OXFORD UNIVERSITY RESPONDS TO THE BLACK REBELLION
THE FIGHT BACK HAS BEGUN AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY
This letter is a response from Oxford University to Black Students,
attending as Rhodes Scholars, who plan to remove the statue of Oxford
Benefactor, Cecil Rhodes.
Interestingly, Chris Patten (Lord Patten of Barnes), The Chancellor of
Oxford University, was on the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4 on
precisely the same topic. The Daily Telegraph headline was "Oxford
will not rewrite history". Patten commented, "Education is not
indoctrination. Our history is not a blank page on which we can write
our own version of what it should have been according to our
contemporary views and prejudices."
**********************************
"Dear Scrotty Black Students,
Cecil Rhodes's generous bequest has contributed greatly to the comfort
and wellbeing of many generations of Oxford students, A good many of
them, dare we say it, better, brighter and more deserving than you.
This does not necessarily mean we approve of everything Rhodes did in
his lifetime, but then we don't have to. Cecil Rhodes died over a
century ago. Autres temps, autres moeurs. If you don't understand
what this means, and it would not remotely surprise us if that were to
be the case, then we really think you should ask yourself the
question, "Why am I at Oxford?"
Oxford, let us remind you, is the world's second oldest extant
university. Scholars have been studying here since the 11th century
A.D. We've played a major part in the development of Western
civilization from the 12th century intellectual renaissance through
the Enlightenment and beyond. Our alumni include William of Ockham,
Roger Bacon, William Tyndale, John Donne, Sir Walter Raleigh, Erasmus,
Sir Christopher Wren, William Penn, Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), Samuel
Johnson, Robert Hooke, William Morris, Oscar Wilde, Emily Davison,
Cardinal Newman and Julie Cocks. We're a big deal. And most of the
people privileged to come and study here are conscious of what a big
deal we are. Oxford is their alma mater, their dear mother, and they
respect and revere her accordingly.
And what were your ancestors doing in that period? Living in mud
huts, mainly. Sure we'll concede you the short lived Southern African
civilization of Great Zimbabwe, but let's be brutally honest here. The
contribution of the Bantu tribes to modern civilisation has been as
near as damn it to zilch.
You'll probably say that is "racist", but it's what we here at Oxford
prefer to call "true". Perhaps the rules are different at other
universities. In fact, we know things are different at other
universities. We've watched with horror at what has been happening
across the pond at the University of Missouri, at the University of
Virginia, and even to revered “safe space” institutions like Harvard
and Yale. The #blacklivesmatter, the creeping cultural relativism and
the stifling political correctness. What Allan Bloom rightly called
"the closing of the American mind". At Oxford however, we will always
prefer facts and free, open debate to petty grievance-mongering,
identity politics and empty sloganeering. The day we cease to do so
is the day we lose the right to call ourselves the world's greatest
university.
Of course, you are perfectly within your rights to squander your time
at Oxford on silly, vexatious, single-issue political campaigns.
(Though it does make us wonder how stringent the vetting procedure is
these days for Rhodes scholarships, and even more so for Mandela
Rhodes scholarships.) We are well used to seeing undergraduates, or
in your case postgraduates, making fools of themselves. Just don't
expect us to indulge your idiocy, let alone genuflect before it. You
may be black, "BME" as the grisly modern terminology has it, but we
are colour blind. We have been educating gifted undergraduates from
our former colonies, our Empire, our Commonwealth and beyond for many
generations. We do not discriminate over sex, race, colour or creed.
We do, however, discriminate according to intellect.
That means, inter alia, that when our undergrads or postgrads come up
with fatuous ideas, we don't pat them on the back, give them a red
rosette, and say, "Oh, you're black, and you come from South Africa.
What a clever chap you are!" No! We prefer to see the quality of
those ideas tested in the crucible of public debate. That's another
key part of the Oxford intellectual tradition you see. You can argue
any damn thing you like, but you need to be able to justify it with
facts and logic. Otherwise your idea is worthless.
This ludicrous notion you have that a bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes
should be removed from Oriel College, because it is a symbol of
"institutional racism" and "white slavery". Well, even if it is,
which we dispute, so bloody what? Any undergraduate so feeble-minded
that they can't pass a bronze statue without having their "safe space"
violated really does not deserve to be here. And besides, if we were
to remove Rhodes's statue on the premise that his life wasn't
blemish-free, where would we stop? As one of our alumni, Dan Hannan,
has pointed out, Oriel's other benefactors include two kings, Edward
II and Charles I, were so awful that their subjects had them killed.
