Some stories are just so stupid and absurd that only someone with an advanced degree could possible believe them. From The Telegraph:
‘Cancelled’, the 1804 train with supposed links to slavery
Trains could face a new kind of “cancellation”, as National Museum Wales reviews steam-powered technology over claims it was linked to the slave trade.
Richard Trevithick unveiled the first steam-powered locomotive in Wales in 1804, but National Museum Wales (NMW) displays covering his revolutionary invention face being altered as part of a process of “decolonising the collection”.
Trevithick had no links to slavery, but the museum has claimed that the steam power he harnessed helped drive an imperial British economy that was tied to the slave trade.
A replica of the Trevithick locomotive used in the first steam-powered rail journey faces being relabeled by NMW to include information on these claimed links between industrial technology and colonialism, as curators audit displays “rooted in colonialism and racism”.
A statement from the museum said: “Although there might not be direct links between the Trevithick locomotive and the slave trade, we acknowledge the reality that links to slavery are woven into the warp and weft of Welsh society.”
“Trade and colonial exploitation were embedded in Wales’ economy and society and were fundamental to Wales’ development as an industrialised nation.
“As we continue to audit the collection, we will explore how the slave trade linked and fed into the development of the steam and railway infrastructure in Wales.”
So we can’t say “steam engines” anymore with the frisson of a P.G. Wodehouse character? (Come to think of it, I expect P.G. Wodehouse must have been cancelled by now. . .)
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