Ostensibly, the fascist rally in Charlottesville took place because people were upset that a monument of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was to be removed.
Knowing what we do about Robert E. Lee, that he was by all accounts (Union included) a gentleman and brilliant strategist, he would have been ashamed and appalled by the motley crew of violent, racist, anti-Semitic haters who gathered to protest in his name.
We say “ostensibly,” because it appears that these haters saw this rally less as a concern for history and more as an opportunity to spew hate. That, however, does not negate the very real question of how to treat Confederate history. There are many US citizens who are descendants of Confederates, and the Confederacy played a key role in American history.
For those who have visited Eastern Europe, the answer might reside there. When considering how to treat a defunct government, there can be no better example than the former communist countries, especially because they loved to build bombastic statues and monuments, far more imposing than the elegant Lee astride his steed.
In Eastern Europe, one finds whole parks dedicated to the collection and display of monuments of a different time. No doubt, the feeling walking amidst Lenins and Stalins is eerie, not to say anachronistic, but how else should touring a no longer extant political and social way of life feel? These parks, while admittedly kitschy, serve an important purpose. They are testaments to the elemental mistakes of history.
They are more powerful than traditional museums, as the monuments are situated in the natural environment, outdoors, for all to see.
The mayor of present day Richmond, Virginia, Levar Stoney, has a similar idea. His solution is to keep the Confederate statues where they are, but to contextualize and explain them. To remove these statues, he rightly observes, will not remove the stain on history that they represent. The Confederacy happened; it cannot be pretended away. Stoney is an African-American mayor of the former Confederate capital. That should lend his voice serious credibility. His solution combines the virtues of historical accuracy and high moral values. It is precisely the public presence of these monuments that makes both possible.
The Eastern European solution gathers and retains the communist monuments but simultaneously removes them from everyday life, firmly placing them in the realm of the “past,” to the exclusion of the present humanitarian values. There remains this critical difference, however: While there is some nostalgia for the old communist system, most Eastern Europeans have no interest in turning back the clock; the monuments are what they are: purely historical. In the American South, the march and car-ramming in Charlottesville disturbingly demonstrated that some Americans would turn back the clock. They would revert to a racially determined society and economy.
Thus, there is a danger that Confederate statues, as centerpieces in a historical park, could turn them into shrines, supplanting their intended character as emblems of the mistakes of history. Still, with sufficient educational content and community buy in, these parks could allow us to confront and condemn the Confederate crisis that once almost sundered our country — so that it remain whole now.
Copyright © 2017 by the Intermountain Jewish News
