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Edward Colston: Bristol slave trader statue 'was an affront'

So where do you draw the line? OK to damage business premises? OK to damage people's property because you don't agree with what they do?

You and KS just don't get how I feel about this at all. Let me explain in simple terms - this is leading to a world where it's going from just being a highly unsettling place I no longer feel I can belong to one where I am going to be genuinely scared.

I certainly don’t agree with violence or looting at all, and I have said as much many times, but I do fully support civil rights protests and I feel the vandalising or destruction of *this particular statue* was entirely justified given the failure of the council to address the issue for decades.

As to your second paragraph just imagine being a member of a discriminated-against minority facing a council who’s response to complaints about a statue glorifying the murder and oppression of your race and ancestors was met by some racist Tory shithead councillor parading a gollywog to belittle and diminish you further. That is what this is about.

If you want to know what real terror is just look at the threats and vile racism the likes of Diane Abbott, Dawn Butler and countless other black folk in the public eye receive day in, day out. Every day the same shit. A relentless stream of hatred, death threats, rape threats, racial caricaturing and fascist sentiment. This protest was just a tiny little kick-back against that. One I’d like to think anyone with a functioning moral compass can support.
 
Well you are coming across like that frankly so maybe try to explain yourself better.

What you clearly chose to ignore in my first post on this was where I said (ans apologies for quoting myself):

"The idea that direct action of any kind is legitimate in certain circumstances opens the door for any group with any agenda to feel OK to go ahead and break this or burn that or some other such wheeze and that leads us to a world in which I feel even less safe in as a person with one or more characteristic that is going to put me in some group or other's firing line: white, middle class, fairly affluent, middle-aged, wishy-washy liberal centrist (and not a fan of Naim :)) just wanting to get to the end of his life as well as he can and to keep his partner safe."

Just to make it clear. I am scared of becoming the target of direct action from any group of people who decide to have an issue with something they think I represent or am part of a group of.

It doesn't mean I want the upper hand and keep pesky BAME, LGBT+ or wokring class people in their place. Far from it. I just don't relish being stuck in the middle of a war because a couple of groups of opposing views think it's a legitimate way to deal with it.

Does that make it clear?
 
I certainly don’t agree with violence or looting at all, and I have said as much many times, but I do fully support civil rights protests and I feel the vandalising or destruction of *this particular statue* was entirely justified given the failure of the council to address the issue for decades.

As to your second paragraph just imagine being a member of a discriminated-against minority facing a council who’s response to complaints about a statue glorifying the murder and oppression of your race and ancestors was met by some racist Tory shithead councillor parading a gollywog to belittle and diminish you further. That is what this is about.

If you want to know what real terror is just look at the threats and vile racism the likes of Diane Abbott, Dawn Butler and countless other black folk in the public eye receive day in, day out. Every day the same shit. A relentless stream of hatred, death threats, rape threats, racial caricaturing and fascist sentiment. This protest was just a tiny little kick-back against that. One I’d like to think anyone with a functioning moral compass can support.

Oh. So I can't be worried fearful as well?
 
What you clearly chose to ignore in my first post on this was where I said (ans apologies for quoting myself):

"The idea that direct action of any kind is legitimate in certain circumstances opens the door for any group with any agenda to feel OK to go ahead and break this or burn that or some other such wheeze and that leads us to a world in which I feel even less safe in as a person with one or more characteristic that is going to put me in some group or other's firing line: white, middle class, fairly affluent, middle-aged, wishy-washy liberal centrist (and not a fan of Naim :)) just wanting to get to the end of his life as well as he can and to keep his partner safe."

Just to make it clear. I am scared of becoming the target of direct action from any group of people who decide to have an issue with something they think I represent or am part of a group of.

It doesn't mean I want the upper hand and keep pesky BAME, LGBT+ or wokring class people in their place. Far from it. I just don't relish being stuck in the middle of a war because a couple of groups of opposing views think it's a legitimate way to deal with it.

Does that make it clear?

Why would you feel threatened, why would people threaten you or your family or whatever it is that you think that they think you represent ?

People aren't suddenly going to turn up at your door and assault you cause you're white or whatever.

Sorry I just don't get this.
 
Now they are starting on the Cecil Rhodes statue at Oxford , a few days ago I expect most of the people there did not know who he was !
Statues have nothing to do with Black life matters , it id about social change not pieces of stone and metal
 
Why would you feel threatened, why would people threaten you or your family or whatever it is that you think that they think you represent ?

People aren't suddenly going to turn up at your door and assault you cause you're white or whatever.

Sorry I just don't get this.
I do. They came for the statues of a racist slave trader, and I did nothing because I wasn’t a racist slave trader. Then they came for the Union Flag and I did nothing, because I wasn’t a nationalist...

etc.
 
Oh. So I can't be worried fearful as well?

Of course, this society is hopelessly damaged, the UK is a remarkably ugly and ignorant place. The people that scare me are the white fascists like Britain First, UKIP, EDL etc. These are the people who may end up throwing rocks through my window, and have certainly done so in the area where I live in previously. I would far prefer to deal with these people now, not let them grow even stronger. We should let the civil rights protests flush them out. Turning a blind-eye to fascism is never a good long-term option.
 
"So for those of you who are comfortable with direct action because you're on 'their' side, good for you. But, be under no illusion, one day, you won't be on the side of the majority and then you'll perhaps see why the events over the weekend trouble us / me"

Must be me then cause that definitely reads pretty dodgy.
It's not at all dodgy.

