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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol 15:41 - Jun 7 with 28101 viewsMullet



Wanton act of destruction? Political statement? Bad PR?

I'm not sure this is quite the same as when they pulled down statues of Saddam in Iraq for example. Strikes me as simply ammo for the critics and little else.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:49 - Jun 7 with 7520 viewsJakeITFC

Quite a nice summary of why Black Lives Matter is important - this man profited over the literal trading of black people and is rewarded with a statue because he used some of that money to build schools or whatever.

This isn’t a case of ‘oh it’s difficult in a historical context’ for me - the guy was a fuccking slave trader.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:50 - Jun 7 with 7518 viewsclive_baker

I think it’s a dangerous precedent to try and eradicate history from memories. Where do you stop? Change all street names? Colston School, change the name? I think rather it should remain, but be contextualised and used as a reminder of how far we’ve come, not celebrated, but not erased from memory. Slippery slope.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:51 - Jun 7 with 7510 viewsShawsey

Not exactly a great statue to have of somebody anyway, but yes wanton destruction will not help the cause.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:52 - Jun 7 with 7505 viewsMullet

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:49 - Jun 7 by JakeITFC

Quite a nice summary of why Black Lives Matter is important - this man profited over the literal trading of black people and is rewarded with a statue because he used some of that money to build schools or whatever.

This isn’t a case of ‘oh it’s difficult in a historical context’ for me - the guy was a fuccking slave trader.


Is it not better to keep him there and remind people of why Bristol is such an important case study? There's an excellent slave museum in Liverpool for example which I think does a great job of that.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:52 - Jun 7 with 7505 viewsclive_baker

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:49 - Jun 7 by JakeITFC

Quite a nice summary of why Black Lives Matter is important - this man profited over the literal trading of black people and is rewarded with a statue because he used some of that money to build schools or whatever.

This isn’t a case of ‘oh it’s difficult in a historical context’ for me - the guy was a fuccking slave trader.


I think the ‘justification’ of this is its for his philanthropic pursuits, but I agree he shouldn’t be celebrated. Regularly walked past it in Bristol and never quite sat right that he’s proudly remembered like that. I just think where do you draw the line? It’s a tough one

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:53 - Jun 7 with 7493 viewsStokieBlue

I understand why they did this and I don't blame them.

However erasing these things won't highlight what has happened in the past, if anything it's removing a reminder of what happened in the past and why it shouldn't happen again. Leaving the statue in place but having a placard there explaining to everyone who sees it what he did and the lives it destroyed is a more powerful message than removing the statue in my opinion.

SB

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:55 - Jun 7 with 7462 viewsfactual_blue

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:50 - Jun 7 by clive_baker

I think it’s a dangerous precedent to try and eradicate history from memories. Where do you stop? Change all street names? Colston School, change the name? I think rather it should remain, but be contextualised and used as a reminder of how far we’ve come, not celebrated, but not erased from memory. Slippery slope.


Our history though is littered with examples we've 'forgotten' or - to put it another way 'ignored'. The English Armada of 1589, the Croke Park massacre.

And of course, so many of our lauded battles are examples of instances of either romanticised instances of not losing (Waterloo) or obvious defeats (Arnhem). In Anthony Beevor's book on Arnhem he quotes a Guards officer's comment that 'we weren't taught to kill and win, we were taught how to die'.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:55 - Jun 7 with 7457 viewsPJH

I saw that the Mayor (I think) of Richmond, Virginia said that a statue of Robert E Lee was to come down because of what he fought for.

I think it would be better if officials authorised the removal of such things rather than it being done as in Bristol because it will be seen by some as wanton destruction whatever the genuine reasons behind it.

It is a political statement but I do not think that it is good PR.

edit-I think the Robert E Lee statue was to put in storage rather than destroyed.
[Post edited 7 Jun 2020 15:58]
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:56 - Jun 7 with 7448 viewsJakeITFC

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:52 - Jun 7 by Mullet

Is it not better to keep him there and remind people of why Bristol is such an important case study? There's an excellent slave museum in Liverpool for example which I think does a great job of that.


Replace it with a memorial to the tens of thousands of lives he destroyed to make his money.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:57 - Jun 7 with 7425 viewsBluefish

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:52 - Jun 7 by Mullet

Is it not better to keep him there and remind people of why Bristol is such an important case study? There's an excellent slave museum in Liverpool for example which I think does a great job of that.


We went to Liverpool for the Titanic museum and the slavery exhibition is the same place. It is incredibly powerful stuff, well worth a visit

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:01 - Jun 7 with 7383 viewsJakeITFC

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:52 - Jun 7 by clive_baker

I think the ‘justification’ of this is its for his philanthropic pursuits, but I agree he shouldn’t be celebrated. Regularly walked past it in Bristol and never quite sat right that he’s proudly remembered like that. I just think where do you draw the line? It’s a tough one


Drawing the line is indeed difficult - I think discussions around Churchill will likely become more troublesome over the next few years for example, however I think the line has to be above having statues of people who directly benefited from the slave trade (if society is genuinely interested in progressing on race matters).
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:03 - Jun 7 with 7368 viewsfooters

Monuments and objects don't constitute history. History is a series of actions and events, and pulling down a statue exonerating a slave trader is an important symbol of where we are today.

