Discussion Over Removal of Confederate Statue Went Off The Rails

“Damn dirty black b*stard”, university alum, Everett Corley, called a Louisville professor Jones in a Facebook post.

The panelists of the debate that was held on Wednesday over whether to remove Louisville’s Confederate monument or not, during an intense discussion on race, slavery and the city’s changing demographics, analysed the history and meaning of the monument.

The President of the University of Liousville James Ramsey and Mayor Greg Fischer made their plans to relocate the 121-year-old statue on April 29. This was just some few days after an African-American professor, Ricky Jones, penned an Op-ed calling for it’s total removal.

“For 20 years, I have walked by that towering granite and bronze eyesore glorifying the nadir of America’s past. For 20 years, I have listened to cries for its removal,” Ricky Jones, Louisville professor and chair of Pan-African Studies, wrote for the Courier-Journal. “For 20 years, we have been plagued by confusion, compromises, excuses and half measures. One hundred twenty-one years is too long. Twenty years is too long. Twenty more weeks is too long. We’ve waited long enough. It’s time for the statue to go.”

Jones, in his statement said  the monument doesn’t teach history but rather celebrates slave owners and others who fought to keep that system in place.

“If I had my druthers, every Confederate monument, memorial, statue in this country would be taken and sank to the bottom of the Pacific or Atlantic,” he said.

But when university alumnus, Everett Corley, was given the stage, he testified of how the monument was an important part of his school days. He moved forward in his resistance to the removal and called professor “Damn dirty black b*stard” in a Facebook post.

“This monument could have been here for the next 200 years and no harm would have been done to anyone,” Corley said at the hearing.

After the debate, Coley said in an interview that his comments were inexcusable and apologized to Jones.

“I oppose moving anything that helps us remember how complex this issue of slavery was and how it still affects and divides us,” Martina Kunnecke, African-American president of the Neighborhood Planning & Preservation, said in her statement.

After all said and done, all three panelists said they were OK with the moving of the Confederate monument to another site of the city.

A change.org petition was proposed to replace the Confederate statue with one of the late three-time heavy weight champion Muhammad Ali.

“Since UofL has decided to remove the blight that is the Confederate statue on campus, what better to replace it than a statue in memory of Louisville’s greatest son, Muhammad Ali,” the petition reads. Over 2,500 people have signed the online petition.

How can black people believe in equality in this country when it still continues to praise slavery and white supremacy on public? All the Confederate symbols should be treated as a hate manifestation and they should be removed from every public place.

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