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Canceling The Confederacy

Rachel Scott Everett | February 1, 2021

Topics: branding, Confederate monuments, EVERGIB, George Floyd, Marcus-David Peters Circle, Robert E. Lee Monument, Virginia Flaggers

Dismantling the Confederacy’s legacy as one of the most ubiquitous brands in American history is not easy. But, as Rachel Scott Everett writes, progress is finally being made.

On July 1, 2020, I stood with hundreds of masked observers to witness history in my hometown of Richmond, Virginia: the official removal of the first Confederate statue in our city.

A deluge of rain poured down, but spectators didn’t budge. We watched as a crane plucked a century-old bronze statue of Confederate general Stonewall Jackson from its 20-foot pedestal on Monument Avenue. Immediately at lift-off, I felt a momentous shift take place. The crowd erupted in cheers and applause. Church bells tolled. Even the heavens offered a resounding approval with a loud clap of thunder.

This wasn’t just the removal of a statue. It was the elimination of a powerful symbol — a visual representation of a belief system with its own narrative, distinct set of values, and unique personality; in short, a successful brand. 

Having spent more than a decade working at ad agencies creating campaigns for national and global companies, I’ve seen firsthand the influence that brands have on people — for better and for worse.

Consider some of the top brands out there and the messaging they invoke.

Coke invites us to “Taste the feeling,” Apple inspires us to “Think different,” and of course, Nike motivates us to “Just do it.” These brands make us feel something, strongly and viscerally. In fact, our emotions play a big role in why we buy a brand’s products and services. It’s also how we inadvertently become “brand ambassadors.” People see our advocacy in the choices we make — what we drink, the phone we use, the clothes we wear, the conversations we have, even the posts we like on social media. 

The same holds true when a person, such as a celebrity or global figure, becomes a brand. Their audience, in the form of fans or followers, become unofficial spokespeople. It’s why a red MAGA hat denotes so much more than a political party. It says to the world that you not only support that particular individual, but you believe in what they do, stand for what they stand for, and subscribe to their ideology.

Branding is an effective marketing tool because it taps deep into our psyche, often without our realizing it.

It can confirm what we already believe to be true, or it can be so persuasive that it changes our mind. In some cases, a brand stretches or distorts the truth to appeal to its audience. Do we really think Pop-Tarts are part of a nutritious breakfast, as Kellogg’s suggests? Over time, the reinforcement of this skewed reality becomes accepted as the norm. It’s exactly how the rise of the Confederacy brand came to pass.

People congregate on Monument Avenue in Richmond, Virginia, to witness the removal of the J.E.B. Stuart Monument by city officials in July. Photo by EVERGIB.

Ultimately, behind every brand is an agenda — whether it’s turning a profit, gaining an audience, acquiring fame or power, promoting a cause, or perhaps all of the above.

The way that agenda comes to life is typically through a “brand story,” a compelling narrative that elicits an emotional response, which in turn affects behavior. While I’d like to say humans are smart enough to recognize this subliminal sales pitch, we’re simple creatures who can be won over easily. Charles Revson, founder of the makeup brand Revlon, once stated, “In our factory, we make lipstick. In our store, we sell hope.”

When the Civil War ended, the Confederacy should have, too. 

But a belief system was already in place — one that included the justification of slavery — and it was profoundly ingrained in the minds of most white Southerners.

The Confederates may have lost the war, but they were not about to give up on their version of America. They needed a way for the Confederacy to stay alive. In the world of advertising, it’s a well-known strategy for a business to launch a new campaign when its brand starts to lose relevance, gets tied up in bad press, or in the case of the Confederacy, faces extinction.

In 2016, Wells Fargo created millions of fraudulent savings and checking accounts on behalf of clients without their consent. The multinational financial company admitted to breaking the law and was fined $3 billion. To recover from the scandal, the company modernized its logo and released a campaign emphasizing a new and improved commitment to customers. Through empathetic language and a tone of humility, Wells Fargo attempted to transform its image from evil banking behemoth to trusted banking friend. Only time will tell if it proves successful.

Branding is a marathon, not a sprint. It can take years to build an impactful brand (or rebrand).

It’s why we know BMW is “The ultimate driving machine” and that we’ll be “in good hands with Allstate” — both slogans have been running for more than 40 years. De Beers has been telling us “A diamond is forever” since 1947. From “Have it your way” to “The happiest place on Earth,” the way brands become part of our cultural landscape is through the story they consistently tell us over time.

Graffiti messages cover what remains of the Jefferson Davis Memorial. The statue of Davis, the former president of the Confederate States, was unofficially removed by protestors in June. Photo by EVERGIB.

