When were you last inspired by a British politician?

[monkers]

Abbott's letter was undeniably pretty dire, even to those of us who like and admire Abbott and defend her right to voice opinions about race and racism without being tone-policed by idiots like Baddiel and piled on by various architects of our own Hostile Environment. You'd have thought that writing a letter to the editor, with some likelihood of it being published on account of who you are, was the sort of context in which you might choose your words with care. Nevertheless it's quite obviously not the only context that matters here. Others include Abbott's status as the nation's most racially-abused mainstream politician, the absolute gall of Starmer's overtly racist Labour party in assuming any authority to adjudicate on such matters, weaponization of anti-Semitism in the Labour Right's war on the Left and the authoritarianism that it has ushered in, the content of the article she was responding to (has anyone even mentioned that?) and Owolade's output more generally and its rather subtle pushback against growing anti-racist consciousness.

Good post ... now for the inevitable 'however' ...

I actually haven't seen Owalade's comment that she was responding to, and maybe I should visit that. However, I remember seeing Whoopi Goldberg on British TV not so long ago asserting that 'anti-Semitism is not racism because it's white on white'. I face-palmed then. That incident drew plenty of media attention and rightly so. Abbott pretty much repeated the mistake, which I feel was astonishing. Owolade's comment may be one context, it isn't the only context.

We become the sum of our experiences. Abbott's experience of abuse has been relentless from mostly white men ranting towards her, a black woman - that hurt and vulnerability is going to place her thoughts firmly to the front of her mind. Some might say it became an easy mistake to make, and perhaps it was, but it has proven a politically damaging one, and one she should have been alert to.

 

[theclaud]

Good post ... now for the inevitable 'however' ...

I actually haven't seen Owalade's comment that she was responding to, and maybe I should visit that. However, I remember seeing Whoopi Goldberg on British TV not so long ago asserting that 'anti-Semitism is not racism because it's white on white'. I face-palmed then. That incident drew plenty of media attention and rightly so. Abbott pretty much repeated the mistake, which I feel was astonishing. Owolade's comment may be one context, it isn't the only context.

We become the sum of our experiences. Abbott's experience of abuse has been relentless from mostly white men ranting towards her, a black woman - that hurt and vulnerability is going to place her thoughts firmly to the front of her mind. Some might say it became an easy mistake to make, and perhaps it was, but it has proven a politically damaging one, and one she should have been alert to.

I think that anti-Semitism is a form of racism - as is prejudice against GRT and Irish people - and that Abbott's parallel with redheads is (probably unintentionally) trivialising. However Black people sometimes need or want to talk about the ways in which anti-Blackness is distinct from other sorts of racism, and not about the things it has in common with them. That's OK with me, especially in the context of the Labour party ignoring racism against black people, Arabs, and Muslims.

 

[theclaud]

Obviously in the rush to reduce public discourse to Pale Rider / Craig / Spen / Dutch Cyclist levels, and the glee people like this feel at having their hostility to Abbott validated, the point about GRT people is going to slide quietly into the background while Tory and Labour politicians compete to abuse their local Traveller populations for electoral gain. Edifying stuff.

 

[monkers]

I think that anti-Semitism is a form of racism - as is prejudice against GRT and Irish people - and that Abbott's parallel with redheads is (probably unintentionally) trivialising. However Black people sometimes need or want to talk about the ways in which anti-Blackness is distinct from other sorts of racism, and not about the things it has in common with them. That's OK with me, especially in the context of the Labour party ignoring racism against black people, Arabs, and Muslims.

I sure wasn't suggesting that you thought that anti-Semitism isn't a form of racism, and I apologise if you read it that way. Two strands of thought about the last part. The biggest criticism of the Labour Party as a whole, and of Corbyn as an individual was concerned with anti-Semitism, and secondary to that, Starmer married a Jewish woman, meaning that Starmer has greater emotional investment in anti-Semitism than other forms of racism? This with this near impossibility of being able to criticize the leaders of the state of Israel without false accusations of anti-Semetism is problematic. The disagreement between Margolyes and Baddiel on this point was revealing.

 

[theclaud]

Oh, and the answer to the OP is Ken Livingstone, obvs. And Matthew Brown for The Preston Model. I'm a card-carrying Corbynista, but having been to rallies and listened to several of his speeches, 'inspiring' is a bit of a stretch.

