Getting facts of history right includes editorial
The June 26 "Statues of Limitation" editorial questions the opinion of a professor of history at Boston University. This professor states the increase of Confederate monuments in the late 1800s and early 1900s attempts to "give a certain legitimacy to the history behind the Confederate monuments which was, in fact, a totally false version of history."
The editorial then repeats the last four words of the quote as if befuddled by the idea, then the editorial goes on to state, "We don't know the false version of history to which she refers. History is based on facts."
That the editorial writers do not "know the facts of history" regarding Confederate statues is in no small way a part of the problem regarding the factual history of racism in the un-United States! I suggest the editorial board read Mitch Landrieu's book "In The Shadow of Statues: A White Southerner Confronts History."
Mitch Landrieu was the mayor of New Orleans for eight years and lieutenant governor of Louisiana for six years. His confrontation of his own history was an eye-opener ... [on] the reality of "the false version of history" promoted by what historians like Dr. Nina Silber at Boston University refer to as "The Cult of the Lost Cause."
The editorial made the valid point that "history is based on facts," but it would be very beneficial to Democrat-Gazette readers if time had been taken to research ... what connects the Confederate monuments to the propagation of a history that is short of the facts.
One quote from Landrieu's commendable work sums up the lack of factual history that most white folks, like myself, were taught at schools across the nation and propagated by mis-directed patriotism and unrecognized, but well-utilized, racial supremacy: "As I read more about the Lost Cause, I was shocked to realize how much I had not learned about the War Between the States ... the idea made pervasive by Lost Cause adherents -- that the war had never been about slavery, but defining regional integrity."
The statues need to come down because we need to get the facts of history right and ask ourselves more honest questions: Why should the country erect monuments that support a "totally false version of history," a version that defended slavery, people owning people who were not considered worthy of "liberty and justice" at all. I suggest if you "don't know," then be humble enough to find out before you (unwittingly or purposefully?) propagate a false version of the facts concerning our history.
Robbie F. Castleman
Siloam Springs