As hysterical and historical retro-activists seek to correct the wrongs of the past, it's just getting silly.
Now, I fully understand the disdain in which the
Confederate flag is viewed. I can almost
understand Corporations like Amazon banning availability of the Confederate
flag, while at the same time allowing Nazi and Communist memorabilia to be sold
unabated....because, after all...the scourge of bigotry and slavery in American
History was so much worse that the scourge of bigotry and slavery in Nazi
Germany and the former USSR.
Heck....many of my family members were sent to the Gulag...but I also acknowledge
that at this time in history, victims of communism are not popular....nor even
seriously viewed as victims....perhaps in a 100 years?
No matter.
The next step in retro-justice is coming.
Last week the Mayor of Memphis, Tennesee, A.C. Wharton,
stated it was time that the remains of Confederate General Nathan Bedford
Forrest and his wife dug up from a City Park and moved to another location.
Digging up bodies of people we don't like? Ooooo.
We
could advocate for retro-trials. After
all, there is historical precedence... the Cadaver Synod (Synodus Horrenda) of
897, where the body of Pope Formosus was dug up and put on trial.
And found guilty.
His punishment? His body was interred in a grave for
foreigners....then eventually dug up and thrown into the Tiber River.
Take that you evil Pope.
In the enlightenment we as a society now seem to possess,
why not correct all the historical wrongs just like we did in the past? Why not
dig up everyone in the past we have a problem with...put them on trial (Reality
TV at its best) and judge them accordingly?
Even my own nation of Canada is struggling to find a way of dealing with the well-known drunkard and genocidal land-thief known as Sir John A. MacDonald...who also happened to be Canada's first Prime Minister.
Why not just dig him up and put him on trial?
Britain passed judgement on Oliver Cromwell....and three
years after his death Charles II ordered Cromwell's body to be dug up, hanged,
drawn and quartered. Cromwell's head was
then removed from his body and placed on a spike at Westminister. As a warning to all.
John Wycliffe was burned as a heretic 45 years after his
death.
Vlad the Impaler (you know him as Dracula) was beheaded after
his assassination.
Famous Russian mystic Rasputin was dug up by a mob and
burned with gasoline.
Gebhard von Blücher was dug up by Soviet troops and his
skull taken and used as a football.
There is no shortage of names, no shortage of those attempting to correct the crimes of the past.
Because as an amateur historian, I just think it's so cool that
we insist on repeating history.
We've come so far in our enlightenment....so pass me a shovel and let the healing begin.
But first, I have a bone to pick, literally, with Josef
Stalin.
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