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In December 2015, the New Orleans City Council voted to remove four Confederate monuments from public grounds. A forceful group of critics protested the decision, and fearing retaliation, no crew would agree to remove the statues.
Director: CJ Hunt
Director: CJ Hunt
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00:00:27In July, I came before this
00:00:29City Council to request
00:00:31the relocation of four Confederate
00:00:34monuments that are occupying
00:00:36prominent spaces
00:00:37in the city of New Orleans.
00:00:40We have the opportunity
00:00:41to show the world that we
00:00:43as New Orleanians and Southerners are able to
00:00:45bring our community together and to do it
00:00:48we must reckon with
00:00:49our past. Let's take down
00:00:51these statutes and put them in a place
00:00:53of proper remembrance
00:00:56not reverence. Thank you all
00:00:58so much. God bless all of you.
00:01:04This is a knee-jerk reaction
00:01:06to an unspeakable tragedy
00:01:08that took place in Charleston,
00:01:10South Carolina
00:01:11that's causing race problems
00:01:13that haven't even occurred in this
00:01:16city for decades.
00:01:18It is amazing in 2015
00:01:19I'm fighting Robert E. Lee.
00:01:21This is almost hilarious.
00:01:24Why are we even
00:01:25talking about this?
00:01:27Those statutes should have been
00:01:29down a long time ago.
00:01:31In fact, they never should have been erected.
00:01:33The South lost.
00:01:35We think it's really important to face
00:01:37the history of whiteness in this country.
00:01:39What I'm hearing today is
00:01:41a lot of distortion of history.
00:01:43The New Orleans I grew up in
00:01:45was one, my family,
00:01:47I didn't know the difference
00:01:48of black and white.
00:01:53The so-called civil war
00:01:54wasn't about slavery.
00:01:56The war between the states
00:01:57was about succession,
00:01:59not about slavery.
00:02:01How the hell are we
00:02:03in a black city
00:02:0468% black or some
00:02:07discussing
00:02:07if we're going to let them
00:02:09remind us
00:02:10of our damn
00:02:11subjugation every day?
00:02:15First, I want to speak
00:02:16to the whole idea
00:02:17of oppression.
00:02:18Oppression is when
00:02:19a tourist comes to New Orleans
00:02:21and gets violently attacked
00:02:22in the CBD
00:02:23and gets his face kicked in
00:02:24by a couple of thugs.
00:02:26That's oppression.
00:02:27That's subjugation.
00:02:28This is not just a conversation
00:02:30about monuments.
00:02:32It is a precursor
00:02:34to the ongoing conversation
00:02:36that we should be having
00:02:38about equity.
00:02:39They're an inanimate object.
00:02:40They're not carrying forward
00:02:42the hatred
00:02:43and the racism
00:02:44and the oppression
00:02:45of our opponents here.
00:02:47If you take out
00:02:48these monuments
00:02:49as nuisances,
00:02:50you really need to
00:02:51nuke the city
00:02:52of New Orleans completely.
00:02:55We are not terrorists.
00:02:57We do not destroy the past.
00:03:00We are not allowing
00:03:02this to deteriorate.
00:03:04It is Muslims,
00:03:05Jacobins and communists
00:03:06who have bent on
00:03:07destroying memory
00:03:08and rewriting the past.
00:03:09It should be clear
00:03:10to everyone
00:03:11north and south
00:03:15that it is not,
00:03:16that it is not,
00:03:18that it is not sensitivity.
00:03:20Where do we stop
00:03:21with all this?
00:03:22Do we go all the way
00:03:23to Washington
00:03:24and take down
00:03:24every memorial there?
00:03:28This is our history.
00:03:50How long have you been working with this company?
00:03:52Uh, not long.
00:03:55I mean, I've known Darcy forever
00:03:56and we've worked together
00:03:57on different projects,
00:03:58but this came together
00:03:59just watching,
00:04:00like, literally right
00:04:02the day of the hearing,
00:04:03being like,
00:04:04is anyone making a documentary
00:04:05about this?
00:04:05This is really crazy.
00:04:06Awesome.
00:04:07All right.
00:04:07So what's your first project?
00:04:09Yeah.
00:04:09Nice.
00:04:10Eight years before
00:04:11I picked up this microphone,
00:04:12clearly not the right kind
00:04:13of microphone
00:04:14for this situation.
00:04:16I moved to New Orleans
00:04:17to become
00:04:18a middle school teacher
00:04:19and eventually
00:04:20an adult comedian.
00:04:24It's been weird
00:04:25growing up, like,
00:04:26looking, like,
00:04:27black, question mark,
00:04:28you know,
00:04:29just, like,
00:04:29kind of black
00:04:30because all my material
00:04:32and, like,
00:04:33the things I'm interested in
00:04:34on stage
00:04:34are, like,
00:04:35very black,
00:04:35but I feel like
00:04:36audiences hear that material
00:04:38and they're like,
00:04:38who is this fragile
00:04:40Mexican teenager?
00:04:43So when the time
00:04:44came for the city council
00:04:45to make a monumental decision,
00:04:47I rose to meet that moment
00:04:49with a YouTube video,
00:04:51an urgent historical rendering
00:04:53that can only be described
00:04:54as a janky imitation
00:04:56of late-night television.
00:04:58What do you think
00:04:59of taking the existing monuments,
00:05:01making them very small?
00:05:03I would say
00:05:03if you're going to go
00:05:04to all that trouble
00:05:05to shrink them...
00:05:06I don't have the technology.
00:05:07Okay, you don't have it.
00:05:08It's never been divisive.
00:05:09A group of people
00:05:11have made it divisive.
00:05:12Does the racial division
00:05:14that you're feeling now
00:05:15feel bigger or smaller
00:05:17than the racial division
00:05:18Lee would have wanted
00:05:20to go to war for?
00:05:22You were saying
00:05:23plaques that could
00:05:24explain things,
00:05:24and you tell me
00:05:25if this wording works for you.
00:05:27Hi, I'm Robert E. Lee.
00:05:28A long time ago,
00:05:29I turned on my country
00:05:30and led over 200,000
00:05:32southern sons
00:05:32to their graves
00:05:33so that we could keep
00:05:34our basic right
00:05:35to own human beings
00:05:36as property.
00:05:37Hashtag,
00:05:37sorry, I'm not sorry.
00:05:39That doesn't sound
00:05:41very good.
00:05:44One of the cool things
00:05:45about Confederate monuments,
00:05:47technically the only cool thing,
00:05:50is that they give us
00:05:51a concrete way
00:05:51to talk about race.
00:05:56And growing up
00:05:58Black and Filipino,
00:05:59I've always been
00:06:00deeply fascinated
00:06:01by the dynamics
00:06:02of race.
00:06:03No.
00:06:04There was a time
00:06:06in your life
00:06:06when you didn't even
00:06:07know you were Black.
00:06:08Okay, but basically
00:06:09from that point on,
00:06:11I think I've been
00:06:12very interested.
00:06:13No, no,
00:06:14not even that.
00:06:15There was a point
00:06:15after that
00:06:16when you denied
00:06:17that you were Black
00:06:19and did everything
00:06:20you could
00:06:20to change yourself
00:06:22into appearing
00:06:23to be White.
00:06:25But after that,
00:06:26I was very interested
00:06:27in race
00:06:28and being Black,
00:06:30I would say.
00:06:31No, not even then.
00:06:32Basically after that.
00:06:34Well, long time after that.
00:06:35It was like a
00:06:38steady progression.
00:06:39At Milton?
00:06:41Yeah, in high school.
00:06:42All-white school?
00:06:43It's not an all-white school.
00:06:45Predominantly white school.
00:06:47Okay.
00:06:47Overwhelmingly white school
00:06:49of rich, preppy kids
00:06:50and you were...
00:06:52Some of us
00:06:52thinking deeply
00:06:53about race.
00:06:54Well, that's not true.
00:06:56When I came to your school
00:06:57as a guest
00:06:58on Martin Luther King Day
00:06:59and talked about lynching,
00:07:00you were horrified.
00:07:02Let's just pause for a second.
00:07:02What would be
00:07:03an appropriate topic
00:07:04for Martin Luther King Day's speech?
00:07:06The triumph of diversity,
00:07:08civil rights.
00:07:10You came to my school
00:07:11and told all the white kids
00:07:13that someone in their family
00:07:15had probably lynched someone.
00:07:16Yeah.
00:07:17I wanted you to know.
00:07:19I wanted you to understand
00:07:20because you didn't understand
00:07:21you were black.
00:07:22So I had to force this
00:07:24on you.
