Who is Cecil Rhodes and why are UK demonstrators protesting at his statue?

[LiberalArkie]

(CNN)Hundreds of protesters in Oxford took to the streets outside the famed university's Oriel College on Tuesday, to demand the removal of a statue of Cecil Rhodes.

The long-running campaign to remove the statue has been reinvigorated after the recent Black Lives Matter protests in the US following the death of George Floyd.


Anti-racism protesters in the UK previously pulled down the statue of slave trader Edward Colston in the English port city of Bristol on Monday.

Members of the Oxford crowd on Tuesday took a knee, put their fists in the air and kept silent for 8 minutes and 46 seconds, the amount of time Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin held his knee on Floyd's neck.

Snip

https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/09/uk/cecil-rhodes-protest-oxford-intl/index.html

[Cirque du So-What]

1. Down with tyrants - worldwide

Here’s hoping pooty-poot has his hands full at home. Maybe it’ll curtail some mischief-making around the world if he’s busy with protesters of his own.

[maxsolomon]

2. Are you asking this rhetorically?

Cecil Rhodes = Rhodesia = Zimbabwe.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

3. Here's why:

One of Rhodes's primary motivations in politics and business was his professed belief that the Anglo-Saxon race was, to quote his will, "the first race in the world". Under the reasoning that "the more of the world we inhabit the better it is for the human race," he advocated vigorous settler colonialism and ultimately a reformation of the British Empire so that each component would be self-governing and represented in a single parliament in London. Historian Richard A. McFarlane has described Rhodes "as integral a participant in southern African and British imperial history as George Washington or Abraham Lincoln are in their respective eras in United States history."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Rhodes

[2naSalit]

4. He had a lot to do with

the colonization of the African continent (Rhodesia), diamond mines, gratuities to education (Rhodes Scholarship)...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cecil_Rhodes

[customerserviceguy]

5. So

is it now politically incorrect to apply for a Rhodes Scholarship? And do previous recipients of this award need to apologize for accepting one?

[Sneederbunk]

6. Rachel, are you listening?

[yardwork]

7. It's always been somewhat problematic to accept Rhodes Scholarship.

They used to require recipients to say nice things about Cecil. I knew people who wouldn't apply back in the 70s for this reason.

[2naSalit]

8. +1

[customerserviceguy]

9. I remember

during the campaign for the Democratic nomination, it came out that Corey Booker was a Rhodes scholar, I wonder if he's commented on the negative aspects of Cecil Rhodes' life.

[yardwork]

10. Why would Corey Booker in particular be expected to comment?

[customerserviceguy]

11. No reason, really

I would just have thought that Rhodes scholars who became prominent might have taken the opportunity to use their notoriety to comment on the matter.