of equality were given out.

Ironic.

I actually learn a lot from these kind of threads. It get's me to research and fact find. I now know that there is a statue of Lenin in Seattle! Is this one on the list to be removed? It will be interesting to see. My money says it won't for the same reasons Sangers bust and Senator Byrd's won't.

In reply to alfadriver:

Actually, if minorities were all treated fully on an equal basis, none of them would have existed because there would be no US- this land would be inhabited fully by Native Americans.

SVreX wrote: But you are measuring it by your knowledge and perspective today, after a hundred years to think about it. That's an unreasonable standard.

And that is why it's important to put into context of when the honor was given and why. Then you do have that perspective and know if the honor is valid or not.

stuart in mn wrote:

Also-- Some seem to be defending the antifa groups. Not the legitimize protesters but the anarchist turds. They are baseball bat carrying, knife wielding, bike lock swinging, police horse stabbing thugs who hide behind masks. They ARE as bad as the right wing turds. Both sides need to be flushed down a toilet.

I've always suspected there are groups of 'professional' protester for hire, who travel around the country to attend whatever political rally that may be going on and then protest for whoever is paying the bills on either side.

There absolutely are, but they're the most peaceful protesters you could ever hope for.

In reply to GameboyRMH:

How in the world could you know that?

SVreX wrote: In reply to GameboyRMH: How in the world could you know that?

It's not all that secret, here's a good intro:

www.cracked.com/personal-experiences-2476-i-know-paid-protesters-are-real-because-im-one-them.html

Finding secret info is one of my hobbies, I have Mitnickitis

In reply to alfadriver:

Real time, but a different time. Overall there were few who considered blacks as "equal" back then. While that is still a subject argued today, it is far more mainstream than it was 150 years ago. A black President would have been inconceivable back then.

Much of what these "alt-right" groups are fighting is simply change. Cultural change. A change away from the way they grew up. They don't like it. Others see this change as part of the natural order of life. There's a strong potential for friction between these views.

What I take particular offense with, is because I'm white, I should therefore be apologetic for something that none of my ancestors took part in. Because I'm not, I'm a privaledged racist angry white man.

This is something that has been told to me not only online but to my face. Multiple times over the years. Now, I know my family history. We have them charted back to the early 1700's. Part of them were stowaways on a ship from england because they were wanted highwaymen at the time. We know that they came to the new world. They were northerners... the farthest south any ever lived was northwestern Kentucky. They have all been poor farmers that had no slaves. Not because they were moral but because they were poor. Their slaves were the 10 children they had to run the farms. Those that fought in the civil war were Indiana Volunteers for the North.

We never had slaves. We fought for the "good side" (as some here have referred to it). I come from a poor family that has had to work their asses off for everything they had. We even lost part of the family farm when my grandmother died because of the 25% inheritance tax (125 acres worth ~$3500/acre at the time put us over the $250k cap). So please tell me how I come from a privaledged family.

This sentiment that many of us have had shoved down our throats for the last 8+ years has left a lot of people very angry, bitter and tired of the bullE36 M3 and rhetoric. I can understand how people could join a group like alt-right. I'm not one of them, but I can understand being so fed up with being told who you are, what you think and how you should be ashamed of who you are because of something a bunch of shiny happy people did a couple hundred years ago.

I don't have the answers to what will fix it. I only know that what we're (royal "we") are doing sure as berkeley isn't working.

I have been beaten because I am white. More than once. Thrown out of my step father's funeral because I am white, too.

Strange, because most everyone in my family history were pastors and abolitionists.

Makes it a little hard to swallow the idea that one side is violent and the other is not.

So, I hear you, Bobzilla.

I've forgotten already, but has it been brought up that most of these statues were put up after Jim Crow laws were affirmed by the Supreme Court or during the civil rights struggles of the mid-20th century? That's pretty inflammatory right there.