I think it’s fine to acknowledge that people from a different time had values that don’t necessarily represent modern liberal values of today, but people don’t have a crystal ball and are capable of knowing what is deemed unacceptable or even frowned upon hundreds of after their time. I can guarantee future generations will look back on our generations and ask “why did they do that?” And “what were they thinking?” We shouldn’t ever stop striving to evolve, civilisations evolve over time. I keep using Lincoln as an example because he used to be remembered for being the president for leading America during a difficult period in US history and for his part in ending slavery, he is often voted America’s greatest ever president. Nowadays, he is seen as a bigot because his views on race (despite his role in ending slavery) aren’t progress by todays standards. But in his time, he was an outlier. Some schools in America have gone as far as to remove his name from schools and have removed statues, even in his home state of Illinois. That for me is silly and is going to far to signal how virtuous you are. If Lincoln isn’t good enough for you then who is? To me it is a cheap way to make our generation look more enlightened. I’d be fine with people acknowledging that his views on race don’t represent modern values of today, but on the whole, he did far more good than bad. I wish more liberals would push back on this kind of thing. To be fair, Sadiq Khan said the statue of Churchill would not be removed when protesters tried to tear it down in 2020. This sort of thing just makes liberals look bad IMO.
