Remove all the Confederate stuff in Virginia, FFS (Richmond, Fairfax: middle school, wage)

[BOS2IAD]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

I actually agree with Hiruko and I'm a millennial. I too am sick of people acting like manbabies because something hurt their feelings. Get over it.

I, too, agree with Hiruko --- and, I agree with you, too. I'm a boomer who is a parent of a millennial.

[mpier015]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

My feelings are irrelevant. And if you read my post properly (which you didn't), you'd see that. Seems like you're interpretting things the way you want in your head.

I know that your feelings are irrelevant, I was simply stating that it was ironic that you were choosing to share those feelings with us while simultaneously complaining about other's feelings. If the irony is lost on you then that is fine. I read and re-read your post and the main point that you wanted to get across was "Who cares what you feel" and "I don't want to hear about your personal morality and feelings." My point is that your morality and feelings led you to make that post, which is true and ironic. I'm not sure what the back and forth is about?

[sonnymarkjiz]

Originally Posted by mpier015

I know that your feelings are irrelevant, I was simply stating that it was ironic that you were choosing to share those feelings with us while simultaneously complaining about other's feelings. If the irony is lost on you then that is fine. I read and re-read your post and the main point that you wanted to get across was "Who cares what you feel" and "I don't want to hear about your personal morality and feelings." My point is that your morality and feelings led you to make that post, which is true and ironic. I'm not sure what the back and forth is about?

You're the one going back and forth with yourself. My original point still stands.

[mpier015]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

You're the one going back and forth with yourself. My original point still stands.

I made a statement, you said I misread or didn't read your post so I figured that you were refuting my statement but I guess you are not.

[JD984]

The suggestion that people need to "get over" their feelings is disingenuous. It's about whose feelings matter at any particular moment.

We wouldn't be taking up these names for potential replacement if the feelings of black Americans had been considered in the first place. And those names wouldn't have been given to schools and subdivisions if it didn't make white Southerners feel better about the Lost Cause at the time.

[sonnymarkjiz]

Originally Posted by JD984

The suggestion that people need to "get over" their feelings is disingenuous. It's about whose feelings matter at any particular moment.

We wouldn't be taking up these names for potential replacement if the feelings of black Americans had been considered in the first place. And those names wouldn't have been given to schools and subdivisions if it didn't make white Southerners feel better about the Lost Cause at the time.

The problem is that changing a name just seems empty at this point for us blacks. We live next to the most powerful city in the world. We want real change, such as improving education for blacks, improving black neighborhoods, finally cleaning up water in poorer areas (like Flint), ending things like redlining and making sure that black neighborhoods have equal worth as white neighborhoods, police being retrained to not target blacks, etc.

Removing a name of a street or a school...meh. I guess? But until we get fundamental changes, it's just symbolic and nothing else changes.

[JD984]

Originally Posted by sonnymarkjiz

The problem is that changing a name just seems empty at this point for us blacks. We live next to the most powerful city in the world. We want real change, such as improving education for blacks, improving black neighborhoods, finally cleaning up water in poorer areas (like Flint), ending things like redlining and making sure that black neighborhoods have equal worth as white neighborhoods, police being retrained to not target blacks, etc.

Removing a name of a street or a school...meh. I guess? But until we get fundamental changes, it's just symbolic and nothing else changes.

You may disagree, but when people in positions of authority aren't willing to make even symbolic changes, it seems to me that squelches the belief of others that there would ever be a willingness to consider other more substantive changes.

The symbolic changes at least let people whose voices haven't always been heard know that they are having some impact. It gives them an incentive to push harder. And when people say that others should "get over their feelings," what they may really admitting to is their own fear that the symbolic changes may lead to more substantive ones that take them out of their own comfort zone.

[nva06]

Originally Posted by JD984

You may disagree, but when people in positions of authority aren't willing to make even symbolic changes, it seems to me that squelches the belief of others that there would ever be a willingness to consider other more substantive changes.

The symbolic changes at least let people whose voices haven't always been heard know that they are having some impact. It gives them an incentive to push harder. And when people say that others should "get over their feelings," what they may really admitting to is their own fear that the symbolic changes may lead to more substantive ones that take them out of their own comfort zone.

Exactly

[dkf747]

Originally Posted by JD984

You may disagree, but when people in positions of authority aren't willing to make even symbolic changes, it seems to me that squelches the belief of others that there would ever be a willingness to consider other more substantive changes.

The symbolic changes at least let people whose voices haven't always been heard know that they are having some impact. It gives them an incentive to push harder. And when people say that others should "get over their feelings," what they may really admitting to is their own fear that the symbolic changes may lead to more substantive ones that take them out of their own comfort zone.

I don’t see it that way. I see focusing on trivial things like street names builds up resistance to making substantive changes. There are a few symbolic changes that I don’t think are trivial, though. He’s right that the focus should be on real change.

[JD984]

Originally Posted by dkf747

I don’t see it that way. I see focusing on trivial things like street names builds up resistance to making substantive changes. There are a few symbolic changes that I don’t think are trivial, though. He’s right that the focus should be on real change.

It gets blurry at times. In Fairfax County, some of the same School Board members who were keenest to rename schools named after Confederates also went right along with a boundary change that concentrated poverty at one of the local middle schools. I can't say they were hypocritical, but they didn't exactly have their eye on the ball, either.