Enter the Lost Cause, an interpretation of the Civil War developed during post-Reconstruction by white Southerners, many of whom were former Confederate generals. The sole aim of this one-sided narrative was to paint the Confederacy in the best possible light. Marketers call this “brand positioning” — the way in which a brand is perceived in the minds of its audience. For the Confederates, this meant writing their own version of history.

The primary purpose of the Lost Cause was to establish the belief that the Confederacy fought for a just and heroic cause — specifically, states’ rights.

Downplaying support of institutionalized slavery, it emphasized Confederate bravery and the struggle for independence. In this romanticized version of the Old South, the “brand personality” of the Confederacy began to take shape.

By applying human traits and characteristics, the brand became more relatable, inspiring more empathy. Serving up Confederate war efforts as noble and virtuous strengthened the brand’s emotional connection to white Southerners by tapping into their longstanding pride. 

The Lost Cause also weaved in guiding principles to perpetuate a more honorable and respected image.

These “brand values” highlighted what was important to Southerners: devotion to family and state, faithfulness to Christian ideals, and preservation of the life and culture of the Antebellum South, characterized by plantation fields, sweet tea, good manners and “happy” slaves.

When brand values, personality and positioning come together, they work to promote what is known as the “brand promise.” This is the expectation a brand sets for itself to motivate its audience to support, and ideally, champion its cause.

For the Confederacy, that promise came to fruition in a brand slogan created by a Southern political coalition known as the Redeemers. “The South will rise again” became the Confederate rallying cry. Depending on whether you were white or Black, the phrase was either a vision for the future or a threat to your very existence. 

Declarations like this are on what’s left of the Confederate statues in Richmond. Other messages include “End White Supremacy,” “We Won’t Stop,” and “With Us or Against.” Photo by EVERGIB.

As the Confederate brand further solidified, its followers sought out the most effective way to push their agenda out into the world. Essentially a “brand launch campaign,” the Confederacy used specific mediums (“media channels”) to communicate its message to the widest audience possible.

Back in the late 1800s, there was obviously no social media, influencer marketing or commercials. However, the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), a white Southern women’s “heritage” group, found a solution that would not only preserve the legacy of the Confederacy, but validate it. Their primary media channel: school textbooks.

The UDC argued that the historical narrative around the Civil War dishonored the South in a legacy of shame.

As such, they referred to the war as the War Between the States or the War for Southern Independence. This is an example of “rebranding” — a marketing strategy that allocates a different identity for a brand; one that works more in its favor.

By pushing for the Lost Cause narrative in the classroom, the Confederates were able to reach children at the origin point of their education, indoctrinating them with a biased perspective of U.S. history. This systematic method of changing attitudes or altering beliefs is often known by another term: brainwashing.

The Lost Cause still remains in some present-day textbooks. The goal of the UDC wasn’t just to rewrite history for the South, but for the entire nation. They wanted to ensure generations grew up knowing their version of the “truth.” But they didn’t stop there. There was a desire to build something permanent and highly visible to maintain the Confederacy’s relevance.

As such, the UDC led the movement to erect memorials to Confederate veterans in public spaces all over the country during two distinct time periods.

The first wave of Confederate statues was built during The Progressive Era (1890-1921). Slavery was abolished, but the South was determined to keep Black people oppressed through Jim Crow laws that legalized and enforced racial segregation. The proliferation of memorials to the Confederacy kept the brand visible, while serving as an intimidation tactic (for context, the UDC also built a memorial commemorating the Ku Klux Klan).

Around this same time, an unprecedented number of lynchings took place. These killings were public acts of racial terror committed by white Southerners to incite fear among newly freed slaves. In some cases, white people who enabled Black people were lynched as well.

The second wave of Confederate statues was built during the Civil Rights Movement (1954-68). Black people were justifiably fed up with the continued inequality stemming from the country’s inherent prejudice.

After World War II, a group of white Southern Democrats briefly formed their own far-right political party called the Dixiecrats. Opposing racial integration, they supported Jim Crow laws and pledged to uphold white supremacy. The party’s symbol: the Confederate battle flag (also known as the Rebel flag). Resurrected after nearly 100 years out of the public eye, it sent a message loud and clear: defiance against racial equality.

Armed defenders of the United Daughters of the Confederacy stand guard outside the national headquarters building after it was vandalized earlier this summer. Photo by EVERGIB.

Today, more than 1,500 Confederate symbols exist in the United States, with over 240 in Virginia alone, more than any other state. Most are statues of Confederate leaders or soldiers from the Civil War, put in prominent spaces for public display.

The Confederacy also found its way into the names of schools, roads, parks, bridges, and of all places, military bases.