00:07:25To shock you into thinking
00:07:27you were black,
00:07:29accept your blackness,
00:07:30see the history
00:07:31of your blackness,
00:07:32see what these white people
00:07:34have done to us.
00:07:35That's it.
00:07:36I don't think it was about
00:07:37showing me that I was black.
00:07:38It was about showing me
00:07:39about the violence
00:07:41of white supremacy
00:07:41and the lie
00:07:43about erasing it.
00:07:45Right.
00:07:45That the thing
00:07:46that you would get
00:07:46most animated about
00:07:48is not that this happened,
00:07:49but this happened
00:07:50and nobody talks about it.
00:07:52And nobody's willing
00:07:53to talk about it,
00:07:54which is why I talked about it
00:07:55at your Martin Luther King Day celebration.
00:07:59Martin Luther King was brave
00:08:00in an environment
00:08:02where lynching was common.
00:08:04I said,
00:08:05probably none of you
00:08:06even know what that means,
00:08:08much less do you have
00:08:09any knowledge
00:08:10of your relatives'
00:08:11involvement in it.
00:08:12But I'm just picturing
00:08:15being a school administrator.
00:08:17When your great-grandparents
00:08:19die
00:08:19and you have to go
00:08:21to their house
00:08:22and clean out their attic
00:08:23or their basement,
00:08:25you're probably going to find,
00:08:27among other things,
00:08:28little vials
00:08:31of alcohol,
00:08:33you know,
00:08:33in which there is
00:08:34a shriveled black item,
00:08:39which could be a finger
00:08:41or a toe,
00:08:42the charred souvenirs
00:08:44of this dead black man
00:08:45who they had lynched,
00:08:46which they have
00:08:47obviously held on to
00:08:50and preserved this
00:08:51for generations.
00:08:54And when you find it,
00:08:55what are you going to do?
00:08:57What are you going to say?
00:09:08Growing up,
00:09:09that was breakfast table talk.
00:09:11Probably why I'm a lunch guy
00:09:13and why I view history
00:09:15as an attic full of racial horrors
00:09:17that we've inherited
00:09:19and most of us
00:09:20would rather not go into.
00:09:22So when I moved to New Orleans,
00:09:24I was, uh, surprised
00:09:25to find this city's
00:09:27darkest souvenirs
00:09:28are not hidden in the attic.
00:09:30They're just out,
00:09:32like in the living room.
00:09:36On the city's highest pedestal,
00:09:38Robert E. Lee.
00:09:39The blacks are immeasurably
00:09:40better off here
00:09:41than in Africa.
00:09:42The painful discipline
00:09:43they are undergoing
00:09:44is necessary
00:09:45for their instruction
00:09:46as a race.
00:09:51Okay.
00:09:53Moving on.
00:09:59Waving good morning
00:10:00to all the joggers,
00:10:01the president of the Confederacy,
00:10:03Jefferson Davis.
00:10:05African slavery,
00:10:06as it exists
00:10:07in the United States,
00:10:08is a moral,
00:10:09a social,
00:10:10and a political blessing.
00:10:17Anyways.
00:10:19Guarding City Park,
00:10:20there's PGT Beauregard,
00:10:22the Confederate general
00:10:23who fired the opening shot
00:10:25of the war.
00:10:27And then,
00:10:29there's this monument,
00:10:30dedicated to the White League,
00:10:32which is exactly
00:10:34what it sounds like.
00:10:35A white supremacist militia
00:10:36with a dream
00:10:37to one day
00:10:38teach the blacks
00:10:39to beware
00:10:40of further insolence
00:10:42and aggression.
00:10:50That day came in 1874,
00:10:52when the White League
00:10:53tried to overthrow
00:10:54Louisiana's interracial government
00:10:56by storming the statehouse
00:10:57and killing police officers
00:10:59in the street.
00:11:00As a consequence
00:11:01for this violent coup,
00:11:04these men received
00:11:05a monument,
00:11:06right in the middle
00:11:08of the Neutral Ground.
00:11:15In New Orleans,
00:11:16the Neutral Ground's
00:11:16just the name
00:11:17for that grassy median
00:11:18between two streets.
00:11:19It's where neighbors
00:11:20meet up to barbecue
00:11:21and get drunk
00:11:22and, on occasion,
00:11:23catch cheap necklaces
00:11:25hurled at them
00:11:25by strangers in masks.
00:11:31The Neutral Ground
00:11:32is supposed to be
00:11:33a space for everyone.
00:11:36So, if you're wondering
00:11:37why a majority black city
00:11:38responsible for so many
00:11:40of the black things you love
00:11:41fills its common spaces
00:11:43with tributes to slave owners
00:11:44and the White League,
00:11:46well,
00:11:47your question is right on time.
00:11:49I call the question.
00:11:52I have a motion.
00:11:53I've moved.
00:11:54It's been seconded
00:11:55by Council Member Brossett.
00:11:57I call the question.
00:12:05Six yays,
00:12:06one name.
00:12:11Happy New Year's Day!
00:12:15After three hours of debate,
00:12:17all but one council member
00:12:18voted in favor
00:12:19of removing the statues.
00:12:21The vote is considered
00:12:22one of the most sweeping moves
00:12:23by a U.S. city
00:12:24to cut ties
00:12:25with Confederate history.
00:12:28This is not something
00:12:29that I just kind of came up with
00:12:30out of the blue.
00:12:32It came to me
00:12:33through Wynton this time.
00:12:34Wynton Marcellus
00:12:35is a friend of mine,
00:12:36and always has been.
00:12:37And he said to me,
00:12:38have you ever thought about
00:12:41that monument
00:12:42from my perspective?
00:12:44He stopped me in my tracks
00:12:45and I said, no,
00:12:46I didn't.
00:12:47He just said,
00:12:48why don't you just think about it?
00:12:49And I said, I will.
00:12:51Sitting in city council chambers,
00:12:54how long did you think
00:12:56that the removal would take?
00:12:57Three months.
00:12:58Three months, four months
00:13:00at most.
00:13:01I'd hope they'd come down that night.
00:13:03I'd hope that there were
00:13:04cranes
00:13:05and individuals
00:13:07poised to do that work.
00:13:09It would have immediately
00:13:10delivered what was decided.
00:13:13We can build
00:13:14more than one high-rise
00:13:15in this town
00:13:16at one time,
00:13:17so certainly we should have
00:13:18been able to take down
00:13:20a couple of statues.
00:13:21But that's not what happened.
00:13:22It's not what happened.
00:13:36Four groups are seeking
00:13:37a federal injunction
00:13:38to stop the city
00:13:39from moving forward
00:13:40with the removal process.
00:13:42So ultimately,
00:13:43these monuments
00:13:43will stay in place
00:13:44until the merits
00:13:45of this case are heard.
00:13:54backlash over a plan
00:13:55to remove these
00:13:55prominent monuments
00:13:56has led to death threats,
00:13:58intimidation,
00:13:58and even what may have been
00:14:00the intentional torching
00:14:01of a contractor's Lamborghini.
00:14:04Sue you in the daytime,
00:14:05bomb your car at night.
00:14:07That felt like
00:14:08classic white supremacy.
00:14:10Right.
00:14:11And let's...
00:14:11Straight out of the greatest hit.
00:14:12Straight out of the greatest hit,
00:14:13straight out of the 1940s,
00:14:1550s, and 60s,
00:14:16and that's what makes racism
00:14:18and the terrorism
00:14:19so pervasive
00:14:19of the deep south
00:14:20of the 1940s and 50s
00:14:22and of today
00:14:23is it comes from all levels,
00:14:25all ages,
00:14:26all socioeconomic groups.
00:14:29Even after growing up
00:14:31in a house like mine...
00:14:32...could send a picture
00:14:32of a lynched person,
00:14:34naked, burnt,
00:14:36hung on a postcard.
00:14:38I didn't expect to witness
00:14:39the type of massive
00:14:40white resistance
00:14:41that made me feel
00:14:42like we were all living
00:14:43in a history book.
00:14:45Every day,
00:14:46it became clearer
00:14:47that this fight
00:14:48over four monuments
00:14:49wasn't going to fit
00:14:50in a YouTube video
00:14:51and that to actually
00:14:53understand where
00:14:54this fight comes from
00:14:55and where it's taking us,
00:14:57the questions I was asking...
00:14:59Would you be willing
00:14:59to just take PGT
00:15:00off the horse,
00:15:01keep the horse?
00:15:02Wow.
00:15:03Jeff Davis.
00:15:04Keeping the birds.
00:15:05I'm not ready for this one.
00:15:07We're going to have
00:15:08to become real.
00:15:25to keep our monuments up.
00:15:27I feel like we've got the majority
00:15:29of New Orleanians behind us.
