ANGER AT EXHIBITION ‘SABOTAGE’ BID
PRO-STATUE GROUP IN BID TO STOP VISITORS SEEING NEW
CAMPAIGNERS who want the statue of Edward Colston to be restored and put back on its plinth in the centre of Bristol are organising an online campaign to block-book slots to see the statue at the M Shed – so people can’t go.
The Twitter campaign, led by an account called ‘Save Our Statues,’ is encouraging people to book the free slots at the museum and then not attend, which could mean that people in Bristol who do want to go cannot get a slot.
The ‘Save Our Statues’ campaign are claiming some success, with screenshots of a fully-booked M Shed rota for today, although it is unclear how many of those bookings have been undertaken by the campaigners.
“Help the protest against the Colston statue display!” the Twitter account tweeted.
“Please can everyone book out the tickets to the display on Monday in protest. Reserving tickets is free. I’m going to be there and it would be such a shame if it was totally empty on the anniversary,” he added.
M Shed museum bosses are restricting numbers in the museum at any one time because of coronavirus, and have been encouraging people to book up in advance to be sure of a space and time to visit.
The museum does operate a traffic light system on the main entrance, so if the building is below Covid capacity, then anyone turning up will be able to enter.
UWE associate professor Shawn Sobers, a member of the We Are Bristol History Commission who played a part in arranging the Colston Statue exhibition, slammed the campaigners on Twitter.
“See how the reactionaries are trying to stop anyone seeing the Colston display at the M Shed,” he wrote.
“It’s too much for them that in a democratic society, people can choose to visit it for themselves and see the wider history, rather than the narrow narrative from the Colston Cult,” he added.
The statue exhibition came in for some criticism in the right-wing media for displaying the statue lying down on its back, and still covered in the graffiti that had been daubed on it over the years, and on the day it was toppled on June 7, 2020.
The museums boss from Bristol City Council, John Finch, explained that the statue was structurally damaged and couldn’t be put back upright, and also it was decided that more people would be able to see it at once if it was lying down.
The statue is surrounded by descriptions, information and facts about its history, the history of Edward Colston himself, and the years of protest surrounding him and the statue in Bristol City Centre.
The ‘Save Our Statues’ campaign claims to be a group who ‘run confident, high-impact political, educational and legal actions to save our country’s illustrious cultural heritage.’
The Twitter account has also told its 24,000 followers to fill in the History Commission’s online questionnaire about the future of the Colston Statue and the plinth, with many of its followers replying that they had done so.
Historian Katie Donnington tweeted her exasperation at the tactic. “So let me get this straight – the same people who took to the streets to demand we preserve and protect statues so that the public can engage with history, are now block booking tickets so that people can’t visit their local museum to view a statue and engage with history. I just can’t .... ” she said.
I’m hoping maybe seeing the statue toppled ... affects some people in much the same way as a film can change people’s perspectives a bit
THE Colston Statue is bigger than the Colston Statue, if you know what I mean. It’s really about the wider, city-wide conversation that we need to be having.
The Colston Statue, and what happened to it, isn’t going to change anything, but what it has done is instigated a conversation about the city, its history and how we move forward together.
This is a conversation that has been going on for decades already in some quarters; but the toppling reignited it, and it’s a conversation Bristol hasn’t been having properly or widely enough: How is Bristol going to permanently recognise and acknowledge its role in the Transatlantic Slave Trade?
Bristol had very few temporary or permanent signs or acknowledgements to this history, which is a huge part of the city’s story.
What the toppling of the Colston Statue has also done is, now the institutions locally and nationally have started to wake up to wider issues of race, class, diversity and their own issues whether that’s cynical, or tokenistic, or meaningful remains to be seen, but at least there are these conversations happening now.
I’m not going to be naive enough to think that suddenly racism and inequality is over in Bristol or anywhere, just because the statue came down, but it has shifted some perspectives and started conversations, so the statue is an opportunity to ask ‘how are we going to deal with this going forward?’ and the fact is, there are still real divisions.
The history is the history - Bristol was involved in the Transatlantic Slave Trade and it’s not going to change that history, but this is about recognising that the history provides a context to what Bristol is like today, and that goes across issues of race and class in Bristol today. The Colston Statue is an opportunity to grasp the nettle and say ‘we need to talk about this.’
Nothing has fundamentally changed in terms of structural inequality, and I’m not naive enough to think it would change anything overnight.
For me it comes back to questions and conversations with people. We’re not going to change entrenched racist attitudes in the city. There might be a few people that have epiphany moments when they realise something they hadn’t before about this, but it’s going to take generations of change, through institutions, schools, parents and children all having these conversations.
I have to hold on to hope, even if it might be cynical and people and organisations saying they now understand, that in amongst all that, that some real attitudes are changing, some real eyes are being opened, so that in 20 years’ time, whenever Colston and the city’s slave trade story is talked about, it’s done properly, and people look back on the day the statue was toppled as something of a turning point.
Things are already changing. Another significant moment in the city is the passing of the Reparations Act bill. This is important, and it’s building on these momentums in the city to keep these topics in the public consciousness.
I’m a film-maker and creative person, rather than a historian, but I do know the power of stories and images. So I approach this whole scenario with hope, knowing that this could be triggering bigger things - in the same way a film hits a spot with some people and leaves an impression, I’m hoping maybe seeing the statue toppled, or seeing it now, affects some people in much the same way as a film can change people’s perspectives a bit.
It’s all about small, incremental change. And the key thing is, it’s not one thing only - sorting the way we tell the story of Bristol’s history is one thing, but we still need to work on inequalities in education, in the criminal justice system, in employment to make necessary changes.
The Colston Statue is not going to change one iota of the inequalities in these areas, but it can be a launching point for a conversation.
The way in which the statue of Edward Colston, and Bristol’s story with regards to the slave trade became part of a wider global ‘culture war’ argument was demoralising. It kind of got subsumed into that whole divisive debate, and that was demoralising and frustrating.
But we also saw that coming. The problem with that culture war, especially on social media, is that it removes any nuance or intellectual debate or rigour to be able to discuss these things properly - you are either one side or the other, when actually most people have considered, complicated views on this.
My agenda isn’t about ‘taking down this’ or ‘taking down that,’ it’s about the history, it’s about finding the right way to tell that history, but even when something appears on TV, the reactionary response is ‘oh they are just being ‘woke’’ or something. What we’re seeing with social media and the culture war is nothing more than entrenched views becoming very verbal, and it is frustrating.
What I still try to do is use film and media to start conversations, knowing that no one can control all the responses. The History Commission has had its detractors but I have to use my role to be as open and transparent as possible.
It’s difficult pleasing everybody and I don’t even see that as being achievable, so all the History Commission can do is listen, make recommendations and show and explain how and why we have done that. We don’t have a mandate to make decisions, all we can do is recommend things.
The first thing we’ve done, and I was heavily involved in this, is the Colston Statue display, and the most important thing is that this is a consultation - it’s by no means trying to say ‘this is the whole story,’ but it’s a starting point to ask questions.
It’s an event that happened in Bristol, that was important globally, and so this is why we’ve called the display ‘What Next?’ What happens in Bristol next and how do we reconcile the city?
I’m very interested in talking to people that don’t agree with how it came down, for example.
What we don’t have yet is the complexity there to acknowledge that two things can exist and be true at the same time - that Colston was a philanthropist and a slave trader, that people have long-standing emotional attachments to things named after him, but don’t want to celebrate him.
How can we publicly acknowledge these disparities - our job will be trying to have those two things meeting somewhere.