Harriet Tubman to be on new US $20 bill

It seems stupid to me to have her on the $20 just for the sake of having a woman on the $20.
You know who I would've picked if I had to find an oppressed minority to be represented on a dollar, who also was a significant figure in American history?

I see no reason why we can't put Sitting Bull on another bill. Why should we be limited to only having one minority who contributed to our society on a bill? Let Tubman be on the $20 and put Sitting Bull on the $50. I feel like there would be less objection to that than to removing Franklin, Hamilton, Lincoln, or Washington. People would probably be more okay with swapping out Grant.

I don't have anything against Tubman, I just think that there are plenty of other good choices and the circumstances leading up to this decision are less than admirable. I've been listening to the coverage of the dollar change for a while now. This only happened as a result of people literally saying that there aren't enough women on our currency. And personally, I think that it's foolish to put a woman on a dollar just for the sake of putting a woman on a dollar. But apparently the folks in charge disagree.

I can't be proud of a decision when it is only brought about due to sexist views.

I don't think it's as simple as "just to have a woman" on the bill. It's about changing the fact that our country is still being run by rich white men. It's about getting some representation of someone other than a rich white man on our national currency. And, as much as this probably doesn't sound great to say, Tubman kind of kills two birds with one stone being an African-American woman. I'm sure that somewhere that came into play.

I think asking to change all of the bills to women would be sexist, but asking to do just one is kind of the least the people in charge can do, in my opinion. Plus, there's never going to be a reason to change who's on the money other than "just to change it."

Harriet Tubman doesn't deserve to be celebrated because she was a woman. She deserves to be celebrated because she was an unstoppable, legendary badass (warning: salty language ahoy) who was one of the bravest fighters for liberty, true liberty from oppression, in the history of the United States. Even if she were a man I would argue that she ought to be celebrated among the very "greatest" figures of American history. Her contemporaries rightly acknowledged that no one sacrificed more or fought with greater urgency, as an individual, to free slaves from bondage.

Yes, I think we ought to be acknowledging our American Indian heritage too (their history is our history, whether we like it or not) along with the so many other peoples who have been part of our history but relegated to footnotes or to nothing at all, but your average high school U.S. history class would lead you to believe that Harriet Tubman is just a historical footnote who happens to be a woman. She's not. She earned this and deserves wider recognition. Balancing the scales so that we view our history as being more than just the triumph of the white man doesn't end with putting an African-American literal freedom fighter on paper currency. Also: hate to say it, but pretty much none of my friends carry cash these days anyways. I definitely don't.

Or, we could just leave things alone and stop being overly sensative to things that were created years ago. We have enough BS to deal with. The images on paper is not worth all this attention.

Trisskar wrote: Or, we could just leave things alone and stop being overly sensative to things that were created years ago. We have enough BS to deal with. The images on paper is not worth all this attention.

I am inclined to agree that there are more pressing matters. But I think it is still important. What is on our money is literally a depiction of what we value as a country. Now I'm a white male so my entire life when I've seen money I've seen myself represented as part of the demographic that this country values, even if I only thought that subconsciously. I can't say for sure, but I'm willing to bet that there are people of minorities out there who, when looking at the currency of the nation that they live in, feel under valued. These are the people that we respect enough to put on the very thing that has the most value in society and they are all old, rich, white guys. And the guy we're discussing replacing is not exactly known for all of his great deeds.

Granted, this could all also be a bigger deal to me because I work at a bank so stuff involving our money is kind of on the forefront of things I worry about. :laugh: