The Civil War Was About Slavery And Nothing More
A state representative from Winona, Mississippi urged in a weekend Facebook post that those who support the removal of Confederate monuments be lynched. Rep. Karl Oliver, R-Winona, wrote:
“The destruction of these monuments, erected in the loving memory of our family and fellow Southern Americans, is both heinous and horrific. If the, and I use this term extremely loosely, “leadership” of Louisiana wishes to, in a Nazi-ish fashion, burn books or destroy historical monuments of OUR HISTORY, they should be LYNCHED! Let it be known, I will do all in my power to prevent this from happening in our State.”
The Civil War Being About Slavery Is Basic History
I feel like we have discussed this ad nauseum. “Southern Pride”, “states rights”, and “northern aggression” are nothing but “alternate facts” spread by white Southerners in the late 1800’s to justify their racist roots and whitewash the history of the true cause of the civil war. It’s called the “Lost Cause of the Confederacy” – an alternate history that’s debunked thoroughly by historians. The money behind this movement is why we have so many monuments to these traitors across America. (And remember folks, when they took up arms against America, they ceased being Americans. Call a Confederate an “American” and you wouldn’t live to tell about it.)
The North didn’t start the Civil War. The South committed the first act of war with their attack on Fort Sumter. The war wasn’t about “states rights”. The South rejected states rights. They insisted that the federal government enforce the Fugitive Slave Law and force Northern states to return their fugitive slave “property” to their Southern “owners” despite state laws protecting them. The Constitution of the Confederacy institutionalized slavery at the federal level, disallowing any state to outlaw slavery if they chose to do so. The South only cared about slaveowner rights, not states rights.
The fact that people still think these “monuments” are erasing history is sad. Anyone is free to start a Jim Crow Museum, or Confederate Six Flags, and whoever wants to go to it is free to go and celebrate that history. But it’s much different to have those symbols of oppression out in public where many people are truly offended by them. They don’t belong in view of people who do not want to have to be subject to witnessing others gaze in reverential awe at them.
The South wasn’t joined in a noble cause. There’s no magic or mirrors here. There is no separate great heritage. It was about racism, brutality, tearing families apart and propping up an economy on the back of free, enforced labor. No more, no less. Stop pretending there’s something mythically great and massively misunderstood about the Confederacy. Confederate Southern leaders made their intentions QUITE clear.
Monuments and Symbols
Symbols and monuments have context and historical meaning. The swastika is an ancient symbol that is now in disuse by all cultures because of how it was used. The flag we all call the “Confederate flag” was brought back into use by the KKK and gained popularity in the 60’s when southern governments began to fly it or add it to their flag in response to forced segregation.
These symbols and characters have their roots deeply entrenched in racism and no amount of whiny crybaby screaming and hissy fits you throw are going to change that. The swastika will always be associated with the Nazis – despite it being used by Hindus for centuries past. Anything associated with the confederacy will always be associated with slavery, segregation, and racism.
