The dangers of rewriting history
All this idiocy in Charlottesville, Virginia, has got President Donald Trump in trouble once again. In this case, however, the Elmer Fudd of American politics probably deserves a little sympathy.
There is no defense whatsoever for the actions, and or beliefs, of the members of the “Alt-right” protest who, in this case anyway, seemed to be largely composed of white supremacists, neo-nazis and those who sartorially tend to prefer bed sheets. At the same time, he is correct that extreme left-wing protestors can be just as stupid and violent. Anyone who attended the 3rd
Summit of the Americas on Free Trade in Quebec City back in 2001 can attest to that. 20,000 protestors were involved in a running fight with security forces that included rocks, paving stones, tear gas and a lot of punching on both sides.
Protestors and anti-protestors aside, however, it’s probably best to take a look at what all the fuss was about in the first place. In their modern wisdom the city fathers of Charlottesville decided to
remove a statue of General Robert E. Lee, Commander of the Army of Northern Virginia for the Confederate States during the Civil War. They also wanted a statue of General Thomas Jonathan “Stonewall” Jackson, another Confederate General, removed as well.
Naturally, the order to remove the statues offended any number of people who strongly believe that rewriting history is a bad thing, however bad that history may be. The unfortunate part in all of this is that the protest quickly left the realm of rational debate, if it ever dwelt there in the first place, and was highjacked by the goons and clowns who still hope the South will rise again and believe that the whole slavery business was exaggerated, sort of like the holocaust.
Nevertheless, the argument still remains that the latest trend toward rewriting or correcting history by removing monuments, renaming buildings and taking down historic plaques, is wrong. Not only, some would say, does it attempt to deny the importance of these individuals in the historic scheme of things but it does so with complete disregard of historical context – judging them by our own modern standards.
Where will it stop? George Washington, the Patron Saint of all things American, was not only an effective Indian fighter, as the colonies spread westward, but a slave owner as well. Should Americans start tearing down the thousands of statues and memorials to the first president? Should they be thinking of a new name for the capital on the Potomac? What about Davy Crockett? The man made his name as an “Indian fighter” and ended up dying at the Alamo defending the American right to steal Mexico from the Mexicans.
The same holds true for Canada. There is, to my knowledge, not one member of the Fathers of Confederation who could pass the modern ‘smell test’ for political sainthood. Sir John A. Macdonald was an alcoholic who played fast and lose with fund raising. Charles Tupper was known as the “Ram of Cumberland County” and it wasn’t for his skill with sheep. Even modern politicians had their foibles. Lester Pearson, working within the department of External Affairs apparently opposed the integration of black and white troops within the Canadian military during World War II. Does that mean his portrait in the House of Commons should come down asap?
As offensive as so much of our past has been it is still our past. These markers remind us not only of the good that was done but the bad and without them there is the simple danger we will
forget. How much better it would be to spend our time not in a vain attempt to rewrite history but in an unceasing effort to avoid repeating it.