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Identity politics

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Comparing Robert E. Lee to George Washington also reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of the issues at stake. The reason to remove statues of Confederate generals like Lee and Jackson isn’t to erase unpleasant history, which is what he argues when he says Washington was “a major slave owner.” Those statues weren’t placed as historical markers. The vast majority were erected decades after the end of the Civil War, built to valorize the Confederacy and mark the establishment of Jim Crow. It’s no accident they were placed in parks and other prominent spaces near courthouses and seats of government. They marked and memorialized white supremacy, and served as a warning to anyone—black or white—who would challenge it. Confederate “heroes” like Robert E. Lee hold no historical significance outside the Confederacy and the myth of the “Lost Cause.” To erect monuments in their honor is to celebrate both.

It should also be said that there is no equivalence between those who march for white denomination and ethnic cleansing and those who march against them. To suggest otherwise isn’t just wrong; it’s obscene—a failure of morality and decency. And Trump isn’t alone in that failure. Turn to the Wall Street Journal and you’ll find the editorial board equating white racists to advocates for racial justice and transgender rights. Turn to the New York Times opinion section and you’ll find the same. At the American Conservative, a similar sleight of hand tries to argue that liberal “identity politics” is responsible for white nationalism, and that minority Americans’ asserting of their humanity is the reason some people turn to white supremacy, as if otherwise it wouldn’t exist.