Today I was reading a post from Nick Sacco on a recent controversy in St. Louis involving a Confederate monument. Apparently some people are uneasy about the monument and want to discuss whether it should be removed. What intrigued me was that our friend Ben Jones, the chief of heritage operations for the Sons of Confederate Veterans, chimed in on the issue.
As I’ve said before, I find Ben a likeable guy, but I am puzzled by something. Has he written a similar essay concerning the debate over the display of the Confederate flag at Richmond’s War Memorial Chapel? After all, we have been told that the 2010 decision of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts to rescind the display of the Confederate flag on the portico of the chapel (a practice that had been going on all of seventeen years, judging by the failure of Confederate heritage groups to offer an image of such a display prior to 1993) sparked the creation of what someone has called “the most powerful and influential southern heritage organization in existence” today. In 2015 the VMFA ceased leasing the War Memorial Chapel altogether.
It’s reasonable to ask why we’ve seen nothing from Ben Jones or the SCV about this issue. Yes, we were treated to (then) SCV commander-in-chief Michael Givens taking a guest turn as a Flagger …
… but that’s been it.
Can anyone explain the silence of Ben Jones and the SCV’s national organization concerning this controversy? If I’ve overlooked evidence of a public declaration, would someone provide it? Thanks.
Crossroads 