Running racism in America thread

This is how I feel because, when does it end?

The other problem I have with all this is in the choosing of what comes down, and what stays, etc. We can't, and probably shouldn't be, trying to change history, or the presentation of it, and statues and memorials, etc. are all about that.

No one good or sane likes Hitler and what he did, or any other of a number of other monsters and their impacts on history, either. Are we going to close down, deface and destroy all reminders, sites and museums pertaining to those periods of time, too, because people were wronged, mistreated and not seen as equal by them and their ilk?

 

Should be. Area also only accessible to NASCAR teams, NASCAR officials, track personnel, and safety crews. No fans.

 

I like this reaction but also want someone to call out the perps for what they are, COWARDS.

They don't show their faces and don't own up to it because they know then they'll have a heavy price to pay. No hide in the shadows, behind your hoods.

 

This isn't "changing history." This is eliminating celebrations of rotten people and daily reminders of the mistreatment of minorities. These aren't museums or historic sites we're talking about. They are statues designed to celebrate people who don't deserve it, or in the case of the Lincoln and Roosevelt statues are depicted in ways that are fairly awful.

The answer to "when does it end?" is it ends when people start to care more about living Black people than they do about dead white people.

 

I hope this doesn’t end up being a Jussie Whatshisname deal. But it being a real thing is even worse.

The best outcome would be that it was one of Bubba’s crew pulling a prank that went way wrong.

 

No, that would be one of the worst outcomes. To think that someone thinks this can be a laughing matter is a huge problem.

Despite all of the public posturing, we know there are rednecks and racists in NASCAR. That someone did this illustrates that. But if it was done as a joke, man, some people just don't get it.

 

It’s only a prank if YOU have ever been reminded of how people wrongfully murdered your ancestors.

Quit saying it’s a laughing matter and most importantly stop saying “can’t you take a joke?”

 

Huge Teddy fan. Huge. From childhood.

Been to every National Park he had a hand in or on, and every one of the sites devoted to him, many times.

Conducted a long-running correspondence with one of his biographers.

And I've had to update and refine my feelings about him.

I've also been going to this museum month in and month out for 58 years.

That statue has to go. Or has to be completely reimagined and remade.

Because the racist / colonialist "white man's burden" subtext of the thing as it is has been a sore point for years. How do you think a little kid registers an image like that?

And to its credit, the museum has been very responsive in the past to cases where exhibitions have been racist or anti-historical in the same way. The famous Holden Caulfield war canoe, and the founding of New York diorama in the great hall being two good examples.

 

it is that hard to remove the offensive statues? Did you look at that statue of TR in question? Easy call. Also, removing statue isn't changing history. One could argue that it's putting things in perspective. Why should we have public statues to those whose greatest legacy is pain? Or white supremacy? Or being a traitor? Also, hyperbole doesn't help and by implying that "sites and museums" are being defaced and destroyed is just that. Sites and museums in fact, whether it's a civil war battle site or some museum you never heard of, are exactly where this stuff belongs. I think that's the ultimate outcome.

 

Why is the statue of TR an easy call on removal? He wasn’t a slave owner or trader. A symbol of American conquests? Human history is the history of conquests, with and without regard to race. Religion is more of a reason.

the confederate statues are an easy call, they were outright traitors.

the statues of Columbus are misguided, the real villain was (is) Christianity and in Columbus’ time, the Catholic Church. The missionaries were the ones who decimated the indigenous population with their convert or die policies. Columbus, Cortez, deGamma ... they had with them missionaries and priests who acted on Church orders. The Portuguese were the instigators of the Atlantic slave trade and did so with the approval of the church. Without the church’s literal and figurative blessing, the slave trade would never have progressed. And contrary to the popular myth of White raiders going into Africa and kidnapping people for slavery, the majority of slaves were sold by native tribes to the Europeans. The Bible was used at cover for god approved slavery. While Jesus cured the sick and even the dead, he never freed one slave. So the slavers had Jesus as a rationale.