People throughout the country seem to be stuck in debate over what should be the simple removal of Confederate statues across America.

For those who may have forgotten, the Confederacy seceded from the Union in 1861 because they no longer wanted to be under the rule of President Lincoln. They argued in favor of slavery, as it was their number one economic service at the time. President Lincoln urged them to desist, but they refused.

The Confederacy’s stubbornness to reason threw the country into civil war and then *SPOILER ALERT* they lost. It would be interesting to note that there were very few Confederate statues at this point in history, but fast-forward just 50 years and there was a massive surge in amount of memorials created.

This initial resurgence happened after the US reconstructed the devastated, formerly Confederate South, when Jim Crow laws first appeared in the 1910s. These racist “separate but equal” laws fostered the formation of white supremacist groups like the KKK whose favorite activity included a Sunday picnic accompanied by a lynching.

During these years of black disenfranchisement and white terror, white supremacists erected most of the Confederate statues around America as a means to intimidate and further terrorize black folk.

The next resurgence of confederate statues came during the 1960s when African-Americans fought for their civil rights. Now considering the dark and insidious histories of these memorials, the fact that many Americans today look to these statues as signs of their proud culture and history is truly baffling.

However, as the losers of a war they started 150 years ago, the South should be apologetic for their actions and actively educate themselves and future generations so that they see the Confederacy as a blatant mistake instead of a relic of their proud history.

Look to Germany and their efforts to deliberately educate their populace about the atrocities of their Nazi past as the model Americans should have taken after the Civil War.

Taking down statues in no way erases history or culture, so for those advocates who worry about the survival of their precious legacy and culture, there is no need to fear. The country still remembers when your ancestors had black slaves and dehumanized them in every possible way just to uphold your white superiority and dominance.

Education is the key to preventing history from repeating itself, so these monuments should be put in museums to acknowledge that they are a part of American history, but they should be seen as mistakes to be learned from rather than a symbol of cultural pride.