That's not the republican (form of government, not political party) way, brainbomb. A republic is made to protect those with all beliefs, not just the majority one.

Also, Adolf Hitler has no place in American history, nor would I support building a new statue of any Confederate figure. The current statues have existed for hundreds of years.

Im thrilled leon1122 has returned to take a principled semi pro hitler semi pro slavery stance.

Its deloghtfully just articulated enough to make liberals look totalitarian while semi endorsing the highest forms of evil our PLANET has ever seen.

@Leon

Censoring free speech is one thing. Tearing down offensive statues is another. For once, I agree with brainbomb when he says: "But as long as the statue is ripped down no one will ever dare to think this was something to honor or revere." It doesn't matter how long the statue has existed. Keeping it for that reason is the logical fallacy of tradition, or whatever it is called.

White supremacists need to get to work gerrymandering city councils or else their history will be lost forever. So sad.

Unless you start censoring and editing the history books like.... TEXAS or you start omitting historical facts theres no way the truth ever dies. One statue is nothing compared to a library full of evidence.

People stare at a monument and get confused thinking it must be a moment of reverence like the vietnam memorial, mount rushmore, washington monument, abe lincolns statue, ect ect.

But then throw in a statue of an arbitrary southern pro slavery civil war commander. What do you leave thinking?
(Should the southern way of life persist? Is slavery wrong? Was he a bad guy? Was he a bad guy for supportimg slavery?)

The problem with this is nothing positive is concluded unless you say "man these people were horrible! I hope we never do this".

Realistically what are the odds 100% of people walk away from a pro slavery monument and conclude my point?

If you love the notion of liberty but also love free speech then you must love speech which destroys liberty especially if its someone other than you.

On the other hand, the criminality of "incitement to hatred" (it exists in Croatia too) is an idiocy and a direct attack on free speech. If someone is a racist, that person should be free to express his or her racism so that everyone else knows who they're dealing with.

I don't care if Confederate statues are on private property, but I don't think state or municipal governments should harbor symbols of traitors on public lands.

Especially if those traitors were traitors on behalf of slavery.

Racism will always exist. But fucking monuments that remind people why slavery was great will never provide a net positive for descendants of slaves living here who deserve the same protection of life liberty and pursuit of happiness. If you fight harder for statues of slave owners than you do for current living black people - you are a racist.

"Its deloghtfully just articulated enough to make liberals look totalitarian while semi endorsing the highest forms of evil our PLANET has ever seen."

That's because you are a totalitarian.

"Unless you start censoring and editing the history books"

I agree. When is the last time you read about slavery in the Ottoman Empire that enslaved at least 4 million Europeans? No, Americans are uniquely evil and must be taught to hate USA.

There is nothing to fight for black people today. They are on more than equal footing compared to basically any other race except possibly Hispanics.

@TrPrado

"Traitors" is a vague word. Was General Lee a traitor? I think such matters should be considered on a case-by-case basis. For example, one might argue for a statue of Rommel, who was a great soldier and a great man (he doesn't have a statue AFAIK), and against a statue of "Bomber Harris", who obliterated Dresden and dozens of other German cities, killing half a million civilians (he has a statue in England, unveiled by Queen Mother).

"Im thrilled leon1122 has returned"

Thank you. This place has become too much of a left wing echo chamber, so I decided to spice things up.

lel

"There is nothing to fight for black people today. They are on more than equal footing compared to basically any other race except possibly Hispanics."

Oh my goodness.

Did you hear how black students at UC Santa Cruz decided to take over an administration building demanding that they be allowed to segregate themselves? Talk about privilege.

Who cares what one group of lunatics do. Dont be them. What is your point?

There wont be a statue commemorating some people at UC Santa Cruz who had a convoluted idea of liberty. But there will be always ever standing statues of civil war commanders who owned slaves or defended someones right to own slaves.

The reason why you are fucked up is youll staunchly defend complete douchebags in the name of liberty becuase its "history".

But youlll condemn and berate modern day fighters of equality as being thugs that history ought to remember disgracefully

@brainbomb

"The reason why you are fucked up..."

And you will be surprised when he doesn't want to discuss things seriously with you.