Confederate museums popped up, serving as shrines to protect the “legacy” of the war, but again, only showcasing the point of view of the South. 

Until a few months ago, the Virginia Flaggers, a neo-Confederate group based in Richmond, would gather on a highly visible corner of Arthur Ashe Boulevard, near the UDC national headquarters (yes, the UDC still exists). According to an article in the Daily Beast, some members of the Virginia Flaggers are directly tied to white nationalist groups that openly promote white supremacy.

Typically, the scene would consist of a few older white men and a lineup of parked trucks flying multiple Confederate flags from 10-foot poles. In recent years, they had added a giant Trump flag to their collection. However, since the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and protests, the Flaggers have been absent.

From a branding perspective, a lack of visibility is a sure sign a brand is losing relevance. Out of sight, out of mind.

For more than a century, the Confederacy built and strengthened its brand through textbooks, monuments, flags and more. Eventually, it made its way into pop culture.

In the 1980s, the country band Alabama released the song “Dixieland Delight.” The feel-good song became popular with students at the University of Alabama, who began singing it during football games. When they added their own profanity-laced lyrics, the school momentarily banned the tradition. Ironically, no one seemed to have a problem with the actual name of the song, “Dixieland,” a nickname referring to the 11 Southern states that seceded to form the Confederate States of America.

In fact, it wasn’t long ago that fraternities at the University of Alabama, and other Southern universities, held “Old South” themed parties and parades. Revelers dressed in Civil War attire with women in Scarlett O’Hara-like hoop skirts and men in Confederate gray military uniforms.

Growing up, I couldn’t get enough of The Dukes of Hazzard.

The action-packed TV show featured the adventures of cousins Bo and Luke Duke, two good ol’ boys who ran a moonshine business for their Uncle Jesse in rural Georgia. Mostly, the show was watching them evade the law by driving around in their 1969 Dodge Charger, named the “General Lee” after Confederate general Robert E. Lee. The car had a Confederate flag painted on the roof and a signature horn that played the first few notes of “Dixie,” the de facto national anthem of the Confederacy. 

In 2005, Warner Brothers released a feature film based on the hit series. Reruns of the show continued to play on TV Land until 2015, when white supremacist Dylann Roof stormed a church in South Carolina, killing nine Black people for the explicit purpose of starting a race war. Photos later surfaced of him posing at a historic Civil War site, holding the gun he used in the massacre, along with a Confederate flag.

Visitors climb on the graffitied steps of the Robert E. Lee Monument. In recent months, the area has seen a dramatic increase of people coming specifically to experience the monument. Photo by EVERGIB.

Brands are powerful because of the complex idea system behind them.

A quick search on Amazon shows the Confederacy’s fight to stay alive. Branded merchandise ranges from Confederate T-shirts and throw pillows to commemorative coins and face masks — even the Dixie Air Horn is available. From generation to generation, the Confederacy brand and its racist ideology have continued to exist. As a society, we’ve failed to bring the truth to the masses. Instead, we’ve succumbed to the branding.

Our tolerance, and in some cases indifference, has translated into acceptance. A brand reaches the pinnacle of success when it becomes a normal part of everyday life — when people carry around the ubiquitous Starbucks coffee cup, talk about their latest run to Targét [“tar-jay”], or when a reality show host becomes president of the United States and defends the statues of traitors proliferating our country.

But the normalization can end when the narrative changes.

And that’s precisely what happened on May 25, 2020, when Minneapolis police killed George Floyd. 

The momentum of protests that erupted across the country quickly made its way to Richmond, former capital of the Confederacy. Nowhere has the Confederacy been more visible in the city than on Monument Avenue, a grand, tree-lined boulevard featuring five enormous statues dedicated to Confederate military and political figures.

Over the years, numerous efforts have been made to remove or relocate the statues, or use historical plaques to provide context. It wasn’t until protesters began to tear down statues around town that Mayor Levar Stoney announced a proposal to officially remove all Confederate statues from Monument Avenue, stating that “Richmond is no longer the capital of the Confederacy — it is filled with diversity and love for all, and we need to demonstrate that.”

In less than a month, four of the five statues were removed. Now, only General Robert E. Lee remains, due to a court order protecting it that is expected to be lifted. The Confederate general on horseback sits perched atop a 60-foot pedestal covered in an impactful array of colorful graffiti.

Finally, “context” has been added.

While a few complain about the profanity, most recognize the profound meaning behind the messages. Centuries of pain, injustice, anger, grief, and trauma are finally being unleashed and recognized, culminating in a beautiful expression that is ultimately about hope. 

