Is it just gloating by the triumphant Left? I think that the Left, notwithstanding that it still, as you point out, holds sway on economic issues, is concerned about a backlash on cultural issues and is genuinely fearful that this may result in a Farage government. Hence the obsession with finding the Far Right Bogeyman everywhere and demonising everyone to the right of Ed Davey as a neo fascist. I’d see this statue in that context.
One reason why the left constantly feels a need to drive additional stakes through the heart of neo-liberalism is that their ideal situation is one in which the percentage of public intellectuals who are neo-liberal is not just small but literally zero. That way, as they see it, none of the rising generation will be neo-liberal (since the young always acquire their views by osmosis from their elders; they never draw their own conclusions from experience). Also, the left will never have to experience the discomfort of wondering whether they are perhaps in error.
Is it just gloating by the triumphant Left? I think that the Left, notwithstanding that it still, as you point out, holds sway on economic issues, is concerned about a backlash on cultural issues and is genuinely fearful that this may result in a Farage government. Hence the obsession with finding the Far Right Bogeyman everywhere and demonising everyone to the right of Ed Davey as a neo fascist. I’d see this statue in that context.
One reason why the left constantly feels a need to drive additional stakes through the heart of neo-liberalism is that their ideal situation is one in which the percentage of public intellectuals who are neo-liberal is not just small but literally zero. That way, as they see it, none of the rising generation will be neo-liberal (since the young always acquire their views by osmosis from their elders; they never draw their own conclusions from experience). Also, the left will never have to experience the discomfort of wondering whether they are perhaps in error.