by Edith Hathaway © 2017

The American Civil War of the 1860s is reappearing in multiple ways during the summer and fall of 2017: The classic Civil War film Gone with the Wind (1939) was removed from a popular film festival in Memphis, Tennessee. Deemed “insensitive” to the local population, which is 64% black, it was removed from the 2017 and 2018 series after a showing on Aug. 11, 2017. The statue of Robert E. Lee and other Confederate soldiers may be removed all across the South. An Asian TV announcer with the name Robert Lee was removed from his announcer post at ESPN – temporarily, as a football game Aug. 26, 2017 was to be held in Charlottesville, Virginia, the scene of the protests and counter protests in mid-August regarding Robert E. Lee’s statue.[i] And since George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were also major slave owners, the question arises: Should their statues be removed as well? And what about their images on U.S. currency? Continue reading →