My interpretation of what he's saying is, if you support people taking things into their own hands on a particular issue because you happen to agree with that particular issue, what about people taking things into their own hands for issues you don't happen to agree with.
 
It's not at all dodgy.

My interpretation of what he's saying is, if you support people taking things into their own hands on a particular issue because you happen to agree with that particular issue, what about people taking things into their own hands for issues you don't happen to agree with.

So because black people are being a bit 'uppity' right now he thinks that they will eventually come for him and his family which is complete nonsense.

He doesn't need to worry too much cause Johnston is already threatening to do a trump.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/boris-johnsons-warning-anyone-thinking-22163609
 
That was my question :) Apologies if I didn't articulate it too well, I'd expanded the group of bad people beyond just slave traders.

However, if we consider slave trading alone, how far removed from the actual deed do we need to stop being bad by association? It's more of a 'philosophical' question than any challenge to your point.

Yes, I agree. Questions about Churchill are irrelevant. Questions about Churchill, or Ghandi, or you and me for that matter are relevant to varying degrees, but it’s not useful to supporting the actions of a group of people protesting against something that was supposed to have been dealt with generations ago.
 
Churchill was an affront. He was a racist who wanted to use poisoned gas on the natives in India. The only négative I ever learn at school was that he was a disastrous money man. Shouldn't we be cutting him down to size, too?
 
So where do you draw the line? OK to damage business premises? OK to damage people's property because you don't agree with what they do?

You and KS just don't get how I feel about this at all. Let me explain in simple terms - this is leading to a world where it's going from just being a highly unsettling place I no longer feel I can belong to one where I am going to be genuinely scared.
Like I say, I do sympathise for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I don't like rowdy behaviour and disorder; it frightens me and there's always the concern that it might turn into something more physical (I'm quite a coward when it comes to physical threats). Secondly, my partner suffers from anxiety which, at its worst, can be quite "contagious", to the extent that even I, a supremely laid-back being, experience some of it myself.

But the toppling of the statue doesn't trigger any of those feelings in me and I doubt I'd have felt threatened if I'd been there at the time. Something as familiar as walking through town as the pubs are closing always feels far more risky to me - all those drunk, unpredictable people give me the heebie-jeebies.

The other point I would make is that we already live in dangerous times (even more so if you happen to be Muslim, say). The far-right is on the rise and isn't just going to go away, especially if we continue to elect politicians who create the conditions where resentment can thrive and be exploited. There is no easy answer to this.

As for where I draw the line, I don't know but I'm certain it's not here. At one point, I was tempted to simply post, "Frankly, I don't give a damn", but opted for something more constructive in the end.
 
jumping back into the thread I'd like to add that in any one 'protest', I'd estimate that 25% of the protesters are intelligent, well educated people who have a real insight into the background of, and therefore the reason for, that protest. Of the rest, 1/4 are virtue signalling, 1/4 have no idea what's really going on, but join in anyway, and the remainder are thugs of whatever political affiliation licenses them to go kick a few heads in this particular instance. They are probably better organised that the original protesters.
 
Churchill was an affront. He was a racist who wanted to use poisoned gas on the natives in India. The only négative I ever learn at school was that he was a disastrous money man. Shouldn't we be cutting him down to size, too?

Not ‘cutting down’, just not glorifying or whitewashing. The truth is far more interesting than some distorted victors revisionism. Churchill and the rest of them should stand on their legacy. All of it. The last thing I’d want to see is any of them brushed from history, people need to know and understand the full picture. The beauty of Colston’s toppling is now more people know who he was and what he did than they’d ever have got from the distorted revisionist plaque in front of his statue. It took a while, but the truth eventually arrived.
 
So because black people are being a bit 'uppity' right now he thinks that they will eventually come for him and his family which is complete nonsense.

He doesn't need to worry too much cause Johnston is already threatening to do a trump.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/politics/boris-johnsons-warning-anyone-thinking-22163609
If that's how you want to interpret what he said that's upto you but I don't get that from he said. I'm not interested in arguing about it. I think he's a decent bloke and I'm not about to start reading between the lines for certain meanings in what he posted. I interpreted it in the way I said, and that's it for me.
 
Francis Drake

He began his career as a slave trader.

Drake went to sea as a young man, but his first major expeditions came in the 1560s, when he joined a cousin named John Hawkins on some of Britain’s earliest slave trading voyages to West Africa. The pair usually procured their human cargo by attacking native villages or attacking Portuguese slave ships. They would then transport the slaves to the Spanish Caribbean and sell them off to local plantations—an action that was illegal under Spanish law. During one of these slaving expeditions in 1568, a flotilla of Spanish ships ambushed Drake and Hawkins at the Mexican port of San Juan de Ulúa, destroying four of their vessels and killing or capturing many of their crew. Drake escaped unharmed, but the defeat left him with a seething hatred for Spain and its king, Philip II.

https://www.history.com/news/10-things-you-may-not-know-about-francis-drake
 
Now they are starting on the Cecil Rhodes statue at Oxford , a few days ago I expect most of the people there did not know who he was !
Statues have nothing to do with Black life matters , it id about social change not pieces of stone and metal

Good ol'Cecil has been talk of the town for a while now...

This article is more than 4 years old
Cecil Rhodes statue row: Chris Patten tells students to embrace freedom of thought
Oxford University chancellor tells students Nelson Mandela endorsed the Rhodes scholarships

https://www.theguardian.com/educati...-tells-students-to-embrace-freedom-of-thought



Remember that you are an Englishman, and have consequently won first prize in the lottery of life. Cecil Rhodes
 


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