You're Probably Wrong About Confederate Monuments

Hello everyone! It's been one year since I made this video, and what a year it's been. Ironically, just a couple of short weeks after filming this, statues once again popped up in the American news cycle as worldwide protests intensified following the murder of George Floyd. But it wasn’t just Confederate monuments in the crosshairs – it was just about any statue deemed problematic. So unfortunately, certain aspects of the video quickly became dated, in particular the information regarding public opinion in 2017 at 6:21. At the time, I posted a correction/update in a pinned comment. Now that enough time has passed to view the events more soberly and objectively, I'd like to share my (probably unasked and unwanted) thoughts about the 2020 monuments controversy.

Last summer, when protestors started toppling non-Confederate statues – including likenesses of Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Christopher Columbus, and others – those who had opposed the removal of Confederate symbols loudly gloated that the "slippery slope" argument had been vindicated. As they saw it, these malevolent anti-American protestors were never going to stop with Confederates, oh no! They would not rest until history was completely rewritten to fit their woke agenda.

Have events since last summer borne that theory out?

No, of course not.

To be sure, protestors did destroy a few statues of slaveowning Founding Fathers (whose legacies are far more morally ambiguous than Confederates, in my opinion). They even took aim at a bust of Ulysses S. Grant in San Francisco. The months-long uprising in Portland, Oregon was especially dangerous for big bronze presidents, claiming such esteemed casualties as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln.

Wait, so you're telling me that leftist activists on the West Coast have a myopic view of American history? Whoa, that's crazy. And those activists, caught up in the heat of the moment and understandably outraged by four hundred years of black oppression in America, went a little too far and tore down a statue that maybe shouldn't have been torn down? Pull the other one!

Here's my main question for the drunk uncles of America: where is the apocalyptic domino of toppled Founding Father statues you keep predicting will happen? If the communists over at Antifa, LLC are trying to destroy American history, they're doing a terrible job. Since the ferocity of last summer, only a couple of inoffensive statues have been removed, always peaceably and (it seems to me) for good reasons. The Emancipation statue in Boston for instance, despite being erected for all the right reasons, depicts a black man kneeling in gratitude at Lincoln's feet – yeah, maybe not a great look, and I can completely understand why the city of Boston would no longer want it on public display.

Times change, and standards change. It's only natural that something that was innocuous 140 years ago might raise a few eyebrows today.

And in all seriousness, I think the statues controversy last year was a terrible shame. Not because of the statues – they're hunks of metal – but because it allowed the enemies of progress to gain the initiative in the cultural conversation, and provided ammunition to the right-wing media, which thrives on fear and misinformation.

Pundits on networks like Fox screamed that what these protests were really about was destroying America, and all that was good about America. See, they even tore down poor George Washington! Their audiences ate it up. All of a sudden, everyone was talking about historical memory and activists were on the defensive. Any notions of police reform, the protests' original aim, were quietly forgotten.

Because, of course, this debate actually has next to nothing to do with statues themselves. They only seem to become important to modern day Americans (of any political persuasion) once they pop up in the news again. So during the next monuments controversy, just remember that it's never been about "preserving history." It's about depriving people of color of even the barest symbolic gesture.

Oh, and if you're curious, my position has remained unchanged. If a local municipality wants to take down a statue, they should be able to, and if I don't live there then it's not my business.

I'm ok with confederate monuments as long as behind every monument there is a statue of Sherman, twice the height, spitting fire in random intervals.

“Stop obsessing about Hannibal’s crescent formation”

I feel called out

I'm surprised you didn't bring up the fact that many of the statues and monuments in question were erected closer to present time than to the Civil War. While arguments could be made about original period monuments erected by veterans of the Civil War are historic, that argument cannot be made about Confederate statues erected in the 1960s and 70s in response to the Civil Rights Movement.

If you take down all the confederate statues how am I supposed to piss on them?

Fun fact: when Lincoln first read out the Gettysburg Address, he wasn’t happy with it. He thought it was a really stupid and underwhelming speech. He was actually quite shocked when people were like “nice job dude”

The Grand Army of the Republic fought the Confederacy?
I've heard this one before...

I love your passion for the Civil War. I'm in my 40s now but when I was 13, I was obsessed. I watched Gettysburg and the Ken Burns series dozens of times, owned a union uniform and had a photo of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain on my wall. Strangest 13 year girl anyone knew XD

Germany remembers its History without making monuments to Himmler and Hitler ....

"I think you're wrong, but I don't think you're stupid."

There's not enough of that these days. Thank you.

In my town we have a statue of the confederacy, which is strange considering we actually voted to secede from Tennesee after it itself seceded from the union.

I think it's unamerican to have monuments to our enemies and their values, I really don't understand why anyone would want these around if not for racism.

This is a thoughtful video. I had 7 ancestors who fought for the Confederacy, 2 of them at Gettysburg in the 13th and 47th Alabama. My family's oral history fully celebrates their service. At the same time, I am completely against anything that rings of racism. It is a very difficult position to be put in to work out those conflicting points. The truth is that it is impossible to separate the Confederate cause from slavery. Thanks for posting this.

My allegiance is to the Republic, to democracy! - A Union soldier, probably

The US really needs a national museum for removed statuary. Maintenence is far easier for a place dedicated to it. Just look at the Neon Museum in Las Vegas. They essentially have the same upkeep problems, but by keeping it all in one place, they can significantly reduce the costs, and dedidicate a museum to that particular type of oversized and defunct artifact. yes, this kind of museum would attract bigots - but just as the holocaust memorials effectively deal with them, so too would this. It would in fact be perfect for what the University of Texas's museum calls their exhibit of an old Jeff Davis statue, "From Commemoration to Education." Bigots will do their thing. The best we can do is exclude and ridicule them, instead focusing on the people who are capable of learning

By God, that conclusion by Atun-Shei quoting Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address was so fucking classy…

I am an old man, and I have heard the Gettysburg Address countless times since my grandfather first recited it to me as a young boy. This is, however, the first time it brought tears to my eyes. Well done, Andrew, and thank you.

THE ONLY TRUE CONFEDERATE FLAG 🏳️

As always, the Witchfinder General has the best, most righteous judgement on this issue.

He looks…almost as if he is holding back tears, reciting the Gettysburg Address. And he nearly brought me to tears.

The country’s ideals have never been truly attained, but still the People fight for this country, they bleed for this country, they speak for this country. And they seek to form the more perfect Union by which our father’s so hopefully sought. It is, therefore, fitting; that our flag is one that should represent the ideals of a country that speaks of freedom and equality, yet cannot attain it due to works of the divisive and the hateful.

We hold our hands to our hearts, we the People of the United States, to pledge allegiance to these ideals. May our ideals, not our actions, succeed in the end. For liberty, and justice for all.

Atun-Shei, I pray you see this. You are a true patriot of our country. And I respect every endeavor and labor you dedicate yourself to, for the sake of teaching lost, confused, deceived people about our country. Faults and all.