New Orleans Monuments

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

I think that it is probably true that the further away in time you get from an event the more one-dimensional it becomes for most people. Most people no longer care about the nuances of Egyptian religion anymore - they just see the Pyramids as tombs for pharaohs.

Most people today rightfully summarize the Confederate effort during the Civil War as a rebellion against the United States of America fought predominately to protect the financial interests of slaveholders.

Steve

That is why we need museums and living historians to provide that nuance. To let the visitors know that, yes, the war was a fight over the issue of slavery, but here is what the actual fighting men (and not the politicians in Washington and Richmond) thought about military service and the war.

Michael Denisovich

[maillemaker]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

That is why we need museums and living historians to provide that nuance. To let the visitors know that, yes, the war was a fight over the issue of slavery, but here is what the actual fighting men (and not the politicians in Washington and Richmond) thought about military service and the war.

+1.

Steve

[Mark Choate]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Well, I dropped in to see how things were and now realize we are now endorsing the sanitization of history and historic symbols based on the latest direction of the political winds.

I very much agree with Patrick and John on this matter as we should not view actions and decisions of the past, especially those as debatable as the cause of the late unpleasantness through lenses of todays fickle views.

I hope this is relatively isolated in its support on this forum. If not, I suppose we should begin a movement to get the people of Italy to tear down the statues of Julius Caesar, Augustus Caesar and Marcus Aurelius since they enslaved the Brits, the Gauls and many of the Germanic tribes.

regards,

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Nobody is saying anything about sanitizing history. We are just saying that statues of Jefferson Davis and the Crescent City White League might not be appropriate in a town that is 60%+ African American. Just as a statue of Hulagu Khan might be inappropriate in Baghdad, or a statue of Leopold II might be inappropriate in Kinshasa. They rightfully belong in museums.

Michael Denisovich

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Nobody is saying anything about sanitizing history.

What do you mean by sanitization?
Put another way: What does it mean to you?

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Sanitization is the removal of information for a specific purpose. It does not apply here, because the statues are being relocated, not destroyed. It is far more beneficial for learning as well, because a museum can more properly convey information about post-war terrorist organizations like the White League than a celebratory statue in a high-traffic area.

Michael Denisovich

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Sanitization is the removal of information for a specific purpose.

How is this different?
Whether the goal is to dispose of the message or not, the goal is to control the message.

It does not apply here, because the statues are being relocated, not destroyed.

The monuments have not been destroyed, this is true. However, no plans have been made for a new location. So, the net effect (so far) is destruction in the form of being removed from public view and access. The city government may simply neglect to take further action and there will be not status change.
--> So, you would be opposed to this?

It is far more beneficial for learning as well, because a museum can more properly convey information about post-war [memorialization of local Confederate war dead] than a celebratory statue in a high-traffic area.

I've edited your last sentence and I'd be curious if you feel that it still holds true.

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

That edit completely changes the message and meaning. Memorials to Confederate veterans are memorials honoring sacrifices and remembering loved ones who gave their lives; no matter what side they fought on, they were still Americans and should be honored as those who fought for the Union. Memorials to Jefferson Davis and the White League are specific messages being sent to the African American community about their place in society. Do you see the difference between memorials to Confederate veterans, and memorials to the White League?

Michael Denisovich

[woodsda]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

So what about PGT Beauregard and the removal of his statue? Was he not veteran from New Orleans, a United States Army veteran prior to the Civil War, an influential person after the war to New Orleans?

"Memorials to Confederate veterans are memorials honoring sacrifices and remembering loved ones who gave their lives; no matter what side they fought on, they were still Americans and should be honored as those who fought for the Union"

Because he did not die, his statue should be removed even if he is a Confederate veteran? Where do we as a society draw the line to rewriting history so suit our current tastes for what we want people to believe? Our nation and how it became the nation today is far from perfect, removing objects we find offensive or makes us think about the past is shunning how we came to be where we are today. No one is arguing that the South and much of the rest of the country is battling racial issues today, but we should not hide from it and take those objects away by locking them in some warehouse where they simply collect dust. This is the United States, and we should embrace our mistakes of the past and we should be reminded how we came to be, not deconstructing our monuments and saying we should move them to museums that don't exist.

I inserted a website for a monument outside of the Colorado capital that listed the Sand Creek massacre as a battle, and a plaque was attached to it as compromise. Rather than removing the statue, it was put into historical context so that people today could learn from it rather than hide from it. Just my two cents.....

http://www.westword.com/arts/a-sand-creek-massacre-memorial-would-join-these-colorado-capitol-monuments-8234710

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Beauregard was a victim of guilt by association. The others just are not the same. Again, I point to the idea of a statue of Leopold II in Kinshasa as an example. Or perhaps a statue of Hussein in Kurdistan. Or a statue of Carleton at Window Rock, Arizona. The statues of Davis and Lee, and the memorial honoring the failed terrorist attack by the White League, were deliberate post-war efforts at intimidation (and not efforts to honor the citizen-soldiers of New Orleans), and I do not know if placing a plaque on them would be sufficient to undo the damage. You have to look at historical context.

