General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTearing down Confederate statues I can understand. But Ulysses S. Grant?
Okay, okay...Prewar Grant once owned a slave when he himself was dirt poor. I believe he inherited the slave from his father-in-law when he died. They both worked side-by-side in the same field Grant owned. Shortly thereafter, Grant freed the man. I know, that doesn't excuse owning another human being under any circumstances, but how about just a modicum of perspective here (I know, it's hard)?
Couldn't one at least make the argument that Grant more than atoned for his brief ownership of that one slave with his heroic and invaluable leadership for the Union during the Civil War, without which the Union may not have prevailed over the Confederacy?
I know I'm going to get pummeled for this, but if statues of Grant are now verboten, please, someone, take down Robert Byrd's statue in West Virginia. I know many here don't want to hear that because it's a favorite RW talking point, but even those a-holes are right about some things. Say what you will about Grant (and there certainly is room for criticism, as with all people, dead or alive) but at least he wasn't the grand cyclops of the KKK. If there's no redemption for Grant, who actively fought to end slavery and the evils of the Confederacy, there should not be any for Byrd either. We forgave Byrd because of (D) this. But Grant doesn't get a single brownie point for being instrumental in defeating the very evil we all claim to despise?
Please, someone explain this to me. What have I missed?
elleng
(130,151 posts)Sadly, I fear nothing will remain untouched.
kimbutgar
(20,882 posts)Golden Gate Park. I suspect its some right wingers who snuck into the Golden Gate park and did this to rile us up.
I can just hear some right winger, you tear down my statues Im taking down yours as revenge.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)EarnestPutz
(2,086 posts)....really good and have been wanting to read it. I wonder if this ownership of a slave is mentioned?
kimbutgar
(20,882 posts)MoonlitKnight
(1,584 posts)Its a shame the post war didnt go as he planned.
kimbutgar
(20,882 posts)MoonlitKnight
(1,584 posts)And then tarnished by the rewriting of history to make the south look better.
Sgent
(5,857 posts)by Mark Twain
EarnestPutz
(2,086 posts)Sgent
(5,857 posts)publisher and editor. Its an open question whether he ghost wrote it or not.
EarnestPutz
(2,086 posts)....Twain's authorship.
https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/02/mark-twain-and-grants-memoirs/253343/
Music Man
(1,181 posts)A legitimate movement to tear down icons of people who fought to preserve the institution of slavery easily begins to look cartoonish when this kind of stuff becomes part of the equation too.
Like you said, there's something to be said about celebrating the journey of people who emancipated their slaves and were on the side that fought the Confederacy. Grant was also at least president of the United States, not a part of a group that tried to secede and fight against it. That, more than anything, is why it's lunacy to put up statues of Confederates. They were literal traitors.
So I understand that tearing down statues of Grant, Jefferson, etc., is born out of a particularly passionate moment, but it's based on bad thinking about history. It is dumb.
Mariana
(14,849 posts)It would be much easier to figure out their motivations, if we knew exactly who did it.
ProfessorGAC
(64,425 posts)"You take down Lee, we're taking down Grant!"
Seems realistic.
Mariana
(14,849 posts)Some Neo-Confederates could have done it, counting on the fact that people like the OP would blame the BLM protesters.
jcmaine72
(1,773 posts)Where did I blame BLM...or ANY GROUP specifically...for tearing down Grant's statue?
You know what? Don't even bother answering my question. I will simply block you. If I've learned anything during my 25 years or so on the internet it's that people who deliberately distort what other people write to the extent that you just did to me cannot be reasoned with under any circumstances.
Good bye.
ProfessorGAC
(64,425 posts)I do not agree with the post extrapolating it to your OP.
I was only agreeing that RWNJs might do this as a Confederate counter protest.
I do not see you as either gullible or anti BLM's message.
Just being clear.
Polybius
(15,238 posts)How would they go about toppling them?
Raine
(30,540 posts)those statues " those who don't remember history are doomed to repeat it ".
Dial H For Hero
(2,971 posts)sarisataka
(18,220 posts)in an iconoclastic direction
Amishman
(5,541 posts)If we want to erase all history that doesn't measure up, we will end up with nothing left.
I get wanting to remove Confederate monuments from prominent display in cities. We're going way past that and it's somewhat worrying
superpatriotman
(6,232 posts)The stupidity and uselessness of wanton, mindless destruction are getting very hard for this Democrat to understand, defend or support.
DTomlinson
(411 posts)jmg257
(11,996 posts)Last edited Sat Jun 20, 2020, 05:19 PM - Edit history (1)
He freed the slave when he could have sold him, even though he was very poor at the time.
Stupid.
brush
(53,474 posts)given the enslaved man. Grant freed him even though he could've gotten a lot of money for him. This was all just shown in the Grant documentary on the History channel.
jmg257
(11,996 posts)coti
(4,612 posts)Grant married into a slave owning family. There was reportedly quite a bit of tension between the families about the issue. But Grant did work amongst the slaves on his wife's farm and even was made fun of by slavery-supporters for it.
But the one slave he ended up taking "ownership" over, he freed, of his own accord. That, on its own, says a LOT.
