Oxford University Succumbs To Anti-Racism Protesters’ Call For Cecil Rhodes' Statue To Fall

Oxford University’s Oriel College on June 17, 2020 expressed its desire to remove a statue of racist imperialist Cecil Rhodes from the façade of one of its buildings in downtown Oxford, hence succumbing to pressure from anti-racism protesters who have been demanding that. The protesters perceived the statue as a symbol of racism, hence relentlessly asserted the statue must fall!

Oxford’s anti-racism protests follows the barbaric torture and murder of unarmed handcuffed African American George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA, on May 25, 2020, by a racist American policeman of European descent. The murder has been condemned worldwide as a manifestation of racism against people of African descent not only in USA but worldwide, and has triggered awakening of all good people of the world to this evil, who now seem to be determined to attack all its aspects including its symbols. Accordingly, besides Oxford city, statues considered to be symbols of racism have been removed elsewhere in Britain and beyond.

For instance, on June 7, 2020 anti-racism protesters in Bristol, England, pulled down a statue of a notorious slave trader called Edward Colston and toppled it into the waters of Bristol harbor. At the same time as anti-racism protesters in London showed growing interest in the statue of another notorious slave trader and owner called Robert Milligan, the city’s authorities removed it and took it into storage.

Removal and storage by city authorities, of statues perceived by anti-racism protesters as symbols of racism, have also been reported in Belgium and USA.

On the one hand, in Belgium, a statue in Antwerp, of the racist brutal colonialist King Leopold II of Belgium who perpetrated genocide in Congo, now Democratic Republic of Congo, during the late 19th century, by which over 10 million innocent Africans were murdered in cold blood, was on early June 2020 removed and taken to storage by city authorities just when anti-racism protesters were about to launch an attack on it.

On the other hand, in USA, a statue of Christopher Columbus in San Francisco, CA, was on June 18, 2020 removed and taken to storage by city authorities that feared it could have been torn apart by angry anti-racism protesters there. Also removed and stored for similar reasons are some statues of Confederates.

While statues of racists are indeed symbols f racism, and as such “must fall”, there others symbols of racism as well. They include, among others, some TV shows, some movies, some books, and above all the controversial white and black classification of people. Coined by hardcore racists after the abolition of slavery, the classification is metaphorical, used by racists who have assigned themselves the color white despite non-existent of white human beings, to claim superiority over others, and particularly to derogate Africans and people of African descent who they have indiscriminately assigned the color black. The white and black classification of people is therefore the very essence of racism. That was evident in the former brutal apartheid system in South Africa, and currently in the thinking of the so called White Supremacists. Abolition of the white and black classification of people is therefore imperative if the ongoing endeavor by anti-racism protesters to eradicate racism in the world is to succeed. Without the white and black classification of people, racism has no conceptual framework!

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