Racial Justice and History

I have just finished texting with one of my conservative friends after he read my previous blog. He gave me a lot to think about. I also just read a great statement from W&L’s president. It is worth reading. It is measured, thoughtful, but most importantly, lucid. The content of W&L’s statement and my friend’s text chain called me to write this. I have to get this off of my chest.

It would be easy for W&L to bend to current pressure and just change the name.  However, W&L would not be the fine institution it is today without both George Washington or Robert E. Lee’s contributions.  How do we honor those that have come before us that deserve to be honored while recognizing that they lived in times unlike our own and that, like us, had human flaws. Just because some group co-opts a person’s image or name as a symbol for their own unjust cause does not mean that the person’s name or image being co-opted should no longer be associated with all the good deeds that person accomplished.

Using current “victim centered and narrow minded thinking” I could argue that King David in the Old Testament and Paul in the New Testament should be banned from the teachings in the Bible. They were flawed human beings that arguably were directly responsible for hurting more people than Washington or Lee.  This current movement of eliminating any reference to any person who may have done something in their past that points to a flaw is a very slippery slope that we are traveling down. We need to move forward. History is a great teacher with lessons to teach. History is not a preacher telling us how we should live our lives today.