Split Thread Tearing Down Statues Associated With Racial Injustice

Gilbert Syndrome said:
It's an example. The question I am asking being: should we now begin to revise all of the other people that we celebrate?

People who were sometimes ****** is a funny way of discussing a person who routinely beat up his wives and didn't give a toss about his children, but okay...

It's just funny, because part of the question being asked here was regarding how we separate the good some people do from the bad they did. As far as people like Colston are concerned, his contributions were seen to pale in comparison to his wrongdoings.

I guess successfully navigating the rope-a-dope game plan and speaking out against Vietnam were enough to diminish Ali's complete disregard for females.

Morrissey makes crap music, and he's a racist, but I guess his contribution to whiney music and his outspoken veganism is enough to give him a pass as well, lol.
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I think Ali is a good example. We admire him primarily for his athleticism. When we put up a statue of him, we aren't saying "this is a perfect person". We are saying, "That one thing you know about this guy makes him a very special person." We are ignoring that there may be other things about him that make him....not so special.

If we only celebrated perfect people, we could save a lot on bronze, because we wouldn't need any statues.
 
I don’t know of a call to topple a statute because the honoree was sometimes an *******. The vast majority of calls I’m aware of have been for a massive “body of evil work.” For the most part not even for owning slaves, but for running slave ships and markets. Or committing treason and fighting for the right to keep slaves.

To honor someone or not must reflect the balance of the good and bad they did in life. To quote Solzhenitsynm

“The line separating good and evil passes...right through every human heart…even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains…an uprooted small corner of evil.“

But to balance out selling other human beings as slaves requires quite an extraordinary pile of “good” on the other pan of the balance. I have yet to see that documented for the statutes in the news.
 
As I posted upthread I often try see things from other people’s perspective. As a Jewish person I imagine going downtown every day and seeing a statute dedicated to Goebbels because enough Nazi apologists were able to raise the money and push it through a city council meeting 30 years ago. I then understand what it must be like to be black and see a statute to a slaver. Or a Confederate General. Such statutes can only honor such people by ignoring the magnitude of the evil they committed and devaluing the evil of slavery itself. “Sure he was a slaver but he made a great contribution to this hospital,” fails to adequately weight the depth of evil of the former. Would most people see that balance as coming out in favor of a statute if the honoree bought and sold our own great grandparents?

The very presence of such a statue is a slap in the face of every black person who sees it. The repeated refusal of the majority to respond to calls to remove these statutes is a worse insult. It not only demonstrates that black suffering doesn’t matter very much to the majority society, but also makes it clear that blacks remain politically powerless to do anything about it.
 
Meadmaker said:
I think Ali is a good example. We admire him primarily for his athleticism. When we put up a statue of him, we aren't saying "this is a perfect person". We are saying, "That one thing you know about this guy makes him a very special person." We are ignoring that there may be other things about him that make him....not so special.

If we only celebrated perfect people, we could save a lot on bronze, because we wouldn't need any statues.
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Exactly, it's a prime example of a person who is notable for his admirable quest for change, while at the same time being a complex character who was actually not that great behind closed doors, especially with his family and his wives. Not to mention his many dubious ties with questionable people.

All I've ever asked is whether or not this revision should include other people we celebrate without considering all of their flaws along with their contributions.

People saying things like you can't compare beating up women to slavery are missing the point. Abuse isn't acceptable in any form, yet we routinely pick and choose the icons that we want to celebrate based on a seemingly flawed system.

(For the record, people, I'm not calling for Ali's statue to be taken down, lol)
 
Giordano said:
I don’t know of a call to topple a statute because the honoree was sometimes an *******. The vast majority of calls I’m aware of have been for a massive “body of evil work.” For the most part not even for owning slaves, but for running slave ships and markets. Or committing treason and fighting for the right to keep slaves.

