Althouse: At the Southern Statue Café...

August 15, 2017

At the Southern Statue Café...

... can we all get together?

(Photograph first posted here in 2012.)

78 comments:

Nonapod said...: ... can we all get together?

Sadly, no.

There's a lot of people who claim to what unity, but what they really what is for everyone else to think exactly as they do. They're not interested in compromise and they will never offer any quarter to those who disagree with them. They are incapable of even considering that they themselves may be wrong in their own thinking. And since so much of there own personal identity and pride are tied up in these ideas, they will not tolerate anybody questioning those ideas.; 8/15/17, 2:01 PM
Static Ping said...: "Get together" requires either conformity or tolerance. At the moment, there is a sizeable part of the left that preaches tolerance but practices conformity or else. The Democratic Party, parts of the Republican Party, the media, and corporate America seem to be taking marching orders from this group. Can we all just get along? Sure. But a whole lot of people in power that effectively oppose that are going to have to get ruined. It won't be pretty.; 8/15/17, 2:05 PM
Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...: Statues on public land do seem to get people agitated. The morons who run my local government put up an enormous metal statue of a heron on the shore. To the naive viewer this might seem unproblematic, but there was local outrage and eventually the heron statue was torn down. Who knew there was an anti-heron constituency?; 8/15/17, 2:08 PM
JohnAnnArbor said...: Who knew there was an anti-heron constituency?

Baby ducks. (Herons are known to eat them.); 8/15/17, 2:12 PM
JohnAnnArbor said...: Why anyone would want to get into politics right now mystifies me.; 8/15/17, 2:15 PM
mockturtle said...: .. can we all get together?

I don't think so.; 8/15/17, 2:15 PM
NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...: What no Youngbloods link?; 8/15/17, 2:17 PM
Chest Rockwell said...: Where to stop with the statue and monument destruction? Most American historical figures had unsavory views on race. Perhaps we should just take them all down, Taliban style?; 8/15/17, 2:19 PM
MayBee said...: Normal people get along just fine every day.; 8/15/17, 2:21 PM
JohnAnnArbor said...: Perhaps we should just take them all down, Taliban style?

That's where this logically ends. All it takes is people who resort to violence and others unwilling/unable to face up to that.

Like in the middle east. Lots of the normal folks want peace, but the guys who want to kill Jews/fight America/whatever have the guns and are ready to use them.; 8/15/17, 2:23 PM
Nonapod said...: I really wish blogger would allow edits. I'm prone to spelling errors and homophone errors when I type too quickly and it drives me nuts.; 8/15/17, 2:23 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: ...can we all get together?

Three people can get together, if two of them are dead.

Or if all of them are horny.; 8/15/17, 2:23 PM
Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...: Nonapod said...
I really wish blogger would allow edits.

Ideally it would allow me to edit other people's posts. I think that would increase the entertainment value of the site enormously.; 8/15/17, 2:26 PM
First Tenor said...: If anyone can bring us all together, a giant Stevie Ray Vaughn statue at Town Lake in Austin, TX can do it.; 8/15/17, 2:31 PM
BudBrown said...: On Lady Bird Lake.; 8/15/17, 2:34 PM
Richard Dillman said...: I predict that the anti-history people will eventually go after the memorials and statues at Gettysburg National Military Park.
That would indeed be tragic; 8/15/17, 2:36 PM
Bilwick said...: The base of the statue has the inscription, "Nothing is better for thee than me."; 8/15/17, 2:38 PM
Ann Althouse said...: Public art is such a problem. It's often bad, just aesthetically. And people use it to say things, sometimes to control or put pressure on people. Just because something goes up doesn't mean it must stay up. If it were otherwise, whoever got there first would put all their junk up and we'd have to live with it, maybe in the most conspicuous central place in our town. Sometimes the people who put things up had oppressive intentions and sometimes it just evolves into oppression over time. We're not stuck with these big ugly intrusions.

I lived through "Tilted Arc" in lower Manhattan, and I know what it's like to feel the hostility of a piece of public sculpture and that was just a purely abstract thing with basically no meaning (other than walk around me, puny office workers).

