Celebrity statues find unlikely homes in Southern California 洛杉矶时报/毛像是名人像，尼克松图书馆/美政府不对毛像有政治态度？

Photo: Kai Chen with Mr. Naftali, 10/1/2010

陈凯一语： Kai Chen's Words:

www.kaichenblog.blogspot.com

Using the words such as Icon or Celebrity to describe Mao - the biggest mass murderer in human history can only be a moral perversion or mental retardation. LA Times' article about statues in Southern California reflects the deep erosion and contamination in America's political cultural landscape.

Since my protest over Mao's statue in the Nixon Library last October, the director of the library Tim Naftali has changed the sign he used to put up by Mao's statue which listed Mao's crime against humanity. Now the new sign says only who the statues are and it does not represent US government position to have the statues there (basically the statues have no meaning according to this position). Now, Naftali further confuses Nixon Library's position on Mao's statue, saying that the US government takes no position on a mass murderer's statue in a public-funded institution that educates our children about world history (without morality?!). The perversion is getting deeper.

Mr. Naftali further stated that since the sign was put up by the "World Leaders Exhibit", (so Mao is still one of the "World Leaders who lead only in murder and torture.) no more protest has been held. It seems that to appease the public anger, not to do the right thing by one's conscience, characterizes his action regarding such a perverse display.

Hereby I reiterate my position on Mao's statue in the Nixon Library: Such a display is anti-America and anti-freedom. Such a display will only serve to castrate our children's moral judgment and diminish a person's common decency. I will not rest till Mao's statue is removed from Nixon Library, along with Mao's portrait and Mao's rotten corps on Tiananmen Square when the communist regime in China falls. I hope all the people in America and in the world will join me in this worthy effort to cleanse our own soul and dump these nauseating contaminants into where they belong - the garbage can of human history. --- Kai Chen

用“名人”或“崇偶”去形容毛泽东 - 一个人类历史上最大的杀人魔，只能说明用词人的灵智混乱与心理残疾。 洛杉矶时报的这篇文章反映了当今美国政治文化的逐渐蜕化与被污染。

自从我去年十月在尼克松图书馆抗议毛塑像后，馆长那夫塔利不知出于什么动机将他原有的一个关于毛的罪行的说明换成了一个不置可否的所谓“说明”，并指出毛塑像展出不代表美国政府立场。 现在那夫塔利又进一步改变了立场说美国政府不对毛塑像展出在尼克松图书馆（一个教育我们后代世界历史的场所, 一个纳税人所付公共机构）有任何立场。 病态扭曲进一步加剧。

那夫塔利又指出自那个说明（不代表美国政府立场）出示后，没有人在去抗议。 似乎平息公众愤怒，而不是诉诸良知做出正确的举动是尼克松图书馆的主要行为动机，不管这种动机有多么病态扭曲。

我在此重申我对毛塑像在尼克松图书馆展出的立场： 这种展出是一种反美、反良知、反自由的举动。 毛塑像的展出只能起到阉割、麻木人的道德美德的作用并对我们的后代对真实历史的认知有着极大的负向作用与障碍。 我将用我的努力一如既往地抗议这样病态扭曲的现象，直到毛塑像连同在天安门广场上的毛画像与毛腐尸一起被丢到人类历史的垃圾箱里去。 --- 陈凯

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Celebrity statues find unlikely homes in Southern California

洛杉矶时报/毛像是名人像，尼克松图书馆/美政府不对毛像有政治态度？

Sculptures of icons including James Dean, John Wayne and even Mao Tse-tung can be discovered in unexpected places in the Los Angeles area.
By Steve Harvey, Los Angeles Times

April 25, 2010

It used to be a sort of running joke: Where else but in Southern California would a high school have a statue of a movie star on its front lawn? The reference was to Venice High's Myrna Loy monument.

But there was an explanation.

Loy was not an actress, just a student, when she modeled for the sculpture in 1922. The oft-damaged cement work was replaced by a bronze version earlier this month.

Several other local statues and busts of notables also occupy what seem, at first glance, to be unlikely settings.

Who would have thought…

China's Mao Tse-tung in Yorba Linda?

Conservative icon John Wayne outside the headquarters of Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flynt?

Actor James Dean at the Griffith Observatory?

Or, how about comic Jack Benny in Rancho Cucamonga, Ludwig van Beethoven in Pershing Square and Amelia Earhart in North Hollywood?

But there are more or less logical reasons for each site.

Mao, for example, is in the World Leaders Hall of the Nixon Presidential Library and Museum. Nixon chose Mao and other subjects because he had met with each of them, but there were still some protests over the dictators in the display.

So, the National Archives and Records Administration, which took over operation of the museum in 2007, posted a sign saying that the federal government takes no position on the "legacies" of the leaders.

Since then, museum Director Timothy Naftali said, there have been no protests. ....