@dropoffyourkeylee:
I do agree that some statues were placed with bad intent. But you don't always have to revere everyone that has a statue.
We have a local park with a statue of Frederick Douglass, my kids ask "who is that" and then I can explain about what he did and what he didn't do. People think Frederick Douglass was a great guy and he did a great deal of good but he was also a politician, he advised Lincoln on the plight of slaves but he was also sympathetic of extreme violence and murder on the part of his cause and a womanizer. Most of what we know about him is from autobiographies and his poems, so take his story with a grain of salt.
Same goes for Columbus, he was a great explorer but his primary objective was to get away from the religious persecution and his story is more nuanced than just discovering the Americas (or should I say, the Carribean).