(07-05-2020 03:52 PM)Rice93 Wrote:  

(07-05-2020 03:27 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(07-05-2020 03:22 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  

(07-05-2020 03:14 PM)OptimisticOwl Wrote:  

(07-05-2020 03:09 PM)RiceLad15 Wrote:  We are apparently moving too slowly via legislative avenues, and an unruly populace is taking matters into their own hands.

Do you support or oppose the unruly populace taking things into their own hands?

I oppose.

I oppose it - I would much prefer people on all sides push for change through legal avenues to address the issues they have.

We have seen, throughout history, that populations eventually take matters into their own hands when their elected (or unelected) leaders don’t listen. This seems to be a situation where a lot of people have felt they weren’t listened to so they’ve decided to act, for better or worse.

I am sure there must have been a time or two when they tried legal means first, but I sure cannot think of one.

But being listened to is not the same as getting your way. Suppose you get this measure on a ballot and the voters say keep the statues, 55% to 45%. Have you been listened to? Or is it time to rally the mob and just do whatever the heck you want?

Suppression of the black vote would likely play into the feelings that simply "voting out" these confederate statues may be difficult.

To answer your question, I oppose pulling down these statues during protests. It becomes a slippery slope of mob rule "OK... now who should we tear down?". I would rather that the exploration of legal avenues continue. I am flummoxed, though, as to why it is 2020 and there are still statues that celebrate the Confederacy that were erected in black neighborhoods in order to intimidate black people. That's really gross, IMO.

If you get really interested in the subject, Mitch Landrieu, former mayor of NOLA, wrote a book In the Shadow of Statues: A White Southerner Confronts History

(He's a Dem and a politician. Comes from family fairly infested with Dems. Be careful, could be two steps from the Little Red Book.)

Shorter version, his speech on the subject: Landrieu's speech