Rhetorical Analysis Of Mayor Landrieu's Statue

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In this speech, Mayor Landrieu believes that the confederate statues should be taken down because they were put up to not only honor them, but to also support the movement of the Cult of the Lost Cause. Landrieu celebrates the fact that by taking down the statues it is a “process that can move us towards healing and understanding of each other” (Landrieu 2017). People may argue that these statues are a part of American history, but he emphasizes that “there is a difference between remembrance of history and reverence of it” (Landrieu 2017). In his speech, he states that New Orleans was the largest slave market in America and that “these monuments purposefully celebrate a fictional, sanitized confederacy; ignoring the death, ignoring the …show more content…

The speaker reminds us that New Orleans was a place where thousands of souls were bought and sold, those people were raped/tortured and force to work. He asserts that the monuments made to honor confederate generals are “self-evident that these men did not fight for the United States of America, they fought against it. They may have been warriors, but in this cause they were not patriots” (Landrieu 2017). Landrieu also asks rhetorical questions when he talks about a girl that asked why there was a statue of Robert E. Lee and the effects that this statue can have on younger generations. He ends his speech with a quote from Abraham Lincoln that says “With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation’s wounds, to do all which may achieve and cherish: a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations” (Landrieu 2017). In conclusion, Mayor Landrieu believes that confederate honoring statues should be taken down so that there can be healing and understanding between the people that live in …show more content…

Lee, Jefferson Davis, and P.G.T. Beauregard statues were not erected just to honor these men, but are a part of the movement which became known as The Cult of the Lost Cause” (Landrieu 2017). Basically, Mayor Landrieu is emphasizing that the statues put up for those men were put there to honor them and support a cult that wanted slavery and believed that people of color were less than human. During his speech, Mayor Landrieu quotes Alexander Stephens and says “cornerstone rests upon the great truth, that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery -subordination to the superior race- is his natural and normal condition” (Landrieu 2017). In making this comment Landrieu urges us to realize that the confederate statues are not there to remember the people that fought in the civil war but to honor them. By keeping the statues, the people of New Orleans are reminded every day that thousands of people were sold and bought, they were raped and forced to work. These quotes support the claim because they are both about how the statues are atrocious and how they are on the wrong side of history. Both quotes establish that removing the confederate statues would benefit New Orleans because young children would not have to be exposed to hatred and racism. To the defenders of the confederate statues Mayor Landrieu says “There is a difference between remembrance of history and

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