So, we don't get caught up in several pages of discussion on basketball related threads let's discuss this here. My take: I grew up a son of the south. I loved to listen to my Uncle Gene, the family's resident historian of the Civil War talk about the battles, the war strategy, the personalities of the generals on both sides. I also heard the longing for the war to have had a different result. If general so and so had done this as Lee ordered him to at X battle the whole war could have turned out differently... Lee's battle strategy was never questioned, nor his character. Of course the war was never about slavery, right?
Then I grew up. I studied it myself as a history major at VCU and beyond. Low and behold the war was absolutely about slavery. If you think it was states' rights, well what right was it? It was the right to own other human beings, force them into labor for you and control every aspect of their lives. And it was my people, white, who owned black Africans and their descendants. The right side won the war. Yes I hear my uncle rolling over in his grave over me saying that, but it is true. That it took one of the most horrible wars in human history for the United States of America, whose declaration of independence in includes the words, "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inallianbal
right. that among these are life, LIBERTY and the pursuit of happiness." (my bold print), to end the institution of slavery is a sad commentary. That after this horrible war making real peace between the sides was close to impossible is to be expected. The south was devastated by the war on a number of fronts, infrastructure was gone, economy (based largely on slavery) was virtually non-existent, the enemy in the war now controlled the institutions of governance... the land was under occupation. When the south finally shook off the holds of reconstruction there was a backlash. It was at this time that "Confederate Monuments" began to be built. I put that in quotation marks to differentiate between monuments and memorials. No one would begrudge anyone the right to memorialize their dead. Monuments however are a celebration of the cause. And the cause was maintaining the institution of the slavery of people of color. Period. So, these monuments are a constant reminder that people, like my uncle and many more in my family, wish that the war had turned out differently, which means that slavery would have continued. Oh, we southerners don't say it that way. It's about heritage. What heritage? The heritage of one group of human beings giving themselves the right to own other human beings as property. That's the heritage we are talking about, we can't get around that. I'm white, southern, male, Virginian through and through (family dating back at least to the 1690's in eastern Henrico County) and it hurts to say that, but it's true. When you ride down Rt. 5 southeast of Richmond and see the beautiful plantations along the James, they were all run with slave labor. Williamsburg, Monticello, and many other of the historical monuments of our founding fathers and mothers located in this state, run by slave labor. It is all around us. We either own it or deny it. We've denied it (I know I have and I recognize it in others too) for too long, those monuments are a symbol (to us white southerners) of that denial. To our sisters and brothers of color they are a symbol of both oppression in the past and ongoing oppression in the present. If we want this to be a place where there is hope for a future that doesn't include that oppression the monuments have to go! R. E. Lee was a brilliant military strategist but he was not a hero. Neither was Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson Davis...
OK I have gone on too long already, I actually have work to do. I mean no animosity toward anyone here. This for me is as much self examination as anything. Be blessed everyone.
Then I grew up. I studied it myself as a history major at VCU and beyond. Low and behold the war was absolutely about slavery. If you think it was states' rights, well what right was it? It was the right to own other human beings, force them into labor for you and control every aspect of their lives. And it was my people, white, who owned black Africans and their descendants. The right side won the war. Yes I hear my uncle rolling over in his grave over me saying that, but it is true. That it took one of the most horrible wars in human history for the United States of America, whose declaration of independence in includes the words, "We hold these truths to be self evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain inallianbal
right. that among these are life, LIBERTY and the pursuit of happiness." (my bold print), to end the institution of slavery is a sad commentary. That after this horrible war making real peace between the sides was close to impossible is to be expected. The south was devastated by the war on a number of fronts, infrastructure was gone, economy (based largely on slavery) was virtually non-existent, the enemy in the war now controlled the institutions of governance... the land was under occupation. When the south finally shook off the holds of reconstruction there was a backlash. It was at this time that "Confederate Monuments" began to be built. I put that in quotation marks to differentiate between monuments and memorials. No one would begrudge anyone the right to memorialize their dead. Monuments however are a celebration of the cause. And the cause was maintaining the institution of the slavery of people of color. Period. So, these monuments are a constant reminder that people, like my uncle and many more in my family, wish that the war had turned out differently, which means that slavery would have continued. Oh, we southerners don't say it that way. It's about heritage. What heritage? The heritage of one group of human beings giving themselves the right to own other human beings as property. That's the heritage we are talking about, we can't get around that. I'm white, southern, male, Virginian through and through (family dating back at least to the 1690's in eastern Henrico County) and it hurts to say that, but it's true. When you ride down Rt. 5 southeast of Richmond and see the beautiful plantations along the James, they were all run with slave labor. Williamsburg, Monticello, and many other of the historical monuments of our founding fathers and mothers located in this state, run by slave labor. It is all around us. We either own it or deny it. We've denied it (I know I have and I recognize it in others too) for too long, those monuments are a symbol (to us white southerners) of that denial. To our sisters and brothers of color they are a symbol of both oppression in the past and ongoing oppression in the present. If we want this to be a place where there is hope for a future that doesn't include that oppression the monuments have to go! R. E. Lee was a brilliant military strategist but he was not a hero. Neither was Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson Davis...
OK I have gone on too long already, I actually have work to do. I mean no animosity toward anyone here. This for me is as much self examination as anything. Be blessed everyone.
