My grandfather had a working definition of villainy.
Essentially it was anyone who was lauded by the British establishment was likely to be, as he put it, “a proper bastard”.
As the Black Lives Matter insurrection travelled across the Atlantic, many people in Britain are facing up to an uncomfortable reality:
That the war criminals and genocidal monsters of the British Empire have been hiding in plain sight.
Lauded and lionised they are immortalised in bronze and stone.
They’re prominently placed on plinths on almost every major British city.
Britain’s 19th-century “heroes” made their bones in the Empire.
Slave traders and generals, it was splendid plunder.
Many Brits concede that “bad things” might have been done in those days.
However, they cling to their fuzzy feelgood narrative about World War Two.
Here, undeniably Britain was the good guy.
Moreover, they heroically “stood alone” against the darkness of the Third Reich.
Well if you count having the resources of the biggest empire in the world being “alone” then fair enough.
As historian Shashi Tharoor has pointed out, there is a statue to the pack animals of WW2 in Whitehall but not one to the million Indian servicemen who came to Blighty’s aid.
There is, of course, a statue to the man who presided over the Bengal Famine.
A hat tip to this chap who did this bit of digital insurgency.
For the avoidance of doubt, we have documentary evidence for Churchill’s complicity in that crime against humanity.
However, a massive pile of evidence was systematically destroyed to cover up British crimes in their colonies.
A shameful legacy indeed…
The insurgents at Waterford Whispers rarely miss the mark, and this one is a headshot!
Many men who the British consider heroes of WW2 should undoubtedly have been indicted for trial at Nuremberg in 1945.
Here is one of them.
Arthur Harris was a pioneer and advocate of “terror bombing” civilians.
Incidentally, that was his preferred phrase for the use of aerial bombardment on enemy cities.
Luckily for him, it was victor’s justice, and only the losing side had to answer for their crimes against humanity.
Here in Ireland, we have some experience in removing offending British sculptures.
The Famine Queen was removed from the front of Leinster House in 1948 and placed in storage where the bronze exterior slowly turned green.
As for the hero of Trafalgar, he clung on until the 50th anniversary of Éirí Amach na Cásca.
There is no record of any Hardy soul kissing the rubble on O’Connell street that night…
We had this old 45, and my mother played it a lot.
It is clear that centuries of anger and insult has boiled over in the States about monuments to Confederate generals and early imperialists from Europe.
Now, this movement has even arrived in Fair Caledonia and not before time.
I noted that some on Planet Fitba are concerned about this overdue development.
Spiers is a kindly soul, well-meaning with a rather endearing tendency to be naïve.
He once told me -in the media centre at the AVIVA stadium in Dublin-that he thought that David Murray would be “morally compelled” to pay the Big Tax Case bill for Rangers when it dropped.
I am still convinced that he was serious!
I’m of the view that he’s a decent chap who tries to see good in everyone.
However, I suspect that the historical narrative that he was given in his childhood was very different from the one your humble correspondent was given.
Old man Murphy was keen to impart some fundamental truths to his grandson.
I owe him so much.
One thing is that when I scan the landscape of Blighty, I can clearly see proper bastards everywhere.
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What Hitler did to the Jews has not slipped my mind. Did us going to war prevent it, by the by? And as for him ‘ invading half of Europe’ get your primer out. What he did in the west was predicated on what he wanted to do in the east. He did not want war with Britain and France, in fact his generals predicted that he would lose. He went against their advice and luck was with him. Not so later on.
I am no apologist for Hitler and his cronies, but if we continue to believe that WW2 was a war against naziism/ fascism why didn’t it start in 1933? And why could the Daily Mail carry a headline invoking us to shout ‘Hurrah For The Blackshirts!’
For what it’s worth, at the tender age of 18 my old man was called up in 1942 and as fas as I know ( he never mentioned it himself) he saw a fair bit of action ( he and his brother met up in Germany towards the end of the war) and it was the latter who filled me in on things. I like to think that if he fought for anything it was that I might grow up and have the freedom to think for myself rather than accept the ‘victor’s narrative’ swallowed by far too many of my contemporaries.
