Most statues are not nuanced. The other reasons for the war don’t really come into play in a non-nuanced world, it’s the main one that rings loudest: slavery, and we can’t glorify that.
Maybe the world needs to be more nuanced. Maybe the other reasons for the war need to be better understood.
There is nuance in nuance. Obviously nuance is important, but as a said a statue is not a nuanced object. It is a symbol, and for many people when they see it they don’t see a million things, they see only one.
Maybe better education on the Civil War and its other causes could help here.
Of course it’s important to understand all the reasons as an educated citizen, but the truth is most of those reasons have little to do with the effects the war still has today
None the less, those reasons need to be considered in the the decision to remove the statues.
(beyond being a common, phony excuse and dog whistle).
?
Build a memorial if you want. But the statues as they exist are misguided.
Which statues? What about the ones for the pows I mentioned and the battlefield markers?
Again, nuance. If a statue depicts a glorification, it should go. If it symbolizes something else, maybe not.
unfortunately, some of the statues at Gettysburg do probably depict glorification. Still if you try to remove them, you will probably get a fight from battle field historians.
i was just recently at gettysburg,
http://wesa.fm/post/confederate-monuments-arent-going-anywhere-says-gettysburg-park#stream/0
there certainly doesn’t need to be an erasing of history. but i have heard the sentiment going around, that i agree with. it goes something like this. “places of prominence should be given to good role models” so to me, anything along the lines of naming a public school, what goes up in the town square, basically anything that says ‘hey world, these are people we like, and you could do worse than to emulate them’, those are places that confederate statues probably don’t belong.