Bristol University has axed the National Anthem from its graduation ceremonies with some students claiming it is “old-fashioned” and “offensive to some”. The Mail has the story.
The anthem has not been played since last year’s ceremony with the university saying it regularly updates its graduation ceremonies.
God Save The King will now only be played when a member of the Royal Family is present.
Some students at the 147-year-old university have suggested the National Anthem was culled because it is “irrelevant”, “old-fashioned” or might even be “offensive to some”.
It comes just weeks after the university vowed to remove slave trader Edward Colston’s emblem from its logo, after his statue was toppled during a Black Lives Matter protest in the city in June 2020.
Layla Daynes, 21, told the Sun: “The monarchy isn’t really relevant to my generation, so it wouldn’t be missed.”
Free Speech Union director Toby Young asked: “Why are Britain’s most prestigious universities openly contemptuous of the country’s history and heritage?”
Worth reading in full.
If the point of multiculturalism – which many of the university bosses who make these decisions would swear by – is that we are supposed to be united as a nation despite sometimes massive differences in cultural outlook, how is axing the National Anthem – a prominent symbol of our nation as one people that transcends our differences – supposed to help with that? The suspicion must be that decisions like this are motivated primarily by hatred of country and its history than any honourable motive. Sidelining the National Anthem makes little sense even for the adherents of the multicultural creed – unless the point is just to do Britain down for its supposed ‘systemic racism’ and historic ‘colonialism’.
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