HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Follyfoot Posted June 8, 2020 VT Supporter Share Posted June 8, 2020 Never get any political slant from the good old Guardian, eh Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 11 minutes ago, Follyfoot said: Never get any political slant from the good old Guardian, eh Care to engage with the actual content of the article? 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 (edited) There is no middle ground and you're either with us, or against us. Protesting for equality is great and I'm all for it. Ripping down statues and vandalising stuff for things people did back in yesteryear in a time when the world was in a completely different place is something I can't get my head around. It's all so "definitive". Who's to say we're in the right now? I'm not comfortable with deleting history, but then again, I'm a keen archaeologist. And I also say that as someone who'd pull down a church to save 5 minutes travel time Statues are a weird thing. There's little doubt any statue of any person could have evidence which goes against cultural grain, because people are flawed. We're bought up into situations and cultures which enforce opinion. Churchill was born in Blenheim Palace - have you seen that place? It's kin' huge and it doesn't surprise me anyone bought up there may have a slight superiority issue. He fought in India, which probably gave him some opinions of Indians which in later life he said stupid things about. The elite have statues of themselves made, people in the elite have no doubt exploited others to get to that position, like Bezos etc now-a-days - why is this a surprise to anyone? We're also sitting here and discussing these issues as people at different ages, with different experiences and educations. But at least we're not the ones at the foot of a statue with a hacksaw. It's impulsive behaviour, even if people have obviously taken issue with the statue. Something just doesn't sit right with me, but I understand why these things are happening - I think. Edited June 8, 2020 by lapal_fan 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Demitri_C Posted June 8, 2020 Author Share Posted June 8, 2020 1 hour ago, HanoiVillan said: The reason I'm asking the question is because there is a difference between a 'protest' and a 'riot'. To call something a 'protest' is not to say that nothing got damaged, but that damage was either small-scale and trivial or targeted for political reasons. A 'riot', by contrast, is when violence stops being targeted and becomes indiscriminate. The post I was responding to asserted that 'they were vandalising everything!', ie that it was a riot, which assertion was withdrawn as soon as I asked about it. I know it wasn't a riot, not only from TV but from hearing from people who were there, and from reading accounts such as the one @mjmooney posted above. Whether its a small scale or large if your destroying peoples businesses by vandalising it that does not make you a protester it makes you a idiot. I dont think he even mentioned the word riot you did. Completely different. Again i stress i dont want to blame a majority as alot of people were there on a peaceful protest. A minority of a few fools but ive spoken with friends that work around there and there is definitely some things foen that had nothing to do with what the protest stands for 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post mjmooney Posted June 8, 2020 VT Supporter Popular Post Share Posted June 8, 2020 1 hour ago, Vive_La_Villa said: Just seen Farage’s tweet of someone setting fire to the Union Jack. People going to these protests really need to stop this kind of behaviour. It’s perfect ammunition for the likes of Farage to incite more hatred. It's just a piece of cloth. The sooner people get over nonsense like flags and national anthems the better, IMO. 9 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 6 minutes ago, mjmooney said: It's just a piece of cloth. The sooner people get over nonsense like flags and national anthems the better, IMO. Yep - absolutely. The sooner boarders are abolished and free movement of anyone and everyone is allowed (LOL THANKS BREXIT), the better. Just because we won the birth lottery and got borneded in a decent country shouldn't go against those bought up in very shit situations - let them travel and give them opportunities to grow and develop - just don't do it next door to me though because their food **** stinks and their language sounds scary innit? 1 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 (edited) 28 minutes ago, lapal_fan said: Ripping down statues and vandalising stuff for things people did back in yesteryear in a time when the world was in a completely different place is something I can't get my head around. It's all so "definitive". Who's to say we're in the right now? I'm pretty comfortable with the moral judgement that we're in the right now, when it comes to 'not celebrating slave-owners'. I don't really think there's much of a debate to be had about the topic, and I would be surprised if you didn't have 'definitive' moral conclusions on whether slavery was right or not. Edited June 8, 2020 by HanoiVillan 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 23 minutes ago, Demitri_C said: I dont think he even mentioned the word riot you did. Completely different. That's my point Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tom_avfc Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 1 minute ago, HanoiVillan said: I'm pretty comfortable with the moral judgement that we're in the right now, when it comes to 'not celebrating slave-owners'. I don't really think there's much of a debate to be had about the topic, and I would be surprised if you didn't have 'definitive' moral conclusions on whether slavery was right or not. Yeah I think I'd take this view too. I can understand the debates around the vandalism of the Churchill statue and the comments regarding times being different then. It doesn't mean that Churchill wasn't a racist but a statue to commemorate a wartime leader is at least understandable. The statue in Bristol on the other hand is something which just shouldn't have been there in the first place and certainly should have been removed a long time before now. I just don't understand why anybody would want to commemorate a man who transported 80,000 slaves with roughly a quarter of those dying during this transportation. It's ludicrous that there was a statue there at any time in my opinion and I can see why it being there now would be a source of anger for anybody. I'd also add that I was completely unaware of the fact that there was a statue to Edward Colston in Bristol and therefore the act of tearing down the statue has educated me (and I'd imagine many others) on this and achieved the aim that I'd imagine it set out to. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 10 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: I'm pretty comfortable with the moral judgement that we're in the right now, when it comes to 'not celebrating slave-owners'. I don't really think there's much of a debate to be had about the topic, and I would be surprised if you didn't have 'definitive' moral conclusions on whether slavery was right or not. Yea that's obviously not what I was saying and that you've suggested I did kinda irks me, so I'm out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 (edited) 16 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: I'm pretty comfortable with the moral judgement that we're in the right now, when it comes to 'not celebrating slave-owners'. I don't really think there's much of a debate to be had about the topic, and I would be surprised if you didn't have 'definitive' moral conclusions on whether slavery was right or not. Shall we pull down the pyramids , the Colosseum , burn The Quran , destroy the works of Plato , as part of this not celebrating slave-owners , or do we just say its only slave owners from a certain era ? where does the moral judgement start / end ? Edited June 8, 2020 by tonyh29 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted June 8, 2020 Moderator Share Posted June 8, 2020 26 minutes ago, HanoiVillan said: I'm pretty comfortable with the moral judgement that we're in the right now, when it comes to 'not celebrating slave-owners'. I read a thing about the bloke the statue was of. It said he wasn't a slave owner, and that the statue was put up for his philanthropic deeds. That said, he was implicated, if that's the right word, in the slave trade. Not directly involved but some sort of owner of a company that was clearly involved in slave trading and horrible abuses of people. In this particular instance, in this time with the current context, I think pulling down the statue was "right". Yes, it's against the law, but the wider context of "what the heck is a statue of a slave trade bod doing out in the open in this day and age?" and that people are correctly completely indignant at the treatment of Black and minority people, and that if no one does anything to express their non-acceptance of the inequality, nothing will change, then, yeah, rip that one down and push it in the water. It feels like, just maybe, something will change for the better because of the scale of the protests and the visibility of them to those indifferent to and unaware of the injustice. I guess a large part of middle England (or wherever else) just think "no I'm not a racist, I don't see racism, I just want my life to stay the same, I don't approve of disorder", but maybe people are seeing a bit more that things aren't right, that there is a genuine unfairness and people are being victimised, either due to individual acts fo discrimination, or due to the system working differently for different races. So pushing over a slave man statue means people maybe get to see the extent and scale of slave trading and how horrible it was, and wonder "what the heck was that statue doing there in the first place in 2020?" 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tom_avfc Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 3 minutes ago, tonyh29 said: Shall we pull down the pyramids , the Colosseum , burn The Quran , destroy the works of Plato , as part of this not celebrating slave-owners , or do we just say its only slave owners from a certain era ? where does the moral judgement start / end ? Are you actually suggesting that there's some sort of historical relevance to a statue of Edward Colston being in Bristol? What purpose does it serve to have a statue of him there? Is there anything we can learn from a statue of him there? I mean I kind of get the point as to where it stops but surely this is pushing it a bit. As a side note I don't really think we should be pulling down any statues but in this case I don't think the statue should have been there in the first place and given that they have seemingly been petitioned to remove it for a number of years with no effect I can understand the reasons for doing so. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted June 8, 2020 Moderator Share Posted June 8, 2020 (edited) 3 hours ago, tonyh29 said: where does the moral judgement start / end ? Good question. There's no one size fits all, easy answer, or formula for deciding. And different people will have different views. The Pyramids is a distraction, as they weren't built by slaves, nor do they celebrate slave trade people. The coliseum and other stuff in Rome 1500 years ago - that's so far back that it's (for me) kind of out of scope also it doesn't "celebrate" slavery, it's a monument in effect, a record of Ancient Rome for people to see. The books - as a historic record of writings from yonks ago, they're there to read if people want to, but they're not plonked out in full public view. Freedom of thought is fine. The statue should have been moved to a museum or elsewhere and marked with something to explain, to visitors, who it was of, why it was made and his background, good and bad. Edited June 8, 2020 by blandy typos 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted June 8, 2020 Moderator Share Posted June 8, 2020 1 minute ago, tom_avfc said: Are you actually suggesting that there's some sort of historical relevance to a statue of Edward Colston being in Bristol? He was from Bristol, and spent a fortune on good deeds in Bristol. But he was also a slave bod, before apparently undergoing a Damascene conversion that slavery was bad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 11 minutes ago, tonyh29 said: Shall we pull down the pyramids , the Colosseum , burn The Quran , destroy the works of Plato , as part of this not celebrating slave-owners , or do we just say its only slave owners from a certain era ? where does the moral judgement start / end ? Since I'm neither Greek nor Egyptian nor a Muslim, I don't think I get to decide, either morally or practically, what other people do with their cultural totems. That being said, I don't think books and statues are particularly similar. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 Well, whatever the side of the fence you're on (and seemingly I fit into the slave-driver sympathiser category ) history has once again, been made. I wonder if in 300 years, Prince Charles will lift it out the water like the Mary Rose? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lapal_fan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 1 minute ago, HanoiVillan said: Since I'm neither Greek nor Egyptian nor a Muslim, I don't think I get to decide, either morally or practically, what other people do with their cultural totems. That being said, I don't think books and statues are particularly similar. You ain't from Bristol either, are you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HanoiVillan Posted June 8, 2020 Share Posted June 8, 2020 Just now, lapal_fan said: You ain't from Bristol either, are you? I'm from England, which is good enough for me. 1 minute ago, lapal_fan said: Well, whatever the side of the fence you're on (and seemingly I fit into the slave-driver sympathiser category ) history has once again, been made. I wonder if in 300 years, Prince Charles will lift it out the water like the Mary Rose? Just to be completely clear, I quite specifically did not suggest that you were a 'slave-driver sympathiser' or any such thing. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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