I’ve been thinking a lot
about Robert E. Lee. We have a
Robert E. Lee problem. We don’t
think of Robert E. Lee as the guy who led the fight to keep black people
enslaved. We remember him with a
sort of apologetic romance—the guy who was personally opposed* to slavery, but
could not take up arms against his beloved Virginia, who would rather oppose
the Union than sacrifice his sacred Southern honor. We felt sorry that he died without his American citizenship
restored, so our Congress posthumously awarded it to him in 1975. Bless his heart.
What is that all
about? I don’t feel sorry for this
guy. He used that classic “but
it’s the Southern way of life” line to excuse some pretty awful shit. I’m glad they turned his family’s
ancestral home into the premier cemetery for the war’s dead.
At the outbreak of the
Civil War, Robert E. Lee was faced with a serious moral decision—fight for your
country against slavery and your home or fight for slavery and your home against your country. The item that defines the morality of
that decision is slavery, but the item that steered General Lee was his
home. A sentimental choice? Yes. A morally correct choice? No. He picked
the wrong side. I see no honor,
Southern or otherwise, in his choice.
Why am I going on about
this? This is not an argument
about the statues. Take them down,
get over it, assholes. Chances
are, your beloved statue got put up by white people trying to assert their dominance over bIack people during Jim Crow or the civil rights era. Is that the heritage you want to
celebrate? Congrats. I’m talking about the morality of our
choices. Many of us chose to vote
for a man who now (unsurprisingly to others of us) cannot whole-heartedly
disavow white supremacists and anti-Semites. A man who declared there were “fine people” in the group
that marched into town wielding torches and chanting “Jews will not replace
us.” Friends and family who voted
for this man, can you condone this? What are the limits of our excuses for vile
behavior? for race-baiting and dog-whistling? Will we not stand up while he
perverts our democratic values?
while he spits on the sacrifices made by our grandparents to defeat
Nazis and fascism?
I ask you to think about
what defines the morality of your choice to condone or disavow the words of
this man. I’ll give you some
hints: it’s not your party affiliation, it’s not the “alt-left”, it’s not your
pride, it’s not how much you hate Hillary Clinton. None of that will justify (or has ever justified) your
choice to support him. The
defining element of Donald Trump is the hatred he spews and promotes. If you
support him and condone his words, you are complicit in his hatemongering.
-
One of my biggest
regrets about Hillary Clinton’s campaign is that she did not double down on her
“deplorables” comment, referring to that contingent of Trump voters. She wasn’t wrong and it wasn’t a
mistake. I wish she had said to
the squeamish Trump voter, “I dare you to tell me those people who would resurrect
the KKK and who would dare to carry a swastika are not deplorable. Do you want to be in their camp?” You didn’t believe it then, but it’s
still true—you’re in their camp.
And they are making the
rules. How long do you want to stick around?
I promise next post will not be so doom and gloom. Maybe we will explore possible reasons my dentist and I always end up talking about prison. (?? it's so weird.)
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