Old but Slow wrote:It may be a point of pride for many, but for people of color it something else. It represents hate, slavery, lynchings, church burnings, and more. Wave the Stars and Bars (I don't like capitalizing that flag) in front of a group of those people and it is a threat and a challenge as if it were spoken.
Largent80 wrote:People wigging out over statues, while people from all over the world come together to help Houston and Texas recover from Harvey.
Seahawkgal wrote:I have a different take about all these monuments, etc.
Leave them alone while pointing out the facts that they were the 'LOSERS' of an awful war. Also point out what they were fighting for so we never forget the travesty of the Confederate's point of view. Kinda like the concentration camps in Europe staying up as museums and places for people to visit. It is not glorifying the Nazi regime at all. Quite the opposite IMO.
Unfortunately, slavery is a part of American history. It should never be erased to appease some agenda. It happened and it should never be forgotten so injustices never happen again.
burrrton wrote:Hey, 'anti-monument' fanatics- want to know how to obliterate your cause? Like this:
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... s-memorial
Validating every person that maintained taking down Confederate statues wasn't about the moral bankruptcy of the Confederacy.
I don't think Washington or Jefferson in the long-term will survive their support of slavery. Their statues will eventually be removed as well.
Sorry guys, slavery is going to continue to haunt this nation into the modern day.
burrrton wrote:Which is what will eventually kill the movement.
Many of them were *very* flawed men, but I'm sorry, 'men of their time' is a legitimate point, and that doesn't excuse the evil of the practice. Virtually *nobody* at that time viewed it the way we do now (regretfully)- the practice was literally ubiquitous, with the vast majority of 'owners' being non-white around the world.
That doesn't excuse anyone, but it has to be viewed through the lens of the 18th century, not the 20th/21st, and to pretend that is the ultimate defining characteristic of men that created the greatest force for good in the history of the planet is insane (and will be the movement's undoing).
MLK Jr. had a *seriously* flawed personal life, but I'll be damned if I'm going to allow anyone to maintain that's a disqualifying characteristic for remembering him among our country's greats
It haunt's *humanity*, not this nation- there was nothing unique about the US as it relates to slavery except that we fought a war to kill it.
idhawkman wrote:Don't forget the Chinese slaves America had.
I wonder if European decent Americans will get minority status when they become the minority.
RiverDog wrote:The reason that otherwise decent, respectable men like Washington and Jefferson could rationalize their position on slavery was that at the time, blacks were not considered to be "men", aka humans. Otherwise, they could not have adapted phrases like "all men are created equal". They were considered property, almost like an inanimate object. Like virtually all white men of that time, they were a product of 18th century thinking.
Our sense of morality evolves just like our bodies evolve. We are not necessarily born with a sense of fairness or right and wrong. Most of us have to acquire it via life experiences. You read or listen to men like Lincoln or MLK and think to yourself "Holy cow, that makes sense". Washington and Jefferson did not have the benefit of experiencing Lincoln and MLK as I did, so their minds evolved differently.
So, speaking for myself, I cannot criticize George and Tom for their positions on slavery as I would be doing so from an unfair position. They did not have the same benefit of learning from other's mistakes or misdeeds as I did.
Aseahawkfan wrote:You're a man of European descent. It will never be the same for you. Not judging a man like Tom or George will not change what an African man will feel when he thinks back to the days of his ancestors and imagine those same men telling his ancestor he was an animal that didn't deserve to be free, not even giving his ancestor the choice of a different life. Like it or not, George and Tom knew what they were doing was wrong. If you read some of their statements and saw their actions later, they knew it well as did most Americans of that time. They knew they were doing an evil, but justified it. It will cost them in time as it should.
This pretense that they didn't know any better is rubbish. Slavery had been abolished in other nations prior to the creation of America. It had been disallowed in England for many, many years. Fact is American slavery started as all evils do: small and overlooked until it grew beyond the control and must be halted by good men finally having the courage and will to stop it.