Not to mention he is arguably the person most responsible for the North winning the Civil War and slavery being outlawed (maybe next to Lincoln himself).
It may be that his history vis a vis blacks is quite different from how he treated Native Americans, though. But I think an awful lot of people need to answer for that.
Kaleva
(36,146 posts)Many of us can recognize Grant, Sherman, Sheriden, Hooker, Burnside, McClellan, Thomas, Lee, Jackson, Hood, Johnston, Stuart and others but some can't.
Mariana
(14,849 posts)and seized the opportunity to destroy it, and get it blamed on others.
tritsofme
(17,323 posts)It might have been aliens?
zipplewrath
(16,646 posts)that which can be explained by stupidity.
My first guess would be it was someone who didn't know their history.
Aristus
(66,095 posts)They all had facial hair, and they all had stars on their uniforms, even majors and colonels. It's easy to get confused. Although I am allowing for the possibility that this was a counter-protest by General Lee supporters.
Raine
(30,540 posts)before destroying something and looking like an ignoramus and tainting the cause.
UncleTomsEvilBrother
(943 posts)No, if he "owned" another individual, there is no atonement. Think about how you sound when you say he "worked side-by-side in the same field." You've effectively reduced this human being to a "working animal" and nothing else.
This enslaved person had the psychological burden of being an owned individual regardless of the "owner" working next to him. What if the enslaved person's desire to sit home and not work for Grant? What if the enslaved person didn't want to work at all. What of his dreams? Desires to love? Those simple human rights were still taken from him by Grant.
"We" didn't forgive Byrd. A political party forgave Byrd.
The sooner we understand that this current movement operates outside of the political stratosphere, the sooner we'll start understanding the pain that Black people have had to endure since reaching the shores of this country.
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,145 posts)We can do better.
Kaleva
(36,146 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,145 posts)Few of our founding fathers and historic military figures can withstand even a cursory examination of their beliefs and record.
It is past time to move forward outside of the omnipresent gaze of monuments to white men.
Kaleva
(36,146 posts)PTWB
(4,131 posts)Do you think it makes the young black teenager feel better knowing that his school was named after a slaveholder who was actually a good man judging by standards 200+ years ago?
It is well past time we tore down every monument, renamed every military base and school, and removed every glorification of every white man who enabled oppression.
I am not advocating we ignore the history, not at all. We need to do a much better job of teaching our young people exactly how terrible and flawed our founding fathers were, in addition to teaching the roles they played in the birth of our nation.
Dial H For Hero
(2,971 posts)Kaleva
(36,146 posts)PTWB
(4,131 posts)Rename the schools. Replace the monuments. Teach about his wonderful actions right alongside his terrible ones.
It is time to move on from our history of white male supremacy.
Kaleva
(36,146 posts)That cannot be ignored unless one wants to falsify our past.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)But we should not maintain these monuments to flawed white men, especially not when the oppression of blacks, women, native Americans and other persons of color continue.
Teach about them. Dont worship them. Dont force minorities to live under their white shadows.
DTomlinson
(411 posts)like this.
This will backfire, I guarantee it.
PTWB
(4,131 posts)coti
(4,612 posts)best President who himself emancipated and won a war to free the slaves, then promptly gave up his very life as a result of that.
Wow. You must be the purest soul on DU. I prostrate myself before your grace.
DTomlinson
(411 posts)WhiskeyGrinder
(22,145 posts)Do the tribes and nations of North America?
DTomlinson
(411 posts)So...
WhiskeyGrinder
(22,145 posts)brush
(53,474 posts)and then freed him even though he was told he could get a lot of money for him.
Grant also wouldn't allow surrendering confederates to keep their slaves. He allowed them to keep their horses and sidearms but not their slaves.
Grant was decent man, and the best general of the Civil War.
rockfordfile
(8,682 posts)jalan48
(13,798 posts)ExciteBike66
(2,280 posts)General Order 11.
Aristus
(66,095 posts)Grant admitted in his memoir that it was one of the worst mistakes of his life.
coti
(4,612 posts)You're not going to find many out there who did as much to empower black Americans as Grant.
Wouldn't be that surprising if people had other issues with him, though.
MichMan
(11,789 posts)other than some old white guy on a horse etc. They see news clips of others doing it and just want to vandalize something themselves.
2naSalit
(86,056 posts)it's a fucking statue, tear them all down, maybe that's really a cathartic thing we need right now. Perhaps it will help us focus on our future rather than trying to live up to a mythical past all the time. We can keep the form of government, sans corruption, it works pretty well. We could do with a major shift in our social culture though.
DTomlinson
(411 posts)2naSalit
(86,056 posts)PTWB
(4,131 posts)After all, Columbus was no confederate.
As far as Im concerned we can tear down every statue and monument that celebrates white privilege and the whitewashing of our oppressive history.
melm00se
(4,974 posts)violent revolutions need to be avoided.
The actions of the mob, in some cases based upon ignorance, very quickly attain legitimacy.
As mentioned above: old dead white guy statute = (out of ignorance) must be a racist.
Here it is Grant.
A week or so ago it was a 19th century abolitionist in Philly.
Additionally, for those who claim that there can be no atonement: If all it takes is a single misstep to be damned, the world will be devoid of people.