Photographer John Biggs used a drone to capture an incredible abstract aerial shot of the Lee Monument. A yoga friend of mine remarked that the colors and textures resemble a mandala, the sacred symbol in Hindu and Buddhist rituals that also represents a sacred space. It’s a poignant analogy that demonstrates how a change in perspective (both literally and figuratively) can open the mind to see things in an entirely new light. It’s precisely what we need right now.

A drone image shows the colorful messages surrounding the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee on Monument Avenue in Richmond. Photo by John Biggs.

A video clip has been trending from the beloved 1980s sitcom The Golden Girls, which focuses on the friendship of four senior women living in Florida. The clip shows one of the main characters, Blanche Devereaux (played by Rue McClanahan), being confronted by a young Don Cheadle, who gives her a lesson in racism prompted by her display of the Confederate flag.

As Blanche attempts to defend her Southern heritage, she quickly realizes her predicament with the flag’s racist ties. Clearly having an existential crisis, she pleads, “What am I supposed to do and think about my family now? What am I supposed to think about all those people I love? What am I supposed to think about ME? Everything I grew up believing in, all my wonderful memories, they’re all tarnished now by …” She pauses for a moment to consider the weight of the moment. “Oh god … by the truth.”

For many, this time has been an awakening as a new, more accurate historical narrative takes shape.

In a display of poetic justice, the area where the Lee Monument stands on Monument Avenue in Richmond has been rebranded as Marcus-David Peters (MDP) Circle. The new community gathering spot is named after a 24-year-old local Black man and high school teacher, who was having a mental health crisis when a Richmond police officer shot and killed him in May 2018.

He is our George Floyd.

A couple embrace at the newly rebranded Marcus-David Peters Circle on Monument Avenue in Richmond. MDP Circle has recently become a celebrated community gathering spot. Photo by EVERGIB.

At the center of MDP Circle, makeshift memorials have been built, featuring Black people from across the country who have died from police brutality. Their photos are accompanied by bios that tell their stories and the injustice of their deaths.

On a daily basis, people come here to learn, cry, contemplate, and rejoice.

They take photos, have conversations, enjoy a picnic, and play pickup basketball games. The location has served as a venue for lectures, dance and music performances, and yoga practices. A community garden has been started, and volunteers under tents regularly offer water and snacks and information on ways to take action and register to vote.

In the evenings, a local lighting artist uses the Lee statue as a backdrop for the projection of the faces of Black victims, alongside Black activists, thinkers and politicians, to reclaim support for the BLM movement.

I wonder, if Lee were alive today, what he might think of his statue’s transformation. Considering he opposed monuments, specifically Confederate war monuments, my hope is he’d recognize the irony. Certainly his descendants do. Rev. Robert Wright Lee, a distant nephew of the Confederate general, has voiced support for removal of the statues for years, stating:

“I fully believe, along with a host of other amazing citizens of this great country, that Black lives matter — and for us to continue to celebrate a man who questioned the education, disparaged the right to vote of Black life, and had previously fought for the continued enslavement of Africans on the North American continent is an affront to those now suffering under the continued weight of oppression.”

Locals watch images of notable Black people projected on the statue of Confederate general Robert E. Lee, created by lighting artist Dustin Klein at MDP Circle in Richmond. Photo by EVERGIB.

This is how we begin to re-educate a nation. This is how we seek the truth.

Already we’re seeing visible signs of change nationwide. Confederate statues are coming down, Black Lives Matter murals are going up. Police reform and accountability are being discussed. Corporate America is taking a stance and rethinking policies and practices. And many are taking a serious look at their branding.

In just the last few months, NASCAR has banned Confederate flags at all races and events, the Dixie Chicks are now the Chicks, the Washington Redskins plan to change their name and logo, and Aunt Jemima, Uncle Ben’s, and Cream of Wheat are among a number of brands looking to update their image.

Finally, we’ve reached a tipping point that is changing our acceptance into action. This is the revolution our country needs.

Make no mistake, symbolic changes will not get rid of the systematic racism that continues to prevail in this country. Police brutality isn’t just happening in the South — it’s happening all over the country, including in liberal cities like Minneapolis. After all, our history of colonization and the racist ideology of white supremacy aren’t exclusive instruments to the Confederacy brand, but to the brand of the entire United States of America. 

Yet there is hope. Through these challenging times, our nation is evolving. We are beginning to acknowledge and understand our past, not from a single narrative, but from multiple perspectives. It’s human nature for people to believe what they want to believe, even if it means ignoring the truth. But there is no growth, empathy, or understanding in ignorance.

The only way of moving toward a more equitable future is by empowering ourselves — and others — through knowledge. 

