There are few sights more frightening for a dictator than seeing footage of your people tearing down your statue. As they cower in their bunkers, they know their days are numbered, that Damocles is sharpening the blade and fraying the thread just a little…more…
But imagine the man has been dead for one hundred years and his ghost has become a ghost. Then what would he think seeing his legacy tarnished and, literally, torn down? Well, not knowing of the dead I can hardly say, and even if an utterance is made, I don’t think it will matter.
After years of systemic racism, people believe that a change is gonna come, to reference the Sam Cooke song from the 1960s, they think change will happen. If we have learnt from history, it is that every revolution removes the topsoil and leaves an equally corrupt system. Ah, but the past had been, wry pun intended, whitewashed, how can the future not be better? How? Because lessons from the past have not been taught, let alone, learnt.
Imagine 100,000 people tearing down statues. A powerful image, sure, now imagine 100,000 teachers educating children of the past. Less sexy, sure, but let’s move to the next frame. The statue is thrown into a river and then people scamper off to avoid littering fines. The whole thing is forgotten in a day. The 100,000 teachers each tells 100 children that this person founded the city, for example, and helped people to thrive, however, engaged in the then socially acceptable (prestigious) act of slavery, an act that should not have happened and here are the reasons why. 10% of the children find this interesting and go home and tell two people, they then each tell six people who then etc. (it’s like a pyramid scheme which is ironic as recent discoveries suggest that the pyramids were made (mostly) by contractors and not, as believed, slaves).
In example one, we have violence and headlines. In example two we have the education of those who will go on to shape the future. What about, not tearing down statues but rather putting plaques in place? This man did this but, unfortunately, also did that causing these problems. How many people would see that and then tell others?
People, proudly, shun the greatest teacher if all, history, and what should be learnt for posterity is only seen as posteriority as people bury their heads in the sand and all is seen is their backsides glinting in the fading light of the past.
Yes, it is important to speak up, yes, it is important to stand up, but it is also important to learn otherwise the sins of the past become the virtues of the future
’till next time
Afterword: note how it is only when one is personally affronted that one acts? I wonder what the natives make of immigrants fighting over their land?
thegreaterfool2016 