wo plaques commemorating a visit to a British university by King Leopold II of Belgium have been torn down after student campaigners claimed they were racist.
The 19th century monarch visited Queen Mary University of London in 1887, when he laid the foundation stone of the library.
But student protesters said the plaques were offensive to ethnic minority students because they ‘pay homage to a genocidal colonialist’ and should be removed.
They claimed this would help black students feel ‘welcomed, respected, integrated and entitled to a sense of belonging on campus’.
Campaigners lobbied the student council to take down the plaques, but members voted against it. However, it emerged yesterday that university authorities removed the memorials quietly in June ‘as part of ongoing refurbishment’.

As usual the "snowflakes" are criticised for "erasing history" which presumably means the folk who tore down monuments to Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Saddam Hussein & Gaddafi were also "erasing history".

If they want to start helping them feel welcome and integrated at uni they would be better asking the BBC why in the last three whole series of university challenge, out of the scores of contestants there has only been three black faces, despite there being plenty on universities around the country. Perhaps the programme is "hideously white" and needs a dose of quotas just like their panel shows have had.😊

Students just get worse and worse. Don't they have anything better to do, such as (gasp) studying?

People should stop being offended and behalf of statues... snowflakes.

I believe after 23 hours a day (gasp) studying they are allowed five minutes to tear down statues of racists.

Still... a statue I'll never see in a place I'll never go isn't there any more... I guess I;m just not a snowflake enough to worry about it.

These students and others who take offence if the wind is blowing in the wrong direction should get out a little more and learn about the real world
This King from Belgium is someone they object to this time, they should visit Antwerpen which is one of the most multicultural place on this earth. I think it is around 160 nationalities who happily live there together, not bad for a "colonial, racist", country

Maybe they should hop in their time machines and see Dutch colonies in 1887... to get a more contextual view.

the daily mail`s "torn down" is the university`s "quietly removed when they refurbished" and didn`t put back afterwards.

edit: i now noticed that in the op

quite right too, the guy was a complete ****

Yeah students always study ever so hard don't they?

Why are people going on about statues? These were plaques.

'Plaques quietly taken down' is certainly a less sensational title

This thread is an object lesson in how to manipulate people through hyperbole.

Okay, so a bunch of students living in the 21st Century world want to unpick something that was done almost 120 years ago. A different age, a different time, and a different world. Fine; but I think if they are to be true to their convictions then there's a lot more of this world they should be tearing down; in fact, anything that was built from the exploitation of men and the world.

Surely then nearly all historical acts of philanthropy would be rendered unacceptable to modern sensibilities? There can't be many wealthy donors who made their fortunes entirely ethically. Bye bye then to most universities, and so too an end to students who open Pandora's box, however well intensioned. A very serious lack of historical literacy on their part.

And a serious lack of actual literacy from all the people in this thread who think any students in this story tore anything down.

"Tore down"! I wonder if they write this sh*t at the Daily Mail with a wry smile, or if they do it with gritted teeth.

Daily Mail Journalists have all the morals of Lord Haw-Haw or Goebbels, and they came to a sticky end. Karma.

If anyone deserves to burn in Hell it is Leopold II. Just read about what happened in the Belgian Congo.

They probably sit there writing it whilst thinking 'jeez, somebody actually pays me to write this shit, they are a bloody mug'

So no fury, just a couple of plaques not put back after a bit of building work. The universities explanation seems perfectly reasonable:

‘The size and prominence of these inscriptions suggested a strength of association that was never the case, and as such the decision was taken to remove both from view.’

The man was a prick, fair play to not display them.

It seems that "snowflake", is 2016's "sheeple", a handy way to spot stupid opinions from people who don't read articles properly - and it's the daily mail, so it's not like there are any hard words.

There's a delicious irony in any British student, or any British person, for that matter, being offended by a colonialist.

"A plaque in the library read: ‘Foundation stone of this library was laid by his Majesty Leopold II King of the Belgians, June 25, 1887.’ Another plaque states that it was unveiled by the Belgian ambassador on behalf of the king.

Both have now been put into an archive, according to the university.

It follows a ‘Leopold Must Fall’ campaign by the institution’s Pan-African Society, demanding the plaque be moved to ‘a museum or space, preferably one dedicated to the memorialisation of the crimes of genocide, colonialism and imperialism’.

They said the plaques needed to be accompanied with a ‘commentary that addresses King Leopold’s colonial past and historical crimes’."

In any event, White Anglo-Saxons condemn many of Britain's excesses and Leopold was a nasty piece of work. I'd be happy to see them gone too.

The teams are assembled by the students themselves , nowt to do with the beeb .
Go ask the students you are championing why they don't put themselves up for the teams .

I take it that these must be (very) mature students?


Do they write it at the Daily Mail, or just copy and paste from somewhere else?

Perhaps it's taken over from 'PC Brigade' or 'political correctness gone mad'.