Goodbye, President McKinley’s Statue

Nearly eight years ago I wrote a short history about how the statue of President William McKinley came to grace the town square of Arcata, California. This was long before the idea that removing statues and other symbols, because they were somehow offensive, became a political tool, weaponized to rewrite U.S. history, both small-scale and large.

Recently, I became aware of how the City of Arcata has voted to remove the statue from the town square. One prominent group says this is the proper thing to do, pointing that McKinley instigated a ‘genocide in the Philippines’ in 1899.

We were at war with Spain at the time, so there is more to the story.  Afterwards, the U.S. established posts and bases in the chain of islands and we’ve maintained a presence there ever since.

It’s true that the U.S. has not always acted in the best interest of those it offers to support. This goes for those foreign lands we so-call ‘occupy,’ as well as those who live within the borders of our own nation.

But here’s the problem with expunging history based on political correctness: the human genome goes back to Africa and the Middle East. This means a complete expungement will return us all (if not you and me — than our coming generations) to this same point of origin. No one escapes the rewrite.

Too simplify this idea — if you are not Asian and insist on wearing pants, you are stealing from the Asian culture — which is ‘cultural misappropriation,’ and thus are to be expunged from ‘our’ history, which I’m sure you’ll agree is total B.S. None of this makes sense unless one breaks it down to beyond the P/C culture and realizes it is about ‘power,’ which in of itself is a politically incorrect act.

Remember what ever weapon’s called for today to destroy history and culture can and will eventually be used again at a later date. After all, it happened to Native American’s and now its ugly head has returned.