Statues should be left alone

[Rubyroost]

Ffs why target statues of Oliver Cromwell, Peel etc. They are history and should be left. Sorry, I know this is probably controversial. When will the book burning start?

I noticed that Colston Hall has announced that they are going to name change

But racial discrimination today has nothing to do with slavery. Sorry, it just doesn't and it has nothing to do with statues. I'm not really against what happened in Bristol, just leave the other statues alone.

And there's loads of statues of Stalin in Russia, even some fairly modern or recent ones

@Rubyroost

I don't think Jimmy Saville is a good comparison to the likes of Peel and Cromwell. You off to Russia to take down staturs of Lenin

we're not allowed to travel at the moment

so - a slave trader is a better human than Jimmy Saville? and we should keep their statue?

But racial discrimination today has nothing to do with slavery.

Rubbish.

I’m on my phone so I can’t send through some reading on the matter but I’ll try and come back later today to explain why this is utter rubbish.

I think i can see a difference between statues of people who just paid for things through 'philanthropy' or had streets and building named in their honour and those who did significant things that shaped history and ended up with statues. I also get the 'celebratory' idea and i dont want to celebrate bad people and statues do seem to be about honoring people - so maybe they are better in museums. I think some significant historical people like nelson, cromwell, churchill might just need a lot more context to their statues. Like a proper inscription and perhaps new sculptures that interplay with the original somehow.

Just leave the bloody statues and concentrate on something important.

Would you accept the statue of a drug dealer or murderer who gave back to the community? What about the statue of someone English who helped torture English POWs in concentration camps in the Far East? Im not sure that you can erase the bad that you've done just because the proceeds of your crime achieved something good?

Jimmy Saville did not shape our history or democracy.

Anything that commemorates slavery or slave traders should be destroyed

But who is the arbiter of what can stay or go?

If a different group decides that, I don't know, they fundamentally disagree with Nelson, are they allowed to tear down Nelson's Column?

I'm not disagreeing with you particularly I just don't think we should be allowing mobs to tear down whatever they disagree with.

Has the world gone stark staring fucking bonkers? We are in the middle of a pandemic, we do NOT need this shit. I have to stop watching the news, its too much, I really do despair.

Why should I, as an Irish person, have to walk past a statue of Cromwell every day? Do I think it should be melted down and destroyed? No. Do I think it should be put in a museum or moved further into Parliament grounds so Irish people don’t have to walk past a celebration of someone who inflicted genocide on their country? Yes.

The Jimmy Saville comparison is apt. There was a statue of him in Glasgow, that was put there to celebrate his charity work. When it came out that he was a mega-paedo and a necrophile it was taken down. Why? Because it was no longer appropriate.

It’s not appropriate to have statues of major slave traffickers or genocidal maniacs in city centres. Fair play to Bristol for getting the ball rolling.

Well said, Pengur!

I read that the Cecil Rhodes statue at Oxford uni is also a statue that campaigners tried to get removed. Must be pretty galling to wan by that one.

Ok, but are there any statues that we can actually keep then? Surely the vast majority are statues of racists, misogynists, homophobes, transphobes, etc. etc. People seem to forget how recent the emergence of mainstream tolerance and generally acceptable behaviour is.

I would like to see some public spending on replacement statues that reflect women, different etnicities, working classes, slaves and so on.

I think that if anyone wants a statue or monument removed then they should campaign, lobby etc.

Are we really ok with people just taking it into their own hands?

'Racial discrimination today had nothing to do with slavery '

Are people blinkered?

Ah cheers. 😚
I just don’t understand the upset. If you move truly controversial statues you now have somewhere for statues of sound people to be put. In Ireland we got rid of loads of statues; a Cromwell one was buried and never dug up again (as far as I know), Nelson’s pillar was blown up in the middle of the night and Queen Victoria was moved to Australia. They got replaced with more appropriate statues.

You can see the British influence in some street names still; Henry Street etc. But as more celebrated people come through, those names will also probably be replaced as well. I’d love to see a city centre street named after Michael D Higgins for instance; maybe we could call it Miggledy Street haha!

Why should I, as an Irish person, have to walk past a statue of Cromwell every day?
Because you're in England and the statue is outside the parliament Cromwell created. I know what he did in Ireland. I'm half Irish but I wouldn't go to Ireland and try to tell Irish people who they should commemorate.

There is a new campaign: www.toppletheracists.org/

Bristol had been trying to get that statue removed “the right way” for years, but they weren’t listened to. Hopefully now people will listen and things can be done in the “right” way in future.

Wow @corlan, maybe I should just fuck off home, eh?

Ireland and Britain and their people are a bit more connected than that simple view @corlan. ...

Oh fuck off op

Absolutely Pangur2. OP I've never seen any of these statues, so how exactly are they educating the masses? If they're valued historically then put them in a museum. A statue is meant to be a mark of respect and celebration, these men are no longer celebrated or respected.

So there's a statue of Millicent Fawcett, a suffragette, in London. She campaigned against Irish home rule - should that be pulled down too?

So true @redbigbananafeet, pulling the statue down educated way more people than leaving it by the side of the road ever could. It’s so good that a dialogue has started about this kind of thing.

I’d love to see it in a museum, on its side, covered in paint, with information on who he was etc, his importance to the city but also why the sculpture was pulled down. What a striking image that would be. (Bits of Nelson’s Column are in a museum in Ireland for instance, with a discussion of why it was there and how and why it was destroyed. Very educational. )