But heart-lifting abstractions are good and maybe some nice realistic things with beloved artists like the one in my photograph. Keep politics out of it.; 8/15/17, 2:38 PM
Bob Ellison said...: A heron comes to the stream near my house every spring. The heron walks suavely into the stream and then suddenly spikes a fish, usually a six-inch whitehorse. Just pokes its beak in the fish.

And then, bizarrely, the bird releases the fish, usually more than once. Seems like taunting. "Swim away, little fish! Good luck!" And then the heron picks the fish up, turns beak skyward, and swallows it whole.

Not a nice bird. Doing its job well, though.; 8/15/17, 2:40 PM
mockturtle said...: Maybee claims: Normal people get along just fine every day.

Many families have been torn apart by this rift, just as they were in the first Civil War.; 8/15/17, 2:41 PM
tcrosse said...: Ideally it would allow me to edit other people's posts. I think that would increase the entertainment value of the site enormously.

Next best thing is to hijack another person's handle and avatar, so as to steal their identity and make ridiculous or offensive posts in their name.; 8/15/17, 2:41 PM
mockturtle said...: Next best thing is to hijack another person's handle and avatar, so as to steal their identity and make ridiculous or offensive posts in their name.

Please, tcrosse. Don't give ARM any ideas.; 8/15/17, 2:43 PM
JohnAnnArbor said...: "Public art is such a problem. It's often bad, just aesthetically."

No kidding. This one in Ann Arbor is particularly ugly. And just plain weird. The kid is stiff like a board, and being held like an object, not a person.

It's oddly on a random streetcorner near the medical campus.; 8/15/17, 2:44 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: "Public art is such a problem. It's often bad, just aesthetically"

I'm thinking of the damned orange grid iron "sunbeam" at the end of Wisconsin Avenue which screams "bad 70's art" and blocks the view of the Calatrava designed art museum. It irritates me every time I see it and I don't understand why people fought to have it remain in place.

At least they didn't put up that stupid blue shirt thing by the airport.; 8/15/17, 2:45 PM
Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...: tcrosse said...
Next best thing is to hijack another person's handle and avatar, so as to steal their identity and make ridiculous or offensive posts in their name.

PM me the details on this, if you could. Not sure I can top some of the posters but I'll give it a solid try.; 8/15/17, 2:46 PM
tcrosse said...: me the details on this, if you could. Not sure I can top some of the posters but I'll give it a solid try.

I'd rather not. There are already enough ridiculous or offensive posts here without anyone having to concoct more of them.; 8/15/17, 2:50 PM
Bob Ellison said...: My brother points and yells, "Bart!" (Bad art.); 8/15/17, 2:50 PM
Unknown said...: "Next best thing is to hijack another person's handle and avatar, so as to steal their identity and make ridiculous or offensive posts in their name."

Didn't that happen to Althouse?; 8/15/17, 2:51 PM
Chest Rockwell said...: Speaking of public sculptures and Nazi's, I was walking through Nuremburg on vacation one year, and stumbled upon an amazing sculpture that translates into The Marriage Merry Go Round

It's pretty grotesque and of excellent craftsmanship.; 8/15/17, 2:55 PM
JohnAnnArbor said...: I'm thinking of the damned orange grid iron "sunbeam" at the end of Wisconsin Avenue which screams "bad 70's art" and blocks the view of the Calatrava designed art museum. It irritates me every time I see it and I don't understand why people fought to have it remain in place.

This thing? I sympathize. Same artist did the same thing to our art museum.

A sculpture placed at the Engineering campus back in the 1990s actually led to protest t-shirts. It had been given by the class of 1933, and the t-shirts asked "what did we ever do to the class of '33?"