To honor someone or not must reflect the balance of the good and bad they did in life. To quote Solzhenitsynm

“The line separating good and evil passes...right through every human heart…even within hearts overwhelmed by evil, one small bridgehead of good is retained. And even in the best of all hearts, there remains…an uprooted small corner of evil.“

But to balance out selling other human beings as slaves requires quite an extraordinary pile of “good” on the other pan of the balance. I have yet to see that documented for the statutes in the news.
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It just seems to me like people are measuring how good or bad a person was, and whether they should be celebrated, based on a really odd set of rules,

Here, we've got a Kitty Wilkinson statue, and that's one monument you'd find it difficult to find a reason to not have erected, because she was rightly regarded as the Saint of the Slums, and her contributions, IMO, surpass those of many people in statue-form, including Ali.
 
Gilbert Syndrome said:
Considering the general public never paid for the Colston statue, what's your point, and why do you keep completely avoiding my request for you to explain the difference between the two cases in detail?
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Did the government pay for the upkeep of the Colston statue? Was the Colston statue on public lands, under the control of the government?

This is not avoiding your request to explain the differences, this is trying to explain the clear and obvious differences to someone who is refusing to see them.
 
wareyin said:
Did the government pay for the upkeep of the Colston statue? Was the Colston statue on public lands, under the control of the government?

This is not avoiding your request to explain the differences, this is trying to explain the clear and obvious differences to someone who is refusing to see them.
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You tell me, then, who paid for the upkeep of his statue, how much was paid by your average citizen of Bristol? If I am paying for all of the statues in my city, it can't be a lot, or I'd be skint, mate.
 
Gilbert Syndrome said:
It just seems to me like people are measuring how good or bad a person was, and whether they should be celebrated, based on a really odd set of rules,
Here, we've got a Kitty Wilkinson statue, and that's one monument you'd find it difficult to find a reason to not have erected, because she was rightly regarded as the Saint of the Slums, and her contributions, IMO, surpass those of many people in statue-form, including Ali.
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I already brought this up in this thread. Most town square type statues seldom would make the top 100 in the list of the great and wonderful. They are often the product of some small group with money and power pursuing some personal agenda. So I fail to get excited when a statue erected for such insipid reasons is pulled down because it is also offensive.

But you responded to my description of the evil of slavery being the 1000 ton weight when balancing an honoree’s good and bad. Are you seeing this as an “odd value?”
 
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Giordano said:
I already brought this up in this thread. Most town square type statues seldom would make the top 100 in the list of the great and wonderful. They are often the product of some small group with money and power pursuing some personal agenda. So I fail to get excited when a statue erected for such insipid reasons is pulled down because it is also offensive.
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Same with me, really. Colston's statue being pulled down doesn't mean much to me, it just makes me wonder how far we can go, or are willing to go, if we're actually now deciding that it's time to change how we look at our history and who we deem fit to celebrate.

Monuments to political figures are always going to be divisive, really.
 
I Am The Scum said:
I would just like to remind people that "Let us stop until we can figure out precisely where to draw the line" is a fallacy so old that it has its roots in ancient mythology.
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My answer to that would be "OK, you can keep your neck and to be sure everything above your chin. Now lie down, this won't hurt for long".
 
Gilbert Syndrome said:
You tell me, then, who paid for the upkeep of his statue, how much was paid by your average citizen of Bristol? If I am paying for all of the statues in my city, it can't be a lot, or I'd be skint, mate.
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Do you pay taxes? Are taxes used to fund the upkeep of these statues?

Conversely, how was the Lovecraftian award funded? How much of that was through voluntary contributions or purchases vs mandatory taxation?
 
Meadmaker said:
If I lived in Saint Paul Minnesota I apparently would not get a vote on Chris Columbus' statue, because a mob with ropes pulled it down. No vote required.



Yes, I understand the concept of "tyranny of the majority", and I understand that in some cases, illegal actions and even revolutions are necessary.

And I don't like mobs with ropes circumventing the laws.
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You're doing it again. "Yes, I understand that the system is inherently biased against minorities, but these things should go through the system".
 
FWIW, Sadiq Khan has commissioned an equality committee to assess the statues and monuments in London. That's just London, and is an example of something that should have happened a long time ago - changing the system to move it towards being less inherently biased.
 
wareyin said:
Do you pay taxes? Are taxes used to fund the upkeep of these statues?