Branding is not the truth. It’s an interpretation — in some cases, an illusion that holds great power, as witnessed by the rise of the Confederacy brand. We live in a time with incredible access to information, yet the lines between fact and fiction are blurred more than ever. That’s why it’s up to us to take individual responsibility — not only as responsible consumers, but as informed citizens.

We must question what is normalized, look past the persuasive narrative, and never stop seeking the truth.

To learn more about this topic, consider reading Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America by Dr. Ibram Kendi.

Top Photo: A biker rides along the perimeter of a heavily graffitied statue of Confederate general J.E.B. Stuart in Richmond, Virginia, former capital of the Confederacy. Photo by EVERGIB.

This essay was first published by Muse by Clio on July 29, 2020.

The Great Gatsby

Will Gonzalez | December 10, 2020

Topics: black lives matter, Goad Gatsby, police violence, protests, Virginia Flaggers

Activist, rapper, mustache-haver — Goad Gatsby is a lot of things. At the end of the day, he just wants to make the world a better, more chill place — and maybe inspire others while he’s at it.

When Kristopher Goad’s friends wanted to get him signed up for Facebook in the mid-2000s, none of them knew his full name. He was known only by his last name within the group, so they signed him up using the name Goad Gatsby.

“And then everybody just decided that my name was Goad Gatsby at that point,” said Goad.

Since then, he has become well-known within Richmond not only as a hip-hop performer with a highly recognizable “disco mustache,” but also as a longtime adversary of the Virginia Flaggers and their public displays of the Confederate battle flag on Arthur Ashe Boulevard. More recently, he’s also gotten some attention as a documenter of the protests in Richmond this summer and the police’s response.

In 2015, Goad was featured in a documentary series by The Atlantic called Battle Flag, about people’s opinions of the modern use of the Confederate flag.

At that point, Goad had been blasting hip hop music next to the Flaggers while they stood in front of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts on weekends for about a year, and was the subject of a considerable amount of vitriol from the group.

“They thought I was a carpetbagger until they found out that I really was just a scalawag,” said Goad.

The Flaggers began to lose momentum in 2015, when they stopped announcing their appearance schedule publicly after two members were arrested on kidnapping charges. Carlos Lesters and Megan Everett of Florida kidnapped Everett’s two-year-old daughter in 2014 in order to prevent the child’s father from vaccinating her or enrolling her in public school.

These days, the Flaggers make it out to Arthur Ashe every once in a while, much less often than their onetime near-weekly basis. But there’s a whole new right-wing movement in Richmond now. Based on his knowledge of who the Flaggers were and who is affilliated with the Trump Train vehicular caravan that rolled through the city in October, Goad doesn’t believe there’s much overlap between the two groups.

Beginning when protests began in the streets of Richmond in late May over the killing of George Floyd and the ongoing issue of police violence, Goad was on the front lines. He did his best to document the response from the police and the city government, as he saw it, on social media. This brought him a whole new wave of attention, for better and for worse.

Goad was arrested several times during the summer, including once in September when he was charged with obstructing the free passage of others. At the time of the arrest, the police alleged the incident he was being charged for happened two weeks earlier during a demonstration in front of the Richmond jail, in which 11 people were arrested. Goad says he wasn’t even there at the jail on that day.

When he was arrested, he was taken to the Third Precinct Police Station, where they took his phone while he was attempting to get in contact with his lawyer. Goad never saw a warrant for his arrest; instead, a city attorney informed his lawyer that the warrant was sealed. He never got his phone back.

Since then, he has kept a lower profile, and the protests have declined. However, he is still keeping tabs on right-wing activity in the city. When he considers the ongoing unrest that occurred across Richmond throughout the summer, it’s his impression that the city created a self-perpetuating cycle of violence by retaliating against protesters instead of addressing the problems that inspired the protests. This, in turn, created more problems and further fueled the unrest.

Photo via Goad Gatsby/Twitter

One issue he sees as important to the way everything played out is the fact that police were brought in from precincts across the city, as well as other localities, as reinforcements during protests. Many of those that operated in this capacity had prior reputations for aggressive behavior.

“People were telling me about some of these officers’ past interactions, and it seemed like they were getting some of the worst officers to deal with protesters,” Goad said. “Instead of getting police that are experts in de-escalation, they were getting experts in doing no-knock raids in the projects.”

Goad believes the police have a particular inclination to go after journalists and people who film protests. That’s because the more specific information gets out, the harder it is for police and city officials to justify their actions.