Michael Denisovich

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Do you see the difference between memorials to Confederate veterans, and memorials to the White League?

Admittedly, I know very little about the Liberty Place business. However, from what I do know of the "battle" and the history of the monument, I would not view it as being of equal stature to, say, the Beauregard monument, which honored a city son, veteran of multiple wars, and was maintained unaltered and in-place since its initial dedication.

So...
I think I read above that you and I agree that the average "Johnny" on the courthouse lawn should be preserved. Am I correct?

What about Andrew Jackson's statue in New Orleans, the site of the military victory that propelled him to the Presidency?

[NMVolunteer]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

I do disagree with the Beauregard statue being removed for that very reason, but on the other hand I think there should be a more prominent statue of Ignatius J. Reilly in town too, as he also embodies New Orleans as a Southern town, a modern town, and an unusual town. Lee and Davis do not represent that. And the White League memorial twists and hides the actual history, like the road sign that mourns the three men of the white militia who died at the Colfax "Riot".

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

... but on the other hand I think there should be a more prominent statue of Ignatius J. Reilly in town too, as he also embodies New Orleans as a Southern town, a modern town, and an unusual town.

I, too, would rather see us adding chapters to the story, rather than burning the book, metaphorically speaking.

[Johnny Lloyd]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

You are making the same mistake as 90% of everyone do... including the press and the people who want the monuments removed.
They put a monument to postwar stuff into the same box as monuments of csa officers and even for ordinary soldiers.

The Liberty Place monument got everything to do with white supremacy.
It was honoring a white terrorist group who killed police officers (both white and blacks).

It belong in a museum as an example for future generations about how monuments are political statements.

Now the other statues are a bit different.

Don't parse historical monuments' meanings. Please.

ALL historical monuments, both judged "good" and "bad" by modern tastes and the mob's whimsy, should be preserved. They have a story in and of themselves to tell. If you want to put a stand alone plaque interpreting New Orleans's Civil War monuments or anywhere else, then fine, do so. But leave the monument itself ALONE. We don't burn books here in America, nor should we desecrate monuments. These monuments are museum pieces of their own and lend knowledge of a long-ago time and beliefs. they are part of us. Period. End of story.

Karl Marx, many would say, is the inventor of a discredited ideology of Communism that has ruthlessly enslaved and killed millions of people around the world. However, there are statues of him in Germany to this day, as an influential thinker of the 19th century. They don't disown him. They discuss him and what he meant. Why can't we do the same here in the US?

Messing with stuff like monument desecration leads us down destructive and scary authoritarian slopes we cannot return our freedom of speech from. Thoughtcrimes are not what America stands for nor has America EVER stood for. We resolve issues here by thinking about them, and dealing with them... not covering them up.

My .02 cents

[thomas aagaard]

Re: New Orleans Monuments

Don't parse historical monuments' meanings. Please.

ALL historical monuments, both judged "good" and "bad" by modern tastes and the mob's whimsy, should be preserved. They have a story in and of themselves to tell. If you want to put a stand alone plaque interpreting New Orleans's Civil War monuments or anywhere else, then fine, do so. But leave the monument itself ALONE. We don't burn books here in America, nor should we desecrate monuments.

Well, you are turning this into a general topic about modern politics.

When it is Burial Grounds belonging to native Americans that gets bulldozer in North Dakota I don't see the reenactment community care about it.
When they protest and use their 1st amendment rights they get brutalized by militarizes police... the reenactment community don't react.
When your president allow oil pipelines to go true Native lands.... the reenactment community don't complain.

Only because its about monuments to "Southern culture" do someone suddenly care.

And yes, most people only care when it directly effect them self... that is normal. But the result is that all of this is just pure hypocrisy.


The monuments belong in museums... where they can be used in education. Not in public parks.



And the last part... I think you lost that fight back in the 1780ties. The US have always been an authoritarian state... and have been from day one.
It just use to be that it only targeted the native and black population...
Deportation, massacres, and broken treaties have been the history of the last 200+ years...
And for the black population, slavery and later Jim crow laws... and today it is a bias criminal system and police brutality...


(naturally it is not like Denmark is any better with our former colonies, and involvement in the slave trade. Or how we treated the population in Greenland... until today)