# What should be done about Gettysburg? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 17, 2017, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853 "2017-08-17T05:14:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/1 "2017-08-17T05:14:45Z")
There are one or two Confederate statues and memorials there. What, if anything, should be done to them? ---
**Author:** ![etasyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9f8e36/32.png) [@etasyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/etasyde)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/2 "2017-08-17T05:44:58Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > There are one or two Confederate statues and memorials there. > > What, if anything, should be done to them? Thermite is fairly easy to make with the right know-how. C4 is a bit more dangerous, but the kids sure love the fireworks! Or… I suppose we could do the boring thing and stick them in a museum. But if not in a museum, I really see only one other solution. The fun kind! ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/3 "2017-08-17T06:02:10Z")
So to be clear, you say that the entire Gettysburg National Military Park should be stripped of statues and memorials that refer to the Confederates and that those should be destroyed or placed in some as yet unidentified museum? ---
**Author:** ![pool](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pool/32/4152_2.png) [@pool](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pool)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/4 "2017-08-17T06:05:53Z")
Apparently whoever is in charge released a statement that they won’t be taking down any monuments: [http://www.eveningsun.com/story/news/2017/08/15/gettysburg-park-officials-confederate-monuments-here-stay/567986001/](http://www.eveningsun.com/story/news/2017/08/15/gettysburg-park-officials-confederate-monuments-here-stay/567986001/) ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/5 "2017-08-17T06:08:37Z")
> [@pool](#): > > Apparently whoever is in charge released a statement that they won’t be taking down any monuments: > > [http://www.eveningsun.com/story/news/2017/08/15/gettysburg-park-officials-confederate-monuments-here-stay/567986001/](http://www.eveningsun.com/story/news/2017/08/15/gettysburg-park-officials-confederate-monuments-here-stay/567986001/) Katie Lawhon sounds like a potential white supremacist, amirite? ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/6 "2017-08-17T06:09:28Z")
Just off the top of my head, but neo-Nazis shouldn’t show up parading around with torches, wielding semi-automatic weapons and shields emblazoned with that lovely Vanguard logo with a fasces, shouting Blut und Boden and murdering counter protesters. Oh, and the president shouldn’t say Nazis and counter protesters are morally equal. I happen to like Gettysburg and have visited the battlefield several times. Color me liberal, but I’d rather not have Nazi trash desecrating what truly is hallowed ground where thousands of Americans killed each other in the bloodiest war in our history. ---
**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 17, 2017, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/7 "2017-08-17T06:40:11Z")
Seems to me statues for educational purposes are fine. Gettysburg happened. Statues denoting who was where to give an impression of the battle at the actual site of the battle are no problem. They are not revering the participants. Just noting they were there. That is a far cry from placing a statue of Jefferson Davis in front of a court house (or whatever) as a means to honor him. ---
**Author:** ![etasyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9f8e36/32.png) [@etasyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/etasyde)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/8 "2017-08-17T07:15:20Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > So to be clear, you say that the entire Gettysburg National Military Park should be stripped of statues and memorials that refer to the Confederates and that those should be destroyed or placed in some as yet unidentified museum? Whack-a-Mole offers an excellent answer that I agree with. > [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Seems to me statues for educational purposes are fine. > > Gettysburg happened. Statues denoting who was where to give an impression of the battle at the actual site of the battle are no problem. They are not revering the participants. Just noting they were there. It really depends on the specifics, namely what the intent of the of the thing is and what the message it sends is. “Never forget the consequence of a breakdown of civil discourse” showing a confederate fighting a union soldier? That’s a fine message worth protecting. “Fighting for slavery is good?” Thermite. I have no interest in pretending something didn’t happen, or whitewashing history. I refuse, however, to ignore the cause for which the confederates fought and murdered loyal American citizens for. Should there be a statue of, say, a Confederate medic who famously objected to the wholesale slaughter and at great personal risk saved the lives of both Union and Confederate soldiers ala Desmond Doss of Hacksaw Ridge/WW2 fame, then by all means praise the heroic act. But fighting for slavery is not heroism, it’s in the same historical garbage heap as Hitler and Nazism. ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 7:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/9 "2017-08-17T07:28:19Z")
The idea that campaigning to remove confederate icons from public spaces is somehow akin to revisionist history is both cute and disingenuous. Removing statues and flags that celebrate the subjugation of a large segment of the population is simple human decency. Such icons are not instructional; they glorify, and teach nothing. The Civil War will not be forgotten, and Museums and National Military Parks are the appropriate places for such relics. