There are about 700 Confederate monuments in the United States. Most of them are on public land and were erected in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Some were put up in the mid 1900s as a backlash to the Civil Rights Movement. Confederate statues were erected by segregationists who wanted to enforce Jim Crow laws.
Confederate statues were set up to honor men who:
- Gave up on the concept of peaceful protests and turned to violence instead.
- Established autonomous zones and forced out American authority.
- Disrespected the American Flag by taking up arms against it.
- Said that non-Southern, American lives didn’t matter and could be legally killed.
- Said that blacks were inferior people and could legally be human trafficked.
Many people today are saying that Confederate monuments need to be kept in place because we can’t change history. However, we can change our understanding of history. My book, Off the RACE Track–From Color-Blind to Color-Kind gives many fresh insights into American history. It’s available at this link.
