As with everything else controversial that 2020 has to offer, we have seen a lot of controversial agendas regarding the Black Lives Matter movement and the removal of Confederate statues across the United States. Everyone has been waying in on this, from members of the U.S. Governments, to foreign nations. The Black Lives Matter movement has struck the hearts of many, but it also began to see a lot of backlash after protesters began to call for the removal of Confederate statues. So why are people saying that these statues should go, but why are people also saying that they should stay?
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Something that many demonstrators for keeping statutes have said is that it is their cultural heritage and that destroying it would be like destroying a part of history, but is it really? They have gone on about how if we take down these statues then what will it be next, history books that mention Confederate soldiers? Anything related to how African Americans were forcefully brought into this country? Will we be banning the books, like Tom Sawyer, because they just happen to have the N-word in them? These people have gone on to say that it will be like erasing slavery and saying that it never existed if these statues did not exist, and that it would be an injustice to our country, but I do think just the opposite.
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You see, we have history books for a reason. We will not simply get rid of these excerpts in books because the material is very horrendous. We do need to teach our children our nation’s history that way we will not doom them to make the same mistakes that our ancestors did. It is important to teach them about Civil Rights and how it came to be, how many people were against giving rights to Black people back in the 60’s. We need to teach our children that they can be the change they want to be and need to be for the good of our country. All history is instructive and worthy of study, but not everything in history is deserving of honor.
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We must always be conscious of our history, the good and the bad, but we should never exhibit this ungly part of history in such a place of honor. The monuments that stand in our squares and on our courts that celebrate such a wrong and un-American thing in a positive light have no place there. These statues, more or less, belong in our museums to be observed as a piece of our history, so that we can see what not to do. Think about it like this. I would not want to take my grandchildren to a Confederate memorial and then have them thinking that this cause is “worthy” because there is a statue dedicated to them. When people say that removing Confederate statues is like “removing history”, that fallacy is wrong because it is merely removing a dishonorable cause from a place of honor.
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There are those on the opposite side of the spectrum who believe that by taking down these statues, then we should also remove the statues of prominent figures that helped revolutionize American Civil Rights, like Martin Luther King Jr.; however, they are getting the wrong idea from this notion of taking down statues. Statues have always been a thing to represent someone getting an award or for doing something so notable that they had to be immortalized in stone, but is it a good thing to immortalize something that is so immoral for all generations to see? We want the figures that our children look at to be figures that made a good difference in the lives of many. We want these people to be inspirations to our kids to want to do good things when they get older. But we do not want them romanticizing a notion of hate and violence because a culture of people wanted to have others remain enslaved to them.Â
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In my opinion, these statues have stood long enough and it is time for them to go. We will always remember our history, but it is not necessary to remind many of the horrors that were inflicted on an entire race of people, and the many good men and women that fought to give them those rights. These statues are nothing but salt on a wound, and after the many racially provoked shooting and discrimination that still continues to plague this country, it is time to move in the right direction and just remove these statues once and for all. After all, why do we need statues dedicated to losers anyways?