Black Beauty Bristol Fashion

Bristol, my old home city, you do us proud again.

I was delighted to see this story break on Channel 4 (about the only news media I have time for nowadays). I admit, the room may have been dusty as I watched the thing happen on my screen.

As a Bristolian, born and bred, I've long been aware of the darker side to the city's heritage. We walked past the same statues to commemorated past mayors, merchants, MPs and slavers, went to concerts at the Coal Snaw, drank in the Colston Arms. We normalised the history, and acknowledged the slavers of the past with a deal of white privilege complacency.

The brutal murder of George Floyd seems to have been a final straw moment for our times. The dropping of Colston's statue into the waters that floated in the slavers ships was emotional, and though the removal was technically criminal damage it only accentuated how slowly Bristol's council had acted after the years of lobbying for it to be placed as an explanatory exhibit in a museum.

I don't know how long this shiny black resin statue of Jen Reid will be allowed to remain - I'd like it to be made permanent but that's unlikely. In truth it will probably end up in the same museum alongside the broken Colston. And that's fine too. But Bristol, my babbe, you do make me smile.