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Of: TT
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Photo: Jack Mayer / AP / TT
The statue of the Southern State General Robert E Lee rises from its podium.
Out with Southern General Robert E Lee. With civil rights pioneer Barbara Johns. The matter of the black lives of the year 2020 ends with a stone statue full of symbols in the Congress of the United States.
For more than 100 years, the statue of Robert E Lee, the Commander-in-Chief of the Confederacy during the American Civil War, has represented Virginia in the United States Congress. But since Monday, the general’s podium is empty. This since the state requested to perform a balance.
“The Confederacy is a symbol of the racist and polarizing history of Virginia. It is time to speak of ourselves with images of perseverance, diversity and inclusion,” Virginia Governor Ralph Notham said in a statement.
The General of the South will be replaced by Barbara Johns, one of the pioneers of the American civil rights movement. When he was 16, Johns saw how many more resources the neighboring school for white children received compared to his own and led protests against Virginia’s segregated school system, reports NPR.
Symboltyngt whore
The statue’s rock marks the symbolic end of a year in which the Black Lives Matter Movement pressured the United States to take a closer look at both its past and its contemporaries.
The protests, which have been gaining momentum since the white police assassinated the black George Floyd in May, amounted to more than police violence against minorities. Better living conditions, economic justice and political influence were also called for.
But much of the discussion centered on historical monuments. In October, the US public service outlet NPR estimated that 60 state statues had been removed from the South following political decisions. Additionally, at least a dozen, in what became a global trend, have been toppled during anti-racist protests.
Racist surveillance
As metoo did in 2017, the lives of blacks have also forced the media to examine themselves. It has been about the evaluation of the news, the representation in the newsrooms and, in some cases, the recognition of one’s own prejudices.
On Sunday, the Kansas City Star, where Ernest Hemingway once worked as a reporter, published an apology for what it called decades of racist coverage.
“For 140 years, the magazine has been one of the most influential players shaping Kansas City and the region. Yet it marginalized, ignored, and mocked, both for what was said and not, to generations. of black Kansas residents, “writes editor-in-chief Mike Fannin. .
Resistance from the highest place
But 2020 also made it clear that the United States remains a divided country where the struggle for historiography still continues. The fallen statues in particular have stirred emotions, even in the highest political place.
“We will never allow angry crowds to topple our statues, destroy our history, indoctrinate our children or trample our freedoms,” thundered President Donald Trump on America’s National Day on July 4.
In the case of Robert E Lee, however, the outgoing president does not have to worry about cultural destruction. The statue will have a new home at the Virginia Museum of History, the governor’s office announced.
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