I did. But its so morbidly obtuse that Andy Dufrene would hamg himself

"Who cares what one group of lunatics do. Dont be them. What is your point?"

I was responding to ghug, who apparently thinks that blacks are some disadvantaged group.

"But youlll condemn and berate modern day fighters of equality as being thugs that history ought to remember disgracefully"

When is the last time you heard of a conservative using violence or otherwise breaking the law to preserve a statue. Leftists use those tactics all the time. Oh, and they don't fight for "equality". They fight for a privileged status as well as insanity.

"And you will be surprised when he doesn't want to discuss things seriously with you."

Don't worry. Brainbomb's emotions reveal him to be an irrational person.

Getting back to Leon's initial post in this thread, I'd ask what's his point ?" ( apart from a bit of casual trolling )
Freedoms of speech and expression are NOT unlimited freedoms, and deviously misrepresenting "freedom of speech" as such is just shoddy disingenuity. Slander, defamation & libel laws , restrictions that prevent people from using "freedom of speech" and "freedom of religious/political expression"/to incite violence or hatred; these are common and widely accepted limits to "freedom of speech and expression".
Discussion and study within Germany of the history of the German Nazi regime is not forbidden, it is allowed and is often part of approved curriculums at German schools and universities. What the German nation is not going to tolerate is any "revisionism" that tries to deny historical truth and fact about the German Nazi regime and in particular, the Holocaust.
Darling Leon, if you choose to assert that the "right to freedom of speech" is unreasonably restricted by sensible limits that prohibit slander, defamation, libel, incitement of violence and hatred, then that is your choice. Just don't expect much support, expect ridicule. That's what such risible nonsense deserves.

1. Should we rip down every statue to George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, etc? They owned slaves?
2. Should we go ahead and rip down and burn and deface and destroy the American flag? The American flag flew over slavery for far longer than the Confederate flag did.
3. Yes the South was beaten, but only one country on Earth (to my knowledge) allowed a defeated rebellious group to build statues to commemorate the fallen. That was an act of coming together, to memorialize and remember the fallen of the war. It was a great and symbolic moment in American history. Now, people like... some.. in this thread want to just throw that in the trashcan and censor memorials because it offends them. Those type of people are true sickos.
4. Anyone who calls for the removal of a statue or war memorial is an authoritarian, borderline thought police fascist, and a censor. They are nothing more than Soviet era, authoritarian, pencil pushing censors.
5. Just because a community has a confederate war memorial does not mean that community is "racist" it may simply (and almost always does mean) that people there want to remember and commemorate the fallen of the war. They are proud Americans like all of us. Just because they are different from you doesn't mean they are racists. It just means they are different and we should be a welcome and open society where all view points are allowed (not censored). If you want censorship go to North Korea, you will fit in just fine, if you aren't sent to the gulag.

Slander and defamation apply to individuals. Broad statements are protected political speech. Incitement of violence causes direct physical harm and is rightfully forbidden. "Hate speech" is not a widely accepted limit to free speech as you say. People are free to hate who they want. Do you hate Hitler? Wow, you should go to jail. It is not the place of government to decide who and why people can hate.

@MajorMitchell

"sensible limits that prohibit slander, defamation, libel, incitement of violence and hatred"

There is the bothersome fact that those limits can be quite insensible. To take a concrete example: in my homeland, it is prohibited to wear fascist insignia. However, the "sensible limit" includes only Italian fascism and German nazism. It does not include communist insignia, even though communism was every bit as fascist as anything Mussolini devised. It is very very easy even for legislators to have double standards depending on what their parents believed in. That's why "sensibility" is a very suspicious yardstick for such matters.

@ND, the reason Washington and Jefferson memorials are tolerated is because it is commonly understood that they stand for National virtues even though they are flawed individuals. Conversely, statues of Beauregard or Stonewall Jackson stand only for rebellion. There's no national virtue in that -- not in the *United States*.

That depends on your point of view. Lots of black nationalists hold negative views of Washington and Jefferson, whereas Confederate figures can also be seen as symbols of a bygone culture of independence and States' rights. Rebellion is very much an American values seeing as America obtained its own independence that way.