00:15:31So are you going
00:15:32to the 4th on the state side
00:15:34and the 5th on the federal?
00:15:35I'm not sure
00:15:36of all of those places
00:15:38and terms,
00:15:38but we're going to pursue
00:15:40this as best...
00:15:41We're going to pursue it
00:15:42as every legal option
00:15:44we can.
00:15:45So your task force
00:15:47is basically preserves
00:15:48these monuments
00:15:48and restores them,
00:15:49the historic value of them.
00:15:51However, a lot of people
00:15:52say they have racial undertones.
00:15:53Yeah.
00:15:54What are your thoughts on that?
00:15:55I don't really know
00:15:55how to address that.
00:16:00The city of New Orleans
00:16:01has dozens and dozens
00:16:03of monuments,
00:16:04symbols,
00:16:04school names,
00:16:05street names,
00:16:06all after white supremacists,
00:16:08former Confederate soldiers
00:16:09and generals
00:16:09and people who were
00:16:10slave owners
00:16:10and what have you.
00:16:11Can't scream
00:16:12Black Lives Matter
00:16:12if you live in a city
00:16:13where everything
00:16:14around you
00:16:15is telling you
00:16:15that they don't.
00:16:16Tigham Dal Nola
00:16:17is a coalition
00:16:19of organizers,
00:16:20activists,
00:16:21all united
00:16:22under removing
00:16:22all symbols
00:16:23of white supremacy
00:16:23in the city of New Orleans.
00:16:25And the activism
00:16:25around getting
00:16:26these things removed
00:16:27goes back to 1973.
00:16:29It took us
00:16:30as Black organizers,
00:16:31Black activists
00:16:31to say,
00:16:32you know what?
00:16:32There's something wrong
00:16:33with this.
00:16:34We can do something
00:16:34about this.
00:16:35What do you say
00:16:37to all those people
00:16:38who say that
00:16:39Confederate monuments
00:16:40are just military monuments?
00:16:41They have nothing
00:16:42to do with white supremacy?
00:16:43Look up the statements
00:16:45of the states
00:16:45that seceded.
00:16:46Look up what was said
00:16:47by South Carolina.
00:16:49Look up what was said
00:16:50by the vice presidents
00:16:51of the Confederacy.
00:16:52The documents said
00:16:53we seceded
00:16:54because of slavery.
00:16:56Consult the documents.
00:16:59Okay.
00:17:00Here we go.
00:17:02To consult the documents,
00:17:03I went to the capital
00:17:05of the Confederacy.
00:17:06Richmond, Virginia
00:17:07has a whole avenue
00:17:09just four Confederate monuments
00:17:11and, for some reason,
00:17:13African-American tennis legend
00:17:14Arthur Ashe.
00:17:15Y'all could have put me
00:17:16on any other street.
00:17:18Richmond also has a museum
00:17:19that examines the Civil War
00:17:21from all sides.
00:17:23So what caused the Civil War?
00:17:25Was it fraud
00:17:25over who had the most power,
00:17:27the states
00:17:28or the federal government?
00:17:30Or was it simply
00:17:31a fight over money
00:17:32and different cultures?
00:17:33Or was it slavery?
00:17:36So push the button
00:17:37that matches
00:17:37what you think
00:17:38was the main cause
00:17:39of the Civil War.
00:17:42Looking at the
00:17:43secession documents,
00:17:44each of these arguments,
00:17:45they all tie back
00:17:46to the institution of slavery.
00:17:48It's just,
00:17:49they just do.
00:17:50Our position
00:17:51is thoroughly identified
00:17:52with the institution
00:17:54of slavery,
00:17:55the greatest material
00:17:57interest of the world.
00:18:00Louisiana looks
00:18:01to the formation
00:18:02of a Southern Confederacy
00:18:04to preserve
00:18:05the blessings
00:18:06of African slavery.
00:18:08Now, to be fair,
00:18:09the secessionists
00:18:10also talked about
00:18:11their rights.
00:18:12They were just
00:18:13incredibly specific.
00:18:15Yield to us
00:18:15our constitutional rights
00:18:17in relation
00:18:18to slave property.
00:18:19to recognize
00:18:20our right
00:18:21of property and slaves.
00:18:22Rights of property
00:18:23in said slaves
00:18:24shall not
00:18:25be thereby impaired.
00:18:27Property and slaves.
00:18:28Property and slaves.
00:18:29And nobody was clearer
00:18:31than Alexander Stevens,
00:18:32the vice president
00:18:33of the Confederacy.
00:18:34What Stevens wanted most,
00:18:36besides just a little bit
00:18:38of water,
00:18:38was for everyone
00:18:39to understand
00:18:40exactly what the Confederacy
00:18:42was built on.
00:18:43Its cornerstone rests upon
00:18:46the great truth
00:18:47that the Negro
00:18:49is not equal
00:18:51to the white man.
00:18:53That slavery
00:18:54is his natural
00:18:56and normal condition.
00:19:01This,
00:19:02our new government,
00:19:04is the first
00:19:05in the history
00:19:06of the world
00:19:07based upon
00:19:08all this great
00:19:09physical,
00:19:11philosophical,
00:19:12and moral truth.
00:19:15I mean,
00:19:16they are
00:19:16exceptionally clear.
00:19:18The founding documents
00:19:20of the Confederacy
00:19:21talk so obsessively
00:19:23about slavery.
00:19:24The real mystery
00:19:25is how so many people
00:19:26came to believe
00:19:27that Confederate symbols
00:19:29have nothing
00:19:30to do with it.
00:19:35The challenge there
00:19:37is finding someone
00:19:38who genuinely
00:19:39believes this
00:19:40and doesn't
00:19:41make me fear
00:19:42for my safety.
00:19:43You,
00:19:43Thomas Taylor,
00:19:44by an unnamed
00:19:46white supremacist blog,
00:19:47have been called,
00:19:48quote,
00:19:48a scallywag.
00:19:50Yeah,
00:19:51that was a good one.
00:19:52And then,
00:19:52quote,
00:19:53a cuckfederate.
00:19:55Yeah,
00:19:56but see,
00:19:57what have they done?
00:19:59Except cowardly,
00:20:01hiding behind
00:20:02their sheets
00:20:03and their computers.
00:20:04Are they in the lawsuit
00:20:06to save the monuments
00:20:07in New Orleans?
00:20:07No.
00:20:08No.
00:20:09Every time
00:20:10I talk to somebody
00:20:11who is very
00:20:12into Confederate history,
00:20:13most of their arguments
00:20:14will be,
00:20:15but Lincoln
00:20:16was into slavery,
00:20:17but Grant
00:20:18had some slaves.
00:20:19Everyone is so
00:20:20into slavery.
00:20:21But that doesn't change
00:20:22how much
00:20:23of the South's
00:20:24stated goal
00:20:26was to preserve slavery.
00:20:29Well,
00:20:29they needed it.
00:20:30There's no doubt.
00:20:31They needed it.
00:20:32So why,
00:20:32why don't you think
00:20:34more Southern sympathizers
00:20:36are just more honest
00:20:37about the role of slavery
00:20:39in the Confederate cause?
00:20:41Because they'll get jumped on.
00:20:43You know,
00:20:44that's what people
00:20:45are looking for,
00:20:45the gotcha.
00:20:46Yeah.
00:20:47A lot of people
00:20:48won't talk to y'all at all.
00:20:49All right.
00:20:49Well, here's my question.
00:20:50Okay.
00:20:51Do you think
00:20:52that the current
00:20:53Confederate statues
00:20:54honestly represent
00:20:56the history
00:20:57that those men
00:20:57were involved with?
00:20:59Yeah.
00:21:01I don't see any reason
00:21:02for them not to be honest.
00:21:03It's just a guy
00:21:03standing on a pedestal.
00:21:05You can look
00:21:06at any national cemetery
00:21:07and there's all
00:21:08these little white headstones
00:21:10and these prudelos,
00:21:12and they're all Yankees.
00:21:14The Southern bent,
00:21:15instead of being
00:21:16those fancy cemeteries,
00:21:18they were pushed
00:21:19in a ditch
00:21:20and covered up.
00:21:21These women's men
00:21:23didn't come home.
00:21:24All these statues
00:21:25are the headstones
00:21:27of their men.
00:21:28I'll admit,
00:21:29I've spent
00:21:30exactly zero minutes
00:21:32thinking about
00:21:33the grief
00:21:33of the Confederacy,
00:21:35of slavers,
00:21:36but I've also
00:21:38never considered
00:21:39how else
00:21:40you would memorialize
00:21:41that many
00:21:42missing soldiers.
