200 WORDS ON - Statues

Statues present a flawed view of history. The great and good portrayed unlikely to have been paragons of virtue in everything they did. To become extremely wealthy often requires the use of dodgy ethical behaviours, which are then laundered retrospectively through philanthropic gestures and charity work. Remember all the statues of Jimmy Saville subsequently destroyed, someone else who hid his moral turpitude behind very public charity work. Perhaps we should exercise greater restraint in whom we immortalise in stone in public spaces. If we do so at all.

Toppling statues is highly symbolic. An expression of disdain, that provocatively edits what can be publicly lauded. Removal is one way to correct the misrepresentations of our history. We can also re-label, providing a greater breadth of information about who someone was. The scope of our history teaching can be broadened. Statues are just dumb monuments otherwise.

Westminster Abbey, a supposedly sacred building, now resembles a storage unit filled with herds of plinths and carved marble statuary. Statues should enhance a space, but there they make it cluttered. Parks are lined with commemorative bronzes to people, either no longer worthy of respect, or mostly forgotten. Historically and aesthetically statues are piss-poor representatives