Ryland and Freeman were both racist people, who now done money to the University of Richmond. Because of the BLM movement and our society moving towards more inclusivity, these names no longer represent “important” and “influential” people, because they aren’t people that others want to look up to. While I do believe it’s important to be aware of our history so that it isn’t ever repeated, I don’t think this a valid reason to keep these names on our buildings. There are many views that I can see how one would believe that, but not this one. There are so many other ways of remembering history rather than plastering slave owners names on buildings. For me, I’m picturing the trolley image from class and wondering, what are the costs and benefits to keeping and changing the names on buildings? If we keep these names, we are hurting more people than we probably even know, but if we take the names down, the university could potentially lose donors. While I can understand the university doesn’t want this, but do they even care how their student body feels about the matter? And if we take these two options and picture the trolley image, what is the ethically right decision?

 

2 thoughts on “

  1. Sophia Picozzi

    I think you phrased the debate in a really cool way, weighing the costs and benefits and the trolley problem. It definitely made me rewire my thinking and think of it in a different more calculated way.

  2. Miriam Gilman

    I agree with your point that Freedman and Ryland are no longer super relevant to our school. The fact that having their names up is actively hurting people should be something that the school remedies. I think that there are ways to be aware of our history in different, more productive ways. Keeping their names up gives the impression that what they did for the school outweighs the consequence and negative impacts of their involvement in the hateful institution of slavery.

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