tearing down mt. rushmore, huh?

i guess we've run out of bamiyan statues to destroy?

i'm never going to stand with anybody that wants to destroy any kind of art. it may be true that there are statues of people all over the world that upset or offend some people, sometimes for better reasons than others, and i'll accept any democratic decisions about removing or replacing those statues if it comes to that point, but i would generally advocate that they be moved to museums or private collections if it is decided that they are not fit for public monuments, or otherwise don't represent current social norms or values. if a community wants to remove a statue, that's entirely their prerogative. however, the historical and cultural significance of the work needs to be respected, in moving the statues elsewhere, rather than destroying them.

so, move the jefferson davis statue to a civil war museum, then. i agree that this is long overdue; i have no argument. just don't break it, like a bunch of puritanical hooligans smashing up some graven images, or something. in that sense, i guess i'm just being an old pagan, in reacting against a typical, if particularly vile, form of judaic zealotry; this is an old argument.

but, what do you do with mt rushmore if you find that the statues are too offensive to too many people, just right now? you can't move them to a museum. so, do you cover them with a tarp?

there's going to be lines, of course. if there was a similar monument on mt. asshole in dumbfuckistan with hitler, stalin, napoleon and genghis khan on it, or something, then some more serious thought would have to be put into removing the monument from public view. but, as it is, i will argue that you surely can't destroy them. this is a major work of art; it must be preserved. like, forever.

i'll state up front that teddy roosevelt does not belong there and should be replaced. full stop.

but, who are the other three presidents? while two of them supported slavery, one of them is responsible for legally abolishing it. however, jefferson's support for slavery is a nuanced and complicated topic of study that i'm not going to delve too far into right now. it's technically true, but slightly unfair, to suggest that jefferson was an advocate of slavery, and it's certainly not fair to trivialize his role in history as a symbol for white supremacy. while washington was far worse than jefferson, especially when he was younger, it is thought that his thinking on the topic evolved greatly as he aged - which is about all you can ask for from an 18th century colonial landlord running an economy that is reliant on forced labour.

so, if these are your symbols of white supremacism and colonial dominance, they are not particularly vile ones, with the exception of roosevelt (who really was a vicious monster, and in fact actually proud of it). now, what if it was teddy roosevelt, andrew jackson, james monroe and andrew johnson? well, those are more substantive symbols of white supremacism and vicious colonialism, none of whom really have any other substantive accomplishments to their names. again: i think some more serious discussion about what to do with the mountain might be more justified, in that case. but, that's not the case...

of washington? & jefferson? & lincoln? there couldn't have been a serious abolition movement without the revolution, of which the civil war was kind of part two of. it's been remarked that the revolutionary war was more of an actual civil war, and the civil war was more of an actual revolution. so, by comparison, and in context, these are, together, the presidents most responsible for ending slavery. following that thinking, perhaps roosevelt could be replaced by madison (although i'd argue they actually just got the wrong roosevelt).

it's not that i'm trying to warp around the history, so much as i'm trying to draw attention to the reality that these were actually the good ones, the ones who pushed back against the system and ultimately succeeded in eroding it. jefferson, especially, wrote widely on a great deal many topics, and was widely influential. reducing his life to an unfair caricature on his ownership of slaves is exactly that, unfair. it's a skewed concept of history, arrived at via tunnel vision.

so, i might ask people to rethink this a little; i wouldn't be very upset if they chiseled out the roosevelt statue, granted, but is targeting mt rushmore really an appropriate outlet of anger? there's lots of statues of actual confederates to make museum pieces out of. maybe you ought to leave mt rushmore alone.

the fact that the statues are on indigenous territory is another question entirely, but i would actually call on the lakota to recognize the historical value of the monument and maintain it for the sake of history. and, i'd suspect a majority would see the sense in that. they're not who i'm worried about.

it seems like too absurd a topic to take seriously, but it is actually recurrent. you hear about this every few years. might the zealots finally get their way, and smash the statues, for being false idols? you'll know that america has truly collapsed into backwardsness, if they ever do.