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>>I tolerate viewpoints - what I don't tolerate is racism and symbols of it. At some point you have to draw the line - and obviously there are fuzzy gray areas where that line should be drawn - but I think one thing we can agree on is that racism and symbols of it is bad ..right? Statues like that of Lee need (and have) to be removed for any meaningful step towards better race relations in the USA. Will removing them all solve the problem? Of course not - at least not on it's own - but things like that can be part of a process of removing many racist things embedded in our society that, as a whole, can make a larger difference.
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>Victor, all that happens when you decide to wash away history by removing statues is you start a civil war (ironically)

It's not washing away history, it's correcting a wrong. Put this thing in a museum where people can come learn from it. You don't need statues of someone to learn about them. I do not expect a civil war to break out in the USA over the removal of racist symbols and statues - just a handful of some looser white nationalist who were able to scrape up enough money for a bus ticket causing problems for a short time. Hopefully no oneelse will get killed over it - but its not going to kickoff a civil war.

>As I said, history is not there for you to love or hate or admire or "wash away" - it's there to learn from.

Then put them in a museum - ya know a place were people go to learn things.