What Does the Time Matter?

As one justification for tearing down statues commemorating people associated with the Confederacy, much is being made of the time the statues were erected.  Apparently if you do not erect a statue immediately following a conflict, then the statue has some other, likely evil, ulterior motive. What does this mean for the World War Two memorial which opened in 2004?

As noted by an historian on the PBS news shortly after the Charlottesville and Durham incidents, often it is when soldiers age and begin to die off that their families seek to have their memories preserved and memorials are built.  He pointed to a group named Daughters of the Confederacy that worked to have memorials and monuments built to commemorate their fathers and brothers as those fathers and brothers reached old age and began to die off.  (I note this historian has not been invited back as the narrative is now that all monuments not erected immediately following the end of the war were done to insult and intimidate people of color.)

This does not mean that some statues may not have been constructed as some sort of in-your-face statement.  But, even if that is the case, so what?  In the words of Hillary Clinton, “what difference does it make?”  Isn’t the argument that these statues, regardless of when erected, are a discomforting reminder of racism in this country?

And, doesn’t taking them down have the likely potential of preserving the status quo?  That is, if we erase our history and all reminders of its dark and ugly parts, then we stop any dialog about that history.  And without dialog, how are we going to improve things or even reach any understanding that they should be improved?

The history of this country is complex.  It has many great and wonderful moments and it has some dark and ugly ones.  That history cannot be changed, and, like all histories it is multifaceted and nuanced.  We cannot erase that history or the emotions and views underlying and stemming from it by tearing down statues and pretending they and the history of which they are a part does not exist.

And, the question of where will it stop is a valid one.  Today Time Out New York reports that the city will begin removing or reworking subway station tiles that “resemble the Confederate flag.”  An MTA spokesperson states, “the tiles were not originally intended to represent the flag but rather the area's moniker as the Crossroads of the World”; nonetheless, they will be removed in order to "avoid absolutely any confusion." The mosaics were installed in 1917 and allegations that they had racist undertones “have largely been debunked.” Nonetheless, they will be torn down as the mayor calls for streets to be renamed and “all symbols of hate” on city property be removed.  These mosaics (a mostly blue X on a reddish background with no other similarity to the Confederate flag) are apparently “symbols of hate.”  If we look hard enough, we can find offense in almost any graphic we see.

History has many aspects, many moments, many reminders, and each and every moment or reminder is going to be offensive to someone.  George Washington and Thomas Jefferson did some amazing things in fighting for and shaping our democracy.  They also held slaves.  I cannot justify that.  I understand that this fact alone may make the thought of them so repugnant to some that they would like to see their images and their names removed from sight and from memory.  But, they are a part of our history; they lived their lives in a time very different from ours and those lives were far more complex and encompass far more than the fact that they held slaves, repugnant as that fact is.  If we erase them because they held slaves, do we also then erase all else they did, including writing the Declaration of Independence and their many acts in shaping our country and our Constitution?  Do we erase the Constitution?

History must be understood in context.  At one time, the law of some states did not allow women to become lawyers and women were not even allowed to serve on juries.  This stance is shocking and unacceptable today, but was fully accepted in the past.  Should we condemn the judges who enforced these rules which made sense in the context of their times, regardless of what other accomplishments these jurists had?  And suppose we erased them and the past treatment of women from our history:  how would that affect the conversation about women’s rights today?   

Does it matter when or why the memorials were erected? Not really.  Tearing them down is an attempt to cleanse us of the history that made us all who we are today.  Essentially it is an attempt to cleanse us of our country and ourselves.  And how is this much different from a conquering Taliban attempting to cleanse a region it has conquered from all signs of Christianity, something which it views as repulsive.  Does it make a difference if the church they destroy was erected to stand as protection from the Taliban or whether it was erected 500 years ago or yesterday?  The goal is to cleanse all thought and memory of these structures and what they represent, period.

Our history is complicated and difficult; we cannot erase it nor can we make it perfect.  Rather, we must preserve our memory of both the moments of greatness and those of darkness. It is those dark times, and our ability to deal with them, which make us stronger.  It is the lessons that we learn from the ugly times that make us grow, as people and as a nation.  Understanding the complexities of our history and the people involved in it help us to better understand ourselves and those with whom we live together within today’s world.  Erasing our history because parts of it are horrifically upsetting to some only leaves us without the ability to understand and learn from that history so as not to repeat it again in the future. 

Destroying all reminders of our past is essentially an effort to destroy who we are as a people and as a country.  I realize there are those who might think that is a good thing, but I, for one, would rather have us face our history, unpleasant as parts of it may be; rather than stopping any dialog with destruction and erasure I would have us face head on that which some wish to erase.  And if a monument was erected to intimidate, then let us not remove it in anger it in the middle of the night but let us face it in full sun-light and talk about what it is and what it means to everyone and what best to do with it.  Let us understand the complexities and the strengths and weaknesses of our history and let us grow together as a nation from that understanding.