Black Lives Matter protesters were right to throw slave trader Edward Colston's statue in Bristol harbour – Laura Waddell

I loved seeing slaver Edward Colston’s statue dragged to its watery grave. It felt deeply satisfying, and yes, like punishment, writes Laura Waddell

Protesters throw a statue of slave trader Edward Colston into Bristol harbour during a Black Lives Matter protest in memory of George Floyd, who was killed in police custody in the US city of Minneapolis. (Picture: Ben Birchall/PA Wire)

It’s awe-inspiring to see the wave caused by Bristol Black Lives Matter protesters who toppled the statue of 17th-century slave trader Edward Colston last weekend, tipping it into the river with a cheer. Since then, others have suddenly jumped into action to follow suit, with a degree of speed suggesting they knew all along what needed to be done but had been dragging their feet. Edinburgh Council will attach a plaque at the Melville Monument more accurately reflecting Henry Dundas’ links to the slave trade. In London, a statue of Robert Milligan was removed from West India Quay. The direct action of the protesters has shamed councils to actually act instead of just talk.

Of course, there are detractors, Boris Johnson and Keir Starmer are among those who’ve criticised the action. Some are probably law-and-order fetishists. Others are poised to resist social progress, with any change at all bringing on motion sickness. But what’s interesting is how few opponents to the protesters’ actions are willing to state for themselves that they would like a statue of a slave owner to stay. Rather, defendants distance themselves from stating their true opinion on the statue’s status by shifting their argument to impersonal ideas of democracy and debate. It’s a little like arguing for putting a frame on the wall, but being too coy to put anything in it.

Those who gesture to “mob rule” like Priti Patel did in her condemnation, decry the direct actions of protesters but ascribe a legitimacy to decision-making processes from history that they don’t necessarily deserve, attaching to them a logical superiority by virtue of just being very old, with the actions leading up to them made oblique by time. In many cases, this doesn’t hold up to scrutiny – if that wasn’t already clear from the immortalisation of slave merchants itself.

When it comes to the principle of deciding what belongs in public spaces, many statues decorating the highest plinths and choicest positions in city squares around the country were erected by small groups of the upper class with outsize power over other citizens, in times before universal suffrage. Many were erected by private financing or charitable donation. Colston is believed to have dealt, through his association with the Royal African Company and privately afterwards, in around 80,000 enslaved Africans. His sugar fortune depended on the domination of fellow human beings. In tearing down his memorial, which described him as “virtuous” and “wise”, was it “undemocratic” to undo an action which was never democratic in the first place?

Endless delay masked as ‘debate’

Defenders of momuments to slavers often float the idea of a “debate” about their fate – prioritising a hypothetical, undefined group of people who just may want to keep the statue, over those who clearly, here and now, are willing to state their own opposition to a memento of slavery. This hypothetical debate is presumed to be representative, democratic, and decisive. In reality, only some take part in such debates, typically those with a professional stake in public speaking or those who already wield cultural power. Some use their voice to call for a debate, endlessly stalling and frustrating their opponent, never actually stating their own view.

Public spaces now, when they evolve, do often involve council-led public consultations with local residents, then the redesign job is put out to tender to commercial agencies. Design doesn’t work by committee, but listening exercises, which are not binding and are often half-hearted, are typically formed of self-selecting citizens. Many more local citizens remain distanced from or unaware of the process entirely. But there can be anger when citizens are impacted by their local environments and do not feel adequately heard. I recall the backlash very recently from Garnethill citizens and small business owners who were scornful of the suggestion they had been engaged meaningfully in the rebuilding of the Glasgow Art School after being impacted by the fire.

Bureaucratic processes throughout history have by design excluded huge segments of the public and promoted the moral values, commercial motivations, and aesthetic standards of a wealthy minority. The protesters took the momentum of change into their own hands.

History is not hermetically sealed

As for the “history lesson” argument, statues to individuals were almost always erected as an honour, intended to bestow prestige. But there is no physical, moral, or legal rule that such glory will be upheld by the citizens of future generations. Just as the ramifications of the slavery of Colston’s era still reverberate in impacted communities and society at large, history didn’t just end one day. “History” is not something to be evoked to insist nothing changes. History is never hermetically sealed. It’s continually created, with this recent chapter part of the long stretch of time.

Personally, I loved seeing the Colston statue toppled and dragged along the street to its watery grave. I enjoyed seeing it thrown into the river and sinking to the bottom among the silt, where merchant boats would once have passed. It felt deeply satisfying, and yes, like punishment. Often anger is accused of invalidating the viewpoint it accompanies. But due process and raw feelings need not be opposites. One can feel strongly and personally about the right course of action. Why, when considering slavery, were we not already angry enough to throw the statues of slavers into the river?

That is what we are truly discussing here. The anger. The impact. The human cost of slavery and racism. Abstracted logical arguments which avoid looking directly can be pulled down too, but this is not really a legal or property discussion. This is not some sanitised debate detached from real world events, or a thought exercise severed from tangible action. The statue did, in fact, stand for something. It was a monument to a 17th-century man who considered his fellow human beings property.

Today’s protesters believe that black lives matter. And they’re right. All of this is about the value of life today, not the cold worth of stone and iron.

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