Nelson's Column should be torn down because the 18th Century naval hero was a "white supremacist", a writer and broadcaster has claimed. Photo / Getty Images
Nelson's Column should be torn down because the 18th Century naval hero was a "white supremacist", a writer and broadcaster has claimed. Photo / Getty Images
By Eleanor Harding, Ross Parker
Nelson's Column should be torn down because the 18th Century naval hero was a "white supremacist", a writer and broadcaster has claimed.
Afua Hirsch, a journalist for Sky News, said it is time to "look at our own landscape" following a number of campaigns to remove similar statues in the US, according to Daily Mail.
She said the monument in London's Trafalgar Square was a prime example of one which should be felled because Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson defended slavery.
Afua Hirsch, a journalist for Sky News, said it is time to "look at our own landscape" following a number of campaigns to remove similar statues in the US. Photo / Twitter
She wrote that Nelson was "what you would now call, without hesitation, a white supremacist" and that his influence hindered the progress of the slavery abolitionists.
"'While many around him were denouncing slavery, Nelson was vigorously defending it,'" she said.
"Britain's best known naval hero - so idealised that after his death in 1805 he was compared to no less than 'the God who made him' - used his seat in the House of Lords and his position of huge influence to perpetuate the tyranny, serial rape and exploitation organised by West Indian planters, some of whom he counted among his closest friends.
"It is figures like Nelson who immediately spring to mind when I hear the latest news of confederate statues being pulled down in the US."
Her piece comes following a controversial - but unsuccessful - campaign at Oxford University to tear down a statue of the Imperialist Cecil Rhodes over fears it might offend ethnic minorities.
It sparked concerns that students were trying to erase a piece of history - and led to accusations of a "snowflake generation" who are unable to deal with reality.
Yesterday, critics said it was wrong to pull down Nelson's Column because it is a "landmark of our past". Hirsch, who has Ghanaian and Jewish heritage and grew up in Wimbledon, southwest London, said there is no "equivalent site of glory" to celebrate black people's achievements of the time.
Nelson's Column, Trafalgar Square, London, England. Photo / Ross Setford
And she said it was illogical to argue against tearing down Britain's cultural heritage when our ancestors had done the same in other countries.
She added: '"We have 'moved on' from this era no more than the US has from its slavery and segregationist past.
"The difference is that America is now in the midst of frenzied debate on what to do about it, whereas Britain - in our inertia, arrogance and intellectual laziness - is not."
On Sky News yesterday, she added of Nelson: "He believed that black people were inferior, that they belong on plantations working under conditions of torture and exploitation and he used his incredible position of influence to try and prolong that situation.
"My real issue is when we remember these figures from British history we don't remember the full picture. We only remember the pro Imperial propaganda that he was a good person, that he was a hero.
"Where are the statues to people who were oppressed by people like Nelson? 'These people are as an integral part of our history as figures like Nelson but where are their monuments?"
Chris McGovern, of the Campaign for Real Education, said: "Statues and monuments provide the landmarks of our past that define our national identity whether we approve of it or not.
"They should be protected and in many cases revered. Pulling them down polarises society and leads to violence and social breakdown.
"Hadrian's Wall is a monument to Roman power that was built on slavery.
"Should we destroy the ancient identity of western civilisation? No."
