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Sean "Diddy" Combs returns key to New York City following mayor's request
Sean "Diddy" Combs was given a key to the city in a Times Square ceremony last year. This week, he honored a request from Mayor Eric Adams that he return...
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Arguments
- There is absolutely no reason to outlaw any monuments, flags or symbols in general. A large steel Hitler's figure is not going to hurt anyone, and people should remember their history, both good and bad. In addition, statues, flags and so on are expressions of free speech, and free speech in the US is protected by the Constitution from the governmental restrictions. If someone loves Stalin and invests a fortune to produce a million flags with Stalin's face on them and communist slogans, then, by all means, let them do that - and vote with your wallets for whether you think such business practices are appropriate or not.
- On the other hand, I do not think the government should have any role at all in the process. That is, the government should not install and maintain any statues or flags at the taxpayers' expense. I do not want to see a $10,000,000 Lincoln monument in Washington DC; I want to see a $10,000,000 worth of practically useful infrastructure built in Washington DC, or, even better, I want to see $10,000,000 finding their way into people's wallets, so they could decide for themselves what they want to spend it on. Needless to say, governments should not take ANY stances on history; it is a scientific domain, not a political one. I am not interested in hearing what my local senator thinks of Napoleon; it is not what I pay him my hard-earned money to do.
Aside from these abstract notions, in this particular case the Union has done a thorough job rewriting history and painting Confederation into extremely dark tones, comparing it to Hitler's Germany and presenting the Union and Lincoln as liberators and saviors. The real history was much more grey, and both sides have committed unspeakable atrocities, before the war, during it and after. The atrocities were just of different kinds: on the South people themselves have done a lot of nasty things, while on the North they bowed before the government doing a lot of nasty things. And while morally Union was probably more positive than Confederation, their values still differed a lot from those the Founding Fathers promoted. All this worship of big government and welfare state we have nowadays - originated in the Union overrun by federalists very early on. Had the Confederates won the war, we would probably have very different problems now, and not necessarily easier ones.History is always written by the victors. But at this stage of cultural evolution, we probably can silence the most obvious victor - the government - and let people write their own history. Nothing good can come from letting the government teach history in schools, given how obviously biased it is and how much it has to gain from people accepting a certain narrative.
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  Considerate: 87%  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: part of America    people   history    
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  Considerate: 79%  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: foreign power    united states of America   states   nbsp  
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Absolutely not! The victim cannot glorify on other's success in the victim's territory. If people want to know about the so called rich 'history' of AMERICA they can learn it through textbooks. A statue does mark the pride of the manipulated 'history' but it does not represent everything. Information in a textbook will! I know people may get offended by my remarks on AMERICA'S accidental history but hey, Culture = INDIA!
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: people    victim's territory   victim   statue  
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Since the Confederation doesn't exist anymore and that the war is over, I fail to see any legal grounds to ban the Confederate flag in the US... Unless you're talking about official State or Federal buildings and property in which case it's already prohibited...
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: official State    legal grounds   Confederate flag   Federal buildings  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: foreign power    keep monuments   lot of lives   war  
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We should not "glorify" anything period. History must be studied and analysed in the most impartial and emotionless way possible, in order for the analysis to be objective. The purpose of statues should not be to "glorify" something or someone, but, rather, to encourage people to study that aspect of history because of its importance in a particular context.
In Budapest, Hungary's capital, a building formerly used by KGB to torture people after the collapse of the East Bloc had the word "terror" erected on it, and the entire building was remade into a museum of history of Soviet occupation:
Obviously the purpose of this is not to glorify terror and Soviet occupation; in fact, it is exactly the opposite.
It is important to have reminders not only on good, but also on controversial and bad parts of our history. And that some people choose to use the Confederate statues to glorify Confederation - has no bearing on the inherent value of the statues themselves. Some people go to the House of Terror in Budapest to worship communists, and that is completely irrelevant with regards to the purpose of the House, and the House largely serves its purpose well.
P.S. I would love to see a statue of Hitler or Stalin at the center of New York City or Los Angeles. That would be a very strong statement in support of freedom of speech, and would also serve as a reminder of what socialism, national or "regular", is in the essence and what people can expect if socialists take power here - a very relevant statement nowadays, when the fundamental values of Western culture are questioned by so many people.
I practice what I preach too; I have a Che t-shirt I wear episodically, even though I cannot stand the guy. Let people who are afraid of symbols show their true nature: that a t-shirt scares them more than actual possibility of losing freedom of speech.
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Your original question makes no distinction between private or public ownership, so I answered accordingly...
Would you outright ban the ownership, sale or display of Confederate flags at a federal level??
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: original question    public ownership   federal level   display of Confederate flags  
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  Considerate: 88%  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: time passes    union of the united states   sale of flags   united states  
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We? no sir, it was not a consistent democratic choice to build parks to which the monuments rest, it had been a donation of ground and the donator's who are commemorated by monument of that donation in their memories of death. It was a mark of legal precedent of a time period as many public records had been sketchy or incomplete and often destroyed and re-drawn.. Something else you should also understand in any remembrance, in many cases pertaining to the Civil War specifically, the grounds with monuments had been hollowed and are graves of dead who have not been named.
As governed lands form state these parcel have right to file grievance, they also have right to fly their flag and flags as seen fit to their rank and file. As any law dictating that a flags distance from the ground and not its treatment while flow is surely just asking for an American flag to be hung in destress, having a military specification to follow is not the tyranny of law maxx.