I actually don't actively dislike that one. But the orange I-beam ones don't seem to make much sense, except "hey, that thing."; 8/15/17, 2:57 PM
traditionalguy said...: Truth is stranger than fiction. ISIS just endorsed the Progressives' riots and violence favoring smashing and removal of Southerner's Monuments to the our dead. In Atlanta's Oakland Cemetery there is a huge Statue of a mourning Lion dedicated to the 4,000 unknown Confederate dead buried there, from the third of the four Battles of Atlanta ( the one in the Cylorama painting) which was fought between Oakland Cemetery and Decatur.

It has a large Jewish section, and of course it has many of the WHITE first families sites with Mausoleums ( including ours including one with old Grandaddy Jack Smith's statute sitting on the doorway arch overlooking downtown.)

The Atlantans caught, hung and buried at Oakland the 8 Andrews Raiders from the Great Locomotive Chase fame. After the war, the Yankees removed them to a National Cemetery.; 8/15/17, 2:57 PM
Del Hollingsworth said...: That looks like Stevie Ray Vaughn.; 8/15/17, 2:59 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Who is that even supposed to be? Looks like a white guy. Tear his fucking head off.

Ann Althouse said...But heart-lifting abstractions are good and maybe some nice realistic things with beloved artists like the one in my photograph. Keep politics out of it.

Keep politics out of it! That's hilarious. That's what the nice people who are in charge say, huh? When the topic is things I like, things I care about, we all ought to just relax and keep politics out of it.
When the topic is things I don't like or things I don't care about, well, politics are what they are, old chum--the mob has spoken, civil disobedience, and all that.; 8/15/17, 3:00 PM
Unknown said...: @althouse says ... can we all get together?

A bit of kumbaya ain't going to work. Trump wanted a divided country and it is between those who voted Trump and those who didn't. It is becoming obvious daily that the division is now between Trump's base and the rest irrespective of whether they are on the left or right.; 8/15/17, 3:01 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Unknown said...

Didn't that happen to Althouse?

I don't know that it happened to the Professor, but it did happen to some commenters here.

That would top my list of instantly getting you banned.; 8/15/17, 3:01 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Who decides what's a heart-lifting abstraction and what's a big ugly intrusion, again?
I'd have thought the Peace Statue in Atlanta (featuring a surrendering Confederate soldier) was heart-lifting, you know, but turns out it's just a big ugly intrusion. I'm not one of the good people, understand, so I have to rely on the smart nice good people to tell me these things.

I remember way back some kerfuffle about a monument to a war hero in your town, and some costly clean up needed to the nice marble panels in the capital building in your city--yeah? I guess in retrospect those things weren't wrong, morally speaking: they were just acts of expression by individuals fighting against what they considered "ugly intrusions."

Golly I've been wrong about so many things! We ugly people can be so foolish.; 8/15/17, 3:05 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Unknown said...

Trump wanted a divided country...

I don't know if Trump wanted a divided country. Whether he wanted one or not, he recognized that a divided country is what we had.

I don't know if we will be able to fix what President Obama broke, but if it is possible, I doubt Trump is the man to do it. But no other Republican recognized that it was divided, and Hillary certainly would have made things worse.

So here we are.; 8/15/17, 3:07 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: "Same artist did the same thing to our art museum."

Jeez, what does that dude have against art museums?

" This one in Ann Arbor is particularly ugly. And just plain weird. The kid is stiff like a board, and being held like an object, not a person."

It would at least be entertaining if the kid was peeing, like the Manneken Pis statues in Belgium.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manneken_Pis; 8/15/17, 3:07 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: Inga thinks the country was united under Obama and Trump divided it?

That's a good one.; 8/15/17, 3:10 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: I wonder if Inga is planning her escape from Waukesha County. She's deep behind enemy lines.; 8/15/17, 3:11 PM
stlcdr said...: The town I live in has 'public art/statues' in each of the green spaces, created by the local college students (I believe). Some of it is quite good, and some not so much. It's only there a year before replaced by the next crop.

I like it. It's decorative and shows off the students work. They get an idea of what art is and the athletics of what they create. Specifically, art is not an obnoxious statement.; 8/15/17, 3:12 PM
Birkel said...: Who got to Salon?

