Not quite rising like lions out of slumber, but -
And I am really not sure that when GK Chesterton was going on about the people of England and whether they had or had not spoken yet, whether he included making direct debits to institutions one deemed worthy of support or pulling down statues or civil protest or, being on jury duty, acquitting people who did the latter, as the sort of speech acts he expected his vision of the people of England to be doing. But still.
Reasons to feel, for once, a little pride:
After rightwing attacks on rescues, UK lifeboat charity has record fundraising year: 'The Royal National Lifeboat Institution has had ‘significant’ increase in annual donations after it went to the aid of asylum seekers: Jayne George, the RNLI’s fundraising director, said that such hostility appeared to have had the opposite effect to what its architects would have wanted. “We’ve had a better response to almost everything that we’ve done in 2021. At the end of the year, we’re going to have more members, we’re going to have more cash donors and more people who give to us via direct debit,” she said.George added that the charity’s database of supporters had also grown appreciably, with the organisation now in regular contact with 300,000 people.
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BLM protesters cleared over toppling of Edward Colston statue: Rhian Graham, Milo Ponsford, Sage Willoughby and Jake Skuse found not guilty over act of public dissent during Bristol protest: Jake Skuse 33, Rhian Graham, 30, Milo Ponsford, 26, and Sage Willoughby, 22, did not dispute the roles they had played in pulling down the statue and throwing it in the River Avon during a 2020 Black Lives Matter protest but all denied criminal damage. In closing statements following the nine-day trial, the defence had urged jurors to “be on the right side of history”, saying the statue, which stood over the city for 125 years, was so indecent and potentially abusive that it constituted a crime. After just under three hours’ deliberation, a jury of six men and six women found the so-called “Colston Four” not guilty by an 11 to one majority decision at Bristol crown court on Wednesday afternoon.
How Bristol came out in support of the ‘Colston 4’; Path of resistance: a timeline of protest against Edward Colston: Key dates, from a clergyman speaking out in 1921 to the 2022 trial verdict that cleared protesters.
And a not entirely unique action by the jury, perhaps: Jurors see the bigger picture: activists who were cleared in court: Cases have included climate, environment, human rights and anti-war protests where damage to property was not denied
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And while the headline on this is scary: National Trust boss says she received death threats amid ‘woke’ row, we also note that 'There had been a “huge jump” in membership in the past few months, she said.' - i.e. just as the whole hoo-hah drummed up by the 'Restore Trust' fanatic entryists was blowing up, and I would not be at all surprised to learn that a significant proportion of those memberships, new or renewed, were motivated like mine.
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