No it simply put a stop to it continuing.
Had the Allied Forces not bothered to put up a fight how many more would have suffered and faced the same fate?
That’s the Romani,Infirm and disabled all classed as sub human and surplus to requirement by these fascist,master race nutters.
Perhaps the Daily Mail agreed with them?
You would have to ask those responsible for the Headlines.
One thing is for certain many British,American and Russians gave their lives to put a stop to it.
We remain sforever in their debt for having done so.
Ps Google The Schlieffen Plan
Germany had planned to invade France a full Decade before the start of WW1.
It was a bad plan when it was created in 1904.
A decade later it has even worse.
It banked on Britain not being a combatant.
Indeed and ultimately it cost them in WW2 as they were spread over two fronts.
The point is the plan to invade France had been in existence over decades before WW2.
To suggest Germany had no plans for Britain in the long term is a tad naive in my opinion.
Some good advice.
Read books…
Derek Robinson’s “Invasion 1940” is a good starting point on the futility of Operation Sealion.
I think it was us who started city bombing, at the behest of our old friend ‘Winnie’ and that was despite being warned that such an act would bring German retaliation. And of course it did.
There is much about WW2 that we have been misinformed about. Take Pearl Harbour. We are told those nasty Japs just up and bombed the US base. What we are seldom told is that the US, the Dutch, and our good selves, starved the Japanese of much needed resources and so provoked them into war—there is even evidence to suggest that FDR had prior knowledge of the attack but saw it as an excuse to take the US to war.
My favourite piece of misinformation was that surrounding Rudolph Hess’ flight to the Duke Of Hamilton’s estate. We are told that Hess was mad . End of story. And yet the plane he flew had to stop to refuel. He then had to perform a nifty bit of flying (upside down) in order to bail out. And why was he kept locked up in Spandau jail for decades after the war, only, on the eve of his release to ‘hang himself’? Could it be that that the powers that be did not want us to know the real reason for his flight is he was here on an official peace mission, but the warmongers in charge did not want peace?
I have read quite extensively about The Third Reich and most historians agree that Hitler never wanted war with Britain. His enemy was the USSR. He never made any secret about this. He hoped Britain would accept defeat and let him get on with it. But then the dastardly Japs attacked the US and that proved to be a gamechanger.
The fact Hitler gassed 6 million Jews and Invaded half of Europe seems to have slipped your mind.
When you put it like that-the British Empire plundered a quarter of the planet and -in India alone- caused the deaths of 35 million in manmade famines.
Yes and no one is denying that they did.
Are you aware that the Irish were the first to invade the British Isles and that St Patrick is believed to have been a slave from one of these raids?
Every single Nation on Earth has evolved from Slavery,Genocide or Oppression at some point.
Including Ireland.
Slavery was rife in Scotland and Ireland before they were even known as Scotland and Ireland.
Britain of course is notoriously guilty of being far more effective at it than anyone else.
None of us alive today are responsible for these actions.
Were the Omagh Bombers any worse or better than the animals at Amritsar or countless other atrocities carried out in Britain’s name?
The answer to that will vary depending on your own ideology or standpoint in the wider question of how or why it came about.
None of that alters the fact innocent lives were taken in the most brutal of actions.
Ultimately though who are we to judge?
As a very famous influential character once stated:
Let he is without sin cast the first stone.
The thought that he could attack another nation and they would meekly surrender hardly seems the action of a man with all his faculties intact. He could have learned from Ireland’s response to that attitude.
Warsaw Gdansk Lodz not cities?? I recommend you watch the excellent movie Hurricane. Mighty help erase your history washing
From RTE’s archives an amusing piece. ‘ Queen turns green at Royal Hospital’.
Nice piece Phil, there’s nought wrong IMHO of denigrating the actions of others from past atrocities. Nothing wrong in having their statues removed either but to remove them from historical records is plainly wrong.
I would suggest that we remove the statues and have small plinths raised in their place with small plaques owning the history.
