The Charlottesville incidents have shown how a violent, disruptive minority may quickly derail a rational cultural debate. The American Left is using white supremacists, Neo-Nazis, and their self-described “alt-right” sympathizers as ammo to support the false claim that all conservatives are racist. Thus, the majority of people who support keeping the Confederate monuments simply note that having actual, concrete traces of history however painful, reminds them of their mistakes so that they don’t do them again. Removing sculptures is a slippery slope that might lead to the reckless removal of monuments from any somewhat controversial personality. In addition, even while what they stood for may seem unpalatable now, they did so in a way that upheld the nation’s principles at the time and protected the rights of the majority of inhabitants.
However, these monuments and sculptures must be erected with care at a spot that is significant to the person who is being honored by them. Despite the atrocities committed during the Holocaust, if these sculptures have to be taken down, they should at the very least be kept in museums today. As people who are conscious of their shortcomings and are determined to hold civility towards one another, in the greatest esteem, their guiding ideal should be cognizant of their flawed past. America is a product of its history, thus it is unfair to try to claim that all of that history was absent when the country was established. The country now known as America was established by the Founding Fathers, who held slaves at a time when doing so was allowed. Let the monuments exist as a reminder of what people endured as a country as they accept what they have been through.