# Silent Sam is down! **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 21, 2018, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960 "2018-08-21T10:59:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/21 "2018-08-21T14:54:13Z")
based on video I saw the police just stood by and did not seem to do anything to prevent it being taken down. I have a feeling they were doing as they were told. ---
**Author:** ![bobot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bobot/32/21622_2.png) [@bobot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobot)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 3:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/22 "2018-08-21T15:17:48Z")
Are we talking about the same school Michael Jordan went to? Replace it with an MJ statue. Piece of cake. Maybe with MJ flipping the bird with one hand, and a giant wad of cash in the other. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/23 "2018-08-21T15:48:02Z")
also at the NC State capitol there are a couple of similar statues. The governor asked they be moved to a civil war battlefield and the NC historical commission is thinking about that but nobody expects they will agree to the move - that group has veto power over the move. Most of that group is little old ladies who probably worship Tump and the GOP and the governor is a Dem. ---
**Author:** ![Lance\_Turbo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lance_turbo/32/6156_2.png) [@Lance\_Turbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lance_Turbo)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/24 "2018-08-21T15:56:24Z")
A year ago I made quite a few posts about Silent Sam and how I wished for him to be removed. I’m glad this happened. As for its replacement, who needs one? There’s a perfectly good memorial less than 100 yards away. [Unsung Founders Memorial](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unsung_Founders_Memorial) ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/25 "2018-08-21T16:04:23Z")
I’m sorry, but I don’t agree. No one should feel free to simply declare that legislative actions with which they disagree are invalid. We have a system to make laws, and a system to assess the validity of those laws. I might as well argue that vandalizing abortion clinics is justified, because no moral law can permit the murder of unborn children. But i don’t make that argument, because I recognize – unlike the OP – that I live in a society in which my own views of what is right are not the touchstone society is compelled to accept. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/26 "2018-08-21T16:14:57Z")
In the US a lot of people have gone to jail for protesting things they thought were wrong , such as MLK Jr. People get arrested a lot at protests in the US. As long as nobody is hurt and people are willing to go to jail I don’t have a problem with it. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/27 "2018-08-21T16:24:18Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > But i don’t make that argument, because I recognize – unlike the OP – that I live in a society in which my own views of what is right are not the touchstone society is compelled to accept. “Recognize” is a sneaky and disingenuous verb to use there. Society isn’t compelled to accept anything. I don’t care what society feels compelled to accept. In 1913, “society” was compelled to accept a monument put up by violent white supremacists to glorify and maintain that system of violent white supremacy. It was compelled to accept that, in part, because of a murderous political coup. Today the law says we should be compelled to accept these monuments, because African Americans have been systematically and with surgical precision excluded from the democratic process. The legal system by which the will of the people could be recognized is broken. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/28 "2018-08-21T16:34:01Z")
BTW quite a few other southern states have recently passed laws banning the moving of monuments . Everybody knows which monuments they don’t want moved or taken down. Memphis sold the land under their civil war monuments to a private party and the new owner took down the monuments. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/29 "2018-08-21T16:39:35Z")
> [@bobot](#): > > Are we talking about the same school Michael Jordan went to? Replace it with an MJ statue. Piece of cake. Maybe with MJ flipping the bird with one hand, and a giant wad of cash in the other. Does the university really want to memorialize a dropout? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/30 "2018-08-21T16:57:27Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Governor Cooper’s statement–“violent destruction of public property has no place in our communities”–serves as a good point. I disagree, for a couple of reasons: > > 1. This was unlawful, but it wasn’t violent, in the normal meaning of the word. To the best of my knowledge, nobody suffered the tiniest scrape or bruise from this incident, nor did the protestors intend to inflict booboos on any living person. > 2. When a statue is put up to promote terrorism, and when its removal is thwarted by an un-democratically-elected legislature, the nonviolent destruction of this public property has every bit as much place in our society as the removal of Saddam statues had in Iraqi society. Indeed, these protesters are part of a very proud traditions of tearing down monuments to tyranny. > > To answer your other question: the statue was paid for [by University alumni and the United Daughters of the Confederacy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silent_Sam), the latter group being formed to promote white supremacy and a pro-Confederate (and pro-slavery) view of the American Civil War. > > I don’t know who the alumni were who paid for the statue. Given the political climate in the years following the Wilmington Massacre, the odds are overwhelming that the alumni in question were avowed white supremacists, and it’s very possible that at least some of them had enslaved people themselves, and/or had committed terrorism under white hoods. In what sense is the North Carolina legislature un-democratically elected? ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/31 "2018-08-21T17:03:06Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Does the university really want to memorialize a dropout? 😉 He went back and got his degree a few years after going to the NBA early. I think he said he promised that to his parents so he kept his promise. He only needed to do 1 more year of school since he played 3 years at UNC. