Open Letter to Tony Abbott

Dear Tony,
We read your recent letter, begging Oxford to protect a statue of your old chum, Cecil Rhodes. It was filled with what you call ‘suppositories of wisdom’.
This isn’t the first time you’ve trivialised genocide: ‘there was a holocaust of jobs under the opposition, Madame Speaker’. Just an honest mistake, of course.
But now you’ve really put your foot in it, Tony. You say removing a statue of old Cecil would lower Oxford’s standing in the world? When the University accepted you, it already did that.
Hate to break it to you, Tony, but opposing glorifications of racist mass murderers is not a ‘fashion’. In case you haven’t noticed, we’re not doing this to win a popularity contest. On the other hand, if old Cecil fell, that might look bad for your flailing political career, wouldn’t it, Tony. Very unfashionabe indeed.
Apparently fighting racism is no longer virtuous to you because ‘everybody knows it’s wrong’.

Here’s the thing, Tony: we think it’s rich of a white former Prime Minister of Australia, a country in which you’re sixteen times more likely to be incarcerated if you’re Aboriginal, to give the world lectures on racial justice. We won’t mention Australia’s own history, Tony, because that would be very, very unfashionable.
We now know why you didn’t speak up about violent police killings abroad, or the racial composition of the illegal detention centres you built at home: you’re avoiding the fashion! You’ve been avoiding fashion for a long time, Tony. Time to give it a try.
We look forward to hearing more of your opinions, now that you have a bit more time on your hands. Sorry about the whole ouster thing. Don’t worry, being removed from a high position is soon to be in fashion.
All our love,
Rhodes Must Fall in Oxford

*************
Sign our Change.org petition to remove the statue here:
http://tinyurl.com/pvtu8ll