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New PC High School...


GMan
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4 hours ago, redtiger said:

The names actually mean something to the county and the schools, good change imo. 

Without wandering too far into a political discussion, I also like the idea of honoring local folks who made a direct contribution to the community.  Much better than generic names referencing directional quadrants and/or landscape features IMO.

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5 hours ago, BigWinners said:

It's PC to not have a school named after a Confederate general? Learn something every day. I'd bet the black students just loved saying they went to a school named after a general who fought for the right to keep their great great grandparents as property.

They've never complained until now. If it was such a big deal, it would have happened years ago...just sayin'...

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57 minutes ago, UVAObserver said:

We have multiple schools, including a governor’s magnet school, named after a bunch of slaveholders.  Where do we draw the line.

For me, I see it as whether you fought to protect the right to own slaves, that's the decider for me personally. I don't support trying to erase US presidents and such just because they were slaveowners, these guys founded the country and they should be held up for that, but teach that history isn't black and white and sometimes good people participated in awful, awful things because that was life then. It wasn't right, it never was, but it is at least I guess understandable. 

but in terms of Confederate monuments and schools named after them, if people want them changed, I support that. They fought against the US government. 

 

and @GMan may be you're right and black people were fine with it for a time, or may be they just didn't feel it was a fight they could win until now, I don't know, I'm not black, I don't believe you are either, so in this case, I'm inclined to go with their thoughts. If it's just young, white hipster douches, forget it they are just trying to earn brownie points with minorities, but if the black folks there want it changed, change it, regardless of whether they thought differently before or not I think.

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2 hours ago, UVAObserver said:

We have multiple schools, including a governor’s magnet school, named after a bunch of slaveholders.  Where do we draw the line.

Bristol, VA is working on changing the names of 3 elementary schools that have confederate names. It’s going to happen across the country. 

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@RichlandsAlum

that was my point, Nothing wrong with naming schools after presidents or whatever but it doesn't carry a lot of meaning. The directional names are terrible.Wise County has Central(terrible generic name) and Eastside(somewhat better). The only thing that may be worse is Patriot or Freedom (which VA now has 2 of). If a school system is going to change a schools name I like the more meaningful names better.

Im ok with them changing the names, but it is a rabbit hole we have to be wary of. If were judging historical figures as Good or Bad based on one bad thing they did then they're all gonna come up short. Were looking at historical figures and their actions as black or white when we all know they're grey. Jackson was someone who was a traitor to his country, a patriot to and defender of his state, and someone who upheld slavery just like millions of others of his time, and held racist views just like the vast majority of the US during his time. 

Weve also adopted this viewpoint that the South was evil and the North was pro black equality, and thats simply not true. Judging either sides attitude toward blacks from todays viewpoint theyre both terrible. 

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19 hours ago, UVAObserver said:

We have multiple schools, including a governor’s magnet school, named after a bunch of slaveholders.  Where do we draw the line.

1820, imo. This is the year slavery was abolished in the British Empire (although pseudo slavery would continue for generations in India). 

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1 hour ago, Liam McPoyle said:

I'd like to see a high school renamed after 40. 

It could be the Ronald Reagan "Capitalist Cowboys"

Instead of a shooting a cannon, they could launch a cruise missile as the team ran onto the field.

 

There is one in Forsyth County, NC.  Mascot is the Raiders.  Nice alliteration there IMO.

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1 hour ago, Liam McPoyle said:

I'd like to see a high school renamed after 40. 

It could be the Ronald Reagan "Capitalist Cowboys"

Instead of a shooting a cannon, they could launch a cruise missile as the team ran onto the field.

 

Or throw jellybeans everywhere after a score.

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1 hour ago, UVAObserver said:

Alrighty.  Thomas Jefferson lived until 1826, so what then? 

The man made invaluable contributions to western civilization. The man sold his own children into slavery - but just the black ones. Idk how to reconcile those two things. I understand that the question you asked was rhetorical... maybe we just need a reboot. 

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4 hours ago, Grapeape said:

The man made invaluable contributions to western civilization. The man sold his own children into slavery - but just the black ones. Idk how to reconcile those two things. I understand that the question you asked was rhetorical... maybe we just need a reboot. 

Wow, you wrote that almost exactly 100% how I feel. I don't have all the answers, I feel like Jefferson was a great American....in some respects. In others, he was a piece of shit. Owning someone else as property, thru a modern lens, seems so outrageous, so horrendous, but in the context of society during the 1760s-1860s, it was perfectly acceptable in the culture. 

 

Is Jefferson an incredibly important part of the birth of America and one of the most influential Americans of the Revolutionary era? Absolutely.

Did Jefferson participate in a system that was asinine and inhumane? Absolutely.

Should we teach Jefferson and laud his accomplishments? Absolutely.

Should we build statues and monuments to people who treated another human being in the same vein as a tractor or an axe? Absolutely not.

But what's the answer? I don't have it. 

With Confederate monuments and the like, it's cut and dry to me. They fought against the federal government for the right to own slaves. When our country finally woke up and realized how terrible the practice was, these generals and Southern leaders decided to wage war bc the federal government said they couldn't expand slavery out west. It doesn't mean every single soldier who fought for the Confederacy was a bad person, most soldiers weren't slave owners IIRC, but it does mean they shouldn't be celebrated. Most statues of the Confederacy were built during pushes for civil rights, in the early 1900s and then the 1950s and 60s so it's obvious what the intent was there. So take them down, rename schools, etc.. (In a civilized manor. Mob justice is never the answer) 

But founding fathers are a different, way more complex issue and as a society we should decide how to proceed. 

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6 hours ago, Liam McPoyle said:

I'd like to see a high school renamed after 40. 

It could be the Ronald Reagan "Capitalist Cowboys"

Instead of a shooting a cannon, they could launch a cruise missile as the team ran onto the field.

 

The halftime speech of each game could motivate the kids to "do it for the Gipper".

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8 hours ago, BigWinners said:

But founding fathers are a different, way more complex issue and as a society we should decide how to proceed. 

It can be hard to look at it this way but all citizens of the U.S. owe what they have to the Founding Fathers; the freedom, opportunity, etc, etc all can be traced back to them. Regardless of how our ancestors came to this country. 

I feel that the documents Jefferson put together is flawless, and that he left the door open for later generations to right the wrongs of his time.  He wrote "all men", when he could have written "all white males". In terms of religion he wrote "Creator" when he could have written "Christian God". In terms of slavery, it could have been listed as a right of whites to won blacks (and given the time that would have been very acceptable) but that wasn't added. The Constitution is very specific in certain areas but vague in others. And they all signed off on it. They put a system in place that could bring about true equality and right the wrongs of society, in time.

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