Protesting in Bristol: a toppling of Britain’s grim past

Marching through the centre of Bristol on Sunday, as part of one of the many Black Lives Matter protests happening around the UK this week, there was a palpable sense of defiance in the air – a cloak of mettle on the 10,000 participants who came together to speak, listen, educate, support and resist. Speakers and poets asserted the need for collective action against centuries of ingrained injustice, reflecting on stories from across backgrounds and generations to decry the complex system of racism that took root centuries ago and has perpetuated hate and ignorance ever since. In alignment with recent events in America, protestors took to their knees for a silence of 8 minutes and 46 seconds, to honour George Floyd before the march.

 

Snaking through the streets of Bristol past dark shopfronts and restaurants that are usually teeming with punters, the march brought a city halted by the pandemic back to life. Bristol is a beautiful city, awash with creativity, innovation and diversity, and is renowned for its impressive sustainability initiatives, architecture and vibrant food scene, as well as being a long-revered centre of musical genius. Its history, however, has its roots in a much darker past. Unbeknownst to many until yesterday’s march, Bristol was built on wealth accrued in the slave trade by the Royal African Company – a company estimated to have transported around 100,000 African men, women and children between West Africa and the Americas. At the forefront of the company stood Edward Colston, a man responsible for nearly 20,000 deaths and the cruel subjugation of tens of thousands more. Bodies from his ships crossing the Middle Passage were discarded like waste into the Atlantic, their lives and stories saturated in the depths of the ocean whilst Bristol’s status as an international port burgeoned and the city saw new investment, constructing its famous parks, squares and buildings with the money earned from years of amorality.

 

Certainly, Colston was not solely responsible for Bristol’s dishonourable past, but the ubiquity with which his legacy is preserved through Bristol to this day is indicative of Britain’s reluctance to acknowledge its complicity in the slave trade.

For this reason, his toppled statue is much more than an isolated act of protest; it exemplifies the immensity of the Black Lives Matter movement across the globe and moves to shatter ingrained misconceptions about the virtuosity of the British Empire. The public have campaigned for years against the shadow Colston casts over the city; his name has been on street corners and schools, buildings and music halls. In the past few hours, Colston Hall, Bristol’s top music venue, has committed to its pledge to be renamed, in a move that typifies the power of resistance. Bristol’s own Massive Attack pledged that they wouldn’t perform at the venue until it was renamed, and have applauded the statue’s removal online, tweeting ‘the elevation of a slave trader clashed badly with our civic identity. A philanthropy derived from crimes against humanity is as hollow as the statue itself’.

 

As the event makes headlines, so do the dozens of other statues around the UK that extol the imperialist white man for war crimes and slave ownership – one need only look to the memorialisation of Churchill, Rhodes, and Nelson to see how desperately Britain clings to jingoism as a marker of virtue.

“Tearing it down has created more discourse than the statue itself ever could, by exposing Britain’s ghastly past and creating a better future.”

But enough is enough. The eruption of the crowd into cries of joy as Colston’s effigy fell highlights the strength of the revolution that urgently seeks the end of a race war that has denigrated and marginalised the Black community for over 400 years. Such an event sits precariously close to being romanticised, but it truly felt like an emblem of change that the establishment simply cannot ignore. Tearing it down has created more discourse than the statue itself ever could, by exposing Britain’s ghastly past and creating a better future.

As the media is flooded with accusations of ‘violence’ and ‘thuggery’ against the Bristolians, it is crucial that the protest is remembered as it really happened: a phenomenal demonstration of activism centred around Black voices.

Bristol’s protest was a place of community and benevolence, but no one wants to have to attend another.

Florence Herlihy

Featured image courtesy of Charlie Miller.