ABSTRACT
A school changing its name from Rebels to Wolves or a city tearing down Confederate monuments appears trivial compared to the grave political and humanitarian disasters of our current historical moment. But changing mascots or tearing down monuments intervenes in the fundamental questions that define our epoch. The battles themselves, their aftermath, and their media coverage reveal that the Confederate monuments and names function as fetish objects, objects that, as Jacques Lacan insists, enable subjects to disavow their own status as lacking while simultaneously establishing their form of enjoyment. Undeniably, these monuments and name dedications were reactions against the move toward equality and were meant to symbolically resist the mandate to end structural oppression, individual violence, and widespread racism. It is the unspoken emotion attached to these symbols and names that is revelatory. The enjoyment itself allows people to disavow that the symbols represent slavery, white nationalism, and contemporary racism. This chapter illustrates that taking the Confederate signs and names as a fetish object allows people to disavow slavery while still repeating its psychic investment.