Conversely, how was the Lovecraftian award funded? How much of that was through voluntary contributions or purchases vs mandatory taxation?
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How do you determine the amount of tax the people of Bristol realistically paid for the Colston statue? Your weird argument seems to be that there's no connection between two hotly debated likenesses created in celebration of dubious characters because the tax payers paid an undetermined amount of money for the upkeep of one and not the other. I can't for the life of me begin to understand your daft outlook on this matter. You're assuming people paid a fortune for Colston's statue to be polished?

The common theme between the two being that they were entirely divisive and controversial. Do you even remember why I originally brought up the Lovecraft award, by the way? I guarantee that you don't, lol.
 
wareyin said:
Do you pay taxes? Are taxes used to fund the upkeep of these statues?
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The cost of erecting memorials and associated projects is not usually
met from public funds but from private donations or public subscription.
Responsibility for the design of a memorial, its maintenance, protection
and decision as to what it commemorates rests with the owner, or the
organisation in which ownership is vested.


Parliamentresearchbriefings.files.parliament.uk
 
Gilbert Syndrome said:
How do you determine the amount of tax the people of Bristol realistically paid for the Colston statue? Your weird argument seems to be that there's no connection between two hotly debated likenesses created in celebration of dubious characters because the tax payers paid an undetermined amount of money for the upkeep of one and not the other. I can't for the life of me begin to understand your daft outlook on this matter. You're assuming people paid a fortune for Colston's statue to be polished?
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No. What in my post leads you to believe the amount of money is the issue? For someone who wants to talk about people not understanding his basic points, you sure seem lost yourself. I suggest you go back and start over, maybe you can do better if you read it again?

Gilbert Syndrome said:
The common theme between the two being that they were entirely divisive and controversial. Do you even remember why I originally brought up the Lovecraft award, by the way? I guarantee that you don't, lol.
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Yes, you brought up Lovecraft as a distraction from the topic at hand, just like you've done with a Jack the Ripper museum, the Tower of London, and Morrissey's music.
 
Gilbert Syndrome said:
The cost of erecting memorials and associated projects is not usually
met from public funds but from private donations or public subscription.
Responsibility for the design of a memorial, its maintenance, protection
and decision as to what it commemorates rests with the owner, or the
organisation in which ownership is vested.


Parliamentresearchbriefings.files.parliament.uk
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Not usually, hmm? Ok, why then was the city council involved in recovering the statue and the mayor involved in rewording the plaque on the statue?
 
Meadmaker said:
I think Ali is a good example. We admire him primarily for his athleticism. When we put up a statue of him, we aren't saying "this is a perfect person". We are saying, "That one thing you know about this guy makes him a very special person." We are ignoring that there may be other things about him that make him....not so special.



If we only celebrated perfect people, we could save a lot on bronze, because we wouldn't need any statues.
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Again this is simple not true there are thousands upon thousands of people that have not beaten their wives or husbands and have never done anything terrible in their entire lives.

If we keep putting up statues to "flawed" people, people that we have to ignore terrible faults to be able to honour I suggest we really do need to reevaluate who we consider to be "worthy" of being honoured in such a way.
 
wareyin said:
No. What in my post leads you to believe the amount of money is the issue? For someone who wants to talk about people not understanding his basic points, you sure seem lost yourself. I suggest you go back and start over, maybe you can do better if you read it again?
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Lovecraft's award was brought up by me to outline the issue we have within our culture to celebrate people with dubious ties, you then oddly began droning on about tax payers paying for Colston's statue for some reason.



wareyin said:
Yes, you brought up Lovecraft as a distraction from the topic at hand, just like you've done with a Jack the Ripper museum, the Tower of London, and Morrissey's music.
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It was a distraction? Seems to me you're easily distracted then, Kemosabe.

If you can't see the relevance between examples of the horrific things we deem okay to celebrate in a discussion about a Colston statue, you're not really worth responding to.

Again, you consistently keep telling me that I'm asking people to stop taking action regarding these monuments, so that says it all about you, really, either blatantly making things up or simply unable to follow a narrative.
 
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