iblis666 said:
ollieoz17 said:
God I can't help but completely agree with you that the confederacy needs to be demonized to an extreme extent. I've family in the south and they are all about the southern gentlemen and romanticizing the confederacy and it drives me insane every time i have to talk to them. Really its gotten to the point where when ever i even think of the confederacy i start to wish that General Sherman had done a better job of burning the south.
Lol. I'm not sure if I even need to comment on this statement, but I couldn't resist:
"Yes these assholes romanticize about their lost cause as if they were the victims of some sort of oppression. What a bunch of dumbasses! Sherman should have done a better job slaughtering them."
I can't help but laugh at the smug sense of moral superiority displayed by those who revel in the idea of the south being burnt and its people butchered.
iblis666 said:
though Lincoln may have wanted to free the slaves he was still a product of his time and the racism that might entail. But it is interesting to note that if he hadnt been assassinated he would have started shipping the freed slave back to africa or at least thats what the history channel says.
There's decent evidence to suggest that although Lincoln hated slavery as a moral wrong, he was also convinced that white and black people weren't equals and seemed to think that they couldn't coexist in the same society. The aspect of Lincoln that people
really don't want to mention is his stance towards Native Americans, which was more or less genocidal.
The fact that we basically worship the president whose election and subsequent actions directly lead to a civil war that killed 600,000 Americans is beyond my comprehension. The Lincoln memorial has Lincoln
sitting on a goddamn throne made out of Roman fasces (the signs of imperium). IT IS DIRECTLY COMPARING HIM TO A ROMAN EMPEROR. You might as well put a goddamn laurel on his head. Though I guess it's only fitting considering he basically seized
imperium when he suspended the writ of
habeas corpus and started throwing journalists in jail.
This is not to say that I want to completely demonize him either; I just want history to be an objective reflection upon past states of affairs, and not a fairy tale that is blatantly used as propaganda to promote mindless nationalism. Guess I've got high hopes.
I can't stand the propaganda on either sides. Anyone who pretends that the Confederacy wasn't politically run by the slave-owners and that the primary reason why they seceded was slavery is just plain crazy. But anyone who thinks that the average southern soldier was a baby eating monster is also an idiot.
The political machinations of both the North and the South were run by business: the slave owners hated the tariffs placed upon them by the northern dominated congress and were obviously afraid that slavery would be outlawed, and the northern industrialists wanted the south to be economically subservient so that they can keep buying and selling goods with them at huge profits.
I already explained by position in reply to ollieoz17:
ReiverCorrupter said:
My point is this. The Civil War should be remembered as a brutal tragedy where 600,000 people lost their lives for a business dispute between two wealthy classes. Both sides should be portrayed for what they actually were: armies of brave men who fought and died for what they believed in because of political corruption. Southern soldiers fought to protect their homes, the politicians like Jeff Davis seceded to protect slavery. Woe upon the man who would judge the soldiers fighting in a war by the politicians who started it.
Southerners have a right to be upset because their country was essentially destroyed and never rebuilt. But they certainly shouldn't go claiming that their cause was pure and just. They should focus less on the cause and more upon the brave sacrifice of their soldiers. That is what should be remembered fondly. The fact that the soldiers on both sides were deluded just makes it all the more tragic.
As Nietzsche put it, "it is not the cause that justifies the war, but the war that justifies the cause."
The fact that politicians are contorting history to fit their agendas sickens me. The south had a right to secede, but it certainly didn't do so for morally righteous reason. Pretending that it was all about state's rights and had nothing to do with slavery so that the republicans and tea party-ers can use it to demonize the democrats is tantamount to pissing on the graves of Confederate soldiers.