“If somebody is saying ‘The police are bad because they’re doing something I don’t like,’ that’s something they can just brush off. But if somebody’s being like ‘The police fired less-lethal rounds at people before there was any type of confrontation, here is some footage to go along with that,’ then the police go ‘Oh no, this isn’t good. They’re building a case against us in the court of public opinion,’” said Goad. “I wish I could build a case against Richmond police in City Hall, or the court of law, but unfortunately I don’t have that ability.”

For now, he’s sticking with the internet, where he continues to fight misinformation and lack of knowledge. He believes that making people aware of what’s really going on is the best way to convince them to take action.

“A lot of people are either willing to help but don’t know what to do, or they’ve never seen the type of information that would make them act,” said Goad.

Top Photo via Goad Gatsby/Twitter

Monument Avenue and The Insidiously Seductive “Lost Cause” Narrative

Jack Clark | November 20, 2018

Topics: confederate statues, Jefferson Davis, monument ave, the Lost Cause, United Daughters of the Confederacy, Virginia Flaggers

Monument Avenue features statues commemorating five Civil War-era political and military figures, all of whom were on the Confederate side of that conflict. These statues stand at the center of a longstanding controversy that has heated up considerably over the last year or so. Feelings were greatly inflamed after the tragic events surrounding last year’s Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville, a rally that originated with the battle over a monument celebrating Confederate general Robert E. Lee.

After seeing the trouble Charlottesville’s Lee statue caused, a great many Richmonders united in attempting to rid our city of our own Lee statue, as well as statues glorifying other Confederate political figures. But quite a few residents in the city still see no cause for consternation. They regard the statues as history, and don’t wish to discuss them any further. Even the Richmond City Council doesn’t seem to want to do anything about the statues; last month, they voted 6-3 against requesting direct control of the monuments from the Virginia state government.

While many today see these statues as lacking modern political context, the fact that their history is inextricable from that of the post-Civil War Lost Cause movement indicates otherwise.

The Lost Cause movement, most prominently represented in Richmond today by the United Daughters of the Confederacy (UDC), is heavily invested in the creation of a certain narrative regarding the pre-Civil War past. Getting its start in the decade following the end of the Civil War, the Lost Cause movement has argued for over a century that slavery was an unimportant factor in the war, ignoring secession statements and pre-Civil War declarations by former members of the United States Congress, who left the Union to join the Confederacy.

The narrative pushed by the UDC and the Lost Cause movement instead, one of overwhelming Northern aggression against a valorized yet ill-defined “Southern way of life,” is strongly promoted by the statues displayed on Monument Avenue.

The Lost Cause narrative became so pervasive during the era in which the monuments to Confederate General Robert E. Lee, Confederate President Jefferson Davis, and other Confederate figures were erected that it showed up in textbooks taught in Virginia schools — and remained there until as recently as four decades ago, in some cases.

A 1914 Virginia History textbook, School History of Virginia by Edgar Sydenstricker and Ammen Burger, contains this quote regarding the life of a slave: “There were some cruel and inconsiderate masters, of course; but they were exceptions. … As a general rule the slaves were happy and contented and were faithful to their owners.” A 1957 textbook called Virginia: History, Government, Geography suggested that slaves were perfectly happy with their situation.

The happiness of these slaves is most famously belied by the incident that took place on August 21, 1831 in Southampton County, Virginia. That day, Nat Turner led a rebellion that resulted in the death of sixty white men, women, and children. Killing children is troubling, but so is slavery — infamously, millions of Africans died while being transported against their will to the Americas. And once they arrived in the US, their infant mortality rates were double that of white Americans of the era.

In this context, Nat Turner’s rebellion, despite its death toll, is more understandable. It wasn’t an isolated case in Virginia either. Take Brother Gabriel, who on October 10th, 1800, was hanged in Richmond, Virginia, along with his two brothers and 23 other slaves, for planning a revolt. In 2017, the decision to create an emancipation-themed statue in Richmond that included both Turner and Gabriel caused significant controversy, with some social media commenters comparing Turner to Hitler.

Yet for over a century, the African-American community of Richmond has had to look at monuments glorifying Civil War generals who fought to keep their ancestors enslaved.

Indeed, there are still people who congregate regularly outside the UDC’s Memorial Building on Boulevard carrying Confederate flags. I saw them while walking by not too long ago, and decided to stop and talk with them. Of course, they supported Monument Avenue remaining unchanged. And when I asked about the impact of slavery on the Southern economy, I heard what can only be described as typical Lost Cause arguments.

“Slavery was on the way out anyway,” one man said, repeating a common Lost Cause myth — one belied by Confederate Vice President Alexander H. Stephens’s 1861 Cornerstone Speech. In the speech, Stephens said of the Confederacy, “Its cornerstone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery — subordination to the superior race — is his natural and normal condition.” The fact is, one in ten of the South’s enlisted soldiers were slave-owners, and more than one in four lived with their slave-owning parents.

