I'm a native of Charlottesville, Virginia. I was born here and have lived my entire life, walking around this town and seeing nearly every corner of it. So I get why someone might be upset when a Vice Mayor decides to tear down a perfectly nice-looking statue in the middle of one of our most centrally-located parks. And why does he want to tear it down? Simply because it offends people? There are bigger problems, one might think, and this statue offending some people is the least of them.
The statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee riding on horseback sits in the center of Lee Park, just off Market Street. It's been there for as long as I can remember, and probably as long pretty much anyone alive today can remember. But let's talk about what that statue represents, and what kind of problem it really is.
Lee led the armies of the southern Confederate States of America. He sided with the states that were fighting to keep slavery legal. Many say, however, that Lee was completely against slavery, even hated it. The reason he fought for the south, they claim, is that he could not find it in his heart to fight against his home state of Virginia. Now, upon first glance, that seems like a noble thing. He disagreed with his country/state but was a true patriot and loyal regardless.
I'm sorry, but that's a ridiculous thing to celebrate. If we all ignored the problems we had with our country, simply because we wanted to remain "loyal," we would be a useless nation of people. Protecting a status quo that is harmful and that you disagree with is, to me, worse than protecting a status quo that you don't understand to be harmful in the first place. The latter was the case for many southerners. They saw slavery as something acceptable and crucial to their economy, so how could they not fight to keep it legal? But Lee? He knew it was wrong, but fought to keep it legal anyway. He surrendered morals to loyalism, and that is a dangerous value to instill in people.
Our responsibility as Americans is to raise our voices to the injustices we see around us. It is in our roots that we deny the powers that be if those powers enforce wrongdoing. Lee didn't want his Virginian flag to burn, but he sure didn't care about black Virginians.