00:21:45At that point,
00:21:46America as a whole
00:21:47has never experienced
00:21:48this level of death,
00:21:50loss,
00:21:50destruction,
00:21:51ever.
00:21:52It would be akin today
00:21:53of us losing
00:21:54roughly 8 million
00:21:55soldiers
00:21:56in a four-year span.
00:21:58So,
00:21:59yeah,
00:22:00people are traumatized.
00:22:02North and South.
00:22:04Now,
00:22:05for the white South,
00:22:06what remains
00:22:08are the women
00:22:09who've lost husbands,
00:22:11they've lost fathers,
00:22:12they've lost brothers,
00:22:13they've lost sons.
00:22:15There's this need
00:22:16to make what happened,
00:22:19make all of this
00:22:19death and destruction
00:22:21mean something.
00:22:25To find meaning
00:22:26in a losing army
00:22:28that went all in
00:22:29on slavery,
00:22:31you'd have to write,
00:22:32like,
00:22:32a whole new story.
00:22:35And that is exactly
00:22:37what white Southerners did.
00:22:39The story they invented
00:22:40after the war
00:22:41is called
00:22:42The Lost Cause.
00:22:44The Lost Cause
00:22:45is an entire mythology
00:22:47around the former Confederacy.
00:22:49It's a false narrative
00:22:50about the Confederacy,
00:22:52about the Old South,
00:22:53about Reconstruction,
00:22:55about the Ku Klux Klan.
00:22:57They know that Northerners
00:22:58are writing histories
00:22:59of the Civil War,
00:23:00and they're very concerned
00:23:02that if they don't get
00:23:03a handle on it
00:23:04and produce their own history,
00:23:06then the history
00:23:07will make their ancestors
00:23:08look bad.
00:23:09Some of the primary truths
00:23:11are that the war
00:23:13wasn't fought over slavery,
00:23:14that we went to war
00:23:16to defend the Tenth Amendment
00:23:18to the Constitution,
00:23:19which is about preserving states' rights.
00:23:22To own human...
00:23:23To own human beings.
00:23:25And that masters of slaves
00:23:27were benevolent.
00:23:28It's a way to change
00:23:30the narrative of defeat
00:23:32to one of celebration
00:23:34and honor.
00:23:35Most of the miseries
00:23:36of the world
00:23:37were caused by wars.
00:23:39And when the wars were over,
00:23:41no one ever knew
00:23:42what they were about.
00:23:44And the Lost Cause
00:23:45is really quite a lovely story,
00:23:47isn't it?
00:23:47That we were this genteel,
00:23:49extraordinary society
00:23:50and that we,
00:23:52as the superior race,
00:23:53were able to take care
00:23:54of everything and everybody.
00:23:56And anybody that says
00:23:57that this is not
00:23:59who we truly are
00:24:01really doesn't understand
00:24:03the elegance of the self.
00:24:10It's a beautiful story.
00:24:11It's just not true.
00:24:13It simply isn't true.
00:24:15It is a society
00:24:17that was built on violence,
00:24:20daily violence.
00:24:21It's a society
00:24:22that is built on the idea
00:24:23that a man's labor
00:24:26isn't his own.
00:24:27It is mine to exploit
00:24:29and manipulate
00:24:30as I see fit
00:24:31for my wealth
00:24:32and for my comfort
00:24:33and for my progeny.
00:24:35That is what we are
00:24:36really talking about here.
00:24:49Look at the story
00:24:51they're telling today.
00:24:52That the Confederacy
00:24:54was a bunch of evil men
00:24:56fighting to keep people
00:24:58in bondage
00:24:59and it's all horse hockey.
00:25:02Anybody's going to abuse
00:25:03any institution.
00:25:05Somebody is going to abuse it.
00:25:07Just like I know guys
00:25:09that have gotten
00:25:10a brand new
00:25:13$40,000
00:25:14four-wheel drive truck
00:25:16and the first thing
00:25:18he does
00:25:18is he gets some
00:25:19big tires on it
00:25:20and he bails off
00:25:21into the swamp
00:25:22with that thing.
00:25:23People don't always
00:25:23take care of their objects well.
00:25:25Right.
00:25:25Including when
00:25:26that object is a person.
00:25:28Including when it's a person.
00:25:33from what I've read
00:25:35research
00:25:37even though
00:25:40they belong
00:25:41to somebody
00:25:42Yeah.
00:25:43The majority of them
00:25:45were not abused.
00:25:47Because
00:25:48Can I say that again?
00:25:49The majority of the slaves
00:25:50were not abused
00:25:51even though
00:25:52they didn't have
00:25:53the freedom
00:25:55to go to San Francisco
00:25:57if they wanted to
00:25:58or whatever.
00:25:59But a lot of them
00:26:00stayed.
00:26:01They were taken care of
00:26:02basically.
00:26:03They got food.
00:26:04They got clothing.
00:26:06They got shelter.
00:26:07The biggest thing.
00:26:08Biggest thing.
00:26:09They got medical.
00:26:10Medical care.
00:26:11This script
00:26:12has survived
00:26:13word for word
00:26:14for 160 years
00:26:15because it just
00:26:16feels good.
00:26:18Not to me.
00:26:19It feels bad to me.
00:26:21And probably
00:26:22to the 4 million humans
00:26:23owned by the Confederacy.
00:26:25But we
00:26:26are not who
00:26:27this script
00:26:28was made for.
00:26:31Talking about
00:26:32white southern women here.
00:26:33Because they are the ones
00:26:34now who are
00:26:35really faced
00:26:36with rebuilding.
00:26:37And in doing so
00:26:39they were building
00:26:40monuments
00:26:41in the cemeteries.
00:26:43Cemeteries
00:26:44seemed the most
00:26:45appropriate place
00:26:46because this was about
00:26:47honoring the dead.
00:26:51To understand
00:26:52why these monuments
00:26:53to the dead
00:26:54would ever move
00:26:54outside of the graveyard
00:26:56we have to talk
00:26:57about Reconstruction.
00:26:58A chapter of history
00:27:00that many of our teachers
00:27:01just skipped over
00:27:02so we could all
00:27:03spend more time
00:27:04learning about
00:27:04John D. Rockefeller.
00:27:09The United States
00:27:10sought to
00:27:12rebuild the South
00:27:13both its infrastructure
00:27:15but also
00:27:16its social order.
00:27:17Okay, so
00:27:18the federal government
00:27:19was trying to give
00:27:20legal equality
00:27:21to black people
00:27:22which was
00:27:22kind of a tough sell
00:27:23for those
00:27:24whose whole society
00:27:25was based on
00:27:26owning black people.
00:27:28Southern racists
00:27:30are having to behave
00:27:32because they're
00:27:32under watch.
00:27:34The military is there.
00:27:35Black folks
00:27:36on the other hand
00:27:37are going to school
00:27:39sending their kids
00:27:40to school
00:27:40they're working on land
00:27:42they are
00:27:43pursuing
00:27:44every dream
00:27:46they can imagine.
00:27:47Including voting
00:27:49and serving
00:27:49as members of Congress.
00:27:51This is not
00:27:52the way it was depicted
00:27:53in Birth of a Nation.
00:27:54fumbling out of the fields
00:27:56and into
00:27:56the statehouse.
00:27:58Reconstruction
00:27:59was painted
00:28:00as this horrid thing
00:28:01when in fact
00:28:02it's one of the most
00:28:03progressive periods
00:28:05in American history.
00:28:07Reconstruction
00:28:08created our first
00:28:09anti-discrimination laws
00:28:10founded our public
00:28:12school system
00:28:12and integrated
00:28:14some of those schools
00:28:1580 years before
00:28:16we ever saw
00:28:17Ruby Bridges
00:28:18and those shocking
00:28:19photos of your neighbor's mom.
00:28:21It was a chapter
00:28:22of exceptional
00:28:23racial progress.
00:28:24and in America
00:28:25we know how those
00:28:28usually end.
00:28:29Reconstruction
00:28:30fails
00:28:31because
00:28:32certain
00:28:33white
00:28:34interests
00:28:35do not like
00:28:36the idea
00:28:37of a truly
00:28:39democratic America.
00:28:43Some northern
00:28:44politicians
00:28:45feared that
00:28:46holding insurrectionists
00:28:47accountable
00:28:47would be too
00:28:49divisive.
00:28:51So
00:28:52they withdrew
00:28:53federal troops
00:28:54and handed local power
00:28:55back to the same
00:28:57ex-Confederates
00:28:58who had spent
00:28:58the last decade
00:28:59moonlighting
00:29:00as vigilantes.
00:29:03People who were
00:29:04accustomed to having
00:29:04power regained it
00:29:05and they aligned
00:29:07with other people
00:29:07of power
00:29:08to control
00:29:09the fate of a nation.
