Again, it’s not the same symbol. Similar, but not the same. Those in Asia know the difference, time for the “Aryans” to also know the difference if they want to opine on it, and its history & meaning.
So what? We do not live in Asia.
As the post clearly said:
(Emphasis mine)
“So what?”
Cultural and historical accuracy and sensitivity. You know: sort of what this whole thread is about.
To make it clearer: Some people may not like having their sacred symbol lazily mistaken for that of Nazi power…
Others may not like living in a building named in honor of someone who lived according to pretty abhorrent ideas, ideas considered abhorrent then (not everyone approved of slavery) but especially today.
Same symbol (with left and right hand versions). The Nazis (who mainly used the right hand version) just soiled its meaning and reputation, at least as far as the US and Europe are concerned. Asia did not see many Nazis, so swastikas did not get associated with Nazis the way they now are in the US and Europe.
If people are going to be so affected and sensitive about history, when are all the black people who have last names based on their plantation owners’ name going to change their names? They must not be able to sleep at night, at all, given they are being addressed daily by an historical slave name.
There comes a point where one starts to do what one says ones against, i.e, interesting that people in the name of tolerance are intolerant about the good things that some people did in the past, even while some of their past actions are now considered bad.
Overall, it is really silly to judge any person in history by the standards of today - simply makes no “historical” sense given that Calhoun and no one else had a window into the future (we are living in their future) and did not know everyone would now consider slavery a bad institution. Well, not everyone, as slavery is alive and well and accepted in Africa and parts of the Middle East.
Oh please! Calhoun died in 1850… the abolitionist movement was strong and even international in focus well before then. One can judge him by the standards of his day and still find him an abhorrent figure.
However, there is a glaring double standard surrounding this overall cultural sensitivity and historical accuracy claim - none of the people affected seem to understand any of the good things that the people they are trying to erase from history have done.
There is only a cultural and sensitivity and historic claim to be affected by the negative and to present the negative as the only thing the people they are protesting have done.
It is like when people endlessly complain that the Founding Fathers were not that great because some had slaves. How stupid can one be? Hey, they gave you the very country in which you can freely complain and express that thought without being killed or put in jail. To try and erase them or diminish their good (actually, great) acts and only see the negative is rather short-sighted and anti-intellectual. It is anti-intellectual because one should be able to digest and understand more than one aspect of a person or situation, not only harp on the part you do not like or disagree with.
Calhoun was not some pro slavery guy. Calhoun was the leader of the pro slavery movement in the senate. The leader.
And there were people against slavery during his time.
The more I read about him, the more I think Yale should have removed his name from the building. Yale is allowed to change the name of the building. Yale isn’t known for its … Imo, Yale wimped out.
Yale didn’t allow women students until when? 1969? I don’t remember.
Yale was set up to perpetuate the status quo.
If the name bothers people so much, then they can vote with their feet.
Next year on CC:
I have great stats, chance me for every IVY except Yale, since Yale is racist.
However, given that he was named for the college, clearly he was not judged by people solely in the negative way you are saying. Again, unlike you, some people saw the good things that he did, which you refuse to acknowledge, which is your right to do. But, that does not make it accurate as the only correct portrayal of the man.
Your post is basically trying to rewrite are how people viewed him - you are projecting your view backwards. Historically, many people obviously did not hold your “abhorrent” view because they saw fit even back then to name things after him, as Calhoun College is not the only thing his name is part of.
More importantly, it does not matter if the Abolitionist Movement was strong when he died because it is important to note that 1850 comes BEFORE 1865. We can look back now and say slavery was ended, but what if the South had won the Civil War? There was a chance we could then, today, look a lot like many countries in Africa right now where people are still traded as goods.
Also, would all of those abolitionists have been for women’s rights, since the women at Yale thing keeps being brought up? If we can’t guarantee that, then we can’t hold them up as beacons either.
Suppose that there was a building named for an important military officer who graduated from one of the service academies before blacks and women were allowed into those. Should be dishonor his service because he was born in the wrong era?
Yeah…the pro slavery people liked Calhoun.
Comparing the US to African countries with slavery…ok. That’s a pretty low bar. 
“Also, would all of those abolitionists have been for women’s rights, since the women at Yale thing keeps being brought up? If we can’t guarantee that, then we can’t hold them up as beacons either.”
Do you know anything about US History? Most Abolitionists were ardent supporters of the women’s suffrage movement…
Really…all this profound lack of basic understanding of history is giving me a headache! Oy Vey!
Fine. That’s how you look at it. Clearly others don’t. Let me also add, that some of what I’m reading here sounds very much like very lame (and inaccurate) excuses for a horrific reality of US history. A reality that says something pretty bad about Americans of that time.
People are skilled at excuses. Columbus and his followers didn’t slaughter Native peoples throughout the New World; the Nazis were only following orders; slaveholders and segregationists didn’t “know” what they were doing was objectionable.
So the Native Americans of today should just shut up and celebrate Columbus Day; Jews should chalk up Nazi war crimes as obedience to a military culture and 21st century university students should overlook that they live in a building honoring the memory of a man who, according to a popular online encyclopedia is “best known for his defense of slavery” at a time when Harriet Beecher Stowe was busy scribbling Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
Everyone should just “get over it.”
Yale is a residential college. Students take a great deal of pride in their particular college and how much of their life is nourished there. How would you feel then, to find out that your “founder” was somehow tainted, dirty, undesirable? You could be in Morse, or Berkley, or Stiles, but no, you end up in the deTorquemada college. Yeah, I would want to rename it too. It’s not just a building name, it is the whole identity of a residential college. Now that the cat is out of the bag, it will be hard for Calhoun students to not feel tainted, or at least, embarrassed by their college.
As for Huck Finn, it has been one of the most banned books since it was first published. Louisa May Alcott would not allow it in the Concord library and Mark Twain was delighted by that fact.
Of course I know many abolitionists were for women’s rights, particularly the women. My point was that there surely must have been some men who were for abolition but not for women’s rights out there, or at least not all the rights women have today, who could theortically accidentally be recognized for one good character trait, but not tossed aside for another.
From what I remember hearing, there were a lot of divisions even on the abolitionist side. Some wanted to make colonies in Liberia for them, others wanted to free them completely, etc.
Here’s a thought, not that it in any way justifies slavery. If we had left the Africans in Africa, would their descendants have had a better quality of life there rather than in America?
OMG. Really albert69? Did you really just write those last two sentences? Please tell me I’m dreaming, and not that a (supposedly) educated person really thinks that way.
And BTW, any thought that begins with “not that it in any way justifies slavery” belongs to the category of “I’m not a bigot, but --” logic.
"Students take a great deal of pride in their particular college and how much of their life is nourished there. How would you feel then, to find out that your “founder” was somehow tainted, dirty, undesirable? "
How do people ever live in Washington State?
But you’ve nailed it, Greenwitch. Black people have unequal access to education, face violence in police encounters, but what’s really important is the feels. What a tremendous difference it will make to the lives of black people everywhere once a handful of Yale students experiencing one of the finest educations in the world feel better about their dorm. The blacks who are trying to get an education in underfunded schools and trying not be shot for a traffic stop will certainly be comforted in knowing that a few students have a better dorm name.
It’s a small victory in a world where large victories are needed.
Btw, no historical figure is perfect. None. Should we rename the many Kennedy schools / foundations? JFK was a womanizer. Teddy Kennedy acted improperly after a death. Why aren’t we arguing to rename the Kennedy School at Harvard?
Who ARE these perfect politicians who are saintly in all aspects? I’d like to know.