History suggests that the disillusioned and the disaffected do not readily take to the streets nor man the barricades to defend a system that failed to defend them.
David OlusogaRead
Public buildings, built from the rates and taxes paid by past generations, are being auctioned off by impoverished councils who need the money to pay the redundancies of workers they can no longer afford to employ. Many of these grand Victorian buildings will be turned into flats that most people will never be able to afford.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects the troubling reality of public heritage being sold to address financial crises caused by austerity measures.
In this quote, David Olusoga discusses the irony and tragedy of public buildings, which were funded by the taxes of previous generations, being auctioned off due to the financial struggles of local councils. This situation highlights the impact of austerity on public resources and the transformation of historic sites into private developments, thereby diminishing the cultural and communal value they once held, often making them inaccessible to the very citizens who contributed to their creation and maintenance.
Themes
Public BuildingsCouncilsTaxesHeritageAusterityCommunityAffordabilityProperty
In practice
Example use cases
During a community meeting about local heritage preservation.
More from David Olusoga
All quotes →No matter that you're a British citizen, no matter that you were born here - your skin colour means you do not have the same rights as others to express critical opinions about your own country.
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Black history is a series of missing chapters from British history. I'm trying to put those bits back in.
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We nonchalantly expect that next year's smartphone will be faster and better than this year's, yet we struggle to imagine that society and our lives could progress at anything like the pace at which technology advances and we meekly accept it when things go backwards.
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Our national history cannot be national if, in the near future, one in three young adults feels their stories remain untold, if this country's long global history of empire and interconnections is marginalised and if the historical reality of race is rendered almost invisible.
David OlusogaRead
Racism is a belief system. It was assembled over centuries from many component parts - bits of biblical scripture, the propaganda of the slave-owning lobby and the pseudo-science of academics working in universities in Europe and America.
David OlusogaRead
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