00:29:12It is this moment
00:29:14of backlash
00:29:15and racial terror.
00:29:17This is the moment
00:29:19public Confederate
00:29:19monuments
00:29:20are born.
00:29:23They want these
00:29:24to be publicly
00:29:25visible
00:29:26and having it
00:29:28adjacent to
00:29:29a courthouse
00:29:29or a statehouse
00:29:30lets you know
00:29:32who's in charge here.
00:29:34It's a statement
00:29:35of white supremacy.
00:29:36That context
00:29:38is important
00:29:39when you talk
00:29:39about these monuments
00:29:40you also need
00:29:41to talk about
00:29:42how many black bodies
00:29:43were lynched
00:29:44during that year alone.
00:30:03It would be so simple
00:30:05if Confederate monuments
00:30:06were only about
00:30:07mourning the dead
00:30:09and if the enthusiasm
00:30:10to build and protect them
00:30:12didn't rise
00:30:13whenever black people
00:30:14were also demanding freedom.
00:30:21Protests grow
00:30:22in Louisiana
00:30:23after an African-American
00:30:24man was shot dead
00:30:25by police
00:30:26outside a Baton Rouge
00:30:27convenience store.
00:30:28Officers in riot gear
00:30:30arrested dozens
00:30:30of protesters
00:30:31demanding justice
00:30:32for Alton Sterling
00:30:33and Philando Castile
00:30:35and other black people
00:30:36killed by police.
00:30:41No peace!
00:30:42No justice!
00:30:44No peace!
00:30:45No justice!
00:30:46No peace!
00:30:47Last December
00:30:48they passed an ordinance
00:30:49to take down
00:30:50four Confederate monuments
00:30:52and we have given them
00:30:54and we have given them ample time
00:30:55to act.
00:30:56Black lives matter!
00:30:58Black lives matter!
00:31:00And since they don't want
00:31:01to move fast enough
00:31:02we need to bring attention
00:31:03to all symbols
00:31:04to white supremacy.
00:31:06You need to know
00:31:07that it is representative
00:31:08of the same kind of
00:31:09state-sanctioned violence
00:31:11that allows for all
00:31:12of these brothers and sisters
00:31:14who have been gunned down
00:31:15with no consequence
00:31:16from police
00:31:17because the reality
00:31:19is when we talk
00:31:20about symbols
00:31:21they are representative
00:31:22of oppressive systems.
00:31:25We demand
00:31:26that the city of New Orleans
00:31:27do what it said
00:31:29it was going to do.
00:31:30We demand
00:31:31that they remove
00:31:32the monument
00:31:33to Robert E. Lee,
00:31:35Beauregard,
00:31:36Jeff Davis,
00:31:36and the 4th Hall
00:31:37Liberty Monument
00:31:38along with all
00:31:39the other monuments
00:31:40to white supremacy
00:31:41including Andrew Jackson.
00:31:43Do what you said
00:31:45you're on for good!
00:31:47Do what you said
00:31:49you're on for good!
00:31:50USA!
00:31:51USA!
00:31:52USA!
00:31:54USA!
00:31:57USA!
00:31:58Thank you very much
00:32:00everybody.
00:32:01With Trump as president
00:32:03with all the white supremacist
00:32:05bullshit that's coming
00:32:06out of the White House
00:32:08now is the best time
00:32:10for us to strike
00:32:11because people
00:32:12or have an elevated sense of what racism does in this country.
00:32:18I feel like we underestimated how much sort of white vitriol and myth is out there.
00:32:25What is our responsibility to investigate the point of view that sees these statues as legitimate?
00:32:34Well, I don't think we have a responsibility to legitimize what's illegitimate.
00:32:41I think we have the responsibility of explaining to people why it's illegitimate.
00:32:57Kent Moore Confederate Museum and Cemetery.
00:33:00This, for me, is the closest we can get to the actual Confederacy.
00:33:05D'Arcy's been very against the idea of us going to a Civil War reenactment because it feels too what?
00:33:19I don't know. It just seems weird to have you go be out in the woods spending the night with
00:33:25a bunch of white people who have said to your face that they didn't think slavery was a bad idea.
00:33:34I don't think they said slavery. I think they said slavery is not that bad.
00:33:38Look at that!
00:33:39I think out of this weekend I'm looking for...
00:33:46a sense of why...
00:33:52I don't know what I'm looking for.
00:33:53I think they're auraitenn R堂 before.
00:33:54What are you looking for...?
00:34:03What are you looking for?
00:34:08What are you looking for?
00:34:24You like that one better than this one?
00:34:26Yeah, that's okay. Wear that one. This is a small one.
00:34:27These aren't period.
00:34:28No.
00:34:29You're making yourself uncomfortable.
00:34:30Put that on.
00:34:31How do I win? Are we gonna win this?
00:34:34Don't know.
00:34:34We're bad guys.
00:34:37We're the bad guys?
00:34:38We're bad guys. We're Yankees.
00:34:41It's a matter of opinion. We are the bad guys.
00:34:44So in the name of accuracy, you guys will wear blue.
00:34:48Sure.
00:34:48Or wear whatever color the battle needs.
00:34:52As a former theater boy, I love costumes.
00:34:55And bonding with a cast of dedicated performers,
00:34:59which makes a Civil War reenactment unexpectedly fun.
00:35:02Until, of course, you start talking about anything besides the costumes.
00:35:06My bloodline, I could be the grand imperial cyclops
00:35:11whatever the hell you wanted to say of the KKK.
00:35:14Are you? You have to tell me if you are.
00:35:17Oh, no.
00:35:17The whole thing about the Civil War is, in a nutshell, is this.
00:35:23Uh-oh.
00:35:24The war actually started, it wasn't because of slavery.
00:35:30When this bitch by the name of Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote the book called Uncle Tom's Cabin,
00:35:36that was just one-tenth of one percent of what happened in the South.
00:35:43The blacks are still on the plantation because their lives are governed by the Democratic Party.
00:35:54What percentage of people at the camp do you think believe that slavery was at least the cause of secession?
00:36:01Probably 25.
00:36:03I wouldn't know.
00:36:03Because just like you, people are getting their opinion from what they hear and see.
00:36:09Oh, no, I was getting my opinion from just looking at the Declaration of Causes and everything the Confederacy wrote
00:36:14about why they're seceding.
00:36:16Not why the war happened, but they're saying we firmly identify with the cause of slavery.
00:36:20Slavery is $3 billion of our economy, and you can't screw our economy and our property, and that's why we're
00:36:27leaving.
00:36:27No.
00:36:28No.
00:36:28So that's not what they said?
00:36:30No.
00:36:33Throughout history, why have white supremacists always been attracted to the Confederacy?
00:36:39Rebel.
00:36:40Rebel.
00:36:41It's that word right there, rebel.
00:36:44Everybody wants to be a rebel.
00:36:44Everybody wants to be a rebel.
00:36:46So you think white supremacists from KKK forward have been attracted to the Confederacy not because of slavery.
00:36:53It's because of the word rebel.
00:36:54Yeah.
00:36:54That's it.
00:36:55That's all it is.
00:36:56I've been seeing it wrong.
00:36:58That's...
00:36:58It's a black and white issue.
00:37:00That makes sense.
00:37:00That's all it is.
00:37:02I don't care how you go.
00:37:03It's a black and white issue.
00:37:05What?
00:37:05The KKK?
00:37:10Forward.
00:37:11Forward.
00:37:12Forward.
00:37:13Forward.
00:37:14Forward.
00:37:18Forward.
00:37:18Forward.
00:37:20Forward.
00:37:25Forward.
00:37:31Forward.
00:37:32Forward.
00:37:33Forward.
00:37:35Forward, Forward.
00:37:36Forward, Forward, punto, Vernon.
00:37:43Forward.
00:37:44Forward.
00:37:45Forward.
00:37:46Half!
00:37:47Forward.
