I firmly believe that without learning from the past we can have no real future.
Today, I heard that another statue is coming under threat. The people of Denbigh in Wales are deciding whether Henry Morton Stanley's statue should stay in place. Stanley is most famous for finding the explorer David Livingstone whom he met with the now famous words "Dr Livingstone I Presume." There are allegations that Stanley, who was actually born John Rowlands in Denbeigh and only changed his name to Stanley after emigrating to the USA and adopting the name of his benefactor, treated Africans badly.
The crux of the matter is simply whether what happened in Victorian times should be overturned by our own 21st century values? We have already seen statues being taken down in various parts of the country due to associations with the slave trade and/or racism. But what we have to remember is that these people were a product of their times. They were living in very different age and we cannot judge the way they were and the way they behaved from our own times. We cannot make decisions using today's customs and values.
How Stanley behaved doesn't instantly make him a bad person. He was, however, a figure from history - a man of his times, behaving the same as many others. Sadly I am less than enamoured by some of the people who suggest statues should be toppled. Very often they have no grasp of history and have virtually no understanding about the past. They probably think that Stanley carried laptops and mobile phones in his backpack!
These are the people that go on quiz shows and complain that they can't answer history questions because they are about things that took place before they were born.
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A couple of weeks ago I made comments about good MPs and how we don't hear enough about their good deeds and their sterling work on behalf of their constituents. Now we have the tragic death of Sir David Amess who sounds like a thoroughly good person.
Sadly what have been termed career politicians (and you know who these are) have none of the caring qualities of a David Amess who is an MP for all the right reasons.
There can be no excuse for attacking an MP but I do have to say that "dirty politics" plays a part in this kind of thing. Whilst our country is ruled by people whose intention is to snipe at and slag off opposition party members we can never go forward. They teach us that it's ok to lie, avoid answering questions, be rude and threatening.
When Jeremy Corbyn was elected leader of the Labour party we were all told that there would be a kinder look to debates in the House of Commons but it just never happened. We still have the dirtiest of dirty politics where members through sheer arrogance never admit that they have made a mistake and show little evidence of basic humanity.
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Stupid comment of the day came from Norwich City manager Daniel Farke after his team had drawn 0-0 with Brighton.
"If you don't score a goal it's very difficult to win a game," he told Radio Norfolk.
Daniel mate if you don't score a goal it's impossible to win a game (unless of course the opposition score an own goal I suppose).
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Have been watching (suffering) the latest incarnation of All Creatures Great and Small which I guess is escapism television. All these semi-period dramas seem at some point to feature a cricket match between two neighbouring villages where there is more at stake than cream teas.
Sadly All Creatures got their rules wrong. James Herriot's team were trying to hang on for a draw as wickets tumbled. Their last but one batsman was felled by a ball that wouldn't have hurt a fly.
So in came James to try to see out the last few balls and not lose his wicket. He was bowled off the last ball (he deliberately lost his wicket as part of the plot). The opposition were declared the winners. But that just wasn't so. The other team had only captured nine wickets and so the game was a draw - the injured man couldn't be deemed out and there were no balls left to bowl.
Please get it right scriptwriters.
I bet this blog gets some comments as I knwo some of the things I have said are a tad controversial.