Here stood a statue of Winston Churchill, once lauded by our country as a great man who in fact was a racist and responsible for the famine in Bengal that killed millions, we no longer hold this man in the esteem we once did. Instead we acknowledge the atrocities and pay tribute to the victims. We own our shame and express our remorse, we beg your forgiveness for our shortsighted and ill thought for your loss.
Something like that would be good I think.
Didn’t the Egyptians use slaves to build the pyramids? Didn’t the Romans use slaves as entertainment, fighting each other and lions? Shall we pull down the pyramids and coliseums? The world has to think this through rationally before it goes too far.
A statue is not an Engineering miracle or feat.
Every Nation and Civilisation was built upon the control and oppression of the people forced to make it happen.
We marvel at the sheer brilliance of those who designed and constructed these things that still stand today thousands of years later.
A statue is a personal tribute to a single person for the achievements they reached in life.
However If those achievements were made off of the back of slavery,genocide or any other crimes against humanity then it is right in a modern Society that they should no longer remain.
You should never look up to these examples in life.
Leave an empty plinth and perhaps a plaque explaining to the children who ask why the statue has been removed.
Perhaps replace it with a work of art that encourages community and or acceptance in its place.
Each Pyramid, all of which were built with slave labour, was built to glorify one individual Pharaoh. On the basis of your logic, brilliant engineering feats or not, they are the biggest statues ever constructed. Do we pull THEM down?
Pharaoh were regarded as (primarily by themselves) Gods.
This was a time over 4000 years ago when men looked at the big fiery ball in the sky and believed it was their grandad smiling at them.
A time before the Industrial Revolution where moving one 5 Ton block more than an inch was a feat of Engineering.
Statues erected to commemorate well heeled individuals which were smelted in Workshops in Industrial England have no conceivable comparison to these structures which to this day serve as a an Archeological reference to a major phase in human endeavour.
Not only that but they are also a contributor to the Economics at local and National level in Egypt.
I fail to see how a Statue that can be replaced replicated many many times over in Foundries is on a par with Monument ps that modern Engineering would struggle to replicate 4000 years on?
As Phil says often enough if you want to research these numpties depicted in Statues dedicated to Slavers and Racists go read a book.
Seek and ye shall find.
“Seek and ye shall find.”
Well therein lies the complete flaw in your argument. Without the statues as pointers to pique the interest of future generations how many people will seek? How many people will even know there is information to find?
In an earlier post you said that their deeds are recorded. Their deeds may very well be recorded in some dry, historical tome that no one other than research scholars will ever open. How many of these books mention the individuals by name.
When the generations who pulled down the statues pass away who will remember, who will even know that the people depicted in the statues ever existed?
How many history books does Joe Bloggs in the street even open unless something seen or heard stimulates his interest enough to look?
Even with the existence of the statues it never fails to amaze me how few Glaswegians know anything about the involvement of the city in the slave trade.
Remove the reminders and within three generations NO ONE will know and the history WILL be forgotten completely.
NOT rewritten, just erased from sight and mind. Which if anything, is worse.
Like I said “Leave an empty plinth and perhaps a plaque explaining to the children who ask why the statue has been removed.”
Then if you want to know more go seek and ye shall find.
Aye. Pulling down statues won’t change history. In fact I would argue that in removing these statues you are removing constant reminders of history. Leave them. Add plaques with information on what truly evil bastards some of them were, but information which references the contexts of the ages they lived in.
Historical characters were, for better or worse, products of the times in which they lived.
Hindsight ALWAYS has Twenty-Twenty vision. But it’s very rarely a good prism through which to view things.
We live in a constantly evolving world. There are undoubtedly opinions widely held today that future generations will find appalling.
When I was a boy no one batted an eye at black people being called darkies. Niggers was still the most common term used in most of the USA. Was it right? Of course it wasn’t. But very few people consciously gave it a second thought. Even fewer pointed out that it was wrong.
As recently as forty or fifty years ago if someone was called gay they were being described as cheerful, or happy-go-lucky. Call someone gay now and you’re calling them a homosexual.
Someone once wrote that those who don’t learn from history are destined to repeat it. If you remove it you won’t learn from it.
The statues were erected as monuments of respect. Let them evolve into symbols and reminders of a darker time in our past.
