A call to action: ignorant persons, unite
The Column: 11.24.21
Personally I like the statue of Theodore Roosevelt on a horse standing majestically in front of the Museum of Natural History in New York, which I often pass on walks and so I’ve followed the controversy about the statue, along with the debate about the statue of Columbus at Columbus Circle.
The statue removalists argue that Roosevelt and Columbus were guilty of inappropriate treatment of indigenous people and so don’t deserve this prominence. The removalists, I’m sure, have done their homework and especially in the case of Columbus could cite cruel and outrageous deeds and I respect their seriousness. There’s an avenue named for Columbus and a university, plus the Circle, and you could change them all to Smith and it’s no problem for me. The statue in the Circle stands on a very high pedestal so as to make it harder for pigeons to defecate on him, so high that his gender is not clear, and I seldom bother to look up.
The mounted Roosevelt statue, it was announced last week, will be removed to Medora, North Dakota, where he spent some pleasant time living the life of a cowboy out west and refashioned himself as a man on horseback, which made it possible for him to be elected president. Medora is a town of 129 people, and I imagine they’ll be thrilled to get this work of art, which may attract people who’ll then stop in a café, have lunch, buy postcards, a souvenir blanket, coffee mugs, teddy bears, and so on. In New York, the statue is no big deal, just a guy on a horse.
This is my point. Ninety-nine percent of those who pass, the crowds of school children, the tourists, we ordinary folk who haven’t studied late 19th-century American history since high school and didn’t find it all that interesting — to us 99 percent, the statue is purely visual, with no particular significance. It is serious scholarship that makes it significant to the 1 percent. If a one-percenter stood below the statue with a loudspeaker and lectured us on Roosevelt’s misdeeds, I would stop and listen, but only for a few minutes, and then I’d walk on. So would you.
I don’t oppose removal, but I do feel that it leaves a gap, visually, and the stone pedestal the horse stood on demands somebody else take Roosevelt’s place. I nominate Kathryn D. Sullivan, the noted geologist and astronaut who was born across the river in Paterson, N.J. Manhattan is built on bedrock, a good foundation for those skyscrapers. Ms. Sullivan dug into the earth and went up in the sky. She’s perfect. I’d put her on that pedestal, holding a big jackhammer, cutting into the pedestal. I’m serious. Geologists don’t go around in ballgowns so you’d have to come up close to see she’s a woman and there you could read a plaque that would tell you something about her and the rock underneath you.
The news story about Roosevelt’s removal gave me a new word that I am eager to use: recontextualize. Removing Teddy to North Dakota would recontextualize him.
Let me insert two other words here: elitist hegemony. Statue removal is justified in the case of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson who were traitors to their country and knew it, but in the case of Roosevelt, it is a project of elitists who are smarter than the rest of us and seek to exercise authority. That is my recontextualization of the whole story. I wish Medora well; I think Roosevelt and his horse will feel more at home there than in Manhattan. If Columbus is hauled down off his towering pedestal and sent back to Genoa, its effect on my life is less than if you put No Parking signs up in front of my apartment building. I don’t own a car. I don’t drive. I ride the subway or I hail a cab.
But if you haul these guys down off their pedestal, how can you ignore Henry Hudson who sailed up the river when indigenous people — who were not friendly to him — occupied Manhattan? And what about the Duke of York? James Madison? The guy whom Lincoln Center is named for — how did he feel about women’s rights?
I am organizing a demonstration in Columbus Circle, holding big signs: DOWN WITH ELITIST HEGEMONY. STOP WEAPONIZING HISTORY OR WE WILL RECONTEXTUALIZE YOU RIGHT OUT OF TOWN AND THE HORSE YOU RODE IN ON. As soon as it’s warm again, let’s get together and march and then we can go have lunch at a little café on Smith Avenue.
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From the Archives - An article in REALSIMPLE November 23, 2010
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!
Thanks Garrison for those fine comments.
I am reluctant to add more comments because I have grown old and cynical. They say that one gains wisdom with age and I hope that is true; but as one ages one comes to see that so much of human activity is just busy work. People don't have anything to do so they come up with "crying needs" which they can then proceed to address. It makes them feel important and it is nice for people to feel important.
Human history is littered with stories of humans mistreating and abusing each other; the strong take advantage or plunder the weak. I wish that people always treated each other fairly and justly and no doubt what Columbus and others did was wrong. But Columbus has been dead for about 600 years. He did not know that he was being honored with street names and statues; and he will not know that he is being dishonored with the removal of said street names. etc.
Are we going to go back through history and correct wrongs and rename streets and cities and move statues? Addressing past wrongs and injustices takes time and money. I don't have time to do what I need to do today; I can't take time to address all of the wrongs of the distant past. We have hungry people and other "crying needs" today.
I agree that people attach too much significance to street names and statues. When I was growing up there was a statue of an unnamed Confederate veteran on the court house square in our town. For most people it was just a statue. It looked nice and fit in with the trees and shrubbery. But it never occurred to me that it represented some supposedly glorious or inglorious past. It was just part of the scenery like the park benches and the decorative fountain. I assume that it has been moved elsewhere by now. and that is fine with most people.
And likewise people who go through Columbus circle never think about Christopher Columbus. Columbus Circle is just a name and it has to be named something.
Enough rambling for now. Garrison, I hope that you and your family and the readers of your column all have a wonderful Thanksgiving. This is a wonderful time of the year and we have so much for which to be thankful. Remember the good things and forget about the bad.
I'm living in the midst of the damage that the 'elitist hegemony' has inflicted on the rest of us, and for what? I'm a 70 year old white teacher working in an urban, Title 1 qualified high school. Yes, the 'elitists' imposed 7th and 8th graders onto our high school students for local reasons I won't bore you with but, these 7th graders are broken in ways that won't be repaired any time soon. It reminds me of the sense of futility I was left with, after reading and analyzing the 'Lord of the Flies', as only a 9th grade English class could. (1965).Concerning the statues, why can't we at least ask what impressed their peers enough to tell future generations about them? Why did Detroit keep the statue of Joe Lewis? Let's look at the whole person, in the context of their own time on the planet. The question: What would I have done? - would then be more challenging and beneficial. Hindsight's shelf life does have a 'use by' date. (I will reread your 'Thanksgiving' wisdom before tomorrow!) Thank you for sharing.