A painting of Lord Balfour housed at the University of Cambridge’s Trinity College was slashed by protest group Palestine Action.
The painting of Lord Balfour was made in 1914 by Philip Alexius de László inside Trinity College. The Palestine Action group specifically targeted the Lord Balfour painting, describing his declaration as the beginning of “ethnic cleansing of Palestine by promising the land away—which the British never had the right to do.”
I believe that we should take the statues and move them into museums dedicated to history. We can’t change what happened before we got here, but we can clean up leftover shit and make the future a better place to live.
In my town there is a huge confederate statue on the courthouse stairs. We had the opportunity to vote to remove it recently and the yes vote made up around 4% of the total.
People were pretty passionate about it. I personally like the statue. I don’t know anything about the man depicted by the statue, but he was a handsome and cool looking fella. The statue is a testament to the time that has passed in this little town that I live in. The earliest photographs of my town feature that statue prominently. I feel like I can connect with all of those people who built my town down through the years when I look at it.
I’m not black. The fact that I find the statue aesthetically pleasing is a minor and tiny little thing. I was among the 4% of people who voted to have it removed because when I put myself in the shoes of a black man entering that courtroom, I can hear that statue say, “Hey boy! Reckon you’ll get a fair trial?”
I enjoyed your story. Thank you.
Let me share 2 practical real reasons why that’s a bad idea.
there are a LOT of these statues and these things are HEAVY. A responsible museum won’t accept this stuff because there’s simply not the room for it.
The people that will accept it end up being the last people that should. Like stone mountain Park, which enshrines and worships these racist assholes.
The very real problem is by having and concentrating this “artwork”, you create meeting spaces for white supremacists. Because ask yourself, WHO is going to and wants to experience the confederacy memorials?
“Stop turning museums into the attic for your aunt’s racist junk”
Man, we all just suck. We really do (humanity, that is). I sat here and tried to refute your point (the one about creating shrines for racists) and I just couldn’t do it.
I don’t want to see them destroyed. Whether we like it or not, the civil war was a huge part of our history. I just wish we could get to a point where we all agree that symbols are symbols of their time and no one hurts because of them. I wish we could solve the leftover systemic issues and move forward as a species.
Wish in one hand…
As for the museum thing, their whole point is the preservation of history.
I know that my little local museum would be more than happy to dedicate a corner to the statue and have a guy dressed in grey talking to visitors about Robert E. Lee. They offered to take it if the vote went the other way.
Also, it would look fine at the local confederate cemetery.
Racists are gonna racist. I wish they’d stop, but burning all the swastikas in the world wouldn’t stop them from making a new swastika and gathering over on Nazi hill to talk about racist things.
If you’re interested, here’s a pretty good podcast episode that sat down with Dr. Janale Schmidt, a history professor who ultimately got the Robert e Lee statue melted down.
[It Could Happen Here] Melting Charlottesville’s Robert E Lee Statue #itCouldHappenHere https://podcastaddict.com/it-could-happen-here/episode/171742565 via @PodcastAddict
What I find fascinating about the whole story is she did not start with the goal of melting down the statue. In fact, this whole controversy was kicked off because the city of Charlottesville wanted to move the statue to a less prominent park, rather than having it in the center of the city.
She talks about the journey of the statue and why ultimately they came to the conclusion that destruction was the right decision (including the fact that they observed these statues turning into racist shrines after the initial incident).
The problem is history is complex. Now days people want good/bad instead of the nuance. Lee wasn’t all bad. He didn’t fight for the confederacy. He fought for Virginia. Had Virginia stayed in the Union, he would have led the Union army.
The civil war has become a meme. It really was about the states. It’s why the 14th amendment took powers from the states which gave us more stability. The recent court decision talked about the 14th taking powers from states.
If you get a bit of time, I recommend the behind the bastards episode about Lee. It’s a recent episode so you won’t have to dig.
In his own letters he made it clear that it wasn’t about Virginia. He wanted to be revered in the new country on the way George Washington was to the US.
He wasn’t living in Virginia, he didn’t care about Virginia.
I mean, I could be wrong, but Robert Evans (the host) generally researches his topics thoroughly and I trust him.
As I stated previously, history is more complex than a simple answer. People rarely have one motivation for doing things.
Now, what is interesting, and I have not heard anyone dispute it, is Lee did not want a monument built for him.
I don’t mind the old monuments to the Confederacy. The ones built after the 50s are the ones I find suspect, and that is the vast majority of them.
All civil rights were championed, people started building more monuments.