00:38:13what do you think now what did you what did you you you expect i gotta be honest i am
00:38:18nervous every time i i enter land where there's a lot of confederate flags i'm always nervous
00:38:25because when you're a person of color and you see a confederate flag you don't know why the person
00:38:32flies it and sometimes you encounter people who call you a nigger at a gas station and that's
00:38:38why they fly it yeah and other times you encounter someone who gives you coffee and a honey bun and
00:38:44and outfits you and puts you up for the weekend so as a person of color we don't have space
00:38:49to
00:38:51assume the best you you've joined in to see things from our perspective more or less okay
00:38:59what could we possibly join in with you to see from your perspective the jazz fest or something like
00:39:05that what could we do we could all go to a slavery museum no there's too much i would never
00:39:13step put
00:39:14on that are you talking about that plantation yeah that's so much fake crap on that thing
00:39:19that's such bullsh** that place
00:39:35that plantation thomas refuses to visit is called the whitney it's an actual plantation that has been
00:39:42turned into a museum focusing on what most plantation tours leave out the people enslaved there
00:39:51there are very few plantations that exclusively focus on slavery there are occasionally people who
00:39:56come and they want to see the house and we're just very candid this is not a house tour
00:40:17so
00:40:17so what is this this is a memorial dedicated to the
00:40:251811 german course of uprising
00:40:29so in one january 8 1811 the people enslaved along this river decided to rise up and march down to
00:40:39new
00:40:39orleans in order to capture the city free all the people enslaved them and and maybe find a way to
00:40:45a
00:40:45free country most of them were arrested shut to death and then decapitated and the heads were posted on poles
00:40:53you
00:40:53you know
00:40:56it's scary
00:40:59it's a scary monument it is scary you don't think so maybe i'm too much used to it
00:41:07it's not it's not subtle
00:41:13are are are they supposed to be terrifying or are they supposed to be inspiring
00:41:19they are supposed to be inspiring i don't think we have anything terrifying here
00:41:26this was the largest ever slave revolt in the usa this is my maybe my favorite monument it's shocking
00:41:33in a way that makes me very uncomfortable but i also like it this is my favorite place too
00:41:43some say it is too graphic some say we are not doing enough you know you cannot talk about slavery
00:41:53and expect that everybody will be comfortable about it but the goal is not to help people be angry or
00:42:00feeling guilty the goal is to generate that spark in the person in order to generate consciousness
00:42:11i think a lot of people once they hear real stories and read real things when they're exposed
00:42:16to the real sources they do feel empathy they do maybe change their minds that you can refute a quote
00:42:25or an account with some other account but it is hard to refute the human experience of being here
00:42:32yeah if we have intentionally misrepresented this history to our own citizens on purpose
00:42:38in schools in our homes then to me it's not entirely your fault if you don't know
00:42:53who's fault is it who is responsible for the fact that so many people can name
00:42:58more of columbus's ships than they can name abolitionists
00:43:07in 1894 you see the emergence of the group that called themselves the united daughters of the confederacy
00:43:15their main purpose is to vindicate the confederate generation the udc put up hundreds of bronze and
00:43:22stone monuments but they also worked with a much more malleable material the minds of children
00:43:34monuments were considered a gift to future generations and so they always chose a child
00:43:41to pull the rope that reveals the monument and they would choose 13 young girls from the community
00:43:47they would wear sashes sort of like a debutante except across the sash would be the names of 13 confederate
00:43:55states
00:43:55and then these children would form what is known as a living battle flag
00:44:04the udc also advised school districts on what should go into textbooks reject a book that says the south
00:44:12fought to hold her slaves reject a book that speaks of the slaveholder of the south as cruel and unjust
00:44:19to
00:44:20his slaves some of these books were basically kkk fan fiction the udc even created an after-school club
00:44:27where children had to memorize the confederate speaking points how are the slaves treated with
00:44:32great kindness and care in nearly all cases a cruel master being rare
00:44:43this narrative was being taught as late as the 1970s until the 70s 1970s it wasn't about slavery
00:45:03the city of new orleans has been cleared to remove three confederate era monuments a federal appeals
00:45:10court cleared the way yesterday for the city to remove them we finally get the authority from the
00:45:14court to take the monuments down there are no other legal consequence to us doing it we're ready to go
00:45:21but i couldn't get anybody to give me a crane we could not find cranes and contractors to do the
00:45:28work who had not been threatened or were in fear of some sort of retaliation from the people who
00:45:34wanted to keep those monuments up in the city that's spending billions of dollars rebuilding and nobody
00:45:40will give me a damn crane are you kidding me i mean are you really kidding me fun fact white
00:45:45supremacists
00:45:46are rarely kidding in 1932 the white league monument got a new inscription to make sure everyone was
00:45:54clear about what they had fought for white supremacy
00:46:02that monument was so obviously racist that in the 1990s the city quietly tried to remove it
00:46:08and they were sued by a group including david duke who is of course a notoriously disgruntled wizard
00:46:16so the city hid the monument in this spot between the aquarium and the back of the mall where david
00:46:24duke
00:46:24still spoke at the rededication ceremony while the police choked out 82 year old state representative
00:46:29avery avery alexander just for protesting even though this monument literally had the words white
00:46:37supremacy inscribed on it crowds still laid wreaths at this monument for decades it became a regular stop
00:46:45on one of mardi gras's biggest parades and that's because the people honoring that monument just like
00:46:52those who left the inscription were not yet ashamed to recognize that preserving southern liberty and
00:46:58preserving white supremacy have historically been the same thing in a city built on nostalgia how do you
00:47:07get people to let go of the structures they grew up with if you're mitch landrew you just wait until
00:47:15they're asleep
00:47:17middle of the night everybody's face is covered this is america this is the country you want to live in
00:47:24whether you agree with it or not this is china this is what they did pre-world war ii
00:47:31believe it might be this monument today but what's tomorrow
00:47:43with one monument down people from around the country rushed to new orleans to protect these men
00:47:50who are made of bronze and are not alive we live out here at the jeff davis monument it is
00:47:56extremely
00:47:57chaotic out here you can see protesters out here armed no pd is out here there's about 50 50 officers
00:48:05out here uh more than 100 150 protesters people for and against the removal of these monuments
00:48:11so this is extremely chaotic right now
00:48:17i wish the hell the south would succeed and we would be a country all of our own because we
00:48:22have
00:48:22different moral values in the south than they do in the northern states from the mason dixon line
00:48:27down south it's a whole different world why have you come out to support the monuments why is that
00:48:33an important cause support the monuments because it is history people keep saying that but i'm afraid
00:48:38that the history of people that look like me my ancestors are going to be further lost one of the
00:48:45most you're talking about women blacks people oh right i mean african whatever you want to call
00:48:50our dates uh my great great granddaddy was and and he loved confederacy he loved the south he may
00:48:56have been black in the slave but he contributed too how do you know they weren't paid how do you
00:49:00know they wouldn't reward it when it got to the point when i saw the crowd was getting bigger and
00:49:03bigger
00:49:07the men decided that's all they need me and i ever be able to go home at least we fall
00:49:12for what we
00:49:12believe in so the folks with the firearms that night were prepared to die yeah for the monument
00:49:17but i told my guys they had to make decisions whatever they decide i'm with them i said we all
00:49:24die in place
00:49:29in 1911 the dedication of this monument had all of the things that had become totally normal at
00:49:35confederate commemorations a human flag made of singing children a whites only ceremony and a big parade
00:49:44now just to be clear these are men in confederate uniform 46 years after the war marching through racially
00:49:53mixed neighborhoods because these commemorations were also a show of force
00:50:07a reminder the confederacy still lives and today this monument is a stage for another show of force
00:50:16where visiting performers get to become brave soldiers instead of whatever they were back home
00:50:22i don't know i had hope good job you losers takeaways from today there are very few police here uh
00:50:34and
00:50:35they are chilling really hard there are militia men showing up you can hear almost uh an eagerness in
00:50:42folks voices when that woman was saying oh sunday she was like implying that it was going to be a
00:50:47blood
00:50:47bath right did you hear that so your so your advice is we shouldn't stick around for nightfall
00:50:54i wouldn't and definitely not sunday why what's what's happening sunday you know what's happening sunday
00:51:03you never heard no what's happening it ain't good there's a give me the intel it's pretty bad
00:51:12like what does that mean
00:51:23the sight of armed white nationalists is always terrifying
00:51:31especially with this music can we can we cut the music please all right to the corner
00:51:37yeah oh okay yeah that feels more accurate
00:51:51we have to be on the front lines um you know fighting for for this kind of change
00:51:55there seems to be a little bit of silliness right now like there's been a music
00:52:16that's just a symbol of us when that's gone what do you think they come for next us it happens
00:52:27every
00:52:27single time
00:52:29time
00:52:31Let's go and take it down!
00:53:01We've got a work to do, and we're not going to give you frankie.
00:53:54I told you, you're about to see a show, boy.
00:54:03I want to go in just as bad as you would.
00:54:10Focus on the task at hand because we've got a lot of work to do.
00:54:13The city of New Orleans has still not held accountable the people who have murdered Eric Harris or Alton Starling.
00:54:22It is very important that we make the connection between symbols and systems.
00:54:27They didn't put these symbols up in the nighttime, so they shouldn't come down in the nighttime.
00:54:31They're coming down in the daytime because this is what democracy looks like.