The third such article will represent enemy action, as they say.
This is preparation for the inevitable nothingburger.; 8/15/17, 3:16 PM
Unknown said...: Headline from today's WaPo "In 1927 Donald Trump's father was arrested after a Klan riot in Queens"

The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.; 8/15/17, 3:17 PM
Big Mike said...: Wait! You Wisconsinites killed Stevie Ray Vaughn?; 8/15/17, 3:22 PM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: Unknown said...

Headline from today's WaPo...

If by today you mean 18 months ago...; 8/15/17, 3:22 PM
Bay Area Guy said...: Come on people now
Smile on your brother
Everybody get together
Try to love one another
Right now

--The Youngbloods, Get Together (1967); 8/15/17, 3:30 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: Damn I'm gonna laugh when they come for you--for some shit you care about.
This has truly been an instructive few days.
I have learned a lot.; 8/15/17, 3:31 PM
Birkel said...: UnknownInga14 is reporting that the sins of the father are visited on seven generations.

I've often wondered if stupid is physically painful.; 8/15/17, 3:36 PM
Unknown said...: From The Borowitz Report @ New Yorker:

Millions Willing to Work for Mueller for Free If That Would Speed Things Up

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Millions of Americans would gladly work for Robert Mueller for free if that would help speed things up, a new poll finds.

According to the survey, a substantial number of Americans would leave their jobs, their homes, and even their families to join the special counsel’s team if doing so would help bring this nightmare to a swifter conclusion.

A spokesperson for the special counsel confirmed that his office has been receiving thousands of résumés a day from Americans begging to do anything to help Mueller “move things along.”

“We saw a big surge in interest after the bust on Paul Manafort’s house,” the spokesperson said. “A lot of folks were devastated that they didn’t get to play a part in that.”

The spokesperson said that, although the special counsel “really appreciates” the public’s interest in helping out, limitations on office space prevent Mueller from accommodating all of those who desperately want to pitch in.

“We hate to disappoint people, but we’re overwhelmed,” the spokesperson said. “Right now, I have about five thousand résumés from people who just want to help investigate Jared.”; 8/15/17, 3:36 PM
Jim at said...: "Trump wanted a divided country and it is between those who voted Trump and those who didn't."

Nope.

I didn't even vote for the guy. I wrote in a name.
But it's assholes like you who are making damn sure I'm going to vote for him should he run in 2020.

Congratulations. You'll get more Trump.; 8/15/17, 3:39 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: I wonder what the battlefield at Gettysburg will look like with the Confederate memorials removed. I'd love to have the Louisiana one in my front yard if no one else wants it.; 8/15/17, 3:45 PM
Bilwick said...: Me, I want a divided country. I want to divide people who want to live freely and without the use of coercion, from those who want to force their wills on other people. And preferably send the latter to some form of Coventry where they can bludgeon and threaten each other to their hearts' content.; 8/15/17, 3:45 PM
Anonymous said...: The father of JFK and RFK and Chappaquiddick Ted was a serious Nazi sympathizer - real Nazis, not just wannabe morons - and all-round asshole. Has Unknown ever said "The apple doesn't fall far from the tree" about them? Will she?; 8/15/17, 3:49 PM
Birkel said...: Nothing says impartial investigation quite like "millions" of partisans wanting to help "move things along".; 8/15/17, 3:52 PM
Birkel said...: Jason Kessler is an Obama guy?

That's what the ridiculously biased SPLC says.

https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/individual/jason-kessler

National Socialists against International Socialists.; 8/15/17, 3:58 PM
rehajm said...: Union Thugs in 'Top Chef' trial found not guilty

Apparently Federal law allows union thugs to be union thugs provided they are being union thugs in the name of advancing unions.

Why have laws at all?; 8/15/17, 4:03 PM
traditionalguy said...: The Dems and the NFL globalists seems to want the Star Spangled Banner to no longer be sung at our sports events. It honors old white men, some of whom owned black slaves, for winning a fight.They will instead lead us into sing the Internationale honoring for our Global comrades like the Commies used to do.

