{"id":114687,"date":"2022-05-03T10:57:56","date_gmt":"2022-05-03T14:57:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=114687"},"modified":"2022-05-03T13:54:31","modified_gmt":"2022-05-03T17:54:31","slug":"flashback-seattles-statue-of-washington-destroyed-statue-of-lenin-untouched","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=114687","title":{"rendered":"FLASHBACK! Seattle\u2019s Statue of Washington Destroyed, Statue of Lenin Untouched"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><!--more--><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/caldronpool-64-1024x399.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"640\" height=\"249\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-114689\" srcset=\"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/caldronpool-64-1024x399.jpg 1024w, http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/caldronpool-64-300x117.jpg 300w, http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/caldronpool-64-768x299.jpg 768w, http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/05\/caldronpool-64.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>BY MARK POWELL<br \/>\ncaldronpool.com<\/p>\n<p>If you wanted any more evidence as to the decay of Western Civilisation, then you need only to consider the following example reported by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/realDailyWire\/status\/1274077222597324800\">The Daily Wire.\u00a0<\/a>As you can see below, In the American city of Seattle, the statue of George Washington has recently been pulled down by rioters and desecrated whereas the statue of Lenin remains untouched.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div class=\"twitter-tweet twitter-tweet-rendered\"><iframe id=\"twitter-widget-0\" class=\"\" title=\"Twitter Tweet\" src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/embed\/Tweet.html?creatorScreenName=caldronpool&amp;dnt=false&amp;embedId=twitter-widget-0&amp;features=eyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH19&amp;frame=false&amp;hideCard=false&amp;hideThread=false&amp;id=1274077222597324800&amp;lang=en-gb&amp;origin=https%3A%2F%2Fcaldronpool.com%2Fseattles-statue-of-washington-destroyed-statue-of-lenin-untouched%2F&amp;sessionId=6362f407b27648913358628603335fa2661ae3fb&amp;siteScreenName=caldronpool&amp;theme=light&amp;widgetsVersion=c8fe9736dd6fb%3A1649830956492&amp;width=550px\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" data-tweet-id=\"1274077222597324800\" data-mce-fragment=\"1\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div class=\"code-block code-block-17\">\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Like me, you might be shocked and more than a little surprised that there is even a statue of Lenin in Seattle. I had to Google it myself just in case it was fake news. But sure enough, it is there. Even more significant, though, was this explanation as to the monument\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Statue_of_Lenin_(Seattle)\">history<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The statue was constructed by\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bulgarians\">Bulgarian<\/a>\u00a0sculptor Emil Venkov (1937\u20132017) under a 1981 commission from the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Communist_Party_of_Czechoslovakia\">Communist Party of Czechoslovakia<\/a>.\u00a0While following the bounds of his commission, Venkov intended to portray Lenin as a bringer of revolution, in contrast to the traditional portrayals of Lenin as a philosopher and educator.\u00a0Venkov intended the statue to function as a critique of communist oppression and depict Lenin as a violent man, with abstract rifles and flames on the statue, in contrast to the traditional depiction of Lenin holding a book.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>How ironic! Lenin\u2019s Marxism was responsible for the death of untold millions. The first President of the United States, though, established one of the greatest democracies the world has ever known. The first produced violence and bloody revolution, the latter political and social freedom.<\/p>\n<p>Sometimes it\u2019s hard to keep up with exactly what progressives are thinking. But thankfully we always have the internet to remind us of what they have previously said. For example, over the weekend, Julia Baird wrote an article in\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/national\/the-toppling-of-statues-is-enriching-not-erasing-history-and-it-has-thrilled-my-heart-20200612-p5523r.html\">The Sydney Morning Herald<\/a>\u00a0with the title, \u201cThe toppling of statues is enriching not erasing history and it has thrilled my heart\u201d. The heart of her argument for cultural iconoclasm was as follows:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>One of the more perplexing arguments made in recent days is that toppling, relocating or removing old statues amounts to the erasure of history. It is in fact the very opposite: it is history. To seek a fuller understanding of the past is not wrecking, but restoring, salvaging and deepening history.<\/p>\n<p>History is not just a set of facts but a series of questions, a mode of inquiry that seeks to comprehend and put flesh on dates, events and places, to understand and include all possible perspectives, all while knowing that, until about 50 years ago, history was almost solely written by white men, about white men.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>But the thing that undermines her woke thesis is that it is completely opposite to what Baird herself had written in 2017 for\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.smh.com.au\/opinion\/statues-help-us-glimpse-into-our-past-even-the-ugly-bits-20170825-gy3yo5.html\">The Sydney Morning Herald<\/a>. Commenting on the historical value of the statue of Queen Victoria\u2014of whom Baird published a full-length biography\u2014currently residing outside Sydney\u2019s town hall, Baird wrote:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>We don\u2019t need to scramble to pull all flawed figures from our past \u2013 for surely few could ever remain\u2026<\/p>\n<p>I don\u2019t like tearing old things down, even those that remind us of our shortcomings. I\u2019d rather put up new statues, or even be creative with street art that often reimagines pedestrian ugliness \u2013 like turning bollards into bollart. I\u2019d like to see more memorials of women who aren\u2019t queens, and of previously invisible Indigenous leaders.<\/p>\n<p>One important thing to note is that it is never historians who panic about all this. Most of us relish debate about remembering and restoring and revisiting the past, and the way we record it. It\u2019s excellent. As long as it is informed and does not become warped by a poisonous culture war or nonsensical slurs.<\/p>\n<p>Surely we have grown up sufficiently as a nation to look our own history, long passed, straight in the eye.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>So, is what Baird saying is that monuments are great, as long as the person agrees entirely with one\u2019s own present point of view? Or maybe it\u2019s as long as the history is being written by white women about a white woman?<\/p>\n<p>Regardless of what Baird thinks\u2014well, at least what she does this year\u2014monuments are there to teach us important lessons from the past. The represent people who have made a significant contribution to making our society what it is today. No one is perfect, just take a look at anyone\u2019s twitter feed. But we need to not only honour the contribution they made while at the same time exercising the tolerance that they didn\u2019t think exactly the same as us.<\/p>\n<p>Baird\u2019s inconsistency, though, seems to be emblematic for what is happening throughout Western Civilisation more generally. Especially when\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RitaPanahi\/status\/1273739801464725504\">Patrisse Cullors<\/a>\u2014the co-founder of Black Lives Matter\u2014has stated unambiguously that she is a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.heraldsun.com.au\/blogs\/rita-panahi\/blm-are-radical-neomarxists\/news-story\/8ed22f8b57042417bf23745dba70ad7c\">Marxist<\/a>. It\u2019s as though COVID is producing an historical and political amnesia. Where light is exchanged for darkness, and what is sweet for what is bitter.<\/p>\n<p>___<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/caldronpool.com\/seattles-statue-of-washington-destroyed-statue-of-lenin-untouched\/\">https:\/\/caldronpool.com\/seattles-statue-of-washington-destroyed-statue-of-lenin-untouched\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=114687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114687\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=114687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=114687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=114687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}