How do we think about taking down controversial statues in the UK?

The controversial statues represent UK history inaccurately

Question: How do we think about taking down controversial statues in the UK?
Position1 of 3›: We have every right to take the statues down
Argument‹10 of 11›: The controversial statues represent UK history inaccurately

Statues misrepresent the past, and are dangerous because of this.

The argument

Individuals have every right to remove historical statues as said statues represent history inaccurately and ineffectively. Statues and other commemorative forms representing individuals are often created in honoring, supporting, or reflecting a legacy. However, if this representation does not include a comprehensive look and understanding of that individual, it is misrepresented. Statues are fundamentally public, and so by not conveying the full story the public is being misinformed. Therefore, the public is within their right to remove misinformation from the public sphere. For example, in the case of the now infamous statue of Edward Colston in Bristol, his full history was not successfully conveyed by his statue. Colston undoubtedly brought great wealth and renown to Bristol through his work as a merchant, philanthropist, and Member of Parliament. These contributions to society appear to have merited his celebration in the city. However, by not detailing his extensive involvement in the Atlantic slave trade and active support for black human suffering, the statue becomes involved in misinformation. The city of Bristol attempted to remedy this with additional plaques, but one cannot rebuild public memory and awareness, prompting the need for its removal.

Premises

[P1]Statues honour a legacy, but because they are fundamentally public and cannot convey a figure's full story, one that omits key facts misinforms the public. [P2] Bristol's statue of Edward Colston celebrated his work as merchant, philanthropist, and MP while omitting his deep involvement in the Atlantic slave trade, and added plaques could not rebuild public memory — showing such statues spread misinformation. [C] Because the public has the right to remove misinformation from the public sphere, we have every right to take the statues down.

Counter-arguments

To remove the statues entirely also represents history inaccurately. By removing celebratory statues and markers, and pretending they were never erected in the first place, protestors are attempting to rewrite rather than reroute historical narrative. Such action can become dangerous in the future, as the possibility to remove anything displeasing in history may result in vast historical inaccuracies.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] The premise proves too much. No memorial conveys a full story, so a criterion of omission would condemn every statue, plaque and street name, including those commemorating figures the argument would not touch. It also treats a monument as a source of information when its function is commemorative — which is why the objection to Colston is usually about honour rather than accuracy. [Rejecting P2] The Colston case is well chosen and the reasoning around it is not. That the original inscription omitted the slave trade is a fact about the inscription; the claim that added plaques "could not rebuild public memory" is asserted, and in Bristol the dispute over new wording ran for years without ever being tested. Calling the statue misinformation also understates the objection, which was that a man enriched by trafficking enslaved people was being honoured in a public square. [Rejecting C] The conclusion rests the right to remove on a right to remove misinformation, which would place the decision with whoever judges a commemoration inaccurate. The stronger ground the argument passes over is that public monuments are public property, and what a community chooses to honour is for that community to decide — as it did, by council vote, over what replaced this statue.