Opinion: Is deconstructing a monument the same as deconstructing history?
Last week, I watched a video of protesters in my hometown of Raleigh, North Carolina, tearing down a Confederate memorial statue, hanging it by the neck from a lamp post. A bronze sword welded to its hands, its feet dangling above the heads of masked protesters and cheering onlookers.
In many states, debates have erupted in response to the removal of monuments or statues erected to represent various historical figures. As is the case in Raleigh, many arguments in opposition to their removal argue that it equates to the erasure of history.
Not only is this debate ongoing in America, but other countries are reckoning with their own pasts as movements to reassess who and what we honor with our monuments, statues and memorials are picking up traction. The vandalism of a Winston Churchill statue sparked both outrage and support in Britain. In Antwerp, a statue of Leopold II was removed after being painted red by protesters and will be placed in a museum.
Many of the conversations I see online about statue removal remind me of a conversation I had years ago with a relative concerning America’s Founding Fathers. Someone had pointed out the role they played in sustaining the institution of chattel slavery even as they wrote the Constitution that would free them from British rule. My relative insisted that it was simply a different time and that a different set of morals ruled life during that period, emphasizing how fruitless it would be to hold dead men accountable for their misguided actions.
However, when we request that historical figures not be judged my “modern morality” — that we should ignore the influence their actions and words had on the trajectory of their nation — we obscure the reality of their cruelty and brutality. It is the equivalent of saying that their gripping speeches or epic journeys are enough to outweigh the ethnocentricity of their policies or their willful ignorance of the suffering of others.
Not only do many of America’s monuments often stand as representations of men who fought for the economic institution of slavery in the Civil War, but they do not address the nuance of that conflict. The plaques or quotes carved into granite slabs do nothing to acknowledge the complexity of the characters that waged that war, such as Robert E. Lee.
Adam Serwer of The Atlantic wrote that the well-known Confederate general and plantation owner Robert E. Lee is often misquoted and misremembered. While Lee did identify the institution of chattel slavery as “a moral & political evil” in a letter to his wife, he went on to assert that the condition of enslaved peoples was a “condition ordered by a wise Merciful Providence” and included that slavery “is necessary for their instruction as a race.”
Are we content to say that men like Robert E. Lee, who argued that slavery was a necessary evil, is someone worth honoring with expensive statues or memorials while many of our school systems suffer from a lack of necessary funds to even teach the history that he is a part of?
An investigation conducted by Smithsonian Magazine and the Investigative Fund at the Nation Institute in 2019 concluded that at least $40 million in taxpayer funds have gone to “Confederate statues, homes, parks, museums, libraries, and cemeteries, as well as to Confederate heritage organizations, over the past decade.”
If we are to put our money where our mouth is, perhaps erecting and protecting statues and monuments of Confederate soldiers or early America’s slave-owners is a miscarriage of our sentiments. Perhaps we should reposition the collective cries for remembering and preserving history, and direct them toward movements to better fund our public schools or create more school programs where students can participate in understanding America’s complicated history with race, among other things.
Honoring someone or something is incredibly distinct from simply remembering them as a historical figure. We can preserve their memory without immortalizing them in granite or bronze, without enshrining them in public spaces. We can learn without bolting their likeness into the concrete of our streets and, thus, our lives.
Taelor Candiloro is a transfer senior to the Anthropology department at USU. When she’s not reading, she’s writing.
— taelorjc@gmail.com
Graphic created by Keith Wilson.
What’s next? Are we going to erase Satan from the Bible? Start burning books? The Confederacy was a democrat imperative and an absolutely essential aspect of American history in spite of its incorrectitude. The statues are historical monuments and pieces of art.
We now have academics promoting racism of a different tune. Academia is teaching students a new “understanding” of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s work. Teaching that he has been “misinterpreted.” that he was not promoting colorblindness! Teaching bald faced lies! It was the core of his preaching. I grew up in his time period, I watched the race riots on TV and listened to Racists (Mormons in my case) saying look at those stupid n–gers tearing down their own neighborhoods. My parents pointed out the obvious truth, which is that, “skin color has less to do with human character than of their socks.” The very thing MLK was battling to teach society of all colors. We now read headlines like, “Martin Luther King Jr. wasn’t a colorblind dreamer.” They’re claiming that he would be 100% behind BLM.
Let’s see: “The limitation of riots, moral questions aside, is that they cannot win and their participants know it. Hence, rioting is not revolutionary but reactionary because it invites defeat. It involves an emotional catharsis, but it must be followed by a sense of futility.” “I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality… I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.” “I have a dream that one day little black boys and girls will be holding hands with little white boys and girls.” “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” “Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.” “I want to be the white man’s brother, not his brother-in-law.” The truth of MLK’s essence is clear in his words.
Statues being defaced by mostly ignorant children who haven’t a clue as to what they’re tearing down. Tearing down the statue of Frederick Douglass in Rochester Park? The ignorance and violence being displayed is disgusting! There is no defense! Tis nothing more than exemplification of the devolution of education going on in America.