To: Mayor Levar Stoney, Mayor of Richmond, Virginia and Governor Ralph Northam
Remove Confederate Statues in Richmond, VA
Establishing monuments to Confederates, in turn, celebrates men who committed treason and sought to break the nation apart in the name of slavery.
Why is this important?
At this point in time, these Confederate statues in our city of Richmond and in the state of Virginia as a whole, are only serving as locations for violent fringe groups (KKK, Neo-Nazi groups, Confederate groups, White Supremacist groups) to gather and express their hate for unity and inclusion among our citizens. Their rallies are meant to terrorize our communities and divide us in our efforts to establish equality for every citizen, and more importantly, provide safe communities for every citizen to dwell.
We did not need statues to educate about the Holocaust, nor do we need statues to educate about the Civil War - this war was about perpetuating the institution of slavery for economic gain in the southern states - it was about violating the most basic human rights of Africans in viewing them as property.
A timeline of the genesis of the Confederate sites shows two notable spikes. One comes around the turn of the 20th century, just after Plessy v. Ferguson, and just as many Southern states were establishing repressive race laws; lynchings and the KKK terrorism were peaking. The second runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s—the peak of the civil-rights movement. In other words, the erection of Confederate monuments has been a way to perform cultural resistance to black equality.
The time is long overdue that we address the problem of these domestic terrorist groups that have been in this country for decade upon decade. One of the easiest things to do is to take away their places of congregating - these Confederate statues. Remove these statues and either put them in museums, auction them off and use the funds for our city, or destroy them. Do not give these domestic terrorist groups any more locations to assemble and terrorize our communities.
We did not need statues to educate about the Holocaust, nor do we need statues to educate about the Civil War - this war was about perpetuating the institution of slavery for economic gain in the southern states - it was about violating the most basic human rights of Africans in viewing them as property.
A timeline of the genesis of the Confederate sites shows two notable spikes. One comes around the turn of the 20th century, just after Plessy v. Ferguson, and just as many Southern states were establishing repressive race laws; lynchings and the KKK terrorism were peaking. The second runs from the mid-1950s to the mid-1960s—the peak of the civil-rights movement. In other words, the erection of Confederate monuments has been a way to perform cultural resistance to black equality.
The time is long overdue that we address the problem of these domestic terrorist groups that have been in this country for decade upon decade. One of the easiest things to do is to take away their places of congregating - these Confederate statues. Remove these statues and either put them in museums, auction them off and use the funds for our city, or destroy them. Do not give these domestic terrorist groups any more locations to assemble and terrorize our communities.