Originally Posted by Lisnaholic

When I first saw a news item about a Charlotteville statue and a group protesting its removal, I didn't imagine how things would escalate.

There's no turning back the clock, but imo the decision to remove Robert E. Lee's statue was a mistake from the start. After all, many people commemorated in statues have caused death and destruction; should they all be taken down? If anything, in multi-cultural societies, we should be putting statues up and if people are uneasy about glorifying Robert E. Lee, wouldn't it have been better to strike a balance by adding a statue of Frederick Douglass or some local equivalent as well?

Sad and alarming on lots of levels, the spiral of violence in Charlotteville has also obscured the original issue.