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/10 "2017-08-17T07:53:02Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Gettysburg happened. Statues denoting who was where to give an impression of the battle at the actual site of the battle are no problem. They are not revering the participants. Just noting they were there. > > That is a far cry from placing a statue of Jefferson Davis in front of a court house (or whatever) as a means to honor him. Agreed. The Gettysburg memorial is an appropriate place for Confederate symbols to be displayed in their historical context. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/11 "2017-08-17T08:34:57Z")
> [@BlankSlate](#): > > The idea that campaigning to remove confederate icons from public spaces is somehow akin to revisionist history is both cute and disingenuous. Removing statues and flags that celebrate the subjugation of a large segment of the population is simple human decency. Such icons are not instructional; they glorify, and teach nothing. The Civil War will not be forgotten, and Museums and National Military Parks are the appropriate places for such relics. Exactly. The wave of monuments to confederates was actually part of a campaign of historical revisionism that picked up speed in the 20s and coincided with the resurgence of the KKK. There was a concerted effort to enforce ideas of white supremacy and rewrite the confederate loss as some kind of moral victory. To keep them up is to embrace historical revisionism and has led to the astoundingly common ignorance expressed by may Americans that slavery was not the cause of the civil war. The great, great grandsons of Stonewall Jackson just wrote an open letter calling for the statues in Richmond to be taken down. The whole thing is worth a read, but here is a quote that puts the monuments in historical perspective: > [@](#): > > Confederate monuments like the Jackson statue were never intended as benign symbols. Rather, they were the clearly articulated artwork of white supremacy. Among many examples, we can see this plainly if we look at the dedication of a Confederate statue at the University of North Carolina, in which a speaker proclaimed that the Confederate soldier “saved the very life of the Anglo-Saxon race in the South.” Disturbingly, he went on to recount a tale of performing the “pleasing duty” of “horse whipping” a black woman in front of federal soldiers. All over the South, this grotesque message is conveyed by similar monuments. As importantly, this message is clear to today’s avowed white supremacists. > **[“The Monuments Must Go”: An Open Letter From the Great-Great-Grandsons of...](https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2017/08/stonewall-jacksons-grandsons-the-monuments-must-go.html)** > > “We are ashamed to benefit from white supremacy while our black family and friends suffer. We are ashamed of the monument.” ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 8:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/12 "2017-08-17T08:54:25Z")
Missed the edit, but I don’t think they necessarily come down, but I do think that we should put them in their proper context. I think plaques could be erected that explain how these statues were part of a campaign to enforce white supremacy and rewrite the history of the civil war. Also, I think it is important that any historical marker about the confederate army at Gettysburg would have to in good conscience note that Lee’s army abducted any black people it came across and carried them back to Virginia as slaves, these weren’t just escaped slave (not that that should matter), but also black people who had been born free. It seems to me, that any marker that is placed to set the historical record straight about the confederacy would have to mention slavery and the atrocities committed by the confederate army under Lee. To do otherwise would be to embrace historical revisionism, wouldn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/13 "2017-08-17T11:08:01Z")
> [@etasyde](#): > > Or… I suppose we could do the boring thing and stick them in a museum. They are in a museum. It is called Gettysburg National Military Park. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/14 "2017-08-17T11:21:49Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > They are in a museum. It is called Gettysburg National Military Park. But are they presented with the academic rigor one would expect of something on display in a museum? In 1903, one Union veteran had this to say about the idea of a statue of Lee at Gettysburg: > [@](#): > > If you want historical accuracy as your excuse, then place upon this field a statue of Lee holding in his hand the banner under which he fought, bearing the legend: ‘We wage this war against a government conceived in liberty and dedicated to humanity.’” > **[The Myth of the Kindly General Lee](https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/06/the-myth-of-the-kindly-general-lee/529038/)** > > The legend of the Confederate leader’s heroism and decency is based in the fiction of a person who never existed. I haven’t been to Gettysburg since I was a little kid, do they talk about the slavery and the Confederate army’s atrocities at the base of the statues? ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/15 "2017-08-17T12:04:00Z")
Gettysburg (and other battlefields and war cemeteries) are the places for these monuments and memorials to be. The visitors’ center and the museum/park guide can provide the information necessary to contextualize. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/16 "2017-08-17T12:17:27Z")