The college opposite, Christ Church, was built by a murderous,
thieving bully who killed two of his wives. Thomas Jefferson kept
slaves. Does that invalidate the US Constitution? Winston Churchill
had unenlightened views about Muslims and India. Was he then the
wrong man to lead Britain in World War II?"
Actually, we'll go further than that. Your “Rhodes Must Fall”
campaign is not merely fatuous, but ugly, vandalistic and dangerous.
We agree with Oxford historian R.W. Johnson who pointed out that what
you are trying to do here is no different from what ISIS and Al-Qaeda
have been doing to artefacts in places like Mali and Syria. You are
murdering history.
And who are you, anyway, to be lecturing Oxford University on how it
should order its affairs? Your #rhodesmustfall campaign originated in
South Africa, and was initiated by a black activist who told one of
his lecturers "whites have to be killed". One of you, Sizwe
Mpofu-Walsh, is the privileged son of a rich politician and a member
of a party whose slogan is "Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer". Another
of you, Ntokozo Qwabe, who is only in Oxford as a beneficiary of a
Rhodes scholarship, has boasted about the need for "socially conscious
black students" to "dominate white universities, and do so ruthlessly
and decisively!”
Great! That's just what Oxford University needs. Some cultural
enrichment from the land of Winnie Mandela, burning tyre necklaces, an
AIDS epidemic almost entirely the result of government indifference
and ignorance. One of the world's highest per capita murder rates,
institutionalised corruption, tribal politics, anti-white racism and a
collapsing economy. Please name which of the above items you think
will enhance the lives of the 22,000 students studying here at Oxford.
And then please explain what it is that makes your attention grabbing
campaign to remove a listed statue from an Oxford college more urgent,
more deserving than the desire of probably at least 20,000 of those
22,000 students to enjoy their time here unencumbered by the
irritation of spoilt, ungrateful little tossers on scholarships they
clearly don't merit using racial politics and cheap guilt-tripping to
ruin the life and fabric of our beloved university.
Understand us, and understand this clearly, you have everything to
learn from us. We have nothing to learn from you.
THE FIGHT BACK HAS BEGUN AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY
This letter is a response from Oxford University to Black Students,
attending as Rhodes Scholars, who plan to remove the statue of Oxford
Benefactor, Cecil Rhodes.
Interestingly, Chris Patten (Lord Patten of Barnes), The Chancellor of
Oxford University, was on the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4 on
precisely the same topic. The Daily Telegraph headline was "Oxford
will not rewrite history". Patten commented, "Education is not
indoctrination. Our history is not a blank page on which we can write
our own version of what it should have been according to our
contemporary views and prejudices."
**********************************
"Dear Scrotty Black Students,
Cecil Rhodes's generous bequest has contributed greatly to the comfort
and wellbeing of many generations of Oxford students, A good many of
them, dare we say it, better, brighter and more deserving than you.
This does not necessarily mean we approve of everything Rhodes did in
his lifetime, but then we don't have to. Cecil Rhodes died over a
century ago. Autres temps, autres moeurs. If you don't understand
what this means, and it would not remotely surprise us if that were to
be the case, then we really think you should ask yourself the
question, "Why am I at Oxford?"
Oxford, let us remind you, is the world's second oldest extant
university. Scholars have been studying here since the 11th century
A.D. We've played a major part in the development of Western
civilization from the 12th century intellectual renaissance through
the Enlightenment and beyond. Our alumni include William of Ockham,
Roger Bacon, William Tyndale, John Donne, Sir Walter Raleigh, Erasmus,
Sir Christopher Wren, William Penn, Rep. Adam Smith (D-WA), Samuel
Johnson, Robert Hooke, William Morris, Oscar Wilde, Emily Davison,
Cardinal Newman and Julie Cocks. We're a big deal. And most of the
people privileged to come and study here are conscious of what a big
deal we are. Oxford is their alma mater, their dear mother, and they
respect and revere her accordingly.
And what were your ancestors doing in that period? Living in mud
huts, mainly. Sure we'll concede you the short lived Southern African
civilization of Great Zimbabwe, but let's be brutally honest here. The
contribution of the Bantu tribes to modern civilisation has been as
near as damn it to zilch.
