Taking The Knee

[Ram59]

Rather than ‘un-inventing’ history, I see the removal of such monuments as history in the making.[/QUOTE]

Personally, I much prefer MA's solution whereby a plaque is added to the monument, putting into context the achievements of such a person. At the same time, it would also give an indication of the attitudes of the British people at the time, rather than it being hidden away. You take away the monument and in years to come, that knowledge will disappear.

Let's look at the facts that existed at the time. Colston was a wealthy person who wasn't doing anything illegal and out of the kindness of his heart, spent money to help the people of Bristol. Will we take down Nelson Mandela's statue, if we find that he struck his children when they played up?

[ramAnag]

Rather than ‘un-inventing’ history, I see the removal of such monuments as history in the making.

Personally, I much prefer MA's solution whereby a plaque is added to the monument, putting into context the achievements of such a person. At the same time, it would also give an indication of the attitudes of the British people at the time, rather than it being hidden away. You take away the monument and in years to come, that knowledge will disappear.

Let's look at the facts that existed at the time. Colston was a wealthy person who wasn't doing anything illegal and out of the kindness of his heart, spent money to help the people of Bristol. Will we take down Nelson Mandela's statue, if we find that he struck his children when they played up?[/QUOTE]

That’s your solution Ram...fair enough. Mine is to put them in a museum where people can still learn from them.

‘Looking at the facts that existed at the time...Colston was a wealthy person who wasn’t doing anything illegal and out of the kindness of his heart, spent money to help the people of Bristol’.

The contemporary legality is largely irrelevant, just shows how immoral rules were back then, but the rest is in his ‘plus’ column.

In the minus column and ‘looking at the facts as they existed’ - both at the time and now, because they’re ‘facts’ - Colston was a wealthy person who made a great deal of such wealth from what would now be called ‘human trafficking’ and which resulted in the deaths of up to 20,000 black men, women and children.

On the road to heaven, if there is such a thing, I reckon his particular ‘minus’ outweighs his ‘plus’.

[ramAnag]

And that is the part RA refuses to acknowledge,

Absolute bollux...as usual.

Stick to what I write not what you want me to have written. Look at your O/T BBC thread and you’ll find that when Andy pointed out how the BLM movement may have been ‘hijacked’ I disassociated myself from those aims.

Tbh I still haven’t actually seen what he suggests in writing but I have no reason to disbelieve him. I continue to sympathise entirely with the original aims of BLM but want nothing to do with the rest of it. Seems the BBC have taken a similar stance...although I doubt that fits your agenda.

[Trickytreesreds]

Absolute bollux...as usual.

Stick to what I write not what you want me to have written. Look at your O/T BBC thread and you’ll find that when Andy pointed out how the BLM movement may have been ‘hijacked’ I disassociated myself from those aims.

Tbh I still haven’t actually seen what he suggests in writing but I have no reason to disbelieve him. I continue to sympathise entirely with the original aims of BLM but want nothing to do with the rest of it. Seems the BBC have taken a similar stance...although I doubt that fits your agenda.

No it fits my agenda perfectly.
I said from day one, there was more to BLM than folks realised.
I am glad folks have woken up to this fact.

Now correct me if I am wrong. But did I not agree with you with the basic aims?
What I will stand by, is that until BLM untangles itself from the political anarchists, it will continue to get folks backs up. Not riase the correct issues.
If you believe folks are just going to get down on one knee, say nothing, let them have their own way whilst this is happening. Then you're mistaken mucker.
As I asked earlier where does it end and what's right.

Seeing as you do not know anything about Motor racing/cars ( not that I'm an expert), read this.

While Mercedes have shown their support for the Black Lives Matter movement with their 2020 livery, the company - as well as some other brands associated with Lewis Hamilton - have a very chequered past...

Daimler, which owns Mercedes, admitted as far back as 1986 that it had employed 40,000 slaves from the Nazis and forced them to work under appalling conditions during the Second World War, enabling them to reap massive profits.

On Daimler's website even today, they detail their links to the Nazis, explaining that 'civilian forced labourers, prisoners of war or concentration camp detainees were loaned out to companies in exchange for money' and in 1944 almost half of their employees were from this scheme.

Hamilton, meanwhile, also has a sponsorship deal with Hugo Boss, who himself was a member of the Nazi party and supplied uniforms to the SA, SS and Hitler Youth.

Boss joined the Nazi Party in 1931, two years before Hitler came to power, and was a loyal supporter until his death in 1948.

Through the war, Hugo Boss' factory also used 140 Polish and 40 French forced workers, and have since apologised for their maltreatment.

