All the love being shown to this man is mind boggling. There is nothing honorable about a man who committed treason and killed more Americans than all other wars combined. Slavery doesn't even need to be mentioned. This attempt to white wash history makes me ill.

You don't need 21st century glasses to see that Robert E. Lee took up arms against his own country.

You don't need 21st century glasses to see that Robert E. Lee took up arms against his own country.

Fuck General Lee and any of his supporters, but this is a god awful reason to dislike the man. John Brown took up arms against his own country and he's one of the best Americans who ever lived.

Fuck General Lee and any of his supporters, but this is a god awful reason to dislike the man. John Brown took up arms against his own country and he's one of the best Americans who ever lived.

I don’t mean to apologize for his downfalls or make excuses for him, but I agree with every single, solitary view he ever held. Great man.

In the PC world today you're going to be labeled a racist. I know where you're coming from. Just like everyone from his time, you put your state before your country. And that's what he did, and if we were living at that time, we would all have done the same thing.

But people don't want to hear that these days. I don't know if he was a racist or a segregationist , but all I do know is he fought for his state which was the highest honor in those days.

In the PC world today you're going to be labeled a racist. I know where you're coming from. Just like everyone from his time, you put your state before your country. And that's what he did, and if we were living at that time, we would all have done the same thing.

But people don't want to hear that these days. I don't know if he was a racist or a segregationist , but all I do know is he fought for his state which was the highest honor in those days.

Every single founder of America did as well.

They did, but not to preserve their right to keep their slavery industry.

American Revolution was more based on taxation and failure to have representation in the British government.

It was said earlier that looking at the Confederacy through 2017 eyes, there is nothing good about their actions. I believe in state's rights to a point, but using them to protect slavery is not one of them.

I admire General Lee's ability as a military tactician and leadership qualities that inspired his soldiers to fight and succeed in some situations where they faced overwhelming odds in terms of the North's manpower and industrial advantage.

I really dont know if Lee fought for slavery.

Seems to me that you hate America. Am I off base?

You don't need 21st century glasses to see that Robert E. Lee took up arms against his own country.

Just like everyone from his time, you put your state before your country.

In the PC world today you're going to be labeled a racist. I know where you're coming from. Just like everyone from his time, you put your state before your country. And that's what he did, and if we were living at that time, we would all have done the same thing.

But people don't want to hear that these days. I don't know if he was a racist or a segregationist , but all I do know is he fought for his state which was the highest honor in those days.

No, I love America even with all her imperfectations.

To Great Britain, the colonies were rebelling, an act of treason. Any historian that looks at the reasons behind the rebellion will agree they were doing so for honorable reasons.

The Confederacy rebelled for an honorable principle: maintaining state sovereignty against a seemingly out of control federal government. They picked the wrong issue (slavery) to proceed with secession.

John Brown was brought up; he was hated in the South for his actions, while abolitionists and blacks cheered him. He took up arms against the federal government (Lee was in command of the forces who quelled the rebellion btw), an act of treason. But since his actions ignited the powder keg that led to the Civil War, he is considered a patriot.

I don't get why everyone has to act like a child about this. He fought for his state(honorable thing) and fought for the right to enslave people(heinous thing). The need for a binary label on him and people of his time is enough to make even Rick blush.

Yeah, it's way more complicated than that. He never knew anything different than the paradigm in which he lived (slavery). That's not an excuse, but I would look at it this way. Imagine in 150 years that abortion is illegal and the practice is accepted as a human atrocity. Should the prism of his abortion support be the way that future society defines someone like Obama or any other pro-choice Democrat of the last century?

Yeah, it's way more complicated than that. He never knew anything different than the paradigm in which he lived (slavery). That's not an excuse, but I would look at it this way. Imagine in 150 years that abortion is illegal and the practice is accepted as a human atrocity. Should the prism of his abortion support be the way that future society defines someone like Obama or any other pro-choice Democrat of the last century?

That's true but the time he lived in also included a lot of people recognizing slavery for the atrocity for it was and he stood up and fought against THAT.

So even in his time, he was still kind of a jerk.

Do you ever step back and listen to yourself?

Yeah, it's way more complicated than that. He never knew anything different than the paradigm in which he lived (slavery). That's not an excuse, but I would look at it this way. Imagine in 150 years that abortion is illegal and the practice is accepted as a human atrocity. Should the prism of his abortion support be the way that future society defines someone like Obama or any other pro-choice Democrat of the last century?

Yeah, it's way more complicated than that. He never knew anything different than the paradigm in which he lived (slavery). That's not an excuse, but I would look at it this way. Imagine in 150 years that abortion is illegal and the practice is accepted as a human atrocity. Should the prism of his abortion support be the way that future society defines someone like Obama or any other pro-choice Democrat of the last century?