Thursday 31 December 2015

Keep Rhodes Up

I have recently been covering a disturbing new trend of false historical revisionism, and the dictatorial and violent imposition of political ideals; and I've upset a few people in doing so. This trend is centred on the United States of America and has manifested in the attacks on the culture and history of the Deep South, the condemnation and removal of the Confederate Battle Flag and the defacement of Southern graves and monuments etc.
At the same time another controversy has broken out in Britain that is surprisingly similar, and it's taking place right here in the city where I live, Oxford. A campaign was begun a few months ago demanding that the statue of Cecil Rhodes be removed from the University. The ornate facade of Oriel College is one of the grandest and most prominent sights on the High Street leading eastwards through the city. In pride of place above the doorway is an alcove containing a statue of Cecil Rhodes, a British imperial expansionist and African colonial statesman from the Victorian age. Rhodes believed in the creation of a one-world government modelled on the British Empire; and when he died in 1902, he dedicated a large part of his estate towards funding Oxford scholarships for young people around the world whom he thought had "the right stuff". For the last century, Rhodes scholars have moved and shaped the Earth, see here for more details: http://hpanwo-tv.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/rhodes-house.html. The campaign to remove his statue from the Oriel entrance is because Rhodes was allegedly a "racist!" He was also one of the Empire's greatest enthusiasts. This makes him a bĂȘte noire of the political left. This political movement was started by a Keble College law student from South Africa called Ntokozo Qwabe. Ironically Mr Qwabe is himself a Rhodes scholar and he is only at Oxford at all because of the generosity of the Rhodes Mandela Trust... Talk about biting the hand that feeds you! This video outlines the case for taking down Rhodes' statue: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ysn7T5FwK0. The uploader runs an open comments box and as a resident of Oxford I felt I was entitled to give my opinion, so I posted a comment stating that I do not think Rhodes' statue should be removed, at least not in today's era. The reasons I gave were the ones I detail in the background links above and below. Within minutes somebody replied to me saying: "In other words you're a fucking fascist piece of shit!" Somebody else called me a "white supremacist!" As in the background material, I appeal to those who know me; is that an accurate and fair description?... It's clear that the campaigners are very binary and have no intention of taking part in any kind of intellectual debate on this matter. You can either support them or you are cast out as a demonized other; that's your only choice. As the presenter of the video says: "No one but than the most hardened grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan would ever defend this man..."
The presenter describes Cecil Rhodes as an "all round evil man!" From what I've seen Rhodes was quite a complicated individual. He has made several quotes that contradict his historical image such as: "I could never accept the position that we should disqualify a human being on account of his colour", a distinctly anti-racist statement; even though he did go on to say that he did consider British people superior to others. He was also a homosexual and so would have been exiled to the periphery of Victorian society himself. The British Empire also did some good as well as bad. It introduced industry into regions that had previously missed out on it, and it was instrumental in the abolition of slavery. Despite what I've said, I think Rhodes was actually not somebody we should admire and some of the things in the video I agree with; but the video presenter has no idea who Rhodes really was and what his real agenda is. When Rhodes died, his supporters wanted him to be buried in Christchurch, Oxford's cathedral, or even Westminster Abbey; but he was instead interred in an outdoor tomb on the Matopo hills in Zimbabwe. This is a sacred site for the Ndebele people who were one of the most powerful cultures in pre-colonial southern Africa. Rhodes' place of rest means that he is making a distinct statement about his true mission. The famous interview with David Icke and Credo Mutwa gives more detail: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4apWOUNOx64. There is no doubt that he was not the British imperialist that history portrays him as. Cecil Rhodes regarded the British Empire merely as a tool, as a means to an end. His will contains these words: "To and for the establishment, promotion and development of a secret society, the true aim and object whereof shall be for the extension of British rule throughout the world, the perfecting of a system of emigration from the United Kingdom, and of colonisation by British subjects of all lands where the means of livelihood are attainable by energy, labour and enterprise, and especially the occupation by British settlers of the entire Continent of Africa, the Holy Land, the Valley of the Euphrates, the Islands of Cyprus and Candia (Crete), the whole of South America, the Islands of the Pacific not heretofore possessed by Great Britain, the whole of the Malay Archipelago (Malaysia and Indonesia), the seaboard of China and Japan, the ultimate recovery of the United States of America as an integral part of the British Empire, the inauguration of a system of colonial representation in the imperial parliament which may tend to weld together the disjointed members of the Empire and, finally, the foundation of so great a Power as to render wars impossible, and promote the best interests of humanity." This is a single world government centred on Great Britain with London no doubt being the "New Jerusalem". This is no different to the goals of the other Illuminati fronts that have sought world control throughout the "Great Work of the Ages"; from Alexander the Great, to the Roman Empire, Zionism and Karl Marx. It's ironic that the video was produced by the CPGB (ML) The Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist). The presenter of the video, "The 10,000 League", has no idea what he is talking about. He is effectively saying that the British Empire was bad and so the solution is Marxism: "I'm opposed to Illuminati Front-A because it's evil! Therefore the solution is Illuminati Front-B!" At a higher level, Cecil Rhodes would regard the presenter as an ally. However, I think we should not remove the statue of Cecil Rhodes from the Oriel doorway. The #RhodesMustFall movement is not just about the statue in Oxford; it has targeted images of Cecil Rhodes all over the world. In April 2015 they succeeded in persuading the University of Cape Town in South Africa to take down the statue of Rhodes at its entrance. This was described as "decolonization". I'm opposed to this, not because I'm a supporter or Rhodes or an unconditional apologist for British imperialism, but because I think it is really a part of the colonization of the human mind. All of us are targets, whether we're black or white, men or women, gay or straight. It's a move to poison our thoughts and feelings with cultural Marxism, just like it is with the debate (or lack of it) over the Confederate flag.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Carefully written piece Ben on a sensitive subject. Like the Trotskyites are to 'Old School' Leninists the Historical Revisionists can fall due to their own prejudices and misconceptions which are aimed at what they believe to be symbols of Fascism, Racism , unaware that what they themselves represent is a unpleasant and often missguided form of left-wing-fascism, racism and discrimination. You point this fact out well but we must also likewise not throw the baby out with the bath water as they do because History has been in need of much revisionism including the so called 'Hero's' it has Eulogised. Rhodes represented the very mentality the 'Anti-Right' represent in the desire to destroy historical monuments that serve as important markers in our history (pleasant or otherwise). As history is y=up for grabs we must treat it like science viz-a-viz that new things are brought to light all the time. When these people appear to attack the rightwing, the historical Eurrocentric superiority over the rest of the 'savage' world via Judeo Christian Religion, it is not a demonstration of pure anti-racismbut just a dualistic battle between Left and Right wing Fascism. Despite peoples motives be they 'meaning well' or hateful they simply represent the very essence of missguided superiority complexes and blind wish fulfilment.

Ben Emlyn-Jones said...

Thanks, Xylomet. I did write it carefully because I know a superficial skim could make it appear I support Rhodes and his ideas. History is an odd word because it contains the words "hi" and "story". "Hi"is a shortened spelling of "high" as in "hi-fi". A synonym of "high" is "tall". So "history" becomes "tall story". ;-)