Much like the historic sites that Daesh destroyed, it may be upsetting for some but you can't treat the world as a museum when real history is happening around you. It's happened for millennia and I can't see it changing.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:12 - Jun 7 with 7299 viewsWeWereZombies

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:01 - Jun 7 by JakeITFC

Drawing the line is indeed difficult - I think discussions around Churchill will likely become more troublesome over the next few years for example, however I think the line has to be above having statues of people who directly benefited from the slave trade (if society is genuinely interested in progressing on race matters).


On Churchill - it is worth remembering that Mandela studied how Churchill had so much influence over the British public at times during the Second World War so that he could apply similar techniques to give opponents of apartheid sufficient resolve. This might seem ironic given Churchill's interpretation of The Atlantic Convention (basically rights for whites) but it is important to separate out strategic effectiveness from outdated attitudes.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:13 - Jun 7 with 7295 viewsgordon

'History' isn't erased or eradicated because a statue comes down.

It's important that we remember Hitler, for example, but that wouldn't be considered a sound argument for having a statue of Hitler in the centre of Bristol.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:15 - Jun 7 with 7276 viewsWeWereZombies

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:13 - Jun 7 by gordon

'History' isn't erased or eradicated because a statue comes down.

It's important that we remember Hitler, for example, but that wouldn't be considered a sound argument for having a statue of Hitler in the centre of Bristol.


Yeah, I mean, they don't even have one in Berlin...

[edit] I think it might be time for me to go on my afternoon bike ride.
[Post edited 7 Jun 2020 16:19]

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:20 - Jun 7 with 7237 viewsEastTownBlue

The statue is now in the harbour.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:21 - Jun 7 with 7234 viewsgordon

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:20 - Jun 7 by EastTownBlue

The statue is now in the harbour.


That seems a better place for it.
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:24 - Jun 7 with 7204 viewsTRUE_BLUE123

This country has a huge problem in the way we honour political heroes.Statues when it comes to politics are not smart. The Churchill statues have been vandalised many times, for everyone who loves Churchill there are people who view him as a huge racist who believed in white supremacy. Edward Colston did a lot of good in his life, he also did an awful lot of bad. Is a statue a smart way of honouring him?? Not for me. Im not surprised its been ripped down and I would be surprised if its not been vandalised in the past

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:28 - Jun 7 with 7180 viewsElephantintheRoom

Where do you draw the line? Bristol and Liverpool grew on the slave trade. The fishing industry grey on the slave trade... so do we stop eating cod, just because off-cuts were sent to the west indies to support the slave trade decades after we parsimoniously banned slavery whilst still profiting from it?

Some of my my best musical memories were going to the Colston Hall in Bristol when a student there - not sure renaming it makes much of a difference.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:34 - Jun 7 with 7140 viewsMullet

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:53 - Jun 7 by StokieBlue

I understand why they did this and I don't blame them.

However erasing these things won't highlight what has happened in the past, if anything it's removing a reminder of what happened in the past and why it shouldn't happen again. Leaving the statue in place but having a placard there explaining to everyone who sees it what he did and the lives it destroyed is a more powerful message than removing the statue in my opinion.

SB


There's also the imagery of mostly white people doing this in the name of black people which the right wing will have a field day with. My assumption is that the statue is pretty old, but I can't remember it very well from the last time I saw it.

It's not like the Civil wars discussed the other day stateside. However, the same rhetoric and venom will be around this too.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:36 - Jun 7 with 7128 viewsMullet

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 15:56 - Jun 7 by JakeITFC

Replace it with a memorial to the tens of thousands of lives he destroyed to make his money.


That's why I mentioned Liverpool as that seems to have the right balance and tone in such cases. I would have thought the aftermath of this would be the perfect climate to build such a place in Bristol which examines Colston and his peers.

I'm not sure you couldn't have both and use them to strengthen understanding could you?

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:37 - Jun 7 with 7127 viewsfooters

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:28 - Jun 7 by ElephantintheRoom

Where do you draw the line? Bristol and Liverpool grew on the slave trade. The fishing industry grey on the slave trade... so do we stop eating cod, just because off-cuts were sent to the west indies to support the slave trade decades after we parsimoniously banned slavery whilst still profiting from it?

Some of my my best musical memories were going to the Colston Hall in Bristol when a student there - not sure renaming it makes much of a difference.


That's a very stupid argument, but you knew that already. It's sophisticated trolling but not sure it's worth the considerable time you spend on it.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:43 - Jun 7 with 7075 viewsBanksterDebtSlave

Criminal....weigh it in don't throw it in the river.

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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:44 - Jun 7 with 7061 viewsgordon

This quote from a historian on twitter puts it much more elegantly:

"A statue or monument is not "history". Its construction, retention, reverence, preservation, defence, relocation, removal, destruction, detonation (or unceremonious dump into a river) *is*."
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Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:44 - Jun 7 with 7058 viewsJakeITFC

Colston statue pulled down by protestors in Bristol on 16:36 - Jun 7 by Mullet

That's why I mentioned Liverpool as that seems to have the right balance and tone in such cases. I would have thought the aftermath of this would be the perfect climate to build such a place in Bristol which examines Colston and his peers.

I'm not sure you couldn't have both and use them to strengthen understanding could you?


I’m afraid it’s fairly black and white for me - you can’t celebrate (and I think having a statue in a prominent part of the city is celebration) people who directly benefited from the slave trade. It is literally devaluing the lives of the people who suffered and died.

There is no balance to be had with the good things he did.
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