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/32 "2018-08-21T17:03:20Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I’m sorry, but I don’t agree. > > No one should feel free to simply declare that legislative actions with which they disagree are invalid. We have a system to make laws, and a system to assess the validity of those laws. I might as well argue that vandalizing abortion clinics is justified, because no moral law can permit the murder of unborn children. > > But i don’t make that argument, because I recognize – unlike the OP – that I live in a society in which my own views of what is right are not the touchstone society is compelled to accept. That is so Trumpian, to mention the argument and claim it was not done. 🙂 IMHO the perpetrators need to be identified and charged with the damage, even arrested. Of course I do expect that the people supporting this will fund the defense or fines of the perpetrators. And I would contribute too, but only because I can see that there was no violence towards people here. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/33 "2018-08-21T17:05:48Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > In what sense is the North Carolina legislature un-democratically elected? Massive gerrymandering and minority vote suppression. It’s been in the news for years. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/34 "2018-08-21T17:12:52Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > That is so Trumpian, to mention the argument and claim it was not done. 🙂 Obviously this is an incorrect assessment on your part. I did not say I won’t MENTION the argument, but that I won’t OFFER the argument – that is, such an argument is made by some, but I don’t endorse it, for the same reasons I don’t endorse the cahin of reasoning offered by the OP. > [@](#): > > IMHO the perpetrators need to be identified and charged with the damage, even arrested. Of course I do expect that the people supporting this will fund the defense or fines of the perpetrators. > > And I would contribute too, but only because I can see that there was no violence towards people here. That’s all part of a free society. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/35 "2018-08-21T17:16:42Z")
last year a Civil War statue was pulled down nearby in Durham and around 7 people were arrested but later charges were dropped for all of them. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/36 "2018-08-21T17:57:17Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > Massive gerrymandering and minority vote suppression. It’s been in the news for years. Yes–and this gerrymandering/suppression is [the basis for an NAACP lawsuit](https://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/article216145540.html) against other legislative shenanigans. > [@](#): > > The lawsuit maintains that since some legislators were elected from districts that a federal court found were unconstitutional racial gerrymanders, a “usurper legislature” does not have the power to put constitutional amendments on the ballot. I don’t expect this lawsuit to prevail, but it won’t fail on its lack of merit; instead, it’ll fail because facing the reality that [we don’t have a functioning democracy in North Carolina](http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/311690-north-carolina-is-no-longer-a-democracy-report) is too disruptive for a court system to really consider. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/37 "2018-08-21T18:05:30Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > We have a system to make laws, and a system to assess the validity of those laws. What do you do when the people making the laws are not representative of the voter’s will and those lawmakers then pass laws that stack the deck in their favor? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/38 "2018-08-21T18:07:44Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > I’m sorry, but I don’t agree. > > No one should feel free to simply declare that legislative actions with which they disagree are invalid. We have a system to make laws, and a system to assess the validity of those laws. I might as well argue that vandalizing abortion clinics is justified, because no moral law can permit the murder of unborn children. > > But i don’t make that argument, because I recognize – unlike the OP – that I live in a society in which my own views of what is right are not the touchstone society is compelled to accept. I see it as a matter of what’s worse – breaking the law is wrong, but erecting (and protecting) white supremacist statues is worse. Sometimes there are only a series of bad choices, including “do nothing”, and one must choose the least bad of the available options. And this can go for every single issue (including, perhaps, abortion). I seriously doubt that you or anyone else would refrain from at least considering breaking a law if you concluded that it was unjust and harmful enough – we just might have different lines as to what qualifies as “unjust and harmful enough”. Was it wrong for MLK Jr. and his allies to break various laws when protesting? Were (illegal) anti-segregation sit-ins wrong? Many things aren’t so black and white as “breaking the law is wrong” – occasionally, refraining from breaking the law is more wrong. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/39 "2018-08-21T18:18:15Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > “Recognize” is a sneaky and disingenuous verb to use there. > > Society isn’t compelled to accept anything. I don’t care what society feels compelled to accept. In 1913, “society” was compelled to accept a monument put up by violent white supremacists to glorify and maintain that system of violent white supremacy. It was compelled to accept that, in part, because of a murderous political coup. > > Today the law says we should be compelled to accept these monuments, because African Americans have been systematically and with surgical precision excluded from the democratic process. > > The legal system by which the will of the people could be recognized is broken. So what are you proposing? Those who feel “marginalized” can live in anarchy? ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [August 21, 2018, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960/40 "2018-08-21T18:27:17Z")
14 NC laws have been challenged in court recently and 13 of the lawsuits have succeeded so far. So it’s no surprise that the NC GOP is now trying to change the NC courts who keep throwing out their laws. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/silent-sam-is-down/819960.md?page=3)