The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #162670   Message #3873373
Posted By: Steve Shaw
23-Aug-17 - 07:02 PM
Thread Name: BS:Statues-Are we any better than ISIS or al-Qaeda
Subject: RE: BS:Statues-Are we any better than ISIS or al-Qaeda
Censorship is such a loaded word. It can be tossed around all too easily by scoundrels who want their hate speech or hate-iconography to remain immune from their adversaries' criticism (people who they'd quite likely characterise as "politically correct" or as "soft liberal lefties," etc.). Censorship is the authoritarian, arbitrary removal from public gaze of material that someone (probably no more qualified to do so than you or me) has decided may "deprave and corrupt" or, to be less kind, that might make them turn against their masters. There is nothing authoritarian about campaigning for the removal of statues offensive to a lot of people. In fact, there may well be an authoritarian angle to the attitude of the people who decided, divisively, to put up those statues in the first place and who argue on ideological grounds that they should remain in place. Democracy and common decency demand compromise. Put the damn things in theme parks or museums.