General Lee’s Final Ride
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Philzone Refugee
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https://www.npr.org/live-updates/robert-e-lee-statue-howard-university-b...
The gigantic statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was removed from it's pedestal in Richmond, Virginia about an hour ago. It was the most prominent memorial to the Lost Cause Of The Confederacy left in the former capitol of the insurrection. It's removal signals a new chapter for the Old Dominion, one where those involved in perpetuating oppression will no longer be honored in public places, no matter their battlefield sagacity, their chivalry, or their statesmanship.
As someone who spent my formative years (from age 8 to 28) in Virginia, this is a very symbolic moment. Initially I resisted the rewriting of the old historical narrative. It was so ingrained in our lives, from school, highway, parks and university names to these very public monuments that it felt like tearing away part of the fabric of what it meant to be a Southerner. I'd grown up with black schoolmates, played sports with black teammates, lived with black housemates, been in love with black girlfriends. No one had ever discussed the systemic racism they faced every day. It was just the way things were, and for some reason, we all played along, no one really talking about the elephant in the room. The murder of George Floyd was the tipping point, the moment the blinders were removed, and it was no longer possible to deny the inequality that was surrounding us in a land where "all men are created equal" is part of our creed.
I'd imagine that attention will now be given to Stone Mountain, outside of Atlanta, as the reckoning of the symbols of the Confederate States continues. As a University of Virginia alumni, I am wondering when Thomas Jefferson will face greater scrutiny. He had six children with his slave Sally Hemmings. Their intimate relationship began when she was 14-16 years old and he was in his mid-40s. He would be guilty of at least statutory rape under today's laws, and in this era of Jeffrey Epstein and Harvey Weinstein, he would be cast as a monster. He never freed Sally, leaving that task to his sister, after his death. Jefferson has a lot more a acclaim than a statue in Richmond. He has a huge monument in Washington D.C., the Jefferson Memorial. His likeness graces the Two Dollar Bill and the Nickel. Will his offenses also be called to account?
It's a new morning in Virginia, the Deep South, and throughout the land of the free and the brave.
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Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Philzone Refugee
Jerry Garcia Band with guest
Jerry Garcia Band with guest Bruce Hornsby
November 9, 1991
Hampton Coliseum
Hampton, Virginia
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PKW6jq3uooc
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Zzzzzz
>>>Stone Mountain
>>>Stone Mountain
A lot of press already about Stone Mountain and a few stupid ideas as well. It's a little harder to change a whole side of a cliff vs removing a statue but by no means impossible or even that hard with the means and ways these days.
As a side note, Lee was a professor and one of my relatives was his student. I have an autographed architecture book that I should probably sell while there is still high demand from a certain group.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: nebulous nelly
Chris Chandler...Stone Mountain/Georgia
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YoulPkEppbA
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: long live the dead
Slavery sucks
Slavery sucks
so does hate
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Rasputin O'Leary
His southern pride/vanity
Fuck Lee
His southern pride/vanity prolonged the nation's heartache and misery for 2 more years. Thousands more dead and maimed on both sides cuz he wouldn't do the honorable thing and surrender after he got whooped at Gettysburg + Grant took Vicksburg the very next day. That should have been it.
Fuck The Confederacy.
I do love history. On a huge rock at the entrance to this Confederate cemetery on Rock Island Illinois are inscribed the last words of Stonewall Jackson. Had no idea the place existed, I had gone to visit the Armory. Was just driving past when I noticed the big rock with the inscription, immediately recognizing those words, and hollered for my buddy to stop. It was something, rows and rows of johnny rebs who died in a prison. Going there was pretty surreal. So much of our history ain't pretty but I do love history.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Woz
Stone Mountain was purchased
Stone Mountain was purchased by the State of Georgia in 1958"as a memorial to the Confederacy." Stone Mountain Park officially opened on April 14, 1965 – 100 years to the day after Lincoln's assassination.
A fact i was unaware of. A pretty fucked up thing tpo do IMO. We can hire the Taliban dudes who blew up the Buddha statues to do a number on Stone Mountain.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Rasputin O'Leary
Lee gone, were there
Lee gone, were there thousands of law enforcement to keep the local good ol boys at bay ? There's gotta be some pissed off bubba's down south tonight.
Stone Mountain next ? Oh boy, some shit be jumpin off in Ga for sure.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Denny
Robert E Lee could still be
Robert E Lee could still be hero if he hadn't betrayed the uniform he had been wearing in1861 and joined the ranks of the treasonous comnfedrate army. Chances are he would have shortened the war with his soldiering abilities on the side of the Union and the US Constitution. How much different reconstruction would have been if Lee was the head of the federal army 1865
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Ken D.
>>>>Robert E Lee could still
>>>>Robert E Lee could still be hero if he hadn't betrayed the uniform
Lee was offered command of the Union Army but declined.
It was dilemma for Lee. If he had stayed with the Union Army, he felt he would have been betraying his home state of Virginia and in the end he felt loyalty to his state was paramount to loyalty to the federal government. Ultimately, Lee chose the wrong side of history and the Civil War sorted out the lingering question of federal supremacy over state's rights (and importantly the right of states to allow chattel slavery).
