Paul R. Lehman, Trump and Goldberg uninformed on Confederacy monument removal

August 24, 2017 at 2:52 pm | Posted in African American, American Bigotry, American history, Baltimore, Bigotry in America, blacks, Catherine Pugh, criminal activity, Criticism, Democrats, discrimination, Disrespect, equality, Ethnicity in America, European American, European Americans, extremists, fairness, justice, justice system, language, law, Leftists, Media and Race, political power, politicians, Prejudice, President Trump, protest, Race in America, racism, respect, Slavery, social justice system, The Oklahoman, The U.S. Constitution, whites | Leave a comment

A Bernard Goldberg commentary “Where Does current Movement End?  Question posed by Trump is one worth considering,” (The Oklahoman 8/23/17) gave pause for concern. The part of the title is a question that President Trump asked while making comments relative to the Charlottesville protest recently. The second part of the title makes the statement that the question was worth asking. For someone knowledgeable of history both question and statement would seem disingenuous. Nonetheless, we will examine both concerns as best we can.

Goldberg begins his comments by relating an incident from his youth, the 1960s when his family drove South from New Jersey to Florida. He recalls his reaction to his father stopping at a restaurant that feathered a “Whites only” sign by refusing to go in and eat. His family decided not to eat there. From this experience, Goldberg makes the statement that “My parents weren’t bigots. They were appalled at what they saw on TV coming out of places like Mississippi and Alabama.”Goldberg still does not realize that all Americans, European Americans, as well as African Americans, were conditioned to see bigotry as something natural. One wonders why Goldberg chose the South to use as an example of ethnic bigotry when he could have just as easily selected any part of New Jersey with its isolated ethnic populated communities. That is, of course, unless he did not live in a segregated community, attend a segregated school, worship in a segregated church, which he possible could have. But one thing was clear from his story; he and his family saw themselves as white. As a white person in America, viewing people of color as inferior was natural and commonly accepted by whites. That conditioning allows European Americans North and South to see bigotry in others, but not in themselves. That might be why Goldberg could say that his parents were not bigots.

He subsequently, made the comment that a case can be made for Trump asking the question: “Where does it end?” He continued: Is taking down a statue of Robert E. Lee or Stonewall Jackson or Jefferson Davis enough?” Goldberg, evidently, does not understand the reasons for removing the statues and monuments in the first place. New Orléans major, Mitch Landrieu,  offered a host of reasons for the removal, for example, he noted that “ New Orleans was America’s largest slave market: a port where hundreds of thousands of souls were brought, sold and shipped up the Mississippi River to lives of forced labor of misery of rape, of torture.” He added that “America was the place where nearly 4,000 of our fellow citizens were lynched, 540 alone in Louisiana; where the courts enshrined ‘separate but equal’; where Freedom riders coming to New Orleans were beaten to a bloody pulp.”Speaking specifically regarding the monuments he stated: “So when people say to me that the monuments in question are history, well what I just described is real history as well, and it is the searing truth.”

In addition to Mayor Landrieu, Baltimore, Maryland, mayor Catherine Pugh, had several statutes removed under the cover of darkness to avoid protesters and possible violence. One statue was “A monument of Taney, the supreme court justice who oversaw the 1857 Dred Scott case declaring that black people could not be American citizens, was to Pugh particularly disgraceful. She remarked: “How does a statue like that, a supreme court judge who oversaw the Dred Scott case, even exist? Why does someone like that even deserve a statue? Why should people have to feel that kind of pain every day?”Many other local and state officials have joined the movement to remove the offensive statues and monuments.

Goldberg shows his bias when he posed the question: “Is that where it ends—with a mob deciding what statues stay and which one go?” Evidently, Goldberg has not been watching or reading the news reports of how the mayors in several Southern cities decided to remove some statues honoring Confederate men. The references to two mayors of two major cities should more than underscore who makes the decisions to remove the statues and monuments. Why would Goldberg think the decisions are made by mobs? If Goldberg and Trump fully understood the reason for the movement of remove the statues and monuments, the question of “where does the movement end” turns rhetorical. The movement has its bases in history, not conjecture or assumed notions of correcting a wrong. The wrongs committed cannot be correct, but a constant reminder wrongs perpetrated against a people can be removed.

Another of Goldberg’s comments seems to go beyond the boundaries of common sense and logic: “Asking who’s next and where does it end doesn’t make you a white supremacist, or even unreasonable.” One would hope that before questions of the nature posed that a working knowledge of the movement in question might be acquired. Asking questions would never make a person anything by seems informed or uninformed about the subject matter. The answer to the question “who’s next” would depend on whose asking the question and what Confederate statue or monument is being considered. The history of the statue or monument relative to the time and place it occupies and why it was erected. A question important to the significance of the statue or monument would be does this monument honor the Confederacy or reflect some aspect of ethnic bigotry? In any case its presence on public property would be of concern.

What Goldberg seems to suggest is that the people who find the monuments the Confederacy offensive and sensitive are somehow taking their 1st Amendment rights too far. He added: “Leftist already shut down speech they don’t like on college campuses, including public universities funded by taxpayers. Is it such a stretch to silence people we detest from the public square?” Identifying but not defining some people as “Leftists,”  Goldberg, apparently, believe these people go about indiscriminately creating and causing problems simply because they do not like something. Also, why would he think these people are not taxpayers? Goldberg totally missed the point of the movement and its proponents and it shows in his uninformed comments and questions. Most people in the movement do not want to silence anyone, but they do want to exercise their rights to protest and seek to remove anything that historically has been shown to be offensive and hurtful to them and other citizens.

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