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blackeyedsusan25 t1_iuczsnl wrote

Besides correcting the offensive optics, what does removing statues expect to accomplish for the Richmond black community? (Serious question). More helpful than downvoting is substantive thought around this issue. Thanks!

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GrandmaPoses t1_iud3gm7 wrote

You’re mistaken that it’s just for the black community. It should be looked at as a correction for the city of Richmond as a whole. In that sense, it’s for the good of the entire community to project that we’re moving away from celebrating the evils of the past or - just as bad - letting these monuments hang around simply because “they’ve always been there” or “what does removing them change?”

Sometimes when you fuck up, it costs money just to get back to zero.

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nilsrva t1_iud3h7e wrote

It is not a positive so much as the removal of a negative.

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2054 t1_iud1fdl wrote

Even if it was just correcting offensive optics, isn't that enough? The pros far outweigh the cons to me. Upvoted for an honest question, for what it's worth.

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invariantGloaming t1_iud16dh wrote

The Confederates fought specifically to preserve slavery. Slavery was, in this case, done to black people. Black people live in Richmond. Seeing statues praising those who enslaved your ancestors and people is, gently put, rather uncomfortable.

Hope this helps.

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hiddenrealism t1_iud5dr3 wrote

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Madison, Monroe etc..

Presidents owned slaves also. Do we delete them from our history books, take down their monuments also?

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Coma_Potion t1_iudcb95 wrote

What do you actually stand to lose if we teach that the founders were fallible and flawed individuals? Your ability to idolize mere men as supermen? I don’t get it, they were often quite literally the local aristocrats living at the top of the hill.

Why the impulse towards rote idolatry? It’s good to you to have a dearth of nuanced understanding? You can criticize the country and still love it, it’s willful simple-mindedness to say otherwise

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jennbo t1_iudall7 wrote

I think so. We have glorified and deified people to the extent that we are unable to learn actual history about them. No historical figure should be off-limits to criticism, and I find it strange that so people are offended by criticism of people who aren’t alive, who they never met. So offended by reality and education.

Regardless, there’s a difference between people who owned slaves (kind of, anyway) and people who were willing to die themselves and leave the country over their right to continue a practice that was being made illegal worldwide, that was being heavily debated. By time the Civil War rolled around, abolitionism was a mainstream ethical movement and frankly, only really unethical people (or really rich people) were still promoting it and rounding up support for their cause by saying “the north wants to take away your rights.”

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sunlightdrop t1_iudhyu6 wrote

I mean maybe, if conservatives weren't constantly fighting against teaching children the actual racial history of these historical figures

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justbecauseiluvthis t1_iud7dnw wrote

Absolutely

George ripped enslaved people's teeth out of their mouth for his own dentures.

Thomas raped his enslaved people

individual issues, I'm sure we could fill books

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WhiteLightningLuna t1_iudhy1i wrote

Let’s not pretend there are stark differences between these characters, primarily the fact that the founding fathers didn’t wage a war with the primary and singular intention of maintaining slavery, not only making them slavers, but traitors as well.

The founding fathers were slavers. This should be highlighted in their histories, the same as their positive achievements and impacts on our history.

Treat confederate icons like Hitler. Teach and condemn dont idolize

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GrandmaPoses t1_iudlst5 wrote

Stop conflating the removal of statues with removal from history books. This is the conservative line that by removing statues we are “deleting history”. This is a false equivalency. Statues like these are not history lessons, they are celebrations of historical figures. And no, we do not want to celebrate these individuals.

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mywar79 t1_iueiosg wrote

What about the erasure of Dwayne Camacho? Just because he plied his trade in the squared circle and parlayed his generational talent at the grunt and graps game into the presidency he's relegated to the dustbin of history.

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Charlesinrichmond t1_iudca2m wrote

There is a big difference. The confederates ONLY thing was enslaving blacks. Not like the founding fathers, for whom it was a blot on very positive records.

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jennbo t1_iud9yx4 wrote

I think it’s problematic that so many people frame this as something only for the Black community rather than just simply being about the fact that we don’t need to honor people who fought to leave the USA over the right to own other human beings. The confederacy were not the good guys. Too many Americans— white Americans, even — glorify them because we’ve tried to honor “both sides.” Nobody in Europe felt a need to honor Nazis after WWII, or make history seem fairer to the concept of antisemitism. America never should have felt the need to memorialize these people in the first place, and they only did so at the beginning of the 20th century as a way to encourage segregation.

Stop making this a black vs. white thing. All people have been done a great disservice by acting we should memorialize any aspect of the Confederacy, and act like there’s some sort of “alternate history” here. People are now being spooked just learning about the realities of American chattel slavery and colonization among Native Americans and call learning that accurate history “critical race theory” even though it’s… not.

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ohihaveasubscription t1_iuda0ic wrote

Brook/Laburnum is one of the deadliest intersections in the city and it's entirely because of the statue. It's good for everyone except confederate loyalists.

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WontArnett t1_iud44zv wrote

Removing a statue of a terrible person that nobody wants to see.

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hiddenrealism t1_iud5nxs wrote

Like George Washington? He had plenty of slaves.

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WontArnett t1_iud5tyg wrote

Let’s remove the domestic terrorists first.

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sleevieb OP t1_iudq5u4 wrote

He was the largest Slavs owner and richest man in America.

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FoHo21 t1_iufzmkh wrote

Damn, he had eastern Europeans working for him too?

