Ben Franklin (The Statue!) Now A "Person Of Concern" In D.C.
I love it. It's like the long-dead Founder and other Founders (also marked as Persons of Concern, despite only existing in statue form), are uncaught peeping Toms terrorizing the ladies of D.C.
In the WSJ, the Editorial Board writes:
'A republic, if you can keep it." Benjamin Franklin's 1787 quip about the government Americans would have is probably the most popular Founding-era wisdom still with us. Maybe not for long. As if to prove Franklin's insight about the tendency of republics to self-destruct, a District of Columbia panel has identified Franklin, among other Founders, as a "person of concern," and recommended his name be removed from D.C. property.The astonishing proposals come from a Washington, D.C., government committee formed by Mayor Muriel Bowser to re-examine the names of schools, statues and parks in the wake of protests. The committee submitted its report Monday, and Ms. Bowser tweeted "I look forward to reviewing and advancing their recommendations."
The committee says it hunted for historical figures with "key disqualifying histories, including participation in slavery, systemic racism, mistreatment of, or actions that suppressed equality for, persons of color, women and LGBTQ communities and violation of the DC Human Right Act." The bureaucrats worked with uncharacteristic dispatch, taking six weeks to render the judgment of history on 1,330 properties named for people.
The committee doesn't explain its case against Franklin, but we can assume he was judged for once owning slaves. He was later president of the Pennsylvania Society for Promoting the Abolition of Slavery, but anyone who believes the report is a considered historical exercise and not an Orwellian effort in ideological reprogramming has been taken in.
The committee wants the Franklin School historic landmark renamed and recommends that D.C. petition the federal government to "remove, relocate, or contextualize" a federally owned Franklin statue. It offers the same recommendation for the federal Washington Monument--yes, the monument to the man who won America's independence.
We will all be backward in hindsight from tomorrow's standards, but only an ideology-over-reasoning-driven ass tosses the people who made America possible on the trash heap because they, at some point in their lives, didn't comport with standards of a time 200-plus years in the future.
Someone needs to tell this District of Columbia panel to go fly a kite.
Thank you, folks. I'm here all week. Be sure to tip your waiters and bartenders.
Conan the Grammarian at September 3, 2020 6:12 AM
It’s like the one way socialist ratchet.
The way to *eat* American history is one statue at a time.
You never see the slippery slope until you are on it, and going down.
Isab at September 3, 2020 6:32 AM
> go fly a kite.
What, and get wet out there?
Crid at September 3, 2020 7:07 AM
Yes, by all means lets be like the Taliban and destroy historic landmarks, since the quest for Truth has been replaced with the quest for subjective perception. Sigh.
In my annual woke training at work, about 10 minutes in, I am told that "perception is reality." What the fuck? I had thought, as the Democrats always tell us, that we must "follow" the Science (except when Science is wrong). The search for the purity of Truth is largely a Western idea, hence racist because it largely originates with old dead white males. cf, "Inshallah."
I fear the new dark ages are coming. School choice is now a cultural imperative.
Bill O Rights at September 3, 2020 7:21 AM
Prior to the mid 1800's everyone throughout the world not living in abject poverty had slaves, serfs, or indentured servants. Thus to be truly woke we must erase all mention of humans or history prior to around 1865.
To do otherwise is racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic. (Did I miss any groups? I want to be totally inclusive).
Jay at September 3, 2020 8:03 AM
DC received home rule status in 1985 I believe. Let's rethink that. Mayor Bowser is a nutter.
FerdBurful at September 3, 2020 8:06 AM
This isn't going to stop until the political class is brought under threat. Mayor Bowser should be compelled to weigh her desire to purge the city of named objects and effigies against the potential that she is shot in the head.
kenk at September 3, 2020 9:33 AM
They also want to remove (or "contextualize") the Washington Monument!
https://www.intellectualtakeout.org/dc-mayor-embraces-report-calling-for-removal-of-washington-monument/
One could be convinced that the Trump campaign is paying these folks...
wambut at September 3, 2020 11:17 AM
"One could be convinced that the Trump campaign is paying these folks..."
Except they know that the biased media will protect them. Avg Americans who don't listen to Fox new or right leaning news will never hear of it except as DC wants to get rid of statues/monuments of racists/slave owners.
Joe j at September 3, 2020 1:26 PM
Every single human in history falls short of our current standards. They all did dozens of things we no longer find ok. All the men were patriarchal and all the women allowed their children to go work in the fields or factories as well as spanking them or worse. But in spite of their failures and sins, there were heroes in the past who made the world better and it behooves us to note them, to be inspired. These idiots are even canceling abolitionists and black union soldiers and 911 first responders and tearing down their statues. It is not Franklin's deficiencies they hate, it is his successes--he symbolizes American virtues and history, which they want to destroy.
cc at September 3, 2020 1:33 PM
No Crid - go fly a kite and get struck by lightening.
It is Ben fly-a-kite-in-a-storm-fame Franklin after all.
charles at September 3, 2020 5:10 PM
Tough room
Crid at September 3, 2020 6:41 PM
Look at this swam kitty:
https://twitter.com/GatorsDaily/status/1301537814455123968
Sixclaws at September 4, 2020 8:36 AM
About flying a kite:
https://twitter.com/ronckk/status/1300350191166341120
Sixclaws at September 4, 2020 8:42 AM
"and violation of the DC Human Right Act"... decades or centuries before it was enacted. Doesn't the constitution prohibit ex-post-facto laws?
Dan T. at September 4, 2020 10:42 AM
Oh, Dan, the Woke love to persecute for things that were not crimes when you did them. Donated to the marriage initiative in Cali in 2008? Cancel you. Etc.
cc at September 4, 2020 12:28 PM
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