You'll probably say that is "racist", but it's what we here at Oxford
prefer to call "true". Perhaps the rules are different at other
universities. In fact, we know things are different at other
universities. We've watched with horror at what has been happening
across the pond at the University of Missouri, at the University of
Virginia, and even to revered “safe space” institutions like Harvard
and Yale. The #blacklivesmatter, the creeping cultural relativism and
the stifling political correctness. What Allan Bloom rightly called
"the closing of the American mind". At Oxford however, we will always
prefer facts and free, open debate to petty grievance-mongering,
identity politics and empty sloganeering. The day we cease to do so
is the day we lose the right to call ourselves the world's greatest
university.
Of course, you are perfectly within your rights to squander your time
at Oxford on silly, vexatious, single-issue political campaigns.
(Though it does make us wonder how stringent the vetting procedure is
these days for Rhodes scholarships, and even more so for Mandela
Rhodes scholarships.) We are well used to seeing undergraduates, or
in your case postgraduates, making fools of themselves. Just don't
expect us to indulge your idiocy, let alone genuflect before it. You
may be black, "BME" as the grisly modern terminology has it, but we
are colour blind. We have been educating gifted undergraduates from
our former colonies, our Empire, our Commonwealth and beyond for many
generations. We do not discriminate over sex, race, colour or creed.
We do, however, discriminate according to intellect.
That means, inter alia, that when our undergrads or postgrads come up
with fatuous ideas, we don't pat them on the back, give them a red
rosette, and say, "Oh, you're black, and you come from South Africa.
What a clever chap you are!" No! We prefer to see the quality of
those ideas tested in the crucible of public debate. That's another
key part of the Oxford intellectual tradition you see. You can argue
any damn thing you like, but you need to be able to justify it with
facts and logic. Otherwise your idea is worthless.
This ludicrous notion you have that a bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes
should be removed from Oriel College, because it is a symbol of
"institutional racism" and "white slavery". Well, even if it is,
which we dispute, so bloody what? Any undergraduate so feeble-minded
that they can't pass a bronze statue without having their "safe space"
violated really does not deserve to be here. And besides, if we were
to remove Rhodes's statue on the premise that his life wasn't
blemish-free, where would we stop? As one of our alumni, Dan Hannan,
has pointed out, Oriel's other benefactors include two kings, Edward
II and Charles I, were so awful that their subjects had them killed.
The college opposite, Christ Church, was built by a murderous,
thieving bully who killed two of his wives. Thomas Jefferson kept
slaves. Does that invalidate the US Constitution? Winston Churchill
had unenlightened views about Muslims and India. Was he then the
wrong man to lead Britain in World War II?"
Actually, we'll go further than that. Your “Rhodes Must Fall”
campaign is not merely fatuous, but ugly, vandalistic and dangerous.
We agree with Oxford historian R.W. Johnson who pointed out that what
you are trying to do here is no different from what ISIS and Al-Qaeda
have been doing to artefacts in places like Mali and Syria. You are
murdering history.
And who are you, anyway, to be lecturing Oxford University on how it
should order its affairs? Your #rhodesmustfall campaign originated in
South Africa, and was initiated by a black activist who told one of
his lecturers "whites have to be killed". One of you, Sizwe
Mpofu-Walsh, is the privileged son of a rich politician and a member
of a party whose slogan is "Kill the Boer, Kill the Farmer". Another
of you, Ntokozo Qwabe, who is only in Oxford as a beneficiary of a
Rhodes scholarship, has boasted about the need for "socially conscious
black students" to "dominate white universities, and do so ruthlessly
and decisively!”
Great! That's just what Oxford University needs. Some cultural
enrichment from the land of Winnie Mandela, burning tyre necklaces, an
AIDS epidemic almost entirely the result of government indifference
and ignorance. One of the world's highest per capita murder rates,
institutionalised corruption, tribal politics, anti-white racism and a
collapsing economy. Please name which of the above items you think
will enhance the lives of the 22,000 students studying here at Oxford.
And then please explain what it is that makes your attention grabbing
campaign to remove a listed statue from an Oxford college more urgent,
more deserving than the desire of probably at least 20,000 of those
22,000 students to enjoy their time here unencumbered by the
irritation of spoilt, ungrateful little tossers on scholarships they
clearly don't merit using racial politics and cheap guilt-tripping to
ruin the life and fabric of our beloved university.
Understand us, and understand this clearly, you have everything to
learn from us. We have nothing to learn from you.