The reason I think so highly of Lincoln is one of the reasons you stated: this was a nation indoctrinated into slavery and to think of the African as subhuman. Even many of The Founders believed in slavery and taught it to future generations. It had been in this land for centuries. Men had tried to stop it prior and failed. Even John Adams as well as several other founders did not like slavery, but could not stop it. You can read how these men, our Founders knew slavery was wrong, but had not the will to stand against it. Then came Lincoln. A man that for some reason had all the necessary traits to somehow hold this nation together and start the eradication of slavery. His life seems so much like a heroic book. Strange how real life turns out that way sometimes.
Can you imagine being Lincoln? Lincoln, your first mission if you choose to accept it as leader of the new Republican party is to win the presidency, dismantle slavery, and hold the nation together. Good luck, sir. If the Misslon Impossible theme had existed back then, it would have been playing as Lincoln took the presidency.
Aseahawkfan wrote:
If they started getting oppressed and mistreated by the majority over a long period of time, sure, they might.
The Chinese slaves and native Americans and the mistreatment of Indians by the English and the natives of South and Central America by the Spanish is the reason why eventually as they grow they will not look kindly on men like George and Tom.
Seahawks4Ever wrote:RD: I know you are very anti-union yet do you not know that these abuses that you speak of only ended when the miners and the rail road workers unionized, and they had to fight and have a lot of their blood in order to get the right to unionize. I am sorry you had a bad experience the short period of time you were in a union. The Democratic Party slit their own throats by turning their back on Labor. If they want to enjoy majorities in Congress and in state houses across the country they need toi remember their roots and again work and fight again for the "regular" people.
Slavery had been abolished in other nations prior to the creation of America.
RiverDog wrote:It would have been impossible for Lincoln to exist had it not been for the founding fathers. We would have been ruled by a monarchy or a dictatorship. There's no way a man raised in a log cabin and self educated could have ever acceded to the head of state had it not been for a system of government established by the founding fathers.
RiverDog wrote:I am anti union in today's world. I fully acknowledge union's positive role in shaping our workplace starting back in the 20's and 30's. But IMO they are as outdated as a buggy whip factory in the modern workplace that's more service orientated and less manufacturing orientated than it was back in the day that I referred to in my previous post. I brought that up just to highlight the fact that past abuses were not always race orientated.
The difference between then and now is that there are laws, lawyers, and all sorts of government agencies that exist today that weren't there nearly a century ago when unions got their start, agencies like OSHA, Fair Labor Relations Board, Human Rights Commission, Department of Labor and Industries, and so on, both at the state and federal levels, that are available to all workers, non union as well as union, salaried as well as hourly. The travesty is that most people are unaware of the resources and protections that are available to them if they feel like they are being taken advantage of. As a member of management of a Fortune 500 company, I can attest to the fact that managers are much more afraid of provoking a government agency than they are a union.
I'm not sure if it were unions per se that turning their backs on that hurt the Dems. Trump didn't reach out to unions, either. As a matter of fact, the Clinton campaign made a huge mistake in not bringing to the conversation some of the unethical labor practices that Trump's businesses engaged in and that he did little to stop. What Trump did well, and how IMO he won the presidency, was campaigning on a theme of "America First" and was able to paint Dems as the party too willing to negotiate trade agreements that compromised traditional American businesses like auto and steel. It just so happened that those states with workers that got hurt more by trade agreements were in the battleground that was contested vs. areas like California, Washington, and New York that are more dependent on overseas trade than the midsection of the country.
Aseahawkfan wrote:I don't agree that unions are useless, but they need to modernize. They are archaic right now in a workplace changing faster than they are. If they don't start looking to offer value to employers, they will be watching themselves replaced by robots and automation due to their crazy demands. I recall reading about the Detroit auto unions having a nap room in the plant. Some of the union demands are ridiculous for removal of problem workers. At what point does the union have to provide real value to the employer in terms of production and expectations before they stop protecting lamers that don't do their job.
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