“The South was a society of honor, family, and tradition,” said another man outside the UDC Memorial Building. He argued that the Union posed a threat to the confederate way of life, and the Confederacy was merely defending itself — another Lost Cause talking point. 

The argument regarding whether or not the Confederacy was a legitimate nation or traitor to an already established nation is still waged today. One thing is for sure though — if it’s your son or daughter killed in a war, you don’t care about sides. Hollywood Cemetery’s monument to Confederate soldiers who died in the Civil War is both a monument to their sacrifice, and a tribute to a lost generation for the Southern states.

Many from the South feel they were denied a glorious destiny when the war was lost. Yet in being forced to reconstruct their culture, the South has never entirely been willing to own up to some of the more sadistic aspects of that same culture. Signs on the Jefferson Davis monument in particular repeat core Lost Cause concepts; this was exactly why Mayor Stoney’s Monument Avenue Commission recommended earlier this year that that monument be removed from Monument Avenue.

“Of all the statues, this one is most unabashedly Lost Cause in its design and sentiment,” the commission members wrote in their report. They felt that the other four Confederate-focused monuments could remain up if signs contextualizing them were added, but the Davis monument must be taken down.

In order to move forward, we must look back on the past with as vigilant of an eye as possible. Monument Avenue only tells a portion of this city’s story; the things it leaves out are of crucial importance. At some point, we need to decide whether remembering a proud bygone culture is worth romanticizing past injustice.

Top photo: George Washington Custis Lee (1832–1913) on horseback in front of the Jefferson Davis Monument in Richmond, Virginia on June 3, 1907, reviewing the Confederate Reunion Parade. Public domain/via Wikimedia

Monument Avenue Commission Held First Open Community Meeting Since 2017 Last Night

David Streever | May 11, 2018

Topics: christy coleman, Civil War, confederate statues, greg kimball, Monument Avenue Commission, Virginia Flaggers

The Monument Avenue Commission, tasked with evaluating the fate of the statuary on Monument Avenue, held its first public community meeting since its contentious, chaotic first meeting last summer. The meeting proceeded relatively peacefully despite two sets of outbursts from pro-monument attendees, with the first occurring near the halfway point of the night and a second at the end.

After a series of presentations by commission members, pro-monument attendees interrupted commission co-chair Greg Kimball from the Library of Virginia, who was sharing historical documents on the construction of Confederate monuments and the root causes of the Civil War.

He’d just finished explaining inaccuracies in the Lost Cause narrative which minimizes the role of slavery in secession, pointing to records of secession voting sessions where slavery was referenced 512 times and states rights only 29. “I think that says something,” Kimball said, making the case that the South seceded over slavery, a statement widely accepted as fact due to the overwhelming preponderance of accepted historical evidence.

It was after this that shouts from pro-monument attendees briefly broke out with one man yelling, “were Union monuments built during Jim Crow too?” Amid the noise, another man, who seemed to be trying to quiet the pro-monument disruptors, yelled, “can you let the man talk please, we didn’t come here for this.”

Much of the meeting was occupied by the presentation of statistics detailing who was present, who gave feedback, and what that feedback has looked like up until this point. Among the findings: 84.5% of respondents favor a change with only 15.5% asking to keep Monument Avenue unchanged. Of those who wanted change, 26.8% favored adding context but leaving the current monuments, 28.5% for relocation, and 20% for removal without relocation.

Commission co-chair Christy Coleman, CEO of the American Civil War Museum, explained that they were collecting the data to help present the community vision for Monument Avenue. She said, “The monument commission feels that it is not their role to make the decision about what to do with the monuments, it is to hear what the community wants to do so that that recommendation can be passed on.”

When it came to public commentary, a majority of speakers spoke against the statues in 2-minute time slots based on the order they queued up.

The first speaker identified himself as being from New Kent County before saying he’d be quick, adding, “I’m tired, I’m hungry, I have to go to the restroom, and I’m on the clock.” He spoke in favor of context, but wanted to see statues to the black soldiers who fought for the Union near Richmond, instead of more contemporary figures or people already honored by statues.

Photo by Chelsea Higgs Wise

After telling the commission he didn’t envy their position, another speaker suggested that Richmond was “too emotional” to have the discussion. “Maybe we should reach out to places around the world that have had this discussion, like South Africa, Germany, or South Korea,” he said, noting that they’d had to deal with similar questions.

