Amid the national debate over whether to remove various problematic monuments, I thought it would be helpful to share some of the important lessons that, were it not for statues, I would never have learned.
Mount Rushmore
Without Mount Rushmore, I would totally have forgotten about that crazy time we had a four-headed man as our U.S. President. It’s because of this statue that I refuse to rest until this backward country elects a woman with six necks, twelve feet, and three rows of razor-sharp fangs.
Rodin’s “The Thinker”
This statue, which depicts a man resting his chin on his fist, deep in thought, but with his mouth suspiciously closed, taught me that it’s possible to think about stuff without simultaneously saying that stuff out loud. I’m still practicing, and it hurts like hell.
Christ the Redeemer
Were it not for this statue, I would not have realized that the wingspan of a man can extend up to ninety-two feet.
The Great Sphinx at Giza
This structure taught me about the relativity of words like “great.” For instance, some people see a statue of a creature with a lion’s body and a human head and think, That’s great. Rational people, like me, see a statue the size of a football field depicting a Frankenstein beast with the body of a goddam lion, the head of something that appears human but most certainly is not human, and claws the size of pickup trucks, and think, If that thing came to life, we’d be fucked. I believe that a much better name for this statue would be “The Sphinx of Giza That, Were It Alive, Would Kill Us All in Two Hours Flat.”
Statue of Liberty
This statue taught me exactly what the progressive French intended—that, even in 2020, millions of people from around the world will travel by the boatload to gawk at some broad.
Christ of the Abyss
Christ of the Abyss, we are told, sits sixty feet deep in the Mediterranean Sea, and was built in honor of the Italian scuba diver Duilio Marcante. This statue has revolutionized my approach to wedding gifts, as there are no fewer than six couples whom I’ve now told that, in lieu of something from their registry, statues honoring their marriages stand tall in the Gulf of Mexico.
The Venus de Milo
Like the Statue of Liberty, this taught me that millions will travel the globe to leer at a woman whose hair style is a little sloppy, on account of her having teeny tiny arms that can only be seen with a microscope.
“Charging Bull,” near Wall Street
Before seeing this statue, I’d never seen a bull. I gleaned all I could from it. I observed people patting the bull’s head, hopping astride its back, grabbing its testicles. For anyone reading this who has also never seen a bull, THIS IS NOT HOW YOU SHOULD INTERACT WITH AN ACTUAL BULL. The colostomy bag taped to my side reminds me of this every three hours or so, depending on what I’ve eaten that day.
Robert E. Lee
I’d never heard of Robert E. Lee when I came across his statue, so I Googled him. I was exposed to a ton of Robert E. Lee’s quotes, which reflected his sentiments and those of his present-day supporters. Were it not for this statue, I wouldn’t have learned that the Confederacy actually won the Civil War, that most Americans want a White History Month, and that the earth isn’t flat—it’s a digital simulation. If this doesn’t serve as an example of what statues can teach Americans, I don’t know what will.