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Thumbkinetic
la-hooos-er
la-hooos-er
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: donster
Don't let the door hit your
Don't let the door hit your horse's ass on the way out.....
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Rasputin O'Leary
He was in charge of the Union
He was in charge of the Union troops sent to put the kabosh to John Browns rebellion at Harpers Ferry in 59.
Imagine if he had a conscience back then.
The more I hear that 'state loyalty' crap, the more I think it's just an alibi for deep down being racist.
Him + Traveller are still there viewing Pickett's Charge on the battlefield at Gettysburg. That's one hell of a place to visit.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: aiq
I would share some stuff that
I would share some stuff that punctures the Lee myth but that might be critical race theory and a Texan would rat me out.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: donster
....
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: El Nino
The blacks are immeasurably
The blacks are immeasurably better off here than in Africa, morally, socially & physically. The painful discipline they are undergoing, is necessary for their instruction as a race, & I hope will prepare & lead them to better things. How long their subjugation may be necessary is known & ordered by a wise Merciful Providence.
-Robert E Lee
To describe this man as an American hero requires ignoring the immense suffering for which he was personally responsible, both on and off the battlefield. It requires ignoring his participation in the industry of human bondage, his betrayal of his country in defense of that institution, the battlefields scattered with the lifeless bodies of men who followed his orders and those they killed, his hostility toward the rights of the freedmen and his indifference to his own students waging a campaign of terror against the newly emancipated. It requires reducing the sum of human virtue to a sense of decorum and the ability to convey gravitas in a gray uniform.
There are former Confederates who sought to redeem themselves—one thinks of James Longstreet, wrongly blamed by Lost Causers for Lee’s disastrous defeat at Gettysburg, who went from fighting the Union army to leading New Orleans’s integrated police force in battle against white-supremacist paramilitaries. But there are no statues of Longstreet in New Orleans.* Lee was devoted to defending the principle of white supremacy; Longstreet was not. This, perhaps, is why Lee was placed atop the largest Confederate monument at Gettysburg in 1917, but the 6-foot-2-inch Longstreet had to wait until 1998 to receive a smaller-scale statue hidden in the woods that makes him look like a hobbit riding a donkey. It’s why Lee is remembered as a hero, and Longstreet is remembered as a disgrace.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/the-myth-of-the-kin...
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Ken D.
Didn't know that about
Didn't know that about Longstreet.
Ironic thing is that had Lee listened to Longstreet on the third day of Gettysburg and hit the south flank of the Union line instead of going with Pickett's Charge, the world might be in a very different place today.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Woz
My favorite thing about
My favorite thing about visiting Gettysburg when I was a kid was that electric map that slowly lit up to show you the trajectory of the arrival of troops and the ensuing battle!
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Ken D.
"Virgil, quick, come see,
"Virgil, quick, come see,
There goes half of Robert E. Lee!"
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: El Nino
Should have left the horse.
Should have left the horse. Horse was just doing his best.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: jazfish
A horse is a horse of course
A horse is a horse of course of course
And no one can talk to a horse of course.
That is of course unless the horse,
,, insert name
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: jazfish
Ha, ha, and ha
Traveller.
https://www.google.com/search?q=what+was+general+lee%27s+horse%27s+name&....
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: jazfish
Traveller stepped on a rusty
Traveller stepped on a rusty nail in his stall and died of tetanus.
https://www.nps.gov/museum/exhibits/arho/exb/Military/medium/ARHO-5478-I...
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Mice elf
In the 1960's there was a
In the 1960's there was a notable North Carolina bootlegger and eventual NASCAR driver named Jerry Rushing, who named his car Traveller, after Robert E Lee's horse. In 1978, it was actually Jerry Rushing's car that became the inspiration behind the Dukes of Hazzard's General Lee. Jerry was the real life duke of Hazzard. He ditched Traveller in a chase after it ran out of gas and the police impounded and sold it.
I agree they should have lifted the bottom sawn off horse part back on the tagged up plinth.
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Philzone Refugee
What's interesting is how the
What's interesting is how the myth of the Lost Cause and the adoration of Lee was propagated by the U.S. government, his sworn enemy, especially after the deaths of the last living Civil War veterans. Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Lee statue in Dallas while President. Eisenhower hung a framed portrait of Lee in the Oval Offiice. Lee was one of eight Colonels in the U.S. Army from Virginia when the Confederate secession occurred. He was the only one who joined the rebels, yet he became the most celebrated and revered?
Top of Page Bottom of Page PermalinkFull Name: Ken D.
>>>>>What's interesting is
>>>>>What's interesting is how the myth of the Lost Cause and the adoration of Lee was propagated by the U.S. government,
That's true and was part of a planned strategy to reunify the country. By encouraging the South to create the Lost Cause mythology, it helped the defeated southerners accept their loss with a modicum of dignity and encourage them to rejoin the rest of the country. That's also why US military bases in the South were named after Confederate generals and various American units in WWI and WWII adopted blue and gray insignia as a symbol on unity recognizing that their forefathers fought on different sides during the Civil War.
Of course, the veneration of Confederate leaders and the Old South in popular 20th Century American culture didn't take into consideration of how the descedants of enslaved people might feel about the subject.