This is Viewpoints for Sunday, Oct. 18, 2015
Stop the trash talk
Spending the first 24 years of my life in Indiana, I was taught the "Northern" history of the Civil War, even though most everyone born and raised in Indiana considers themselves "Midwesterners," not Yankees. I was told that Southerners were "traitors," people who mistreated their slaves and fought only to preserve slavery, etc. etc. That's how our history books read.
Fortunately, the Air Force transferred me to Robins Air Force Base, where I lived off base and met a lot of native Southerners. It didn't take me long to realize that I had received a biased education concerning the Civil War. First, the word "traitor" is totally improper. The people who decided to leave the Union are no more traitors than were the colonial people who decided to leave the British Commonwealth and start their own country.
Therefore, if Southerners were traitors, then so were the Revolutionary War patriots who founded our nation (many of whom were Southerners). The only difference is, "who won," because that's who gets to write the history.
Southerners had as much right to leave the United States that the colonists had to leave the British commonwealth, but unlike them, the Southerners lost their struggle to govern themselves, and with it, the institution of slavery.
One thing I never have understood is how someone who owned very expensive slaves could mistreat them. That doesn't make sense. I realize that it happened, however, but to what extent I have never seen reliable accounts. Of course the whole notion of one human being owning another as a slave is a concept that could not survive, even if treated well. I personally think slavery would have been eliminated by industrialization — machinery replacing manual labor — as happened a little later even in the North and continues today.
In any event, all the rhetoric using emotional and improper words does nothing to bring a multicultural society together to solve problems.
Trashing a Southerner's heritage only yields resistance and resentment, exactly the same response as trashing minorities and their heritage. Nobody has a monopoly on the truth. Let's just stop the trash talk on both sides.
— Richard Jones
Warner Robins
Who is to blame?
New York and Chicago blame the Southern states for the guns used for the shootings in their cities. Where do they get the criminals?
— Stan Dominy
Macon
Fight back
Presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson has been criticized by the left as "insensitive" to the families of the victims of the Roseburg, Oregon, massacre. He said that he would take a bullet to try to stop a killer and suggested that future intended mass murder victims simply attack the shooter en masse rather than passively waiting to be shot one at a time. (One heroic soul took seven bullets trying to stop the Roseburg shooter). Todd Beamer and his fellow United Flight 93 passengers probably saved the U.S. Capitol Building, the White House, or perhaps a nuclear power plant and countless lives by attacking the 911 terrorists and forcing a crash rather than allowing the intended attack to take place.
Spencer Stone, Alek Skarlatos and Anthony Sadler undoubtedly saved countless passenger lives on the Amsterdam to Paris train in August by attacking the shooter before he could start killing, and all three lived to tell the story. Would those on the left prefer that Carson either remain silent or tell us to sit quietly while the next would-be mass murderer prepares to shoot us, one by one, as we wait our turn to be killed? Apparently so.
Dr. Carson displays the kind of courage that once was common in this nation. He understands that trying to prevent mass murder is much more constructive than even the most sensitive and sincere comforting of the victim's next of kin afterward. What's hard to understand is that anyone would see a problem with it.
— Bill Pitts
Centerville
Rude behavior
Ed Armijo, candidate for Centerville City Council Post 4, had been invited to speak after the council meeting last week. After Amijo began speaking, Councilman Cameron Andrews could be heard talking loudly behind his back. The interruption was so annoying that the candidate stopped talking, and Andrews explained he wasn't sure "campaigning within the boundaries of a polling place" was allowed. What a devious trick.
Georgia laws state that a person can campaign within the boundaries of an election site on nonvoting days. The City Council and attorney should have surely done their homework on election laws prior to inviting Armijo to speak. The mayor allowed Armijo to continue his speech. Then loud talking began anew. Armijo cut his speech short, and no questions were allowed.
During another incident, Councilman Andrews contacted a police officer to ask that all of Armijo's campaign signs be removed from the city's right-of-way. Andrews actually followed the officer to make sure the signs were removed. Seriously? Why not remove all those signs that we see that advertise real estate, and help wanted? Does Andrews not realize that the sheriff's department is now in charge of the Centerville Police Department? Bullying a police officer is so unbecoming of a councilman.
— Geraldine Parker
Centerville
Structure and meaning
Faith is the belief in a religious doctrine which gives structure and meaning to our lives. Superstition is the belief in a religious doctrine which gives structure and meaning to the lives of those whose faith we don't share. From a Christian perspective, 68 percent of the world's population is merely superstitious.
— Neal Snyder
Warner Robins
This story was originally published October 17, 2015 at 4:55 PM with the headline "This is Viewpoints for Sunday, Oct. 18, 2015 ."