As far as I know, there are no Confederate monuments in Detroit, or anywhere in Michigan. But there are statues in Detroit of historical figures we feel ambivalent about, if not outright disgusted.
One of those is Christopher Columbus, usually credited with discovering the American continent, even though what he was actually looking for was a shorter route to India. Steve Neavling of Motor City Muckraker reports:
An online petition calls for the removal of the Christopher Columbus statue from downtown Detroit.
More than 1,000 people signed the petition since it was posted earlier this week on Change.org. [As of last night, there were 1,229 signers.]
The petition, which addresses Detroit City Council and Mayor Duggan, also calls for the end of Columbus Day in the city.
A coalition of cultural, religious and social justice organizations joined Raiz Up, a neighborhood collective in southwest Detroit, to organize the petition drive.
I’m not sure how to feel about this one. You don’t have to twist my arm to get me to say that Columbus was a racist bastard who doesn’t deserve any new monuments. But should it be a priority to take down his existing monuments?
Maybe removing statues of Confederates should be a higher priority, and this Columbus issue can remain on the back burner. I suppose if I lived in the South, I might feel differently about this: Northerners should also argue about statues.
And what if this Columbus-bashing is actually being instigated by Breitbart in order to paint liberal activists as violent and lacking perspective?
Especially given that Führer Drumpf’s suggestion of a slippery slope that would target George Washington statues was quickly refuted, Columbus makes a better target with which to discredit “social justice warriors.”
There are elements of the Columbus statue removal petition I can support more fully, such as:
We demand that the city memorialize one of our cultural/political forbears such as Tecumseh, Sojourner Truth, Charity Hicks, Chief Pontiac, Judge Damon Keith, or Grace Lee Boggs.
We further demand that the city commission a Detroit artist to create the new monument working with a committee of local historians, scholars, and organizers to to ensure that this new memorial, and existing monuments throughout the city represent the values and stories that we honor.
I have recommendations of sculptors for the city to commission: Sergio De Giusti and Gabriel Viñas. They are both very talented artists, and also humble, which, as it turns out, is a very important quality for this purpose.
The committee of historians and scholars is a good idea. Remember in 2014 when the very arrogant Andrew Pisacane came to Detroit, supposedly to memorialize Vincent Chin in a mural with the approval of Chin’s family?
Instead Pisacane used the mural to show off his knowledge of world history, by including three people who had no direct connection to Chin’s death. Probably Pisacane didn’t intent to excuse the killers, but that’s how his mural came across.
The Pisacane debacle showed that it is very important to have an artist proposing any public artwork show his full concept, so that there are no unpleasant surprises when the artwork is completed.
In any case, I’d much prefer a new statue to be of someone who accomplished something, rather than of a victim of a hate crime. Still, as much as I’d like for Detroit to have statues of Damon Keith and Grace Lee Boggs, I don’t think it’s such a high priority.
And what about the RoboCop statue? There are fictional characters I’d prefer over the cybernetic constable, but I suppose many find him more palatable than Columbus.
Don’t ask me to predict when or where the RoboCop statue will finally be installed, throwing a dart at a map of Detroit is how I would make my guess. As for when, I don’t know that either.
What do you think about the Columbus statue? Let me know in the poll, perhaps elaborate in the comments.