00:54:42In 1884, this Lee Monument was the largest bronze ever cast in New York.
00:54:48Yes, the first towering monument to the hero of the Confederacy is a transplant from the home of the Yankees.
00:54:57Well, Northerners are complicit in the lost cause, and this is the thing that never gets said.
00:55:03They publish the books about the lost cause.
00:55:05They make the movies about the lost cause.
00:55:09They basically hold their nose or just turn a blind eye to what's happening in the South around issues of
00:55:16race, for example.
00:55:17You know, when we talk about reconciliation between the North and the South, what we're really talking about is reconciliation
00:55:24between white people.
00:55:39As whites-only veterans' reunions recast the war as a tragic misunderstanding with fine people on both sides,
00:55:48Northerners got rich making Dixie as romantic and as American as the Wild West.
00:55:58More people are familiar with popular culture than they are with historical fact.
00:56:06So popular culture has the ability to move sentiments and understanding around history.
00:56:17This is why reconciliation is possible, because the North buys in.
00:56:23With the help of the nation's brightest stars, the lost cause finally became immortal.
00:56:29Ready, ho!
00:56:30Not as a fringe piece of propaganda, but as the story that reunited a nation.
00:56:36A lie born in the South, bronzed in the North.
00:56:55I wish I was in the land of cotton.
00:57:01Old times there are not forgotten, look away, look away.
00:57:10It's just stone.
00:57:11It's just stone and bronze.
00:57:13The man Jefferson Davis was a Christian gentleman, right?
00:57:16He's with Jesus.
00:57:17He's with Jesus.
00:57:19Here we go.
00:57:20Here's a lot more coming.
00:57:23Really on, limping a little제.
00:57:25Take him down, take him down, take him down, take him down, take him down.
00:57:48This is a particularly important reading from the Word of God.
00:57:52It's used in exorcisms, and it's used to defend us against all evil.
00:57:56Pray, O Lord, that those who are attacking our heritage may repent of their sins, and
00:58:02may likewise join us as your people.
00:58:06Make haste, O God, to deliver me.
00:58:09Make haste to help me, O Lord, as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever.
00:58:16Amen.
00:58:39Come here, O God!
00:58:59He had no strength!
00:59:02He was with the Democrats!
00:59:02He was not American, you f***ing hell!
00:59:05He was with the shoes!
00:59:33I'm not a kid.
00:59:34I &e
00:59:54I'm my guest...
01:00:12I must have passed by these monuments thousands of times
01:00:15without giving them a second thought.
01:00:19So I'm not judging anybody.
01:00:23I just hope people listen like I did when my dear friend asked me to consider these four monuments
01:00:27from the perspective of an African-American mother or father
01:00:30trying to explain to their fifth-grade daughter why Robert E. Lee sat atop of our city.
01:00:38Can you look into the eyes of this young girl and convince her that Robert E. Lee is there to
01:00:44encourage her?
01:00:45Do you think that she feels inspired and hopeful by that story?
01:00:51When you look into this child's eyes is the moment when the searing truth comes into focus.
01:00:57This is the moment when we know what we must do, when we know what is right.
01:01:26All right, all right. Give yourselves a big hand, y'all.
01:01:51We must love to protect each other.
01:01:53We must love to protect each other.
01:01:55We have nothing to lose but our change.
01:01:58I say it's our duty to fight for our freedom.
01:02:03It's our duty to win.
01:02:05We must love and protect each other.
01:02:09We have nothing to lose but our change.
01:02:10We have nothing to lose but our chance.
01:02:12I say it's our duty to fight for our freedom.
01:02:14It's our duty to fight for our freedom.
01:02:31I think Mitch, politically smart, saw the wave coming,
01:02:36and he decided to get his surfboard out and take advantage of it.
01:02:39Why don't you get rid of all of them?
01:02:41If you really feel like you say that you feel,
01:02:44that these are an insult to any people
01:02:46with progressive thoughts in their mind,
01:02:48then you should, in one fell swoop, get rid of it.
01:02:52You don't actually mean white.
01:02:54I mean all.
01:02:56Take down all names of Confederate soldiers.
01:02:59And white supremacists as well.
01:03:01And slave owners.
01:03:02And slave owners.
01:03:03And white supremacists.
01:03:05And vocal advocates of slavery?
01:03:07And vocal advocates of slavery.
01:03:08Okay, but you don't mean like segregationists also.
01:03:11Of course.
01:03:12That's so many names.
01:03:13That's a few hundred.
01:03:15But they got a sign shop at City Hall.
01:03:18They can make their own signs.
01:03:24When you witness century-old statues of slave owners finally come off their pedestals,
01:03:30you start to feel like maybe anything is possible.
01:03:34And as we celebrated the end of filming in New Orleans,
01:03:37I still wanted just one final shot of the monument's fight spreading to another city.
01:03:42Luckily, my friend Aziz, a war photographer who you've already met a few times,
01:03:47was on his way to just such a place.
01:03:50So I joined him on a road trip to a rally uniting the defenders of another Lee statue.
01:03:56I do.
01:03:59who, who, whoWilliam McAlittan.
01:04:03Who, who, who, who.
01:04:04Uh, who, who, who resume.
01:04:06Euroarmed with his eets.
01:04:09And um, perfectly terrifying.
01:04:12who, WHO, WHO, WHO, WHO WILL NOTše EUA N Thompson.
01:04:44I was thinking about what made last night so scary.
01:04:47And part of it is because I've never seen mob violence before.
01:04:53Yeah.
01:04:55Do you think that the potential for violence is higher, even though it's daylight?
01:05:00Absolutely.
01:05:00Well, the thing is, is that now you have Antifa, which will be showing up today.
01:05:05And that's their arch rival.
01:05:07They live for Antifa blood.
01:05:09The thing that scares me is at the monuments, the narrative is we are not white supremacists.
01:05:16There's nothing white supremacist about this.
01:05:20Yeah.
01:05:21No, that's not this.
01:05:22That's not this.
01:05:23This is gas the juice, kill the .
01:05:27That's what this is.
01:05:30That's who we'll be near.
01:05:31That's who we were with last night.
01:05:33We'll swing, You f***ing
01:05:35You f***ing
01:05:36You f***ing
01:05:37You f***ing
01:05:38Keep moving, but staying with us.
01:05:40Let's go!
01:05:42Hey!
01:05:45You f***ing
01:05:46You f***ing
01:05:47And give me a friend!
01:05:49You f***ing
01:05:50And a piece of bread.
01:05:57You f***ing
01:06:02Hey!
01:06:14Oh, God, I know.
01:06:22Hey, man.
01:06:23It looks like you're trying to do an eye flush right now.
01:06:25Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:06:25I have a trained street medic on this JR.
01:06:28Do you mind if I...
01:06:28Yeah, please.
01:06:29Okay.
01:06:30I just got it in here.
01:06:31I'm just going to roll your eyes out.
01:06:36A horrific scene in Charlottesville, Virginia.
01:06:40A white nationalist rally that descended into deadly violence and chaos.
01:06:44A car plowing into a crowd of demonstrators protesting against those white nationalists.
01:06:50A 32-year-old woman killed.
01:06:51A number of severe injuries, many life-threatening.
01:06:58I am just really anxious to get out of here.
01:07:03Just to know that we're beyond the city limit.
01:07:12I was watching the police open the road for this little mini tank that they have.
01:07:19And all of a sudden, I hear this person screaming.
01:07:24And it's, um, like a young white guy dressed in a white shirt, khakis and hat and boots, which is
01:07:32the uniform for the supremacist group Vanguard America.
01:07:37And this kid is being chased by counter-protesters who are going to kick his ass.
01:07:41And I see him take off his shirt.
01:07:45And he's shivering with fear.
01:07:46And he says to them...
01:07:47I'm not really white power, man.
01:07:49I just came here for the fun.
01:07:51I'm sorry.
01:07:51You can't just take your costume, huh?
01:07:55So, you just came here for the fun?
01:07:58For the fun.
01:07:59Yeah, yeah.
01:08:00So you're not a real white supremacist.
01:08:02Barely.
01:08:04It's kind of a fun idea.
01:08:06Which part?
01:08:07Uh, just being able to say, like, hey, man, white power.
01:08:11Do you know?
01:08:12Yeah, yeah.
01:08:13What's the...
01:08:13Where's the fun part come?
01:08:15They killed someone today.
01:08:18Yeah.
01:08:20They killed someone today.
01:08:22Someone's dead today.
01:08:23And someone was probably critically injured last night.
01:08:29I think there's comedy in people who are white supremacists and don't admit that they're white supremacists because you can
01:08:35kind of pick apart their narrative.
01:08:37But when people are just out there screaming blood and soil, you will not replace me.
