What should we make of the clamour for more statues to meet the same fate as Edward Colston’s? One thing to say is that the toppling of monuments is rarely historically literate. During the French revolution, Parisians destroyed twenty-eight statues of biblical kings from the west façade of Notre Dame Cathedral. In their zeal, it didn’t matter that the 500-year old statues didn’t actually portray the kings of France. Countless pieces of art, books and historical artefacts have been lost to this kind of ideological erasure. Finding themselves in the illustrious company of the Taliban and Islamic State, it is wrong to describe this weekend’s iconoclasts as mere vandals.
Even if you agree with the removal of Colston’s statue, it is possible to be horrified by the way in which it was done. Indeed, many Brits were: a YouGov poll found that while 40 per cent approved of its removal, only 13 per cent agreed with the method.
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