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: southern states    donation of ground   use of a gold standard   constitutional union  
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Lets make this a much less complicated argument. shall we? What you are asking basically is does a elected official or group have a constitutional right after time to dig up human remains and place them elsewhere? Or just change the markers and monuments placed over top of the unmarked graves and un named dead to be forever forgotten as their only documentation?
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  Considerate: 83%  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: places    grave marker   ground others   health risk  
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https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/burial
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: places of mass burial    statues   others of mass cremations   nbsp  
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  Considerate: 91%  
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  Considerate: 72%  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: American soldiers    enemy   sir   monuments  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: unmarked graves    large numbers   dead soldiers   inabilities of the states  
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: words    question   mouth   debate  
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"should confederate monuments and confederate flags be allowed in the united states"
Do you understand and know that the parks are mass graves?
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The introduction of international POW's general welfare to the Civil War cause and blame was quick thinking on behalf of the North. It was not a quick answer to the numbers of mass casualties and human body parts as a result of the battles which brought disease and added deaths creating mass graves.
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: general welfare    quick answer   introduction of international POW   Civil War cause  
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I was doing a job down in Mobile AL back in the 80's. I decided to take a back road trip back to my hotel. I quickly found myself in a seriously poor, black community. I drove across a small bridge (culvert) and off to my left was what appeared to be a cemetery, very poorly kept. there was a stream running through it (the culvert), that had apparently flooded after hurricanes and heavy rains. a lot of the ground had washed away and I could see parts of coffins sticking out from the dirt. No one seemed to care about them. They were STILL only 4/5ths human to those with the ability and equipment to correct this mess. Some of them may have been killed in that war you are speaking of … unmarked and forgotten … ! Some think that war was not fought over slavery, some still think that the Earth is flat!
In answer to maxx: The monuments to the ones who would divide this country that our founding fathers fought and died for should NOT be displayed in public parks. We wouldn't want Satanic monuments , Nazi monuments, communist monuments, serial killer monuments on public display, they would offend too many people. Confederate monuments should be in museums where those who WANT to see them, can. We should not forget. However, to many of those that were what the war WAS fought over, they have the right to feel disgusted by them, to not want them revered. Many of those "4/5th human(s)" are our doctors, judges, scientists and politicians today. They deserve MORE respect than those who tried to divide this country, their country.
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@AlofRi
The one’s who most likely divided the United Constitutional state of union are not buried under or around the monuments.
As we are going to get into semantics the Civil War was started over international trade, slaves as POW’s had always been a part of international trade. There was no resolution by Constitutional union ever made by the Americas Congress of the time over POW’s. WWII lade testament to that. I am not going to argue the duties of Executive officer Lincoln over his states of the Constitutional Union during Civil War.
To stay more on topic the parks built in the northern cities such as New York City tend to be recreational by there creation. In the South, and Deep South bodies and body parts pick up off of the battle fields never made it home in condition to be identified to receive proper burials by family. They had been often put into mass graves unidentified, or the bodies were burned with those who died of diseases transporting them back to towns in the south.
I understand a person needs to support the overall idea of bigotry and prejudice as a threat to the general welfare. However, many of these burial grounds that are said to be just public parks are of commissioned soldiers of a State Army never returned home to be claimed by the families. They deserve the respect give all religious cemetery. Shall we now place all grave markers in public museum’s and how is that different then allowing them to rest on the unmarked graves?
I have never said this verbatim before but if a group is willing to place or allowed placed statue of someone in a cemetery to present a skewed idea of what history is. The morality of the display of overall powers of democracy should be openly declared. It may make a otherwise vandalism that occur in the general welfare more clear as to their nature of grievance. Not Right, not legal, not just, only clear as to cause.
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  Entity Sentiment Detection: mistake uncommission soldiers    face death   education   money  
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As for the second notion, speak for yourself. I absolutely would love to have those monuments around, and that they would "offend" someone is an absolutely irrelevant notion. Things that offend a lot of people are usually the ones most worthy of talking about and displaying, because they indicate systematic flaws in the society that need to be worked out. A mature society does not get offended by mere symbols.
When Soviet Union collapsed, Lenin's statues all over the country were being demolished. That offended a lot of people who still believed in Leninism, and people would group up and guard the statues 24/7, so as to not allow for their demolition.
What is your response to people who are going to be offended by demolition of the statues of the Confederate generals? Or is an appeal to offensiveness only relevant when it goes your way?
I continue being amazed by the lack of foresight from so many political activists. They want to have their way right now, at this moment, by forceful means - not realising that the same forceful method can just as much be used against them in the future. They want democracy to only work in their favor, defeating the whole purpose of the system. Democracy is supposed to represent interests of everyone, even the people that you find reprehensible. It is not supposed to represent your interests and ignore everyone else's.
If you believe that you can institute a soft tyranny working in your favor and not have it turn on you eventually, then you should study history harder, because this approach has never worked as intended. Not a single time. It always backfired.
There is a reason we have due process mechanisms in place aimed at preventing tyranny of the majority. Just because the majority of people want something to happen does not give the government Constitutional power to make it happen. This is a democracy, not an ochlocracy, and what action you believe to be morally right has no bearing on whether it is permissible for the government to take the action.
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