The Fayetteville NC Market house. A place to sell slaves.

abc11.com...

I will present this article, which is about removing the logo of the city of Fayetteville, and changing it to reflect a more positive view. I can agree that having this as a symbol for the city, when fully understood for what it is, should not be there.

But, I also feel as if this bit of history is HUGELY important to learn from, and continue to use as a reminder of what we once were, and how far we have come.

The market house is in the center of the downtown area. It has been revitalized in the past 10 years and now, downtown Fayetteville is a nice place to take your family to.

20 years ago, this place was full of strip clubs, and hookers. It was the LAST place you would take your family to.

So while I applaud the city for it's work on the downtown area, I hope enough people will keep the history of the town for all to see and enjoy, and learn from.

a reply to: network dude
I think that erasing history is the wrong way to go about things.

There is a specific reason that you can visit concentration camps in Europe today, even though they represent a heinous act perpetrated 70 years ago. We should not forget our history, especially the painful things. People visit those concentration camps and leave with tears in their eyes... as they should. If we forget, it can easily happen again.

Your subject line made me think Fayetteville still operated a house that sold slaves. Now that would have been an interesting story and something for people to totally get their panties in a wad about.

The real story is more of the same drivel attempting to erase history.

We are bored with this attempt and it's time to stop it and move on.

originally posted by: butcherguy
I think that erasing history is the wrong way to go about things.

There is a specific reason that you can visit concentration camps in Europe today, even though they represent a heinous act perpetrated 70 years ago. We should not forget our history, especially the painful things. People visit those concentration camps and leave with tears in their eyes... as they should. If we forget, it can easily happen again.

What about this story is "erasing history" though? Logos and letterheads are changed over far less and clearly do not serve the same purpose as making museums out of concentration camps. It's interesting that you bring up concentration camps though because the Germans have actually outlawed Nazi symbolism.

Wikipedia - Strafgesetzbuch section 86a

The German Strafgesetzbuch (Criminal Code) in § 86a outlaws "use of symbols of unconstitutional organizations". This concerns Nazi symbolism in particular and is part of the denazification efforts following the fall of the Third Reich.

The law prohibits the distribution or public use of symbols of unconstitutional groups, in particular, flags, insignia, uniforms, slogans and forms of greeting.[1]

The law text does not name the individual symbols to be outlawed, and there is no official exhaustive list. A symbol may be a flag, emblem, uniform pants, or a motto or greeting formula. The prohibition is not tied to the symbol itself but to its use in a context suggestive of association with outlawed organizations. Thus, the Swastika is outlawed if used in a context of völkisch ideology, while it is legitimate if used as a symbol of religious faith, particularly any South Eastern or East Asian religions. Similarly, the Wolfsangel is outlawed if used in the context of the Junge Front but not in other contexts such as heraldry, or as the emblem of "landscape poet" Hermann Löns. Due to the law, German Neo-Nazis took to displaying modified symbols similar but not identical with those outlawed. In 1994, such symbols were declared equivalent to the ones they imitate (Verbrechensbekämpfungsgesetz Abs. 2).

The obvious difference is that in the South, the Confederacy and its leaders have been and continue to be venerated and because of this there's a whole lot of apologist excuse making about slavery while in Germany, the overwhelming majority of people aren't making excuses for the Holocaust or venerating Nazi leadership.

Anyway, it's interesting to see how these things are treated differently. Can you imagine if swastikas were still flying over government buildings in Germany and "heritage not hate" was a thing Germans said in defense of it with a straight face?

a reply to: theantediluvian

It is one of many stories in the news right now, and it is my opinion that there is an organized effort to erase history in regard to the Confederacy, not just slavery. I believe this is part of that effort.

Coming next in the purge of history:

"The ground we're standing on was once used to transport and sell slaves. We need to dig it up and throw it in a volcano."

a reply to: butcherguy

I think that erasing history is the wrong way to go about things.

There is a specific reason that you can visit concentration camp

I fully understand what you are trying to get at and I don't disagree that we must learn from our history. However, I don't really see that happening nor do I see history as being presented unbiased or in positive manner for society to learn from.

What I have seen is CONTROLLED or selective history , the victimization and vilification of people based on race or some other quantitative measures to encourage separation.

What this has done is caused anger, hate, conflict and instead of making it a humanity issue they make into a type of group issue that you are forced into. The truth of the matter is no race has clean hands when it comes to slavery.

Instead of presenting slavery as a bad thing that every race has done including the African Americans who sold their prisoner of war to the white man, they chose to quantify or stereotype the villain and victims into two separate groups.

The problem with that is that it creates hate and separation among people and forces them into a side when their is really no clear side: Whites (Villain) and Black (Victims) .

Nobody likes to be either a Villain or a Victim , so its no wonder racial tension still exists.

Its a HUMAN problem not a Black or White problem.

IMO I think this is done purposely by those that create history to force people to pick a side and keep them fighting among themselves. This is done with race, politics, and even sexuality.

Perhaps we need to focus better on how history is presented to encourage positive benefits versus negative one? I'm not saying to alter it , but perhaps more efforts should be put into making a humanity problem than a certain type of people problem ?.

a reply to: theantediluvian

The article is about removing the image of the market House from the Logo of the city. I don't disagree with that. I think in light of the recent events, this would be like an open wound if it was left as is.

But my main reason for posting this, is that groups of people. Some NAACP, and some random people, want to remove these types of memorials/landmarks. I can even understand (to a point) their frustration, but removing a landmark and pretending it was never there, will not erase what happened. It will not make racial tensions disappear.

Our history, good/bad/indifferent still took place. As was brought up already, the Holocaust is something we all wish never happened. And thinking about it, it's almost inconceivable that humans were able to treat other humans this way. I cannot imagine what kind of mentality it would take to rationalize killing people for no other reason than they were different. But it happened. And everyone needs to think about why it should never, ever happen again.