I think we should tear down Australia, built on the backs of convict slave labour. Lets chuck a rope around it and drag it into the sea. Fkin slavers.
Is anyone actually suggesting pulling down everything built by slaves rather than pulling down memorials celebrating slavers?
Well HBO's decision to pull Gone with the Wind is hardly a memorial to celebrate slavers. so we need to be careful - I am all for moving statues of slave traders to museums - not so keen on removing memorials to Kings/ Queens Soldiers prime ministers etc who were active at the time though
Steward Lee .... racking my brains trying to find the comedian who quoted that. Sure it was Steward Lee now.
Think I got one of them. Was that the wee red covered one? Sure I must have been about 13 when it was imposed upon me. Might still have it.
I think what he’s saying is, in 200 years time how will you be judged? A fictional scenario... Maybe you build a small family business, that makes a lot of money. Maybe you then save your local football club. You then donate to many charities in the area. The town you live in decides to build a statue to commemorate your contribution. The statue is deemed art. Fast forward 200 years. Your statue stands covered in pigeon muck. Nobody outside of a few who have cared to read the plaque know who you are, or what you did. A kid might remember his grandad mentioning something. A flag that gets passed around the football ground has his face on it. The statue lends a certain amount of art to the otherwise modern and functional buildings surrounding it. And is generally a pleasant place to sit on a sunny day. The statue is pulled down during civil unrest, destroyed, and erased from existence. They pulled the statue down because the man in question was a butcher and in 200 years time the majority of people think that eating and killing animals is barbaric. Distasteful history, is still history. I have not written this to belittle the black lives matter movement. I wholeheartedly support the abolishment of racism. It has no place in society. The slave trade was abhorrent, and I cant even begin to imagine how people thought it was even remotely acceptable. I do think that most statues depict people who in today’s enlightened society would not be seen the same as they were at the time of the erection of the statue. So do we ban statues altogether and remove them all, or commission statues based around today’s society and outnumber the old ones?
Isn't there a bit of an argument over whether the pyramids were built with slave labour? Perhaps we should knock em down anyway, just in case. Those nasty Pharaohs had loads of slaves. And pyramids are there to commemorate them.
Yeah the red one. I've still got mine. Kept it after all these years. Amazing the stuff that survives.
I think you're right. There's a line somewhere of what is universally considered abhorrent, and I think it's right that we don't have statues in public stil commemorating people who did these things. The main contribution of Edward Colston to the world was his role in the sllave trade, so he shouldn't be commemorated with this statue. I think the severity of what he did and the people who still suffer due to recism make this offensive. Now people who happened to be racist a hundred years ago shouldn't be written off based on current standards. That was the behaviour of the time, and though it was obviously wrong we can't t apply our standards to a previous society. Your point about butchers is really interesting - eating meat could well be the next thing that looks unbelievable to people in 200 years time
Whether it was slave labour or not . I more look at the pyramids as a fantastic human achievement. And stand in their honour not the Pharoes.
Isn't there a bit of an argument over whether the pyramids were built with slave labour? Perhaps we should knock em down anyway, just in case. Those nasty Pharaohs had loads of slaves. And pyramids are there to commemorate them. I'm not sure that a banner at Giza stating "Look what can be achieved with slave labour" would be too tasteful at the mo.