I've lived north of the Mason-Dixon Line all of my life and never saw or heard of them.

Once, a long time ago, a woman from Michigan was explaining to me why I was wrong to not cherish Confederate monuments.

I'm from the South.

The more she talked the more I looked at her like she was crazy. She took note of my look and told me I was brainwashed.

This, from a woman whose entire family was from Michigan - a state who fought for the Union - who flew the Confederate battle flag and couldn't understand why I thought her nuts. Trying to tell me that it was my heritage and I should be proud. I told her if it was my heritage as a Southerner, then why did she fly it and I didn't?

She said I didn't understand what it meant.

I was simply blown away by her ignorance.

A lot of Confederate sympathizers outside the South is probably the reason. Also, just because someone didn't fight for the Confederacy doesn't mean they weren't racist. Racism doesn't know borders. Confederate deserters and soldiers also left the South after losing and settled elsewhere. They carried their hate and bitterness with them.

counterproductive.

Lets take the monument recently toppled of a generic Confederate soldier. Many of the soldiers fighting for the South really had no choice in the matter. It is one thing to place a statue of Lee, a slave owner who actually fought the lawful release of his slaves and engaged in the kidnapping of Northern African Americans (among also being a slave master who did not hesitate to fully adopt the chattel principle of buying and selling regardless of the impact on the slave), in a prominent pedestal overlooking a university and a city and someone who was coerced and driven by peer pressure to engage in the Civil War. These soldiers are more akin to our soldiers who have fought in unjust wars like the Iraq and Vietnam wars.

Also grave plaques placed in places like Rock Island to recognize the appalling loss of life in Northern prisons should definitely remain.