Peter Lemiska
The great 2017 statuary war
By Peter Lemiska
The war currently being waged against Confederate monuments seemingly came from nowhere, but it's quickly becoming a fierce and brutal conflict. That was made clear when those self-appointed champions of justice triumphantly toppled the statue of a Confederate soldier in Durham and then, in an orgy of hate, took turns kicking and spitting on the vanquished hunk of metal.
Rational people are finding it hard to understand this collective statuary revulsion. It's as if so many Rip Van Winkles simultaneously awoke from a 150-year slumber, filled with self-righteous rage, and ready to do battle against a scourge that had already ended around the time they dozed off.
What motivates these people?
Clearly, a small number are instigators, antagonists who hate everything America stands for, the ones who scavenge for wedge issues that can be can used to divide our country.
As for the others, there can be only one explanation for the spontaneous, irrational hysteria. Borrowing the words of contemporary author, James Rozoff, "Sheep only need a single flock, but people need two: one to belong to and make them feel comfortable, and another to blame all of society's problems on."
Because this crusade defies all logic, it and can only be explained in terms of herd mentality. One study showed that it takes only five percent of a population to control the direction of the remaining 95 percent. Most of those followers have convinced themselves that by destroying those monuments, they somehow seize the moral high ground. They equate those statues to slavery and racism, and believe their mission to eradicate them is a noble cause. While they call Confederate monuments divisive, the rest of us wonder what makes them believe that marauding mobs, vandalizing and destroying America's history, can somehow unite our country.
And long before Nancy Pelosi and other high-profile Democrats jumped on this bandwagon, we knew where these mobs stood on the political spectrum. It is the Democrats and the left who, for years, have tried to portray themselves as champions of the black man.
Most of those monuments, victims of sham Democratic outrage, were erected in the aftermath of the Civil War, when real passion was still high on both sides. Yet there was no frenzied opposition at that time. No one associated those statues with slavery. In fact, they have no relevance to slavery; their purpose was to help heal the wounds of a bitter war between Americans. They were intended to pay respect to the courage and valor of our brothers who fought on America's battlefields, not to glorify their misguided cause.
Today, it doesn't take special insight, nobility, intellect, or courage to acknowledge the evil of slavery. We all understand it, and we sure don't need the Democratic Party lecturing us on civil rights issues.
Everyone knows where the southern Democrats stood on slavery, when most of those monuments were built. Even as recently as the mid 1900s, Congressional Democrats introduced a document called the Southern Manifesto, opposing integration. It was signed by 99 Democrats and two Republicans. Around that same time, Democrats were electing politicians like segregationist George Wallace, Al Gore senior, one of many Democrats opposing the 1964 Civil Rights Act and former KKK recruiter, Robert Byrd.
Maybe those who are now trying to destroy American history are really just looking for redemption.
As for the rest of us, the vast majority have put racism behind us. That was proven in 2008 and 2012, when Americans elected and then re-elected our first black President.
But these anti-American elements continue to create controversy from nothing, to fuel the notion of endemic racism in America. If they prevail, all the progress we've made on race relations will be lost.
© Peter Lemiska
August 27, 2017
The war currently being waged against Confederate monuments seemingly came from nowhere, but it's quickly becoming a fierce and brutal conflict. That was made clear when those self-appointed champions of justice triumphantly toppled the statue of a Confederate soldier in Durham and then, in an orgy of hate, took turns kicking and spitting on the vanquished hunk of metal.
Rational people are finding it hard to understand this collective statuary revulsion. It's as if so many Rip Van Winkles simultaneously awoke from a 150-year slumber, filled with self-righteous rage, and ready to do battle against a scourge that had already ended around the time they dozed off.
What motivates these people?
Clearly, a small number are instigators, antagonists who hate everything America stands for, the ones who scavenge for wedge issues that can be can used to divide our country.
As for the others, there can be only one explanation for the spontaneous, irrational hysteria. Borrowing the words of contemporary author, James Rozoff, "Sheep only need a single flock, but people need two: one to belong to and make them feel comfortable, and another to blame all of society's problems on."
Because this crusade defies all logic, it and can only be explained in terms of herd mentality. One study showed that it takes only five percent of a population to control the direction of the remaining 95 percent. Most of those followers have convinced themselves that by destroying those monuments, they somehow seize the moral high ground. They equate those statues to slavery and racism, and believe their mission to eradicate them is a noble cause. While they call Confederate monuments divisive, the rest of us wonder what makes them believe that marauding mobs, vandalizing and destroying America's history, can somehow unite our country.
And long before Nancy Pelosi and other high-profile Democrats jumped on this bandwagon, we knew where these mobs stood on the political spectrum. It is the Democrats and the left who, for years, have tried to portray themselves as champions of the black man.
Most of those monuments, victims of sham Democratic outrage, were erected in the aftermath of the Civil War, when real passion was still high on both sides. Yet there was no frenzied opposition at that time. No one associated those statues with slavery. In fact, they have no relevance to slavery; their purpose was to help heal the wounds of a bitter war between Americans. They were intended to pay respect to the courage and valor of our brothers who fought on America's battlefields, not to glorify their misguided cause.
Today, it doesn't take special insight, nobility, intellect, or courage to acknowledge the evil of slavery. We all understand it, and we sure don't need the Democratic Party lecturing us on civil rights issues.
Everyone knows where the southern Democrats stood on slavery, when most of those monuments were built. Even as recently as the mid 1900s, Congressional Democrats introduced a document called the Southern Manifesto, opposing integration. It was signed by 99 Democrats and two Republicans. Around that same time, Democrats were electing politicians like segregationist George Wallace, Al Gore senior, one of many Democrats opposing the 1964 Civil Rights Act and former KKK recruiter, Robert Byrd.
Maybe those who are now trying to destroy American history are really just looking for redemption.
As for the rest of us, the vast majority have put racism behind us. That was proven in 2008 and 2012, when Americans elected and then re-elected our first black President.
But these anti-American elements continue to create controversy from nothing, to fuel the notion of endemic racism in America. If they prevail, all the progress we've made on race relations will be lost.
© Peter Lemiska
The views expressed by RenewAmerica columnists are their own and do not necessarily reflect the position of RenewAmerica or its affiliates.
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