Concentrate efforts and energies in rooting out the slave traders and owners who still exist today. That would serve a far more useful purpose.
No what you are doing is removing their reward from Public view.
Then hopefully in doing so you consign them and their actions to the annals of History.
You should never reward bad behaviour.
A Statue is a reward.
Their actions are then more likely to be forgotten. And the further we move from those times the more they’ll be forgotten.
Their actions are on record.
Cyan, people walk past statues every day. A constant reminder of the actions of an individual is a far more effective lesson than some vague mention in a history book very few people will ever open.
Apparently they aren’t just walking by them anymore.
No they are ripping them down.
The history books,Internet and digital records will last for an eternity.
I’m cool with that.
Melt the bronze down and make a work of art dedicated to a better future and not a shameful past.
The pyramids are a testament to the slaves who built them and not a statue to the slave owner. There’s a very big difference between something built with blood, sweat and tears and a statue that is an icon to evil. HH
Why is King Billy being protected and still standing typical Scotland
I think Arthur Harris gets a bad name unfairly.
After all, it was the Germans who started the aerial bombing of cities and civilians across Europe, so I have little sympathy for complaints about them getting a good helping in return.
And of course, it was Nazi Germany being bombed – who could have sympathy for the Nazi regime, backed as it was by a majority of Germans – at least while the war was going well for them?
While the Soviet Union (an equally despicable regime) gets most of the credit for beating Nazi Germany, the western allies did play their part and the bombing of Germany was devastating for their war effort.
Harris’ campaign of area bombing is a simple reflection of the level of technology at the time. Precision bombing is a very modern thing.
Even at the time of the Falklands war, bombing was still a ropey business. The RAF flew a Vulcan bomber all the way from Ascension Island to attack Port Stanley Airport, and missed the runway. The Argentine Air Force hit lots of Royal Navy ships with (what are now called) “dumb bombs”, many of which didn’t explode – they were not giving the bombs sufficient free fall time to arm properly.
In Harris’s day bombing was about a guy 1000s of feet in the air, judging it by eye and hoping the wind wasn’t too strong when he opened the bomb bay. And he was trying to do this at night (recalling prior experience, the British managed to talk the Americans into taking on the daylight raids). And often when under attack.
There is no way things could be precise in such circumstances, hence area bombing.
Really, heavy bomber crews at night would be looking for fires started by pathfinder aircraft, and trying to dump their bombs somewhere around the same place. Quite a crude business in all.
Anyway is it not absurd than in the modern day, Harris receives more vitriol than his Nazi counterpart Hermann Goering?
Scroll to 22.00 where Peter Hitchens deals forensically with the fizzy feelgood nonsense that you believe but Britain’s terror bombing campaign.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEouqoZt9I0
Hi Phil – I am not trying to put a feel good spin on anything, just be realistic about WW2 bombing.
I’m genuinely amazed people can find the bombing of Nazi Germany to be a problem.
Its true there is a catalogue of horrible figures in British military history, e.g. Reginald Dyer (responsible for the Jallianwala Bagh massacre), but I don’t think Arthur Harris is one of them.
Thanks for the video – I will watch it, Peter Hitchens talks a lot of sense.
Look back at the Dresden bombings. How many innocents died when an entire city was essentially wiped out. Although there are no official figures for the civilian deaths there, it is thought to be anywhere between 100-135,000 innocents killed in terror bombing raids
The number of deaths in Dresden is estimated at 25,000. This is what the City Council estimated at the time, and again in a 2010 investigation.
I have never met anyone who thinks that its a good thing that 25,000 people were killed.
I am sure not every German was an ardent Nazi, but even still I would hesitate to describe the citizens of Nazi Germany as “innocents”. We know the kind of narratives which had arisen and had come to influence very many people. Of course, some bombing victims would indeed have been innocents, children and infants.
Ultimately, it was Germany which started the war and Germany which started the bombing of civilians. They were even at it years before in Spain, at Guernica.
These facts mean I am unconcerned over complaints about the RAF.
Should the western allies not have bombed Germany, allowing their industry and population to thrive? Who would take that seriously?