The first man to speak for the statues said they were to “great men” who “struggled, fought and died to defend their country,” before comparing the Civil War to the American Revolution.

A woman who also rose to defend the statues claimed that they were about love, not hate, and invoked her race when she said, “I didn’t know that if you’re white you have a certain amount of time to put up a statue.” She added, “They’re taking my statues down but y’all are letting them put their statues up all the time.”

A man who started by saying he hadn’t prepared to speak called on the commission to keep the statues and not change the city. He described Richmond as “not a city of the future, it is a city of the past. It was the Capital of the Confederacy.” In a fast-paced conclusion, he made the counterfactual claim of the Lost Cause narrative that men “fought not for slavery but for states rights.”

A later speaker addressed his claim without naming him by reciting the conclusion to the Cornerstone Speech of Confederate Vice President Alexander Stephens, in which he stated that the Confederacy was founded upon the idea that the white man was superior.

Former school board member Mamie Taylor spoke against the statues, telling the story of her grandmother, Mary McLeod Bethune, who was born to parents who’d been enslaved. After talking about her ancestors, she addressed proponents of the monuments, asking how they would feel “if someone raped, murdered, castrated your grandmother, and then placed a picture of that monstrous person on your living room wall.” She said that feeling is “what I feel like when I have to drive up and down Monument Avenue on an almost daily basis.”

One of the last speakers was former City Council Member Marty Jewell, who asked for a truth and reconciliation process in the city before further discussion of the monuments. He also addressed an undercurrent that’s surrounded the process, asking why people who don’t live in the city were included.

Several of the pro-monument attendees were affiliated with the Virginia Flaggers, a pro-Confederacy organization that organized to support the statues. On Facebook, members advised out-of-town supporters to lie about their address, suggesting they use the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts street address so they could leave a comment, something restricted to people who work or reside in the city.

As the meeting ended, Coleman thanked attendees. As she detailed the next community meeting to be held at Martin Luther King, Jr., High School on May 19, a Saturday, at 10 a.m., followed by a commission work session the same day in City Hall at 6 p.m., one of the men sitting with the Flaggers interrupted her, yelling, “Why isn’t the mayor here?”

Continuing to talk over the co-chair, the man blamed the mayor for the commission and insisted that he needed to be at the meetings.

Keeping her composure, Coleman finished thanking the attendees before she told the man to take it up with the mayor’s office as she adjourned the meeting.

Cover Photo by Landon Shroder

Confederate monument rally canceled in September

RVA Staff | August 15, 2017

Topics: Confederate monuments, Mayor Stoney, monument ave, richmond, Unite the Right, Virginia Flaggers

This is a developing story.

According to a story filed by CBS 6, September’s pro-Confederate demonstration at the statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee has been cancelled. The main organizer of the event, Brag Bowling speaking with WRVA’s Jimmy Barret, announced that he did not want the same kinds of protests in Richmond that broke out in Charlottesville this past weekend.

Bowling spoke with CBS 6, claiming the events at Unite the Right changed his feelings on the event. He did, however, say that he might seek to plan a rally at a later date.

News of the September rally in front of Confederate General Robert E. Lee was first broken by RVA Mag on Sunday, as Virginia was still reeling from the events of Unite the Right. While Bowling admitted to CBS 6 that he did not want “outside elements” to descend upon Richmond, pro-Confederate events have become a beacon for white nationalists, white supremacists, and alt-right groups who use the “heritage” debate as a means of furthering their message.

Unite the Right was originally billed as a pro-Southern heritage event, but was inevitably appropriated by groups such as the Traditionalist Worker Party and National Socialist Movement, along with other various white nationalist personalities, like David Duke, who push ethno-nationalsm and racial superiority. This event ended in a domestic terrorist incident when a white supremacist ran his car into a group of counter-protesters, killing one person and injured 19.

The contention surrounding the September rally has put the city of Richmond in an unenviable position. RVA Mag reached out to the Department of General Services yesterday to seek clarification on the permit process and received the following statement, “The Department of General Services received a request on July 28, 2017, from Americans for Richmond Monument Preservation for a permit to hold an event at Lee Monument from 11:30 a.m. until 2 p.m. on September 16, 2017.  The request is under review, and there is no immediate timeline for a decision.” The Department’s Director of Communications concluded with, “As we would with any permit request, we are gathering information about the proposed event, meeting with the applicant to discuss rules and guidelines, and meeting with our law enforcement partners to make sure that the safety of the participants and public property remains the priority.”

This rally would have coincided with Mayor Stoney’s commission on Monument Avenue, and at a time when Southern states are grappling with what to do about public displays of Confederate symbols.

*Cover photo by Landon Shroder

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