Now they're taking down statues of Thomas Jefferson

bekkilyn said:

Well it didn't stop with the Confederate monuments, so I guess Donald Trump was right. And I really hate to admit that.

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If you don't like Donald Trump, how about George Orwell?

Pommer said:

By moving this statue back to it’s original place?

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Again, according to the article, that hasn't been determined

MMXX said:

I predicted this when the confederate statues started being pulled down. George Washington will be next. The state I live in will be renamed. They got smart with King County where Seattle is located, by attributing it to Martin Luther King.

I suppose they can do that with Washington state too, by saying it's named after Booker T. Washington. They'll have to charge the state flag though.

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I doubt we will change our state name or change the person it is named after. For all his flaws, he still is the first President of this country under the Constitution and did a number of great things that help make this country.

JustSomeBloke said:

If you don't like Donald Trump, how about George Orwell?

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It was such a strange choice to put those fire bombs in libraries containing all the primary and secondary sources about Jefferson set to go off if that one statue was moved again.

Paulos23 said:

I doubt we will change our state name or change the person it is named after. For all his flaws, he still is the first President of this country under the Constitution and did a number of great things that help make this country.

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I was being facetious for the most part. But still I think the sentiment exists somewhere. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see a petition for something like having the UW statue of Washington removed and the name of the university changed.

MMXX said:

I was being facetious for the most part. But still I think the sentiment exists somewhere. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised to see a petition for something like having the UW statue of Washington removed and the name of the university changed.

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It is possible, but the university is named for the state so I don't think it will be renamed.

But the statue is another matter and might become a victim of the statue removal craze.

Mark Quayle said:

Pelosi's face seems particularly suited for stone; appears about to develop a crack —good thing she's wearing a mask to hold her face together.

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Hahaha - that's funny because Rep. Pelosi is a woman who is no longer young thus ripe for ridicule.

bekkilyn said:

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news...tue-removed-after-commission-vote/8529649002/

You know that guy who drafted the American Declaration of Independence as part of the Continental Congress, our first Secretary of State as a new nation, and third President of the U.S. I wonder what or who is next in this huge push to tear apart the very foundations of this country and Democracy itself.

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Yeah, I heard that the other day on the radio. There's 2 (or 3) ways of looking at it that occur to me.

First is that we are starting to just take down all statues of anyone that ever did anything wrong ... ...and that would mean over time about 100% of people we know anything much about.

So that gradually every statue gets torn down.

Another way of looking at that is that in this moment, we especially today need to work as a nation on admitting national tendencies to prejudices and racism against Americans with darker skin, and so we have to point to any instance of it as part of that working it out process.

Because a statue can be a way of idolizing, unless we put the statute down to our own level/size or less, so that the figure isn't elevated above us.

And statues often show an idealized quality.

But, removing one hero/heroine, won't we just fantasize another?

There is just 1 person who was more purely good, of course, and one is reminded that God said not to make images of other gods and worship them.

pacomascarot said:

Given that more Americans understand the MCU better than they understand their own country that's actually not a bad idea at all!

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The idea has some things going for it. Almost any historical figure we have put up statues of has been reduced to a two dimensional caricatures of who they really were by the time the monuments went up why not start off with a real cartoon character? If we create someone out of whole cloth we don't have to fret over their deeds falling outside the overton window, just retcon the cannon and on we go.

chevyontheriver said:

Not a president but I could see MLK. None of the rest of them. Oh, and I'm sure other people would suggest Reagan or Eisenhower or somebody without a D attached to their name. My own opinion is that just like Catholic saints, who are not named for a long time after they died, we should wait.

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MLK had his faults too.
Only the 100% perfect can represent what lesser people
might aspire to emulate.

Abaxvahl said:

Considering he was a slave owner and seems to also have been a rapist this is hardly surprising. I in fact thought most people had a negative opinion of him but that just shows my own bubble.

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Jefferson was a racist pig in a number of ways. In order to keep Sally Hemmings with him while he was ambassador to France (which she could have walked away as a free woman), he blackmailed her by leaving her sons on the plantation in Virginia, promising to free them if she stayed with him.

He also maintained a running feud with Benjamin Banneker (who designed the layout of central Washington, DC, and wrote a popular almanac). First he claimed Banneker's almanac was trash, but then while he was in France, he claimed to have written it himself. He also had a running feud with the black poet Phyllis Wheatley, denigrated (literally) her work at every opportunity.

I'd like to see more statues to Roger Williams, myself.

Tanj said:

and slave owner.

More broadly, what is this obsession with founding fathers. It feels quite unwholesome to me

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Obsession?
Who feels that way?
Kind of a strong word, esp as it involves mental illness.

Portraits and statues represent far more than the person,
and we all know nobody is without faults-
The representstions are of greatness toward which
we might strive.
Here, we see statues of Confucius outside schools.

Not because he was perfect,but because he taught to revere
education- something Americans have forgotten, or never learned
in the first place.

Estrid said:

Obsession?
Who feels that way?
Kind of a strong word, esp as it involves mental illness.

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It what now?

Portraits and statues represent far more than the person,
and we all know nobody is without faults-
The tepresentstions are of greatness toward which
we might strive.
Here, we see statues of Confucius outside schools.

Not because he was faultless,but because he taught to revere
education- something Americans have forgotten, or never learned
in the first place.

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None of that explains the American obsession with their founding fathers, which goes way beyond statues, and all the way to their supreme court deciding laws based on What Would the Founding Fathers Do.

Aldebaran said:

South Dakota is "holy land"?

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The Sioux in South Dakota consider a lot of the Black Hills to be holy.

Aldebaran said:

Then maybe all paintings are other likenesses of George Floyd should be removed,

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I'm fine with that. He should never have been lionized in the first place.