The RAF pioneered the terror bombing of civilians before the Luftwaffe was formed.
Clue: Kurdistan.
Arthur Harris was a pioneer of terror bombing before the Luftwaffe was formed.
Kurdistan is your clue…
Is there a record of Harris referring to RAF raids as “terror bombing?” (genuine question, I don’t know).
I know Joseph Goebbels called RAF raids “terror attacks” as a propaganda tool.
It was also the term favoured by Churchill.
There speaks a guy who thinks himself a good Christian,all you are is an apologist for the British establishment and all the atrocities that they have committed over the past 500 years. Bomber Harris was our equivalent of Hermann Goering and he would have fitted right in with the Nazi war machine, he continued to carpet bomb cities even after the war was more or less won.
It is truly absurd to equate Arthur Harris with Goering, one of the central figures of the 3rd Reich Hierarchy.
And a war “more or less won” is still a war in progress. Bombing is useful for forcing your opponent to capitulate.
That’s how America put the Japanese out of the war (with nuclear bombs) and, earlier, it was how Germany put the Netherlands out of the war (they destroyed Rotterdam from the air then, the example having been made, threatened Utrecht with the same).
Germany tried to KO the UK in the same fashion, but failed thanks to the RAF and hundreds of foreign volunteer pilots (including 10 noble souls from Rep Ireland).
More historical illiteracy from you.
The idea that the RAF prevented the invasion of Britain in 1940 is refuted by serious historians.
The Kreigsmarine was tiny and could not mount an amphibious operation.
I suggest that you consult “Invasion 1940” by Derek Robinson.
Oh they were going to have a go at it, alright. They had brought 1000s of barges from all over Europe for the purpose, and proposed to tow these across the channel.
Towed barges wallowing across the channel would not have been as an impressive a sight as the American backed Operation Overlord but still – they might have pulled it off, especially had they control of the skies.
You are right the Kriegsmarine was small and hardly suited for the task, but even still managed amphibious landing successes against Norway. Very inventive people, the Germans.
And who says they needed to come by water? The Germans had some very effective parachute troops too and could probably have created glider infantry units in fairly short order.
Certainly a very perilous undertaking, but it might have worked – especially given the British Army was a shambles at the time.
Nonsense.
Read Derek Robinson’s book-as I have already suggested.
You are talking nonsense. Britain bombed Berlin 5 times before hitler OKed the bombing campaign against London. Before that the Germans were just bombing airfields in the south coast.
It was bomber Harris who start carpet bombing German cities.
In the UK started the war with a specific policy of only bombing military and infrastructure targets (of which there were many in Berlin). In the early war the RAF lacked the aircraft inventory which could deliver the sort of huge devastation which came in later years,
The UK abandoned its bombing policy after the Germans completely devastated Rotterdam from the air. In a UK-German context specifically, I think the first time civilians were bombed was when the Germans accidentally bombed residential areas of London (which goes back to the difficulties of bombing accurately in that era).
After this, the Germans felt they would be as well carrying on attacking the UK population, to try to force a capitulation. We all know about the London Blitz. Coventry was so badly bombed that the Germans actually invented a new adjective (something like) “coventried” to describe something which had been completely wrecked. And in Scotland, the town of Clydebank was largely destroyed.
In the face of all this, it is completely inconceivable that the UK would not respond in kind.
You should read Peter Hitchen’s “Phoney Victory”.
Chapter Eight “Gomorrah”.
The title of the chapter, of course, refers to Operation Gomorrah, the bombing of Hamburg in July 1943.
This was the first time that the RAF created a firestorm to increase the citizens of a German city.
Read that chapter at least and, if you have the facility of reason, you will see the falsehoods in the narrative that you currently support.
You should research the role of Churchill’s favourite scientist Frederick Lindemann in the terror bombing policy.
I forgot to say, the Germans switch from attacking the (nearly spent) RAF to attacking the population was one of the factors why they lost the Battle of Britain. And after that, the game was ours 😉
40,000 British civilians died as a result of German bombing in WW2. 25,000 German civilians died in the FIRST of three nights of the bombing of Dresden. 410,000 German civilians in total died in allied bombing raids.