01:08:45Uh, and then running pedestrians down on purpose to kill them.
01:08:53I feel like I have no tools for that.
01:09:21I haven't understood until a month or two ago that I'm an aunt.
01:09:25I feel like I'm an angry person.
01:09:26Hmm.
01:09:27That generally I'm, like, very upbeat and jokey.
01:09:32But in the process of making this film, I've been like, oh, I'm pretty angry all the time.
01:09:38Yeah.
01:09:38And I want to know if you know that you made me like that.
01:09:43Absolutely.
01:09:44Because I woke you up.
01:09:46I made you wake up.
01:09:47And as I said a second ago, it is not possible to be a black man in America, black person
01:09:54in America, and not be angry.
01:09:57I don't know who I'd be without it, but I also, I feel like my mind always goes to the
01:10:04idea of, oh, but these people who are really bigoted, I bet we could just change their minds.
01:10:14Why do you think that?
01:10:17I don't know.
01:10:18Because I have a...
01:10:19Why do you hold that hope out, that illusion?
01:10:22There are some people, like students in my class, who can be awoken.
01:10:26But it's like an alcoholic, right?
01:10:30You cannot get treatment for alcoholism until you first admit that you're an alcoholic.
01:10:38And America, as a country, is so blind to the institutional racism that seizes through every fiber of this country.
01:10:49They don't understand, and they don't want to understand.
01:10:53They don't want to be waken up.
01:10:54That's my goal in life, to wake people up.
01:10:57But once you wake up, you can never go back to sleep.
01:11:02After Charlottesville, what once took years could suddenly be done overnight.
01:11:08But I was still afraid that what we celebrate as the dying breath of the Confederacy is often just the
01:11:15sound of it roaring back to life.
01:11:17This week it's Robert E. Lee.
01:11:19I notice that Stonewall Jackson's coming down.
01:11:22I wonder, is it George Washington next week, and is it Thomas Jefferson the week after?
01:11:27You know, you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop?
01:11:30If this were a summer blockbuster starring Will Smith, now would be the moment when we discover
01:11:35that you can't kill the monster of the lost cause just by destroying its physical form.
01:11:41Maybe the only way to do that is for New Orleanians to dig up the stories the Confederacy worked so
01:11:48hard to bury.
01:11:52So this is it, huh?
01:11:54Yes, yes, this is the marker for the transatlantic slave trade to Louisiana.
01:11:59This is where the enslaved people were brought to be sold to planters, you know, on this side of the
01:12:05river.
01:12:06The system that was developed in the South as far as slave trade was not going to tell the story
01:12:11of the Africans.
01:12:13It was going to glorify the story of those who exploited them.
01:12:17Freddie and Luther are part of a group of New Orleanians putting up plaques at the 52 unmarked sites around
01:12:23the city
01:12:24where Africans were imprisoned or sold.
01:12:27So they understand the difficulty of reminding tourists what the French Quarter used to sell.
01:12:34People who were descendants of the people who perpetuated the crime,
01:12:38they don't want the story to tell or they don't want to hear it because it brings anxiety to them.
01:12:42But we as victims have also been brainwashed to not want to tell our own story.
01:12:48You know, our ancestors didn't talk to us a lot about what happened because they felt ashamed of it.
01:12:53These stories are coming out.
01:12:55So I think we're in a different portal of time that these things are not going to be swept under
01:13:00the rug any longer.
01:13:02I've always thought of slavery as this peace missing in white people's memory,
01:13:07which is why it's hard to hear that that peace might also be missing from me.
01:13:12That those of us descended from the enslaved,
01:13:15some of us who have fashioned identities out of remembering the whips and the dogs and the swamps,
01:13:20that even we have only ever heard a fraction of our own story.
01:13:28It's been more than 200 years since a group of enslaved black men and women
01:13:32launched an uprising in modern-day St. John the Baptist Parish, Louisiana.
01:13:36Many were captured and convicted of insurrection.
01:13:39But now, two centuries later, an artist has staged his own version of that fateful event.
01:13:59Thank you all for showing up.
01:14:00This is a difficult durational performance that's deeply engaged with the ideas of the revolt of 1811.
01:14:08Self-determination in that era is something that people have written out.
01:14:12The black people had the most radical ideas of freedom at the time.
01:14:16The black people played in that era was the only reason I was the one when I was lost and
01:14:20played with the police.
01:14:32It was only a hotel in this country that I had worked in my life just at the time.
01:14:35The black people had his ownころ on the town.
01:14:38It's like a lot of pride in that era when he saw that up in that era is something that
01:14:38we found after an era one of things that were not only pleasant.
01:14:38There was nothing to see that there was not even when I was else to try it.
01:14:42There was no reason that I was likely going to do it.
01:14:43The black people had the best.
01:14:44SOU Machine CON faced me with the boyal government in that era.
01:15:10To me it feels like sometimes a lot of being black is a
01:15:14lot about remembering pain and wearing that pain and recalling that pain.
01:15:19Accept your blackness, see the history of your blackness, see what these white people
01:15:24have done to us.
01:15:25It is a freeing thing to be able to look at that history in a positive way and a way
01:15:31that
01:15:31feels like, no, we were agents of change as well.
01:15:37Marching in an army of black rebels, I realize how long I've been spending doing the opposite.
01:15:44I feel blackest when I'm chasing white supremacists, like I'm somehow earning my spot any time
01:15:52I put myself in danger or dive back in history to dig up the evidence.
01:16:00But the power I feel in this moment has nothing to do with staring at whiteness.
01:16:06It comes from being able to see myself outside of that chase.
01:16:12It comes from being able to see myself outside of the house.
01:16:14It comes from being able to see myself outside of the house.
01:16:29And I feel, even though I feel if I'm not together.
01:17:01We still see the vestiges of the very things that we're talking about all around us.
01:17:15I'm worried. I don't know what timeline we are on. Are we on the timeline where historians
01:17:23are going to look back and remember, there, that was the turning point. They started taking
01:17:28down monuments. They started questioning Confederate symbols with real persistence.
01:17:33They started straightening the road where it went wrong. Or is this time now just a flash in the pan?
01:17:45I have no idea. If you look at sort of historical pattern, and, you know, there's no fixed pattern
01:17:56to things, but we are undergoing rapid change. We're seeing a desire by communities to see
01:18:03themselves in the historical narrative in accurate ways. All of those things have a positive,
01:18:09but it is also disruptive. Will it be a situation where we all back up and go, OK, now let's
01:18:17have a real reckoning with what our past is and what we hope for, for the future of the
01:18:23United States? Or if it becomes so disruptive that new comforting myths emerge? I don't know
01:18:33what happens on the backside of disruption.
01:18:54Outrage at the death of George Floyd, an African-American man while in police custody in Minneapolis. In
01:18:59city after American city tonight, thousands of people have once again taken to the streets to
01:19:04express their anger, frustration, and solidarity. It is a precarious moment for this country,
01:19:10still in the grip of a pandemic that has claimed more than 100,000 lives.
01:19:15Hands up, don't shoot! Hands up!
01:19:18I'm looking at video of a Minneapolis police station that was set ablaze late last night.
01:19:24All of this in response to the death of George Floyd at the hands of city police officers.
01:19:31It looks like they're attacking the United Daughters of the Confederacy building.
01:19:36Oh, they just lit the building on fire.
01:19:52Protesters toppled a statue of Jefferson Davis, the latest in several statues that have been damaged
01:19:58across the state of Virginia.
01:20:00The city of Houston, Mobile, Alabama.
01:20:02Kentucky removing a statue of Jefferson Davis from the state capitol building.
01:20:12I wish I was in the land of cotton, old times they are not forgotten.
01:20:22Look away, look away, look away, Dixieland, in Dixieland, where I was born in.
01:20:35Early on one frosty morning, look away, look away, look away, look away, look away,
01:20:42When it comes to truth and reconciliation, we cannot have reconciliation without truth.
01:20:48You're just right, look away, look away, look away.
01:20:56Quick trzy apart —
01:20:57I'm out I'm in Dixieland, I'll take my strength to live and die in Dixie,
01:21:05Lets wait!
01:21:16Wouh!
01:21:17Away down Southern Dixie
01:21:50What's next? Progress To be successful comes with a process
01:21:55But sometimes we're too close to notice our own growth Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:01What's next? Progress To be successful comes with a process
01:22:06But sometimes we're too close to notice our own growth Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:14What's next? Progress To be successful comes with a process
01:22:18But sometimes we're too close to notice our own growth Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:44Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:46Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:49Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:54Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:58Step back and see the bigger picture
01:22:59Step back and see the bigger picture
01:23:00Step back and see the bigger picture
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