I've recently had a few people say something like this to me: "Someday, we might have to tear down statues of Martin Luther King Jr. because he did things that, in the future, we'll find morally repugnant...like eating meat."

In case this argument is holding water with anyone, here's the real quick version of why it is complete bullshit.

We do not tear down confederate statues because the men did things that we now find distasteful, we tear them down for two reasons:

1. Those men were presented with a choice...stop doing the terrible thing or go to war to continue doing it. They chose to go to war, and that's THE ONLY REASON WHY WE KNOW WHO THEY ARE.

2. Those statues were built /in retaliation/ to the continued fight for the rights of Black Americans. They were built both to commemorate people who killed to deny human rights to Black Americans, AND to terrorize Black Americans still fighting for their rights.

When we build statues of Martin Luther King Jr., we are not praising every action he ever took in his life, we are holding him up as an important figure in a long story of the extension civil and human rights to all Americans. A story worthy of praise.

This isn't complicated.</>