SS: The destruction of historic monuments with the tacit approval of those in authority coupled with this show of force to protect a road sign positioned to troll the president is indicative of current societal values.

What is often not remarked on is the degradation in aesthetics — so much of the modern world seems coarse and ugly compared with the past and the ugliness little by little gradually starts to erode of soul — it is the spiritual equivalent of attempting to sustain an organism on a diet of endless junk food.

As far as I know only Lionel Shriver has written about the importance of aesthetics in relation to the wave of statue toppling currently sweeping Western nations.

Spectator:

Against the movement to cleanse the American South of Civil War tributes, aesthetic attachment to regional oddity constitutes a weak argument. I’ll make it anyway. These sculptures are curious, interesting, specific to one part of the country and often better crafted than anything that would replace them. Some are defiant; many others have a mournful cast. They are sobering reminders of a dreadful juncture in American history, and you have to remember a war even to regret it. Junking all these memorials off in some cluttered museum would result in an ineffable atmospheric loss for [Raleigh] my complicated home town.