"We've come to this place where history is viewed only entirely through the prism of the present"
Those are the words of Emma Soames, Winston Churchill's granddaughter as reported by the BBC. I call what she is talking about "moral populism". We know about "political populism", which has been associated with Brexit and Donald Trump. We now need to get used to the new reality of moral populism, where how the country thinks about itself is now based purely on who is shouting the loudest. Everything is seen through the prism not just of the present but as an opportunity to overturn existing moral consensus. The present is always better than the past.
I would suggest that the reason why this is happening is that we have no referee. In every society or field (from sports to economics) there are some basic rules than govern the rules of the game. Prinicples that help those who belong to it to accept or reject ideas. Western civilisation had such rules. There was a time in this country when people had a standard for accepting and rejecting ideas. That has long gone.
I am afraid to say that there is no point of crying over statues if one does not see the deeper the problem. The country has lost its moral referee. It has lost its Judeo-Chrsitian moral compass. The result is that the UK does not know itself anymore. It is a nation now without identity. If it has an identity, then it is "presentism". It is being deconstructed, if it has not already happened, into nothingness.
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