But a factoid: The USSR and their Communist cadre revolutions were the largest slave owning Community ever known. And their slaves were intentionally worked to death or were shot for mentioning freedom.; 8/15/17, 4:03 PM
bleh said...: Did Stevie ever say the n-word?; 8/15/17, 4:06 PM
mockturtle said...: But a factoid: The USSR and their Communist cadre revolutions were the largest slave owning Community ever known. And their slaves were intentionally worked to death or were shot for mentioning freedom.

But I'm sure these antifas have never heard of a gulag.; 8/15/17, 4:06 PM
Birkel said...: Informed as I am by my moral betters (like ARM and sunsong) it seems the Left will have to wear a hairshirt and flog themselves with a cat of 9 tails because they are guilty of Leftist crime.

Political executions that don't get discussed are interestingly one sided.; 8/15/17, 4:07 PM
Birkel said...: The Leftist International Socialists are Pro-Fa.
Quit allowing your language to be determined by people who hate you.; 8/15/17, 4:09 PM
Unknown said...: @Jim at says But it's assholes like you who are making damn sure I'm going to vote for him should he run in 2020.

It is a free country. Vote for whoever you want. Otherwise, sticks and stones.; 8/15/17, 4:17 PM
Michael said...: Tradguy: Wish you wouldn't have pointed out the statuary in Oakland.; 8/15/17, 4:23 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: traditionalguy said...In Atlanta's Oakland Cemetery there is a huge Statue of a mourning Lion dedicated to the 4,000 unknown Confederate dead buried there, from the third of the four Battles of Atlanta ( the one in the Cylorama painting) which was fought between Oakland Cemetery and Decatur.

We talked about this the other day: Confederate lion of Atlanta; it's based off of the Lion of Lucerne that Althouse posted Mark Twain's quote on.

Here's a nice story for the good people: UNC's "Silent Sam" defaced again That's a memorial on the UNC campus to dead Confederate alumni. Civil disobedience, you see--tear it down!; 8/15/17, 4:30 PM
mockturtle said...: I read somewhere that the Lincoln Memorial was spray painted today.; 8/15/17, 4:58 PM
D 2 said...: How do we all get together, and make the world a better place?
Outside of ----, there are carrot farmers. They make the world better. So do the pickers, the truck drivers, the shop clerks, the chefs, and the people who work hard to bring something of value to the rest of us. The nurses, engineers, widgetmakers, widget sales staff, the teachers, road pavers, hairdressers and security guards who ate a few carrots on their lunch break also made the world better by doing what was asked of them, which in turn gave them some $ to buy the carrots they valued.
That is not to say that the important things in life are not done out of love and charity. They are.
But anyone and everyone can be a critic of carrot farmers, and a few of us can make millions opining on late night tv or wondering aloud on 24/7 news. We spend time hearing/reading/fighting endless wars of opinion, and seemingly "value" the critics more for their words than is necessary. Since the most idealistic critics are usually adept at becoming regulators of their passions, the endless fight moves into government, which can make you "value" something you might not, via tax/law. A fight over opinions now becomes a fight over policy or money. Lawyers get involved, and it all goes......
Maybe it was not always that way, but i dont believe so. The critics voices seem to be elevated- maybe even celebrated.

A Trump fan made the world better today by selling socks. A Trump hater made the world better by doing traffic control at a road site. When the two interacted, no one mentioned marches, hearings, prison camps, enemies lists, injustices or indictments. They did for each other something of value.
I hope (wish?) that theres a deal of trust still out there, but it can be eroded very very quickly by society choosing to give a megaphone to the loudest and harshest critics.; 8/15/17, 5:01 PM
Tyrone Slothrop said...: Unknown said...

