[conspire] Federales in Portland?

[Deirdre Saoirse Moen]

> On Jul 22, 2020, at 09:15, paulz at ieee.org wrote:
> 
> While I am at the computer...  A couple days ago there were people in Chicago throwing stones at the police.  The rioters wanted to take down a statue of Columbus.
> 
> I get it that there is a dark side about the Columbus story that isn't in most history books.  BUT IMO, tearing down a statue is destruction of public property and should not be accepted.  If the people of Chicago talk to their aldermen and the city government decides to move the statue, that is OK.  But there needs to be a process to debate all sides and come to an agreement.
> 
> Why not more statues?   Remember Fearless Girl on Wall Street?  Adding a new statue tells a bigger, more complex, story.   Just removing statues erases the story.  

Generally, I agree with you, however in the case of the statue of Colston in Bristol (UK), the talks had been dragging on for freakin’ YEARS. Because of that, I agree with dragging the effing slaver into the drink.

tl;dr version: basically, no one would agree to remove it, even to a museum, because it was “historical,” but eventually, there was concession to a sign noting he’d been a slaver, then years later arguing over the language, all the slavery reference got muted and then gutted. The sign never happened. Somewhere on my twitter stream (around June 7, when the event occurred), I retweeted a first-hand account, but I’m too lazy to go back and look for it.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jun/07/blm-protesters-topple-statue-of-bristol-slave-trader-edward-colston

Time after time, that’s the kind of thing that happens, which is why it is so infuriating.

Deirdre
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