Charlottesville: Where Do We Go From Here?

[Hakons]

Vile revisionism. Here, a few quotes from official Southern statements from that era:

- South Carolina was the first state to secede from the Union. In its “Declaration of Immediate Causes” the government of South Carolina itself said that secession was necessary due to “an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery.”

- In its Declaration of Secession, the state of Mississippi wrote, “Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery.” It went on, “A blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition [of slavery], or a dissolution of the Union.”

- In his famous Cornerstone Address, Confederate Vice President Alexander Stevens made it absolutely clear what caused secession and justified the Civil War. “The new [Confederate] Constitution has put at rest forever all the agitating questions relating to our peculiar institutions—African slavery as it exists among us—the proper status of the negro in our form of civilization. This was the immediate cause of the late rupture and present revolution.”

They feared the release of an incompatible people into their nation; so did Lincoln. They feared reprisals from a resentful population of freed slaves and what they considered to be the true nature of black people, rightly or wrongly.

They were still traitors without a good moral justification. You can realize one side was morally better than the other without casting the lesser side as completely evil. The South seceding was understandable, but not right.

[Napkiraly]

The Civil War was pretty weird in all truth. You had slave states siding with the loyalists. Pro peace militias on both sides running amok, and people from all over loyalists states joining the rebellion. Then you had the governor's of northern Mexico finding common cause with the Confederacy, and trying to secede.

Then of course you had counties across the CSA that remained loyal to the Union and broke out in rebellion against the CSA.

[The Empire of Pretantia]

What?! Freedom ends?! What sort of commie are you?!


I'll just be over here, winning the west.

More like putting it to the sword, I think you mean.

That's how you win wests, my friend. Western US, Western Front, Western film...

[Olerand]

Hey I don't get it either. He and the rest of the CSA where traitors and shouldn't be memorialized

After the war he did a bunch of things that had lasting positive effects. He surrendered where many other generals of the CSA would have continued fighting and led to thousands of deaths.

There is also a trend in human history to recognize opponents who fought honorably.

That might not be worth being memorialized to you, but it isn't unreasonable to see how people would for just that. Besides, any time someone talks about Lee, Grant is inevitably going to come up along with the fact that the Union won the war.

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

[Hakons]

The Civil War was pretty weird in all truth. You had slave states siding with the loyalists. Pro peace militias on both sides running amok, and people from all over loyalists states joining the rebellion. Then you had the governor's of northern Mexico finding common cause with the Confederacy, and trying to secede.

This is why we can't have nice things. Sorry Uncle Sam, looks like you need more power to keep the family together.

[Olerand]

Did they rise up in rebellion against France? Did they commit treason against France?

Hell, I would even understand having statues of Toussaint Louverture for his historical significance, but Lee? The Confederacy lost the war, they were a blink of the eye of History, and their legacy has been more powerful (and harmful) than their existence.

I'm really arguing against my actual opinion here and pushing devil's advocacy to its limits but if you were to ask some Royalists, I'm sure they would tell you yes.

And I would agree with you on your second point.

And I would argue, as would most of France, and the French State, that the royalists are the true traitors to the Nation.

[Empire of Cats]

More like putting it to the sword, I think you mean.

That's how you win wests, my friend. Western US, Western Front, Western film...

Yes. But there's a difference between defeating someone else and dominating them.

[Napkiraly]

More like putting it to the sword, I think you mean.

That's how you win wests, my friend. Western US, Western Front, Western film...

Western Airlines, Best Western...

[Benuty]

After the war he did a bunch of things that had lasting positive effects. He surrendered where many other generals of the CSA would have continued fighting and led to thousands of deaths.

There is also a trend in human history to recognize opponents who fought honorably.

That might not be worth being memorialized to you, but it isn't unreasonable to see how people would for just that. Besides, any time someone talks about Lee, Grant is inevitably going to come up along with the fact that the Union won the war.

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

A traitor who for all intents, and purposes left the federal military because his home state seceded. Expecting him to have actually fought against his own state is a bit much.

[Sovaal]

There is a statue of Napoleon at Apsley House in London. The Duke of Wellington's residence....

Probably has more to do with Britain's unhealthy fetishization of its handful of victories during the Napoleonic Wars.

I there defense the last one they won really mattered.

[The Empire of Pretantia]

That's how you win wests, my friend. Western US, Western Front, Western film...

Yes. But there's a difference between defeating someone else and dominating them.

It's all just different degrees.

[Ostroeuropa]

I oppose the statue being removed personally, it is registered as a historic landmark by the National Register of Historic Places and is approaching 100 years old.

The thing is, the type of people who care enough about it to go out and actually protest to signal their disagreement with its removal are inevitably going to be extreme.

I'll point out that this is needlessly escalating tensions and putting the public at risk, i'd argue the council has poorly served Charlottesville with their decision.

I'm not sure this is a terrorist attack though, or if it is, does all the violence at the rallies count as terrorism?

Is Richard Spencer a victim of terrorism for when he got hit by that anti-fascist?