Trump wanted a divided country and it is between those who voted Trump and those who didn't

Blinkered, ignorant, weak, dismissive and false. In short, the usual.; 8/15/17, 5:03 PM
Richard Dillman said...: When they remove the confederate monuments at Gettysburg, I volunteer to take the North Carolina sculpture
done by Gutzom Borglum for my backyard. It is a truely impressive, moving, and beautiful work of art. Borglum also did major work on Mount Rushmore and other places. Look him up.; 8/15/17, 5:08 PM
HoodlumDoodlum said...: mockturtle said...I read somewhere that the Lincoln Memorial was spray painted today.

Why wouldn't it be? Civil disobedience, my false chelonian friend, civil disobedience.
Unless...unless it was done by bad people. If it was done by bad people then that's just awful and mustn't be tolerated.; 8/15/17, 5:10 PM
mockturtle said...: D suggests: I hope (wish?) that theres a deal of trust still out there, but it can be eroded very very quickly by society choosing to give a megaphone to the loudest and harshest critics.

I hope (wish?) that theres a deal of trust still out there, but it can be eroded very very quickly by the media choosing to give a megaphone to the loudest and harshest critics.

FIFY.; 8/15/17, 5:35 PM
Paddy O said...: "According to the survey, a substantial number of Americans would leave their jobs, their homes, and even their families to join the special counsel’s team..."

This is called a cult.; 8/15/17, 5:39 PM
Freeman Hunt said...: Poor future liberated North Korea. You will look absurd forever because we can't "erase history."

And too bad we can't change any stupid progessive statues. All things must remain for all time!

You either keep everything or keep nothing; there's no room at all for hashing out guiding principles or voting on changes to public spaces. The world of the future is a forest of monumentia.; 8/15/17, 7:28 PM
Temujin said...: Y'all ready for The Great Leap Forward? Because it's here. The Left has been prying open this door for some time. Leap

They've worshipped the mongers of collectivist destruction and are now role-playing the Red Guard. I wonder what they'll do with the Lenin statue in the town square of Fremont/Seattle. Or the statue of Margaret Sanger bizarrely placed in the 'Struggle for Justice' wing of the Smithsonian. Or Washington, Jefferson.

I wonder what will come next. What books do you read? What books do you have in your home? Who do you hang out with? Little Red Guards being cranked out from the universities by the hundreds for decades now. Nice country you have there. Be a shame to lose it.; 8/15/17, 7:58 PM
Jaq said...: the Lincoln Memorial in Washington was vandalized with red spray paint. - MSN.com; 8/15/17, 7:59 PM
Jaq said...: Millions Willing to Work for Mueller for Free If That Would Speed Things Up

I guess they have this fantasy that there is evidence they haven't seen yet, because, what if all of this is bull shit, just like the deplorables have been claiming? Surely there is a pony under all of this horseshit!

http://www.salon.com/2017/08/15/what-if-the-dnc-russian-hack-was-really-a-leak-after-all-a-new-report-raises-questions-media-and-democrats-would-rather-ignore/; 8/15/17, 8:07 PM
Dude1394 said...: the Lincoln Memorial in Washington was vandalized with red spray paint. - MSN.com

Excellent.. Next they need to tear it down.; 8/15/17, 10:38 PM
JOB said...: House of Haddix

Wisdom builds her house,
But folly with her own hands tears it down.
- Proverbs 14:1

First Mansion
You enter the house to see the house, four walls
And foundation under constant hazard
Of time and crumbling emotions in time.
You enter the house to see what the house
Is not: the four walls that see not the weariness
Of history, nor keepers of the shades
Now gone down to sacred rest and left restless,
Unburied. Enter the house and senses detect
A quiet genius undisturbed as attic air,
Locked in a tomb, no part of the fixtures
But like a fiction, finding the locus
Where object and memory meet, escape
Time, and maintain vigilance over what
From root cellar grows in the house of Haddix
Expressed in elegant elegiacs,
In the dust and mold, the fingers of bone
Trace the moistened tracks a snail will make,
Moving toward inevitable lessons of the salt-lick.; 8/15/17, 11:11 PM
Etienne said...: Here's a video you might want to watch before you have a stroke or heart attack. Get your donor cards up to date.

El Hombre y el Perro; 8/16/17, 2:08 AM