FOUR-TIME world surfing champion Mark Richards has long been known as an influencer.
The master surfboard designer and shaper was acknowledged as such when crowned in 2013 as Australia's most influential surfer (1963-2013). In terms of contemporary influence, the mayor of Merewether's Instagram account has more than 100,000 followers and provides a case study on how to use the medium.
Richards is well aware of his place in surfing history. And there's been more than few occasions when others have suggested a statue in the Merewether precinct would provide a fitting recognition for the ages. But MR hasn't been an enthusiastic fan of such proposals.
He's not just being a woke bloke when he says that statues make ideal targets for vandals and pigeon poop.
Thanks, but no thanks.
There's a campaign for rugby league immortal Andrew Johns to have a statue erected at Turton Road. The Andrew Johns Statue Supporters Page on Facebook has about 4000 followers and the GoFundMe campaign to secure the $50,000 required for the bronze sculpture has raised almost one-tenth of its target.
Johns has the eastern stand at the football stadium named after him, but the sign is embarrassingly small and is disproportionate acknowledgement. Possibly the smallest nameplate on a big-time footy stadium anywhere.
But statues and symbols seen as racist have become subject to political protest as part of the Black Lives Matter movement. Locally, Jocko the black boy statue in Maitland's High Street is in the firing line. Golliwog sales in the main street of Morpeth might be next.
Maybe Margel Hinder's wonderful James Cook Memorial Fountain in Civic Park might be a target for renaming if most people didn't already refer to it as the Civic Park Fountain. I wasn't aware of its official name until I came across CoN's pamphlet The Artist's City.
But it's more than just statues and symbols seen as racist that are being eradicated.
The Rolf Harris sidewalk star on the Coles side of Marketown - a display modestly modelled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame - evaporated from public view when Harris was convicted in the UK for sex attacks on girls. Perhaps the shopping centre management felt leaving the Harris star on display would have made the stroll more a semi-sleazy Walk of Shame rather than a semi-cheesy Walk of Fame.
In 2017, former NSW Local Government minister Gabrielle Upton demanded Lake Macquarie City Council remove pictures of former councillors and convicted child sex offenders Milton Orkopoulos and Douglas Carley from council chambers. Upton told the Herald the council was "completely out of touch ... the portraits should be removed today". The portraits were removed from council chambers. But Upton didn't offer that scathing criticism to her own mob for refusing to remove portraits of Orkopoulos from parliament house in Sydney.
Remove, obliterate, hide. Is that the answer? There is a strong argument that pictures of smiling convicted paedophiles hanging in public buildings can cause severe distress to victims. And that is enough reason to remove them. On the other hand, a statement accompanying the picture or statue might be of use in a more complete appraisal of the figure.
"A talented artist, comedian, musician, composer and generous philanthropist. Also, a serial paedophile who abused trust, children and destroyed lives. Convicted and sent to prison for five years and nine months."
On Friday, Kurri Kurri's James Worthington expressed his dismay in the Herald's Short Takes, about the push to remove the statue of Australia's first prime minister located at Port Macquarie upon a traditional Indigenous burial site. Barton's government passed the Immigration Restriction Act, the forerunner to the White Australia policy. Barton was a key contributor to the Australian Constitution that excluded Indigenous people from discussion about a new nation to be situated on their lands and waters.
Mr Worthington wrote that "you can't change or erase history, regardless of the rights and wrongs of all".
Port Macquarie Historical Society president Clive Smith said last week that "there are too many statues to dead white men whose achievements get reviewed from time-to-time and are perhaps not as great as they were once thought to be".
You can't change past events. But the practice of historical revisionism is crucial in presenting a truth based narrative and deeper, broader understanding of people and events.
Revisiting orthodox history can, and will, challenge long-held understandings, beliefs and symbols. That can be mightily "uncomfortable" for some. For others, it's a central component in moving towards the possibility of properly addressing "the rights and wrongs of it all".
