Nèdeem Elmahjoub's blog

Do statues serve history? The English historian Simon Schama is not a leftist. Here is what he has to say in a non-leftist paper: "Statues are not history; rather, its opposite. History is argument; statues brook none. The whole honour of history lies in its contrarian irrepressibility; its brief to puncture the pieties of power, should they belie the truth. Those horrified by the de-pedestalisations of recent days — the Black Lives Matter protests have led to the felling of statues from the slave trader Edward Colston in Bristol to the brutal colonialist  Leopold II  in Belgian cities — claim that such acts “erase” history. But the contrary is true. It is more usually statues, lording it over civic space, which shut off debate through their invitation to reverence." History is better served by putting Men in Stone in museums Related Churchill's statue may have to be put in a museum . I hope so!

Symbols of crime and empire "The statue of 17th century slave trader Edward Colston , which was pulled down by anti-racism protestors in Bristol earlier, has been dumped in the River Avon. It had been situated in the city’s centre since 1895, and was subject to an 11,000-strong petition to have it removed." (Source: the Guardian online) There are many similar statues in Britain. Most Brits do not care about their existence. They have accepted Winston Churchill on a five-pound note, a statue of Henry Havelock in Traflagr Square and another of General Charles Gordon also in London. In a poll in the local newspaper, the  Bristol Post , in 2014 56 per cent of the 1,100 respondents said it [Colston's statue] should stay while 44 per cent wanted it to go. A comment by nwhithfield on the Guardian : Many cities in Europe have squares, roads, tunnels and so on named after figures from the 20th century, often done post war - Roosevelt, Kennedy, Eisenhower, and even John