Dresden was NOT a strategic military target in Germany. If it had been it would would have been attacked long before it was.
I’ve always believed that as well as a revenge attack for the bombing of Coventry – which, keep in mind, Churchill ALLOWED to happen and which WAS a military target – the bombing of Dresden was also a message to the Russians.
There was a genuine worry among senior western allied figures that Russian forces might not stop at Germany. They might push on towards the Atlantic. There was no stomach among the British and US high commands to go straight into another war.
The Dresden bombing was a frightening display of fire power and sent a clear message to the rapidly approaching Russian forces and to Stalin, “This far and no further!Take us on and you will not be dealing with a fleeing army in disarray.”
There is so much I agree with about your writing Phil. But the big divide comes in your second sentence when you tell us of what your grandfather said of the British.
Mary Slessor was British John McLean was British, James Connolly was British, Jock Stein, Yariq Ali…..I was born into a post war Britain and was given a worthy legacy by a wee almost forgotten man called Clem Atlee.
When I was ten years of age I watched another ten year-old kid verbally abuse and denigrate a wee Glaswegian guy on our Main Street to the applause and support of several adults that should have known better. The wee guy was half cut, a Celtic supporter on his way to Palmerston Park, Saturday noon. A fung Kafflik! Hence the communal laughter. I don’t know why at the age of ten, I was so disgusted by my fellow villagers at the treatment of someone whose age alone, demanded respected. It was a cut off moment for me.
Don’t you get tired of fixating your ire on one group? The world is on fire. It’s been stoking up for a long long time. Slavery and racism, oppression and exploitation, man’s inhumanity to man is global, is endemic.
I find your (understandable and personal) anger at Britain and my ethnicity, the Scots a furrow too deeply ploughed to allow any sense of a way forward. For me, for you.
Keep safe. Look for the way forward. Keep healthy. HH Lewis
Good grief-the term I used was “British establishment”.
Read the piece again if that hasn’t sunk in.
Trolls get banned here-and quickly.
Shape up or stay away-either works for me.
Aon rud eile:
James Connolly said to his daughter Nora “they will probably forget I’m an Irishman” perhaps he was thinking of unevolved chaps like you.
Well said Phil,there’s plenty of those ‘proper bastards’ frequent both houses of parliament,in fact,in that whole area of the shitty of london too,greedy bastards to a man.
I was very glad to see that renowned liar columbus was decapitated,how is it possible to ‘discover’ a land that is already inhabited by natives of that land?
He discovered nothing and we All know that now,or,at least we All should know that by now.I have no idea if they’re still teaching these lies in the schools our children attend.However,with the ever bettering technology We will know more of both North and South America in the near future,GPR is but one of these tools.
They have already found ancient Egyptian artefacts(papyrus and metal artefacts,I think)carbon dated to long before columbus set foot on Native American soil.These items were found in a Mesa in an area around the Grand Canyon,Arizona.
They found these things that could only have come from Egypt and in turn,they’ve found trace amounts of cocaine and tobacco in a crypt/dig in Egypt that could only have come from the Americas.This proves that there were travellers from Africa visiting that area long before columbus landed in America.There were tribes in west Africa that specialised in seafaring and fishing,these tribes have stories/myths long handed down that corollate with this new evidence on these matters.
Scholars now believe that in South America there are many lost civilisations yet to be discovered but,with GPR they will slowly uncover these and history will need to be revised appropriately.Maybe by then churchills statue will also correctly have been removed.
Power tae yir elbow Phil.🇮🇪
Read Graham Hancocks book Before America. That will give you your answer to Ancient Civilisations. Fingerprints of the Gods is another. Indigenous peoples all over the world have had terrible treatment through history, mostly from European countries all in the name of advancement, empire expansion and the removal of riches, under the guise of God.On the subject of statues, and removing of. My feeling is that statues should remain with plaques added to explain the unbrushed factual history of that individual. Education is the key to understanding. Schools still teach history as fact when it should be explained is that it depends who writes and relates it. All countries have shameful episodes in history and currently too.
