Steenkamp on statues and their place in history

Royal Roads President Philip Steenkamp’s recent video remarks on statues and their place in recording history were covered in an article in the Georgia Straight.

Here is an excerpt:

The president of Royal Roads University has posted a video on YouTube refuting claims that removing statues somehow erases history.

Philip Steenkamp's comments came before a Toronto Black Lives Matter protest today in which several statues were vandalized.

Among them was a sculpture of educator Egerton Ryerson, seen by many as the architect of the residential school system. This government policy was characterized as "cultural genocide" by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada in 2015.

“At some point, it becomes intolerable to live with the images of slave traders, genocidal kings, brutal dictators, and the architects of white supremacy," Steenkamp says in the video. "And there is a justifiable fury about honouring these figures in the public square."

A statue of Canada's first prime minister, John A. Macdonald, like the sculpture of Ryerson, was drenched in pink ink today in Toronto. The same occurred to a statue of King Edward VII.

The Royal Roads president was a historian before becoming a senior bureaucrat and later a senior administrator at SFU and UBC.

This article originally appeared in the Georgia Straight.