This seems to me to be escalation of violence that seems unfortunately rather inherent to far-right and anti-fascist clashes, and such violence is commonplace enough that the university president urged students stay away from the area because of the likelihood of violence between these two groups.

Is it terrorism because he used a car?
No.
It's political violence, and street clashes. Not terrorism. A riot is not terrorism, even if some individuals within that riot escalate.

It is, however, a murder, and seemingly premeditated, and should be judged accordingly.

[Great Confederacy of Commonwealth States]

Probably has more to do with Britain's unhealthy fetishization of its handful of victories during the Napoleonic Wars.

I there defense the last one they won really mattered.

Which is really a combined Anglo-Dutch-Prussian-Hanoverian effort, but because Wellington had the fastest riders and the most premature celebrations, we call it 'Waterloo' instead of the proper 'Mont-Saint-Jean' and the wrong but not quite as wrong 'La Belle Alliance'.

[Nexus of All Realities]

After the war he did a bunch of things that had lasting positive effects. He surrendered where many other generals of the CSA would have continued fighting and led to thousands of deaths.

There is also a trend in human history to recognize opponents who fought honorably.

That might not be worth being memorialized to you, but it isn't unreasonable to see how people would for just that. Besides, any time someone talks about Lee, Grant is inevitably going to come up along with the fact that the Union won the war.

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

Believe it or not, he didn't want further bloodshed. There was a call from some in the South for guerrilla war, but he was, more or less, the one who talked them out of it.

[Computer Lab]

After the war he did a bunch of things that had lasting positive effects. He surrendered where many other generals of the CSA would have continued fighting and led to thousands of deaths.

There is also a trend in human history to recognize opponents who fought honorably.

That might not be worth being memorialized to you, but it isn't unreasonable to see how people would for just that. Besides, any time someone talks about Lee, Grant is inevitably going to come up along with the fact that the Union won the war.

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

He was a traitor who didn't draw out a losing war to avoid harming both sides more and then after the war worked to make up for being a traitor. Also he was someone both sides respected. Whether you consider what he did after the war worth memorializing is up to you.

As a Virginian, I was also taught that he didn't want the war, he was asked to fight for both sides, and chose the South because all of his family lived in the South. I haven't actually seen the sources that suggest that (I would imagine letters or memoirs of friends he talked to about it), I was just told it in the course of lectures in US history classes.

Personally I think he deserves to be remembered, probably not on government properties, but certainly at the college he expanded and improved as president (so much so that they changed the name to include him).

[Empire of Cats]

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

He was a traitor who didn't draw out a losing war to avoid harming both sides more and then after the war worked to make up for being a traitor. Also he was someone both sides respected. Whether you consider what he did after the war worth memorializing is up to you.

As a Virginian, I was also taught that he didn't want the war, he was asked to fight for both sides, and chose the South because all of his family lived in the South. I haven't actually seen the sources that suggest that (I would imagine letters or memoirs of friends he talked to about it), I was just told it in the course of lectures in US history classes.

Personally I think he deserves to be remembered, probably not on government properties, but certainly at the college he expanded and improved as president (so much so that they changed the name to include him).

I agree.

[Napkiraly]

So he was a traitor who knew when to quit?

A traitor who for all intents, and purposes left the federal military because his home state seceded. Expecting him to have actually fought against his own state is a bit much.

Didn't stop George Henry Thomas, Farragut, or Winfield Scott.

[Computer Lab]

For the purpose of clarity, University of Virginia is not the college I am talking about. UVA is a public university. University of Washington and Lee is the college I was referring to. It is a private school that Lee led for many years after the war.

[Sovaal]

A traitor who for all intents, and purposes left the federal military because his home state seceded. Expecting him to have actually fought against his own state is a bit much.

Didn't stop George Henry Thomas, Farragut, or Winfield Scott.

But it did for the majority of the Confederacy's officer corp.

[Napkiraly]

Didn't stop George Henry Thomas, Farragut, or Winfield Scott.

But it did for the majority of the Confederacy's officer corp.

Which is of course the issue - where their primary loyalty was. And it wasn't to the Union. Hence they were traitors.

[Benjabobaria]

Well, i"m so glad that the morons we've spent so much time being told don't exist are out in force now. Really makes the ol' Russian Roulette circle look more and more appealing every day.

Couldn't agree more.
The right is always like "WELELL THESE AREN'T FASCISTS WAIT TILL YOU SEE REAL ONES"
We have seen the real ones.

[Empire of Cats]

But it did for the majority of the Confederacy's officer corp.

Which is of course the issue - where their primary loyalty was. And it wasn't to the Union. Hence they were traitors.

In all fairness, can you blame someone for not wanting to be the one to raze their own home?

[The Shady Looking Vukmiri Delegates]

About time the right formed a coherent demonstration. Much love from Canada.

[Sovaal]

But it did for the majority of the Confederacy's officer corp.

Which is of course the issue - where their primary loyalty was. And it wasn't to the Union. Hence they were traitors.

Hence why they where called rebels. But for them an even greater level of treason would be to go against their own states.

[Proctopeo]

Condolences to the injured and the dead, but please don't stand in the street. It's dumb and may get you hit by a car, even by accident.