Jun 2020
10:07am, 14 Jun 2020
23,401 posts
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Johnny Blaze
I think it's impossible to expect principled, moral leadership at a time of national crisis when the person at the top is such an unprincipled, immoral shitbag. And by "moral" I mean morality in the "do the right thing for the right reason" sense and the "don't shag the PR woman when your wife is being treated for cancer" sense. |
Jun 2020
10:42am, 14 Jun 2020
800 posts
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TheBeardRunner (aka Abul Choudhury
Exactly
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Jun 2020
10:47am, 14 Jun 2020
1,845 posts
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JRitchie
I don't think you can allocate blame intolerance and division to one person or one persons ideology from the 80s. The labour government and the state of Britain which brought in Thatcher was every bit as bad. Asking for international bail outs, rampant inflation undermining savings and pensions. I had a discussion with my father about BAME - he was a construction manager on the Barbican and he relayed that he was overruled in promoting a person of colour by union / shop steward interference. The answer to intolerance is much more complex and comes from many different inputs. The EU free movement of people has helped the UK economy enormously and at the same time has been something that has agitated intolerant views of certain sections of society that have been in place for years. Statues over time have take on the role of historical landmark and tourist point of interest. I think they should be kept but that the roles of people being memorialised should be properly explained at the site (or taken to museums). If we are getting rid of all statutes of bad rulers and people, surely Rome and most of Italy will become far less interesting to visit. |
Jun 2020
11:57am, 14 Jun 2020
2,378 posts
|
Canute
The article from Bristol Live linked in Simbil post a few pages back reported a survey of opinions about the Colston statue. The majority of the 10,252 responders wanted to see something else replace it. Only 11% wanted the statue back on the plinth. This might have been a biased sample of the population, but nonetheless it suggests that despite the vices and virtues of Johnson, Blair, Thatcher, Wilson and others, our society is becoming more humane in some important respects. Now is the time to act on that. Public opinion can lead to action. At first the Government published only a part of the report on BAME deaths due to CV-19. As a result of public outcry, they will publish the other part, including recommendations for action, next week. We do still live in a democracy where our opinions count. It is more crucial than ever that we express them vociferously. |
Jun 2020
1:06pm, 14 Jun 2020
345 posts
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deslauriers
Going back to the point made by several posters about ignorance: Yesterday, in Newcastle city centre, many true patriots (anti-antiFa or counter protesters) gathered to protect Grey's monument. I very much doubt any of them knew that Grey was the Prime Minister who abolished slavery and who tried to push through the Catholic Emancipation Act. |
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Jun 2020
1:26pm, 14 Jun 2020
23,402 posts
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Johnny Blaze
Well, emancipating several million slaves didn't stop Lincoln's statue from getting defaced...
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Jun 2020
1:32pm, 14 Jun 2020
346 posts
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deslauriers
JB- I doubt any of them knew who Grey even was, beyond perhaps a connection with tea.
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Jun 2020
2:34pm, 14 Jun 2020
30,250 posts
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SPR
Which Lincoln statue was defaced and when? I see there was at least some false stories going around of a Lincoln statue being defaced recently. Obviously there's reason's why people might decide to deface it though, even if he did right one wrong. |
Jun 2020
3:02pm, 14 Jun 2020
16,155 posts
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Sharkie
Lincoln's personal history is more complicated than you might think.
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Jun 2020
3:28pm, 14 Jun 2020
16,212 posts
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Chrisull
JRitchie - And yet the UK's highest rank in the happiness index was in the mid 1970s just after Wilson had gone cap in hand to the IMF (source Andy Beckett's excellent book - When the lights went out - a history of the 70s) ... I'm not suggesting it was better then, and certainly while attitudes to race and religion might be poor now, they were positively antidiluvian then. He makes a good argument too that we were more productive and happier under the 3 day week too. I think most agree that statues should be properly contextualised and the most egregious examples officially removed (I mean no-one would say the Saville statue in Glasgow should have remained). The Colston one, the Merchant Venturers had been dragging their heels for years about this one, and really there was no justification for it's continued staying up. Indeed throwing it in the harbour enabled historians to find and preserve a new bit of history, when they found a rolled up magazine from 1895 in the coat tails along with details of the installers: twitter.com Here's David Olusoga arguing in the Times why Colston should not have a statue "“There is no other achievement in Colston’s life. This is just somebody who got rich through an immoral activity and then lavished some money on the city”: " twitter.com |
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