Danny Boyle’s history lesson in British history had some glaring omissions at the London Olympic ceremony last night. Granted, it would be impossible to include everything but considering that profits from the slave ‘trade’ fuelled the industrial revolution it was worth a mention, surely?
Especially given that depictions of the industrial revolution featured so prominently in the opening ceremony. Skipping over Britain’s most shameful and bloody chapter of history – which claimed tens of millions of African’s lives and left deep generational scars and a legacy of racism that persist up to today – is nothing short of disgraceful. Let’s not forget that the exploitation and sacrifice of so many African helped build Britain’s economy to make it the worlds’ most powerful nation by the advent of colonialism.
Another example of carefully airbrushing out the Maafa (African Holocaust) from Britains’ collective conscience. It was either ignorance or deliberate amnesia.
And while I was pleased to see the Olympic ceremony include a model of the SS Windrush, and representations of the first generation of Caribbean immigrants arriving in their Zoot suits, there was nothing at all to remind us of the hardships and daily explicit racism faced by those pioneers in the late 1950s and onwards.
Tory MP Aidan Burley – he of the Nazi-themed party – tweeted that the ceremony was “multi-cultural crap”, and his sentiments and intentions were appalling. But from another perspective it was deeply disappointing. The use of many black volunteers and nurses for the performance presented a picture of Britain to the world that excluded the reality of struggle against intolerance and the existing racial disparities affecting the nation today.
Given that the show featured the Suffergettes it was a great shame that there was no recognition of the struggle for race equality. The other day a gentleman called me about an event carrying the title “should Black History Month be abolished?” Going on last nights’ offering alone, the answer has to be “no”, we need a lot more of it to foster much greater awareness of the history of black people in Britain.
No mention of slavery for the same reason no mention of the civil war, danegeld, cromwell, the black death or even the blitz. It was a pageant not a university workshop, a celebration of our common history.Theres a time & a place for the dark side & this wasnt it.
What about the tribute to 7/7 victims, Paul?
Lester. You are not the first person who has said this to me, and I disagreed with them, like I disagree with you. This was a celebration of all that was great about Britain. Whilst slavery is a historical fact, it is nothing to celebrate. I, like many people, was very impressed with the Opening Ceremony. Pleasantly surprised infact, that multi-culturalism was such a dominant theme. From the acknowledgement of the Windrush, to the many black kids in the choirs, to the mixed race family representing British family life, to Dizzie Rascal and Emile Sande performing, to Doreen Lawrence holding the Olympic flag. Come on Lester. Highlight racism where it exists, but give credit where it is due.
Hmmm… considering the Olympic bid was won on diversity they could hardly omit representations of multiculturalism, and for that I join the army of those heaping credit on them! But you know if it was a black guy organising the ceremony, it’d be done differently!
This is a fair challenge. I thought the opening ceremony was rather magnificent, especially for its diversity. But there was certainly airbrushing.
If it was a celebration the July 7 bombings shouldn’t have been included, if it was to represent what made Britain the country it is slavery should have been included given it, more than most other parts of UK history, has had the biggest impact on Britain being what it is today.
We could have celebrated that Britain was the first country to ban the slave trade and for the next 70 years ran naval patrols (with considerable loss of life) to stop slave traders.
Or on the other hand we could remember that the naval patrols were at the behest of the British slave owners who didn’t want other European nations to gain advantage over them, but continued to keep the slaves they had for many decades and increased rates of rape in order to create young slaves as the ‘supply’ had dried up. Or we could even recall the fact that the end of slavery heralded the beginning of an extremely bloody era of colonialism.