Should we feel proud of our history or should we be ashamed of it?
Kenji Sato
We should take down the William Crowther statue, not because we’re ashamed of our past, not to pay a debt owed by our ancestors, but simply because it is the right thing to do, argues
WHENEVER I visit Tokyo I always make sure to pay a visit to the Yasukuni Shrine, a quiet place where people come to take a rest from the chaotic bustle of modern Japan.
It also just so happens to be the burial ground for 1068 war criminals.
It raises an inconvenient question for the Japanese: how can we be proud of our history with this unpleasant reminder of our ancestors’ war crimes smack-bang in the middle of Tokyo?
The right-wing solution is to downplay, diminish, or deny – typical stuff – but the leftbecause wing solution is more interesting.
Every few years they’ll turn up to the shrine with a monk or Shinto priest who’ll wave their hands around in an attempt to exorcise the spirits, much like wafting a bad smell from a room.
This will trigger a tsunami of indignation from the rightwingers who will accuse them of trying to destroy Japan’s legacy and erase history.
The exorcism seems to wear off after a while, though, history repeats itself every year as the same debate bobs back up to the surface like an unflushable wet wipe.
As we stare into the toilet bowl of history we face a dilemma: should we feel proud of our history or should we be ashamed of it?
This question has reared its ugly head in Hobart, where council are debating whether or not to remove the statue of the former premier and doctor William Crowther.
William Crowther was no war criminal, but he did collect Aboriginal skulls and body parts as part of his morbid curiosity into the “lower races” as he saw them.
Hobart City Council Alderman Jeff Briscoe’s view is that Crowther did do terrible things, but that “on balance” he was a great man who made overall positive contributions to Tasmania’s history.
He argues that attempts to remove the statue amount to an attempt to erase history itself.
I’ve always found the “erasing history” argument rather strange.
Removing the Crowther statue wouldn’t erase history. It will always remain the case
that the soon-to-be premier of Tasmania once snuck into a morgue to steal an Aboriginal man’s skull.
You can smash the symbols of the past, topple statues, rewrite the calendars, expunge street names from the face of Google Earth, but you can never change the cold hard facts of history.
That which has been done cannot be undone, and we cannot exorcise the ghost of the past no matter how much mystical hand-waving we do.
In any case, the last thing any self-respecting leftie would wish to do is deny
Tasmania’s genocidal past.
If the left is self-flagellatory, the right is selfcongratulatory; for them, history is a source of pride, of identity, of tradition, of heritage.
If we are to feel proud as Australians of our forebears, their achievements and their legacies, then does it not also follow that we should feel ashamed of their sins and their failures?
Should we feel pride or shame for our history?
To me, the answer is obvious: we should feel neither.
History is not something to be proud of; we are individuals who should be proud of our own efforts and achievements, rather than taking credit for the achievements of long dead ancestors.
Conversely, you do not inherit the sins of your ancestors, you are not culpable for their crimes, you are not guilty by dint of your white skin, you are responsible for your actions in the present.
In the present, First Nations people are still suffering the real consequences of historical injustice and the generational disadvantages and indignities which follow to this day.
One such indignity is the William Crowther statue, which was built to honour a man who already had all the respect, power, privilege, and dignity that was denied Tasmania’s Indigenous inhabitants.
We should take down the statue, not because we should be ashamed of our past, not to pay a debt owed by our ancestors, but because it is the right thing to do.
History does not care whether you are proud or ashamed of it, because the cold hard facts of the past are not contingent on your feelings or your race or your ancestry.
I share no ancestry with the first settlers, but that makes me no more or less responsible for the past. It is utterly irrelevant who our ancestors were.
If it was relevant I’d certainly be in a pickle, being the half-Japanese and halfChinese mutt that I am.
As a Japanese man should I be apologising for the rape of Nanking, or should I be angrily demanding reparations on the basis of my Chinese victim status?
Such questions are nonsensical, and they will only become more nonsensical for future generations as they become more racially mixed.
Neither is an appropriate reaction to historical injustice; we do not inherit the sins of our ancestors, nor can we take credit for their past achievements.
When we argue over names, symbols, and ghosts, what we’re really arguing over is our injured pride. We’re better than that.