Never has so much hate been shown by so few

At the head of the queue of those se putting the boot in was Piers Morgan, making himself look even en more bumptious than usual. full weight of the TV host’s reactionary ridicule and the dubious support it garnered. History belongs to youngster Greer as much as it does to middle-aged Morgan and he’s just as entitled to express his interpretation, not least because there is truth in the points he was (clumsily) attempting to make. Churchill was born in Victorian England and raised in Edwardian entitlement – he held the imperialist views of the time. But we are allowed to be appalled. He supportedpp the use of poison gas against “uncivilised tribes”, is accusedaccuse of complicity in the BengalBenga famine in which three millionmillio people starved to death, referredreferr to Indians as “a beastly peoplepeop with a beastly religion” and spokes of the inevitable triumphtrium of “Aryan stock”. In 1920, he was the war secretarysecrreta who sent the violentvio Black and Tans constablesco to Ireland. ImagineIm if Morgan had the privilege of coaxing ChurchillChu into his intervieweeinter chair now. SurelySurel even he would grill him oover these actions? Instead,Inst he encourages intoleranceintoler of anyone who brings up the subjects. This stramash blew up in the week an important exhibition opens in Glasgow, celebrating South African hero Nelson Mandela. Glasgow was the first city in thet world to award him its freedom and the lord provost who did so, Michael Kelly,Kelly rereminds us that the move was hugely controversial given the widely-held view – not least within the Thatcher government – that Mandela was simply a terrorist. Had there not been enough people brave and committed enough to challenge that view, we might have found ourselves on the wrong side of history. If we’re not free to question, analyse and criticise, we only ever know part of the story. Another famous quote: “History is written by the victors.” But it’s read by the generations who follow, the ones grateful for the freedom to form their own views, and even tweet them.