PBS American Experience 2002 Mount Rushmore 720p x264 AAC - Forums - EZTV

definitely an impressive creation/carving, and worthy of technical praise.

then you realize that it is a commemoration of two men that literally owned and sold human beings as
property, and used them as slave labor to accrue personal wealth. jefferson had some great
qualities, but shouldn't supporting and owning human beings as personal property trump all his
favorable qualities? isn't human enslavement the worst system humans have ever perpetrated upon
other humans? would we build monuments to goebbels, hitler, eichmann because they had some favorable
leadership qualities?

lincoln appears to have been a racist and white supremecist, judging by his own lifetime quotations
and writings, and was content with slavery remaining as long as the union was preserved. so
dismantling the system that was enslaving innocent human beings was not his primary motivation or
primary concern - so much for role model.

✎ Quote by abraham lincoln

my paramount object in this struggle is to save the union, and is not either
to save or to destroy slavery. if i could save the union without freeing any slave i would do it,
and if i could save it by freeing all the slaves i would do it; and if i could save it by freeing
some and leaving others alone i would also do that. what i do about slavery, and the colored race, i
do because i believe it helps to save the union; and what i forbear, i forbear because i do not
believe it would help to save the union ... i have here stated my purpose according to my view of
official duty; and i intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men
everywhere could be free

as for teddy roosevelt, i'd say he is the least damning figure of the 4. although, he embraced
forceful sterilization of criminals, and seeing as how being branded a criminal is a rather loose
and subjectively flawed procedure, i'd say that's pretty fucked up to sterilize people when the
procedure of determining criminality was and is so flawed.

like most things in the us related to historical figures, it's all about hero worship and creating a
cult of personality around political figures. it keeps the masses ignorant, complacent, and
obedient, on top of nationalistic; all the while ignoring the flaws and horror of what transpired.