Next PM must reject the need to 'explain' our past

It's time to confront the woke culture warriors rewriting our history

Britain is at a tipping point. The fight back against the woke religion has often felt slow and uncoordinated, but the voices of science and enlightenment have gained ground in recent months against those of dogma and ‘feelings’. We know this because the high priests, ensconced in our universities and media, are busy deflecting even more than usual, desperately trying to pretend the ‘culture war’ is a right-wing choice. I suppose it’s true that it only becomes a war if the other side fights back. Otherwise, it’s just a massacre… which is undoubtedly what they would prefer.

Those who object to the rebranding of “history” as “the history of slavery plus maybe one or two other things if there’s room” have always been on the back foot. Boris Johnson’s government did eventually take some defensive measures, but it was too little too late, as exemplified by their Retain and Explain (or rather Retain and Shame) policy. The unresolved ‘Explain’ part is where the next battlefield will be, and the Conservatives need to get there now and occupy the high ground.

Thus far, Government policy has actually encouraged anti-British activists to rewrite history by first conceding the need to explain ourselves, and then by inviting them to do the explaining. It may have seemed expedient in the short term to stop statue removals, but, in the long term, it’s proving a disastrously masochistic act of unconditional surrender.

Plaques do not open up debate, they shut it down.

Just look at the examples so far. From Dundas in Edinburgh to Rhodes in Oxford, every plaque hammered into our historic statues has been hopelessly one-sided, offering prominence to a single, invariably race-orientated, interpretation of history. Plaques do not open up debate, they shut it down. A sure sign of democracy is that the study of its history is free and fair, with no ‘official’ narrative. But this is now under threat as activists, sponsored by left wing councils, are given free rein to inscribe their propaganda across the public realm. Their sanctioned view is unchallengeable and anyone who dares offer an alternative is immediately denounced as racist.

Institutions, desperate to indulge their desire for virtuous self-flagellation, are also becoming more creative in circumventing the rules. Thus in Oxford, All Souls College has settled on projecting virtual graffiti onto the Grade I listed statue of their benefactor to help humiliate him in perpetuity. As Robert Jackson put it:

Since they cannot Colstonise it by throwing it into a river, they have chosen to fall back on the next best thing: a “virtual” Colstonisation by which the statue remains in place while the Fellows allow their primitive instincts of hatred and destruction to wreak themselves virtually upon it by means of a permanent light-show.

And much more is to come. Liverpool is busy covering numerous street signs with plaques about slavery, while Edinburgh’s slavery review is likely to recommend a similar papering of the Athens of the North. In London, plaques are planned for the founders of Guy’s and St Thomas’s Hospitals, as well as for two statues in the Guildhall and four at Goldsmith’s University, including Drake and Nelson. Even war memorials are being ‘explained’.

When asked, the people consistently reject the need for plaques. Only 16% backed them at Goldsmiths, while others have been commissioned with as little as 2% support (the Picton Monument in Carmarthen). Plaques have become the default minimum action, even when no action is either warranted or wanted.

Plaques will only ever promote a very narrow understanding of our wonderful, complex history.

Retain and Explain clearly isn’t up to scratch and it’s vital that the next Prime Minister adopts a confident position from day one. Paying lip service to our history while trying to tread a conciliatory middle line (a la Boris Johnson) doesn’t work. Appeasement never does. The next Prime Minister must grab the culture war by the scruff of the neck, stop offering concessions to tiny groups of noisy activists, and just say no. The plaque is a blunt tool for a complex task and will only ever promote a very narrow understanding of our wonderful, complex history. It’s time for Retain and Explain to become simply Retain, full stop.