NationStates

A crowd of protesters gathered around a statue of George Washington in Portland, Oregon, on Thursday night and lit a fire on its head before pulling it to the ground.

Photos and video from the scene showed that the statue was spray painted with "Genocidal Colonist," "You're on native lands," "BLM" and "Big Floyd" -- presumably referring to George Floyd, who died last month at the hands of Minneapolis police.

It was also tagged with 1619, which is a reference to the year the first slaves were brought to what is now the United States.

Portland Police said the group ran off and there have been no arrests.

On Sunday, protesters pulled down a statue of Thomas Jefferson outside of a Portland high school named after the third president and spray painted "slave owner" and George Floyd's name on its base, CNN affiliate KOIN reported.

Both Washington and Jefferson owned hundreds of slaves during their lifetimes.

Police said hundreds of people held a peaceful rally on Thursday night outside Jefferson High School. Many people there told KOIN that they were ending that event early to rest up for Friday's Juneteenth celebrations commemorating the end of slavery in the United States.

People around the country are reconsidering the legacies of the founding fathers and other historic figures in response to the massive Black Lives Matter protests against systematic racism and injustice.

Source: https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/19/us/portl ... index.html

Basically to summarize this article BLM protestors have pulled down a statue of Washington and Jefferson due their history of owning slaves. As for my opinion on this matter while I understand why the protestors did this I don't think was a good move. While Washington and Jefferson had their flaws, I don't think they should've been pulled down because of their bad deeds they were human just like us and we all make mistakes in our lives. And while we shouldn't celebrate Washington and Jefferson's dark deeds I feel like we need to look at both their good and bad deeds to understand they were flawed, but still did some good things in their lives.

What is your opinion on this NSG was this a good move or no?

Ngl thats pretty fucking stupid. If you destroy everything that has bad history behind it, you're just gonna get rid of most of history.

Rojava Free State wrote:Ngl thats pretty fucking stupid. If you destroy everything that has bad history behind it, you're just gonna get rid of most of history.

I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

Nice.

That's a great way to lose support.

This shit is going to lead to a massive backslash and possibly several people being driven into more radical positions like white supremacy.

Aeritai wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:Ngl thats pretty fucking stupid. If you destroy everything that has bad history behind it, you're just gonna get rid of most of history.

I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

It's worth remembering how ignorant most of these rioters are.

Washington Resistance Army wrote:That's a great way to lose support.

Or worse make the racists gain support

Aeritai wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:Ngl thats pretty fucking stupid. If you destroy everything that has bad history behind it, you're just gonna get rid of most of history.

I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Israeli Defense Force wrote:

Aeritai wrote:
I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

It's worth remembering how ignorant most of these rioters are.

Rioters don’t really give a shit about anything. All it takes is a few people and the rioters can start toppling statues

Arcturus Novus wrote:Nice.

How is this nice? Care to explain?

Idiots feeling empowered by the current political climate to act on their insane idiocies. The sooner they’re caught the better.

Dumb!

Rojava Free State wrote:

Aeritai wrote:
I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Traitors shouldn’t get statues though. Moving them to a museum or using them as target practice would be fine.

Hey I got a great idea. I’ll come up with a museum where the statues of confederates can go and people will learn about the racist past while being allowed to shoot at the statues.

$500 to the person who can take off Lee’s head with a rifle

If I were to build a statue of Colonel Sander and said he owned slaves, would they disgrace it?

But yeah, these rioters are small brain.

Aeritai wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:Ngl thats pretty fucking stupid. If you destroy everything that has bad history behind it, you're just gonna get rid of most of history.

I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

Historical figures should be judged by the standards of their contemporaries, not by today's standards. George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were the pioneers of a groundbreaking, liberal experiment in their day. Edward Colston was a racist POS even in his time. If George Washington were alive today, I think he would be a very liberal, far-sighted Democrat. More liberal, in fact, than Barack Obama. These BLM protesters have gone too far and should be publicly named and shamed.

I hate to claim credit but I was urging them to target Jefferson on Reddit. Woohoo.

Thermodolia wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:
You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Traitors shouldn’t get statues though. Moving them to a museum or using them as target practice would be fine.

Hey I got a great idea. I’ll come up with a museum where the statues of confederates can go and people will learn about the racist past while being allowed to shoot at the statues.

$500 to the person who can take off Lee’s head with a rifle

Putting them in a museum would work just fine.

Rojava Free State wrote:

Aeritai wrote:
I understand going after Confederate statues, but going after founding fathers statues is unnecessary.

You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Do you actually think the only way people learn history is through statues?

Kowani wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:
You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Do you actually think the only way people learn history is through statues?

Schools sure as fuck don't do it so there's not a ton of other places left.

Kowani wrote:

Rojava Free State wrote:
You dislike a statue? Sign a petition to have it moved to a museum and stop acting like a dickhead. These people are so focused on just destroying statues that they don't realize its self defeating. No one will remember the history of racism in 200 years if you destroy anything remotely connected to racism.

Do you actually think the only way people learn history is through statues?

I mean some of them have little auto-bios so sure.

Greed and Death wrote:I hate to claim credit but I was urging them to target Jefferson on Reddit. Woohoo.

We all appreciate your hard work.

Dytarma wrote:

Kowani wrote:Do you actually think the only way people learn history is through statues?

I mean some of them have little auto-bios so sure.

Most of which are about as historically accurate as Disney's Paul Bunyan.

Washington Resistance Army wrote:

Kowani wrote:Do you actually think the only way people learn history is through statues?

Schools sure as fuck don't do it so there's not a ton of other places left.

This is a bad argument.
Statues glorify, a thing that is not inherent in schooling. Even if we accepted for the sake of argument that schools aren’t teaching history, that doesn’t mean that the job is being done by a 10 foot tall hunk of iron.

Rojava Free State wrote:

Thermodolia wrote:Traitors shouldn’t get statues though. Moving them to a museum or using them as target practice would be fine.

Hey I got a great idea. I’ll come up with a museum where the statues of confederates can go and people will learn about the racist past while being allowed to shoot at the statues.

$500 to the person who can take off Lee’s head with a rifle

Putting them in a museum would work just fine.

But this way you can shoot at things and win money!!

I feel like schools should teach about the good and the bad deeds the founding fathers did, so kids can judge for themselves rather they like or dislike the founding fathers.