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sleevieb OP t1_iudqdf6 wrote

It signals that the will of the people can not be denied and that efficacy of direct action.

It shows that no institution is sacred or safe from destructions.

It shows that the south will fall again.

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jael-oh-el t1_iudwrht wrote

I'm all for taking down the monuments and fixing the messed up things that are weird relics from the past, but I don't think saying the south will fall again is as clever as you think it is.

There are plenty of people who live in the south who aren't racist pieces of shit. We all live here. No one has tried to leave the union and form a new confederacy (lately, lol).

Idk, just sounds gross. There are more people living here now that I want good things for. I don't want society to crumble and fall just because it's southern, but that's just me. I don't think the answer is more snark and negativity, but do you.

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sleevieb OP t1_iue2pte wrote

What are “the messed up things that are weird relics from the past”?

There were plenty of abolitionists here in the 1860s and freedom fighters in the 1960s. Schools are more segregated now than they were in the 1950s.

A government that does not reflect the people’s will is tyranical and illegitimate. The society will remove it if it does not acquiesces. I think the answer is legalizing housing, annexation, having a representative and democratic government.

What do you think the solution is?

0

jael-oh-el t1_iuec19x wrote

Confederate monuments, streets/buildings/parks/places/colleges/etc named after problematic historical figures that shouldn't be celebrated. Stuff like that.

I don't disagree that we have problems. It's not specific to the south though. If there were a simple solution, someone would have implemented it already.

I do know that you won't win anyone to your side or convince anyone with snarkiness or negativity though. 🤷🏻‍♀️

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sleevieb OP t1_iuepyzc wrote

Guess I'll just move two counties away and tell myself it is too complicated to fix and that calling out the powers at be for being corrupt, trynical, and antithetical to the peoples wants or needs. If that is snarky than so be it.

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ValidGarry t1_iuecpsb wrote

Conversely, what would be the value in doing anything else if the city still had statues honoring dead Confederates across the city?

It's all important and all necessary.

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Charlesinrichmond t1_iudc2h5 wrote

It won't accomplish anything for the black community. (except improve traffic and fewer accidents at that horrible intersection) Ironically, it does improve our marketing to people who want to move here, which will probably result in people moving here.

Some would say more immigrants from the northeast and california will help make Richmond a better place. I certainly think that. But some will say it will cause gentrification and force black people out of the city. This is probably also true

But practically speaking, taking down the other statues and leaving AP hill is silly. We should be taking down AP Hill

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Chad_Big_C0ck t1_iud1p38 wrote

Absolutely nothing, it's just so white liberals can feel good, similar to terms like Latinx.

Taking money used for statue removal (at least $1.8 million plus attorney costs to fight in court over some of them) and using it for scholarships to send poor black graduates otherwise stuck in the poverty cycle to community college/4 year college. 1.8 million at $158/credit (current J Sarg cost), that would be 11k credit hours or 189 associates degrees (60 credit hours/degree), if we covered the whole tuition.

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jodyhighrola t1_iud3w3v wrote

>just so white liberals can feel good

Everyone in this thread is now dumber for having read this. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

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Chad_Big_C0ck t1_iud5xyi wrote

Right, because Richmond's white voter block has voted in so many great things for black people over the past decade. We've now got better schools, graduation rates, lower income gap disparity, people escaping poverty. Oh right, none of these things happened. But we have taken down totally defaced and ignored statues and stopped a casino.

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jennbo t1_iudaydm wrote

So since you’re so concerned about education, I assume you’re in full support of student loan forgiveness and would advocate taxing the rich to be able to send historically underserved people to college? Btw, community college is already free in Virginia if you make under a certain amount. Unless Youngkin does away with the program.

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invariantGloaming t1_iud2die wrote

Individually paying for <200 black kids to go to college doesn't solve systemic oppression or even make a dent in the black population's troubles in Richmond ALONE. At least removing the statues is a step toward delegitimizing the bullshit Lost Cause narrative of the Confederacy. Paying on the individual level doesn't do anything for the collective, nor the systemic issues at large.

Edit: to the surprise of all, this dude was suspended.

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Chad_Big_C0ck t1_iud32zp wrote

Systematic oppression is not being able to afford higher education to get a better job because your parents also couldn't afford higher education to get a better job.

Say we pay half of their tuition. That's 400 kids. Now add in the lawyer/court costs of fighting over the statues for years now. Who knows what that costs, possibly millions more, but I'll say at least 500 kids.

That's 500 people who now get better jobs and can afford to send their children to higher education. This gradually breaks the cycle.

Say you grew up barely being able to afford food. What is going matter more in your life. A better 40 year career or taking down a statue that nobody paid any mind to in a city that has voted blue for decades.

−5

jennbo t1_iudweqc wrote

Comrade, if you are worried about these issues and feel the neoliberals have failed to address them, I have an entirely new system of politics I'd like to introduce to you! A way we can ensure every American has access to food, healthcare, education, and shelter. Solidarity forever!

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chillbro_baggins91 t1_iue0r92 wrote

Vom

−1

jennbo t1_iued2t9 wrote

Oh, I see! You only value caring about marginalized people when it comes to “owning the libs” as an abstract concept to argue with people on Reddit, but don’t support any actual policies or beliefs that would legitimately help them in the ways OP and his huge cock have described here. A conservative having sincere concern for his fellow man? Lo, I have been so naive. What a shock!

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