When it comes to removing controversial statues, where do we draw the line?

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The Confederate statue of General Robert E Lee has been the focus of protests in Charlottesville (AP)

Having travelled the world for a large chunk of my life, working closely and amicably with people of all different races and religions, and being in a happy mixed-race marriage for almost a half century, I am appalled by recent acts of bigotry that are the focus of so much media attention. I’m also very puzzled that some segments of present day society think it necessary to remove all historical names from streets, buildings, plaques and statues, because they have become offensive in representing a completely different attitude towards coexistence from what we have today.

Some of Donald Trump’s tactless comments caused more media uproar and condemnation than did the plans to remove the statue of General Robert E Lee in Virginia, but the President made a valid point about George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Both those presidents were slave owners, as were so many landed gentry and merchants in many parts of the world at that time. There seems to be a headlong rush to obliterate certain historical names from buildings, streets, statues, etc, like those in Canada who mistreated Indigenous populations, and we have to wonder where will it all end?

Remember that the Church Of England was one of the biggest slave owners in some West Indian islands. Those who toiled on the sugar plantations the church owned in Barbados had the word “Society” branded on their skin. This stood for “The honourable and reverent society for the propagation of the gospel in foreign parts”. It was the missionary arm of the Anglican Church, which only relinquished slave-holdings when the UK Slavery Abolition Act was passed in 1833. All slave owners were compensated by the government of the day, with the Church of England receiving the princely sum of almost £9,000, a fortune at the time.

The Roman Catholic Church history is equally gruesome regarding slavery and other decidedly ungodly treatment of mankind, and Christianity is not the only religion bearing similar terrible blemishes. In this age of demanding politically correct removal of names, plaques, statues, maybe certain places of worship should be shuttered or demolished in recrimination for what happened throughout history. George Santayana said: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”, but he didn’t suggest that we obliterate history.

Bernie Smith
Parksville, Canada

The “Muslim problem” is not dissimilar from the way Chinese immigrants were treated

While Sean O’Grady’s piece draws parallels between Trevor Kavanagh’s column on the “Muslim Problem” with Nazi propaganda regarding the Jews, I feel that there are also some parallels between The Sun’s depiction of Britain’s Muslims and the vilification of the Chinese community during the “Yellow Peril” of the 19th and 20th centuries.

Many of the depictions of China from this era are eerily similar to how Muslims are depicted today, with fears over Muslim migration turning Europe into an Islamic entity appearing to be similar to the “Yellow Tide” used to depict Chinese migrant labour in the nineteenth century.

At the same time, both of these depictions owed more to fear and fantasy rather than having any strong factual basis. While the issue of Islamic extremism is real, its overall depiction in the likes of The Sun isn’t any more real than the fears over Chinese plots during the days of Sax Rohmer. What was real is the victimisation of these communities by those who believed these claims. Both also appear to have been utilised to justify the foreign policies of the day, whether it be European imperialism in China during the Boxer Rebellion or the current interventions in the Middle East during the War on Terror which were ultimately fighting a phantom enemy in this regard.

Tom Harper
Address supplied

Our unfair economic system, not Trump, is pushing us to nuclear war

We live under an economic system that is pushing us closer and closer to nuclear war. It isn’t about who is president. Nearly every president since Truman has considered using nuclear weapons in war – Eisenhower on North Korea, Kennedy on the Soviet Union, Johnson on North Vietnam, and apparently Nixon considered using nuclear weapons on four different occasions. It isn’t about electing into office the right candidate.

The political system isn’t designed to allow rational thinking people to hold top office as the economic system we live under is irrational and there are filters in place to guarantee that those at the top of all institutional bodies champion the status quo. Our economic system may be providing the top 20 per cent of the world’s population with a comfortable lifestyle and the top one per cent with an opulent lifestyle but this is at the expense of the 80 per cent living on less than $10 per day (World Bank Development Indicators 2008).

And more significantly, it’s at the expense of our global environment which is being devastated to the point of collapse. We need to educate ourselves to the point where we see these problems as being systemic and to organise together to create a better society and a more equitable economic order – maybe one that has never been tried before on a large scale. How can we accept that our present system is the best possible system when the world has come to the brink of nuclear war so many times in the past and that at present we are close to nuclear war (and consequently nuclear annihilation) due to our confrontation with North Korea?

As always it is time to discontinue the trivia we fill our lives with and to become responsible citizens and collectively build a better society – one which is peaceful, fair, inclusive, and progressive.

Louis Shawcross
Northern Ireland

May needs to realise she won’t get her way on Northern Ireland

“There should be no physical border infrastructure of any kind on either side of the border between Northern Ireland and Ireland,” Ms May added. ”I want people to be absolutely clear: the UK does not want to see border posts for any purpose.” (Brexit: Northern Irish will still get EU citizens’ rights, Government reveals, 16 August).

The Government has begun to reveal its master-plan for Brexit, consisting of a wishlist stated as if whatever May “wants” will come to pass.

The two alternatives for dealing with what I see as the intractable problem of retaining a hassle/tariff free border between Northern and southern Ireland are not going to be accepted by the EU. Brexit will see Irish relations put back to the pre Good Friday Agreement state, imperilling the relative calm of today.

But if either of the fatuous “systems” were to be accepted by the EU (impossible) then cross border trade in Ireland would monopolise all trade between the EU and the UK. Cloud-cuckoo land rules.

Eddie Dougall
Walsham le Willows

Theresa May’s lack of condemnation is hypocritical

Remember back in June when Theresa May said Britain was “too tolerant of extremism”?

Her refusal to condemn Donald Trump’s defence of neo-Nazis proves that she – for one – is guilty as charged.

Sasha Simic
London N16

Despite the Bank of England’s decision, I shan’t be using the animal fat £5 note

I see the jokes about the polymer notes have begun – people who object to the new polymer bank notes should send them to those who don’t mind. So predictable. The fact remains that large chunks of the population don’t want these animal fat notes.

We have as much right to be treated as fairly as anyone else, and not in this cavalier fashion by the Bank of England. This has all been so unnecessary. I will not touch these yucky notes, but demand coins – and that’s not going to go down well in banks and shops, is it.

Sue Berry
Preston