Tommy Hilfiger are another of Hamilton's biggest sponsors, and the driver also has an entire range with the American clothing brand.

In 2019, their parent company PVH - who also own Calvin Klein - were at the centre of a report by US-based Workers Rights Consortium (WRC) that lifted the lid on the treatment of their staff in an Ethiopian sweatshop.

It was reported that workers faced verbal abuse and discrimination, all while earning as little as 12 cents per hour.

The report claimed workers in PVH supplier factories were also forced to work unpaid overtime and were docked pay for drinking water at their work stations.

PVH later said it would investigate the reports.


Now this season, Mercedes has changed it's cars colours, ditching the silver arrows, to the black arrows in answer to BLM. Hamilton and his team mate will wear black jump suits as well.
Does that satisfy you?

[ramAnag]

No it fits my agenda perfectly.

Mercedes has changed it's cars colours, ditching the silver arrows, to the black arrows in answer to BLM. Hamilton and his team mate will wear black jump suits as well.
Does that satisfy you?

Can’t quite see how. You loathe the BBC, they’re one of your pet hates and yet here they are, reacting quite properly and responsibly to what appears to be the ‘hijacking’ of the BLM movement.

I have no interest at all in what colour Mercedes F1 cars are or what colour clothing Hamilton wears, so why would it ‘satisfy’ me?
I just objected to you claiming that Lewis Hamilton owed his success to his colour and ethnicity. That was total rubbish.

[ramAnag]

More relevantly, and interestingly perhaps, the E&WCB - hardly a bunch of left wing extremists - have announced that the England cricket team will wear the BLM logo on their shirts next week.

They have said that ‘there is no place for racism in society or sport’...and added, ‘our support of that message is not an endorsement, tacit or otherwise, of any political organisation, nor the backing of any group that calls for violence or condones illegal activity.’

Joe Root has further suggested, ‘It is important to show solidarity to the black community and to raise much needed awareness around the topics of equality and justice.’

All sentiments which, to be clear, I applaud and entirely agree with.

P.S. They also plan to ‘take the knee’...though hopefully not in the face of a Shannon Gabriel bouncer.

[Ram59]

I don't think BLM has been 'highjacked' though, I've previously said that there is a lot of evidence to show that they are racist in their own comments in interviews and media publications.

Unfortunately, the Liberal minded folk have jumped on a bandwagon of support for what they think is a good cause, without seeing or wishing to see the uncomfortable truth of the organisation.

Personally, I would totally back an ALM campaign, All Lives Matter, whether they be black, white, Asian, oriental or whatever.

[Geoff Parkstone]

More relevantly, and interestingly perhaps, the E&WCB - hardly a bunch of left wing extremists - have announced that the England cricket team will wear the BLM logo on their shirts next week.

They have said that ‘there is no place for racism in society or sport’...and added, ‘our support of that message is not an endorsement, tacit or otherwise, of any political organisation, nor the backing of any group that calls for violence or condones illegal activity.’

Joe Root has further suggested, ‘It is important to show solidarity to the black community and to raise much needed awareness around the topics of equality and justice.’

All sentiments which, to be clear, I applaud and entirely agree with.

P.S. They also plan to ‘take the knee’...though hopefully not in the face of a Shannon Gabriel bouncer.

Perhaps cynically, perhaps unfairly, I wonder if they would have taken the knee had they been playing Australia, rather than the West Indies

[Andy_Faber]

I don't think BLM has been 'highjacked' though, I've previously said that there is a lot of evidence to show that they are racist in their own comments in interviews and media publications.

Unfortunately, the Liberal minded folk have jumped on a bandwagon of support for what they think is a good cause, without seeing or wishing to see the uncomfortable truth of the organisation.

Personally, I would totally back an ALM campaign, All Lives Matter, whether they be black, white, Asian, oriental or whatever.

Well put.

[Trickytreesreds]

I don't think BLM has been 'highjacked' though, I've previously said that there is a lot of evidence to show that they are racist in their own comments in interviews and media publications.

Unfortunately, the Liberal minded folk have jumped on a bandwagon of support for what they think is a good cause, without seeing or wishing to see the uncomfortable truth of the organisation.

Personally, I would totally back an ALM campaign, All Lives Matter, whether they be black, white, Asian, oriental or whatever.

Awesome 59. I'm not convinced that would apply to everyone with BLM. But its leaders have been complicit in their agenda.
Because of the sensitivity of the subject, I would agree that many have dived in head first to support it, Look before you leap comes to mind.

Talkradio discussed it yesterday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iPP27q6bMx8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sW5PKMQ0a5M