Watched the images on the news yesterday with the so called statue protectors causing havoc in cities in the UK. This does not help a balanced argument for people who might have valid points to solve obvious racism in Britain, and I include Irish descendants in the West if Scotland. Press are complicit. Not right wing fascists who tarnish the image of average people with a more educated view.
Thank you for the heads up re.readers,Fingerprints of the Gods I’ve noted to read at some point,list just just grows n grows.As far as the adding of plaques to statues goes that works for me,though I’d add no renovation or any maintenance on those same statues,above the six foot mark,you wouldn’t want to get soiled by brushing against them.
In Auld Caledonia the so called press play to their sevco masters,no good will or,ever has,come from that.They are the blindly loyal leading the deluded racists up and down the garden path,repeatedly.As my dear auld ma would have said;Hell mend them.
HH🍀
I’ve always loved a comment I heard from an Aboriginal man when asked what he thought about the 200 year anniversary of the discovery of Australia. “We knew it was here all the time” he replied.
JS.
Another one Ghandi was asked what he thought about western civilisation replied ‘I think it would be a good idea’🤣
Wrong, he was asked what he thought of “BRITISH civilization”.
Phil – that was what I thought and checked out on line to get correct wording and this what I found for quote.
Happy to be corrected if you can give me a reliable source.
Applicable to British and many other colonial countries
Thanks
John
Unfortunatly intolerance has many faces, it seems to me that the so called BLM momevent has been hijacked by those who would destroy our western and Christian society and impose on us their narrow ideology, which we have seen so many times in the past result in genocide as has happened in such socialist havens as China under Mao, who I may add was praised by Diane Abbott as a doer of good, or Stalin and pol pot, etc, who never get any criticisms from the left wing loons who squeal about everything they perceive as against their way of thought. REMOVE the statues if must be, but not in the way these fanatics are doing, we have other ways of doing it, it’s called democracy and should always be done that way, by the consenting process, even though those who those statues represent way back when did not, those who are behaving this way today in destoying these statues are mimicking them in a lesser way, but also a very dangerous way.
There now seems to be an overwhelming clamour to wipe out our history with regard to slavery and diabolical acts within the “Empire “
The truth is these atrocities happened ,the people driving this clamour are the same ones who condemned the German people who tried the same with the actions Of Hitler.
Don’t deny accept it happened feel remorse and make sure nothing like it happens again
So when do the masses start the march on Rome, clearly built on the backs of slaves. Oddly enough like every other empire or country doing well In the modern era. Not trying to dis anyone but ALL lives matter. Why do all these so called equality issues have people wanting to be treated like everyone else only to banner headline themselves as different. Stop trying to rewrite history and try learning from it.
The statues themselves are material evidence that the British state has persistently re-written the historical record.
I would refer you to Simon Sharma’s article in FT about history and statues.
Yes all lives matter this is taken as read by all reasonable people. The whole point of BLM is because all lives do not matter equally in UK or many other previously colonial countries.
It is that simple and if you cannot see it you need to take a long deep look inside yourself.
All lives SHOULD matter equally. But DON’T and never will. NOT until people are born equal, and I don’t see that happening any time soon.
People are not born equal socially or even physically.
This is NOT however exclusive to black people. Any child of any colour born in an area like Drumchapel will not have the same opportunities in life and will in all probability have a shorter life expectancy than a child of any colour born in Bearsden, which is less than a mile away.
This is a situation that is replicated in every town and every city in the world. Sometimes in several areas of the same city.
This is not right and it’s not fair. But It’s how it is. And as I said, it’s NOT going to change any time soon
Certainly won’t with your negative attitude.
Covid-19 death rates have shown up that UK unequal for all poorer sections of society and racist (because a high number of BAME people are trapped in poverty than the rest of society)
and I avoided use of CAPITAL letters – do not persuade anyone except yourself by doing this😉
A lot of Churchill’s rhetoric clearly had disturbing similarities to the Third Reich. This wearisome excuse about ‘being a complex figure of his time’ is a convenient airbrushing of history. Important to be transparent and have a national discussion about British imperialism. Would help to explain their countless war crimes and monopolising of other countries assets. You have to question the motives of people guarding statues like Baden Powell (a known Nazi sympathiser) Because like the past, nothing’s changed in present day Whitehall. They still posses this unhealthy gung-ho, colonialist, jingoistic mind set.