Hopefully no one has the impression that Gettysburg is disproportionately loaded with Confederate monuments. There are (according to my memory of the place) even more Union memorials. Some monuments might be a bit ostentatious (i.e. certain statues dedicated to N.Y. troops) but Gettysburg is an appropriate place to display them. And as mentioned elsewhere, places in cemeteries where Confederate dead are buried and museums are also OK for Confederate memorials in my opinion. The courthouse lawn and Bedford Forrest High School, not so much. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/17 "2017-08-17T12:44:43Z")
> [@JRDelirious](#): > > Gettysburg (and other battlefields and war cemeteries) are the places for these monuments and memorials to be. The visitors’ center and the museum/park guide can provide the information necessary to contextualize. I would argue that a great place to contextualize would be right at the base of a big fancy statue. Robert E. Lee’s historical significance is that he led an army in rebellion intent on preserving slavery. The only reason there is a statue of him at Gettysburg is because his army intent on preserving slavery was defeated by the United States there. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/18 "2017-08-17T12:57:43Z")
One problem with many of these controversial issues is that Americans seem to have lost the ability to understand shades of gray and context. Something is either “evil” or not, so it follows that anyone who had anything to do with slavery or who might have been, by today’s standard, a white supremacist must have their legacy nullified. I don’t agree with that sort of extremist interpretation of history. And one of the reasons I don’t is because it immediately engenders an equally absurd and uncompromising response from the other side. It encourages them to take the equally extreme position of defending people and values that shouldn’t be defended. We shouldn’t be having a debate about whether monuments that are clearly dedicated to the idea of a white supremacist South ought to be either removed or at minimum improvised to reflect true history. Gettysburg monuments to confederate soldiers were ostensibly erected to memorialize the war dead and to allow the country to better reconcile their differences. Statues of confederate leaders erected during the period from 1880 to 1950 were almost certainly done to reinforce a system of legalized white supremacy in the South. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/19 "2017-08-17T13:31:40Z")
I would argue that the ones rejecting the shades of grey are the people opposed to discussing the real legacy of the confederacy and insisting on portraying Lee as a sort of reluctant warrior Santa Claus. We are just starting to untangle that revisionist knot and it has sparked armed resistance from white supremacists. American history is no longer just the history of white people, we’ve diversified and grown more mature, not less and we are coming to better understand that Lee’s only historical significance is as a white supremacist, Washington’s historical contribution is in spite of his owning slaves, Lee’s only relevance is that he led troops to defend white supremacy. Revisionists have presented the civil war as this tragic, but noble chess match played by Grant and Lee who were both deeply and equally honorable. But that is a corrosive lie that has caused real harm. It’s time to rectify the situation. Plus, look at this gaudy statue of Lee at Gettysburg! There is ample room on this racist hood ornament to put an asterisk and a note that says “by the way, he slaughtered captured black troops and refused to punish university students for raping black girls, oh and the war was about slavery.” You could do it in 50 Pt font and still have room for a mural honoring John Brown. [https://www.google.ps/search?q=Statue+of+Robert+E.+Lee+Gettysburg&safe=strict&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjEwNS2rd7VAhUBbhQKHWKXBpwQ\_AUICigB&biw=1536&bih=740&dpr=1.25#imgrc=CV64iMd-KHlf0M:&spf=1502975874095](https://www.google.ps/search?q=Statue+of+Robert+E.+Lee+Gettysburg&safe=strict&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjEwNS2rd7VAhUBbhQKHWKXBpwQ_AUICigB&biw=1536&bih=740&dpr=1.25#imgrc=CV64iMd-KHlf0M:&spf=1502975874095) ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2017, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853/20 "2017-08-17T14:03:06Z")
> [@Dissonance](#): > > Just off the top of my head, but neo-Nazis shouldn’t show up parading around with torches, wielding semi-automatic weapons and shields emblazoned with that lovely Vanguard logo with a fasces, shouting Blut und Boden and murdering counter protesters. Oh, and the president shouldn’t say Nazis and counter protesters are morally equal. > > I happen to like Gettysburg and have visited the battlefield several times. Color me liberal, but I’d rather not have Nazi trash desecrating what truly is hallowed ground where thousands of Americans killed each other in the bloodiest war in our history. When I asked, “What should be done with them,” I meant to imply, “. . . from the perspective of government action?” In other words, I agree with your aspirational statement: neo-Nazis shouldn’t show up parading around with torches. But since the neo-Nazis seem disinclined to accept my advice, this means little. So I’m not asking what the bad guys should do. I’m asking what specific things the good guys should do, given the proclivity of the bad guys to be nasty shits. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-be-done-about-gettysburg/793853.md?page=2)