Confederate statue removed from Jacksonville park by city crews overnight

[downtownbrown]

speaking of flawed heros, I don't think I've ever heard of a George S. Patton High School...

[BridgeTroll]

speaking of flawed heros, I don't think I've ever heard of a George S. Patton High School...

California... go figure...
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/california/districts/los-angeles-unified-school-district/george-s-patton-continuation-2576

[Adam White]

speaking of flawed heros, I don't think I've ever heard of a George S. Patton High School...

California... go figure...
https://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/california/districts/los-angeles-unified-school-district/george-s-patton-continuation-2576

Well, he was Californian and was from the area.

[Steve]

I hear you BT where does it end.  I get that some American heroes are flawed and how we remember them is complicated. The confederates roll in the war was specifically Anti-USA so they are in a different category.

I think I can agree to that. To me markers are a very different category-the event that they're marking happened whether we like it or not. The markers also generally don't glorify an event, just note that it happened.

In terms of things named for people: There are VERY few people from history that would be considered "good people" by today's standard. Someone above mentioned the Weavers-who honestly knows. They're almost 80, so they've had a lot of experiences. Maybe Wayne Weaver fired anyone who wanted to join a union (against the law). Maybe 60 years ago he donated to political candidates who favored segregation. Trying to judge a person from another generation based on what is considered acceptable today is not likely to end well.

(to be clear-the hypothetical examples I said about Weaver is entirely made up. I've never met Wayne Weaver and I don't know him outside of the context of owning the Jaguars and their family's charitable contributions).

[Tacachale]

Confederate monuments and memorials are one thing - they were specifically placed to advance a particular view of the war that saw the "cause" as good and/or to take a swipe at African Americans. That's why I don't really get the crusade to go after every thing named for some ostensible bad guy from history. The bridges weren't named as some swipe, they're mostly named for the people who got the money to build them or significant people in Jax history. And the historical markers make even less sense - what the hell are they accomplishing by removing markers about forts, the Union line of demarcation, and the wreck of a Union ship piloted by an escaped slave that's now a national heritage site? This makes absolutely no sense to me.

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

Trying to judge a person from another generation based on what is considered acceptable today is not likely to end well.

Playing DA a bit, but isn't that exactly what we're doing now with the removal of certain statues and renaming of schools?

BT's question earlier is a very valid one:

What about names like Washington and Jefferson?  Cities, monuments, landmarks, and schools are named after them.  How far is everyone willing to go?

[bl8jaxnative]

The Union won the war but lost the insurrection.

[marcuscnelson]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

[Ken_FSU]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

Torch it all, I say.

Things should not be named or placed commemoratively if their namesake was involved in any form of systematic discrimination or oppression.

"Because they've always been called that" isn't a good enough excuse to keep them intact.

What we've been doing since the founding of this country in terms of racial relations clearly hasn't worked.

Time for a change.

[Steve]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

Torch it all, I say.

Things should not be named or placed commemoratively if their namesake was involved in any form of systematic discrimination or oppression.

"Because they've always been called that" isn't a good enough excuse to keep them intact.

What we've been doing since the founding of this country in terms of racial relations clearly hasn't worked.

Time for a change.

Under that, the name of our nation's capital should change too as Washington owned slaves until the day he died as should the monument bearing his name.

I'm not trying to be argumentative - I think it's a legit conundrum. I do thing the difference with the Hemming confederate soldier is that the plaque below it specifically commemorated the confederate troops from Florida that fought against our country.

[Tacachale]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

Torch it all, I say.

Things should not be named or placed commemoratively if their namesake was involved in any form of systematic discrimination or oppression.

"Because they've always been called that" isn't a good enough excuse to keep them intact.

What we've been doing since the founding of this country in terms of racial relations clearly hasn't worked.

Time for a change.

Under that, the name of our nation's capital should change too as Washington owned slaves until the day he died as should the monument bearing his name.

I'm not trying to be argumentative - I think it's a legit conundrum. I do thing the difference with the Hemming confederate soldier is that the plaque below it specifically commemorated the confederate troops from Florida that fought against our country.

The "where does it end" question is absolutely legit in a world where a campaign to remove Confederate monuments leads to historical markers and park signage coming down too. At this rate we're going to have no public memorial of anything bad or controversial that has ever happened, and nothing named for anyone besides maybe Abe Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, and a selection of people active only since about the 50s or 60s.

[BridgeTroll]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

Torch it all, I say.

Things should not be named or placed commemoratively if their namesake was involved in any form of systematic discrimination or oppression.

"Because they've always been called that" isn't a good enough excuse to keep them intact.

What we've been doing since the founding of this country in terms of racial relations clearly hasn't worked.

Time for a change.

Perhaps even school mascots named after and depicting oppressed natives...

[Snaketoz]

I agree with Steve.  Where is this to stop?  Jefferson? Washington? Jackson? Indian "fighters"? VietNam war vets? 

[Tacachale]

We're having a difficult discussion on this kind of thing at UF. There have been a lot of protests calling for buildings like our student union and arena to be renamed because of the history of their namesakes. The Union was named after a university president who helped the Johns Committee hunt down LGBTQ students and faculty. The Arena was named after a university president who forced the withdrawal of dozens of black students seeking acceptance. Then you have residence halls named after the wives of Confederate cabinet members, or famous confederate figures. It's messy.

Torch it all, I say.

Things should not be named or placed commemoratively if their namesake was involved in any form of systematic discrimination or oppression.

"Because they've always been called that" isn't a good enough excuse to keep them intact.

What we've been doing since the founding of this country in terms of racial relations clearly hasn't worked.

Time for a change.

Perhaps even school mascots named after and depicting oppressed natives...

LOL! But that's a good point. The Indian names need to go if the rest of it does.

[Adam White]

I agree with Steve.  Where is this to stop?  Jefferson? Washington? Jackson? Indian "fighters"? VietNam war vets?

It's difficult when it comes to US history, as so many owned slaves; however, I think removing monuments to people who were actively involved in the slave trade makes sense (not sure if there are any in the USA, but we had that over here recently). And removing statues and monuments to unjust wars is a good idea - nothing wrong with memorialising Vietnam war dead, but we shouldn't be celebrating that war.

"Indian" mascots should change. And Jackson was a pretty bad guy - I'd be comfortable with removing references to him.

Might give Jacksonville the chance to re-brand. My friend Jeremy always said Hart City would be his choice - but I think that was because he wanted to rename the Jaguars as the "Hart City Breakers" which is an excellent name, IMO.