People who explode munitions in and around civilian populations are often labelled terrorists. At least Harris called it what it was. Bomber Command lost 55,000 to 57,000 killed. Its total casualty rate was around 60% – killed, wounded, taken prisoner. Churchill denied those men a campaign medal because of the success of Joseph Goebbels in promoting the lie that 200,000 were killed in Dresden when the number was put at 25,000 by the Dresden police. That is still an awful figure, but the men of Bomber Command deserve a statue of their own.
Dresden was not a one-off.
The terror bombing of German cities by the RAF was extensive.
Peter Hitchens deals with this in his excellent book Phoney Victory.
You do know that only 5% of the RAF’s bombs landed within 5 miles of their target. Hardly deserving of a medal
It is not the men of bomber command that are being criticised it is the commanders who ordered the carpet bombing of cities to terrorise the civilian population even after it was obvious the war was more or less over. I don’t know where you got the figure of 25000 dead in Dresden as to this day it is unknown how many people were killed and incidentally a lot of those killed were POW,s and slave labourers caught in the city as the Germans were retreating in disarray. I’m pretty sure their wasn’t any police spokesman around to give a precise figure of the casualties.Get real man I don’t think their would have been a press conference after such a nightmare scenario .
25,000 German civilians is now the generally accepted figure. You are correct in one regard though. This figure does NOT take into account POW’s, refugees or retreating soldiers fleeing the Russian advance. The true number of deaths is undoubtedly many thousands more.
I do not disagree with what you say, but the current situation is divide and conquer. The so called great and good have always used that tactic with the proles. Turn one race against another, one religion against another, one individual against the other then step in and mop up the rewards.
The BE was founded on that basis by the so called elite, until the plebs realise that they are just pawns in the machine their wailing and gnashing of teeth is pointless. As long as there is one starving child in the world it is one too many and until people realise they have the power to change things this will repeat and repeat, justified by so called good and kind hearted individuals
Hey, Ed, you are obviously someone who has realised that together we have the power to change things. However, when other people begin to realise it too you tell them their efforts are pointless. When people wake up, Ed, give them the time to have a stretch and a yawn – they might catch up and things could begin to change.
🎵The sorrow, the suffering the glory and the pain.
The killing and dying it all was in vain.
For young Willie McBride it all happened again, and again, and again and again.🎵
Spiers has also come across, over the years, as a “professional fence sitter”, combined with the very occasional, blowing with the wind.
As for the statues, what seems clear is;
– no more statues or roads/places should be dedicated to any individual in future
&
– it’s either ALL statues are torn down or they ALL remain.
Personally, I think it’s better to retain statues / named places – but with appropriate signs explaining the bad stuff – so we can’t forget our history.
It’s also a positive reminder about how our communities can change, develop and improve.
Nothing’s set in stone, so to speak, except perhaps for statues? 🙂
But the other dilemma: in today’s socially inclusive, PC “gone mad” environment – why should any one person have a statue anyway?
If only one person should have a statue in their honour, then it should be Cheryl Cole – after all, SHE’S WORTH IT!
Sorry!.. couldn’t resist the overwhelming urge to post this reply! 😂😂😂
Ok, that’s the only exception then!
Would need an extra long plaque though… to capture ALL her surnames. 🙂
Can you imagine the social and economic carnage that would be caused by Britain’s immigrant population accepted the “invitation” to repatriate themselves, but took their motherland’s stolen wealth with them?
The biggest symbols of Empire would be gone – the Crown, Orb, and Sceptre of the monarchy, gone in a flash, the Bank of England in absolute chaos, the NHS decimated, owing to the fact that our doctors and nurses have returned to the Caribbean, Africa, India, Pakistan, the Middle East, Philippines, etc?
It seems that Pandora’s Box has now been opened, and there is about to be a almighty struggle to put the lid back on the box!