Why symbols of injustice matter and what to do with them

In the span of several days earlier this month, monuments to at least two Confederate generals were yanked from their pedestals in the US. The statue of a 17th-century slave trader was dumped in a British harbour. In Belgium, a statue of a king whose exploitation of an African colony caused millions of deaths was set on fire before its removal.

Amid the anger at the killing of an unarmed African American man at the hands of police in the US and dwindling tolerance for systemic racism, people around the world are feeling empowered to dismantle divisive symbols.

In many cases, formal requests for removal have been achieved by working through official channels. But not always – this past Tuesday, a request to remove the bust of a Ku Klux Klan grand wizard from the Tennessee state capitol building was voted down.

Symbols matter, a University of New Hampshire professor wrote in response to the display of Confederate flags at the 2017 “Unite the Right” rally held in Charlottesville, Virginia, because of the emotional content they convey. Symbols deemed especially problematic have routinely been eradicated throughout history – from Soviet monuments in the former Eastern Bloc, to the statue of a British imperialist in South Africa.

In the US, the recent death of George Floyd and demands for racial justice make this a particularly fraught moment for the country – and for its visible historical baggage. Confederate monuments are especially charged not just because they commemorate a bid to establish a slave-holding republic, but also because their construction accompanied the subsequent rise of Jim Crow laws that disenfranchised black Americans.

In 2015, Dylann Roof murdered nine African Americans in a South Carolina church. Images subsequently emerged of Roof posing with the Confederate flag. Between those murders and early 2019, 114 Confederate symbols were removed, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. But 1,747 remained.

The use of Confederate symbols isn’t confined to the US. Supporters of a professional soccer club in Italy have brandished the Confederate flag, as have descendants of Confederate soldiers in Brazil, and rock 'n' roll fanatics in Sweden.

In many cases these symbols are used due to an ignorance of their true meaning. In other instances, the meaning is very much embraced.

Some have argued that dismantling monuments and eliminating symbols amounts to erasing history. But an awareness of their potentially harmful effects has only increased – evidenced by a recent decision by NASCAR to ban the Confederate flag from its racing events and properties, and an effort in London to comprehensively review links between statues in the city and slavery.

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