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What Washington did in his personal life does not negate this fact: The Revolutionary War was not fought so that the USA could continue slavery. The Confederates were about that. No one is revolting against George Washington because of what the Revolutionary War was about. It is about why the USA revolted against Britain vs why the Confederates revolted against America.
I'm not trying to defend George Washington. I'm simply saying that comparing the Patriots of the Revolutionary War and the Confederates of the Civil War, based on the main cause being fought for, is quite stupid. The Patriots of the Revolutionary War weren't fighting against Britain for the sake of keep slavery. It was stuff like taxation without consent, quartering soldiers in citizens' homes, and denying colonists the right to a trial. The Confederate cause was all about keeping slavery. You cannot compare the two.
The confederates were fighting to keep the country that George Washington created.
2) "My ancestors" didn't sell themselves. People would take slaves from tribes not their own. A Fulani would never refer to a Hausa as "their people". Shows how much you know about Africa.
3) We are talking about America, and what happened here, no where else.
4) I don't have tribal connections with people based solely on skin color. I just understand where I stand in America as a Black man. I didn't chose it. I'm just here. I have to look at how things would have affected me back then and today.
5) I live in America. I was born and raised here. I have more in common with someone from Minnesota than I do from Ghana.
6) Go back and prove where I've lied about anything. If you can't do that, then cut through the formalities and just say what you think. Don't try to convince me to think your way. Just admit how you really feel.
Well you're just lumping all "black" people together and calling them "your ancestors."
You did that, not me.
We are talking about the complexities of slavery as viewed through a modern lens. Why do you want to limit that conversation?
Yes, you live in America. So why do you somehow identify with African slaves from a century and a half ago?
The confederates were fighting to keep the country that George Washington created.
Period.
Incorrect. Had the confederates won, can there be any doubt that they would have changed the Constitution to enshrine a right to slavery? That’s not the country the founders built, most of them were opposed to slavery even though they recognized they could not settle the question at the founding. There was a shared understanding though that slavery was likely to be banned in the near future, and that was their hope. Even the pro slavery side had to accept the provision that the slave trade could be outlawed by 1806.
You are going off on a tangent, this is about removing statues of confederate officers that were willing to send thousands of Americans to their death to defend slavery. No one is defending slave owners. Each jurisdiction can decide on their own whether it wants to have monuments to insurrectionists but it doesn't change history.
And again, by your definition, George Washington was an "insurrectionist."
Why the need to force this equivalence? So you honestly feel that the confederate cause was as just as Washington’s was in his war?
You feel that rebellion against the US Constitution, an eminently fairer government than former England’s was to the colonies, is a comparable comparison? Because that sounds like lost cause nonsense to me.
Of course Washington broke the rules when he committed treason against the British crown. Where did I suggest he did not? It was obviously necessary for all the founders to commit treason against England to form a new country.
And the American constitution said slaves were 3/5ths of a person.
And Washington himself had hundreds of slaves.
I'm trying to understand your support of one set of slave owners, but your denigration of ANOTHER set of slave owners who were simply trying to uphold Washington's America and resist Lincoln's NEW America.
The confederates were fighting to keep the country that George Washington created.
Period.
No. The Confederates were fighting explicitly for slavery. George Washington wasn't fighting explicitly for that. Again, the two cannot be compared, so stop trying.
I certainly won't shed a tear for the Confederates no longer being idolized and worshiped as wonderful people, but it would be the height of stupidity to erase all trace of them.
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