 

[monkers]

Nobody has mentioned Zara Sultana yet. I think she has the potential to attract young voters to the Labour Party. I think she is yet to come to prominence, but I'm hoping to see her rise in the party.

I wouldn't call this 'great oratory' in the classical sense, but it was rousing ...

View: https://youtu.be/xSgaiEKIrT8

 

[Ian H]

How many jewish people do you meet at the supermarket who look like that? Or rather, how many people do you see in the supermarket who you can tell they are jewish?

There's a long history of Jewish people trying to 'fit in' in order to avoid anything from discrimination to arrest to death.

 

[icowden]

Abbott's letter was undeniably pretty dire, even to those of us who like and admire Abbott and defend her right to voice opinions about race and racism without being tone-policed by idiots like Baddiel and piled on by various architects of our own Hostile Environment.

The thing is that Abbott has history of only really thinking about racism as being towards black people. And to be fair, they do tend to be the group that suffers from it most in this country.

And like or loathe Baddiel I think he makes some good points - such as this one:-

Well, there are lots of answers. But the basic one, underpinning all others, is that Jews are the only objects of racism who are imagined – by the racists – as both low and high status. Jews are stereotyped, by the racists, in all the same ways that other minorities are – as lying, thieving, dirty, vile, stinking – but also as moneyed, privileged, powerful and secretly in control of the world. Jews are somehow both sub-human and humanity’s secret masters. And it’s this racist mythology that’s in the air when the left pause before putting Jews into their sacred circle. Because all the people in the sacred circle are oppressed. And if you believe, even a little bit, that Jews are moneyed, privileged, powerful and secretly in control of the world … well, you can’t put them into the sacred circle of the oppressed. Some might even say they belong in the damned circle of the oppressors.

and also

Significantly, one of the things that marks Jewishness out as different from other ethnicities is that it can be hidden. One of the many contradictory beliefs held by anti-Semites is that Jews are incredibly, obviously Jewish – because they all have big noses and swarthy skin and dark hair and are fattened up with their own greed – and simultaneously difficult to spot, which is what allows them to get under the radar of non-Jews and work their despicable secret doings. This is why the Nazis were able to have cartoons of Jews that depicted them in a very recognisable, uniformly grotesque manner – big noses, swarthy skin, dark hair, fattened with their own greed – but also extensive and complex checks for spotting Jews. And, of course, the requirement of Jews to wear armbands that identified them as Jews.

 

[monkers]

Genuine question here, how does Baddiel look jewish rather than say, arab?

I see people are shying away from this question, and I can see why. So I'll be bold and give you a personal perception of what I see and hear often in the faces and voices of Jewish people that is a tell; white people with a look and air of vulnerability.

 

[winjim]

Without condoning her letter -

View: https://twitter.com/ToryFibs/status/1650402150118305793?t=r1VEiC91_13Ot3SqeEt_4g&s=19

Abbott's letter was undeniably pretty dire, even to those of us who like and admire Abbott and defend her right to voice opinions about race and racism without being tone-policed by idiots like Baddiel and piled on by various architects of our own Hostile Environment. You'd have thought that writing a letter to the editor, with some likelihood of it being published on account of who you are, was the sort of context in which you might choose your words with care. Nevertheless it's quite obviously not the only context that matters here. Others include Abbott's status as the nation's most racially-abused mainstream politician, the absolute gall of Starmer's overtly racist Labour party in assuming any authority to adjudicate on such matters, weaponization of anti-Semitism in the Labour Right's war on the Left and the authoritarianism that it has ushered in, the content of the article she was responding to (has anyone even mentioned that?) and Owolade's output more generally and its rather subtle pushback against growing anti-racist consciousness.

I absolutely don't want to minimise the extent of the racism that Abbott herself has been subject to. In my first post on the topic I also aconowledged that her perceptions of racism would be different to mine. In fact it's precisely because the topic is so complex, nuanced and emotional that a two paragraph letter is probably the wrong medium to use to enter the discussion. I wonder if she could have contacted the Guardian with a view to writing a more substantial piece.

At the end of the day, regardless of the complications around the subject, I'm trying to hold her to the standards I would expect from a Home Secretary, which is what she would be if I'd had my way at the last election. What would we think had it been Patel or Braverman, both of course ethnic minority women?

 

[monkers]

And like or loathe Baddiel I think he makes some good points - such as this one:-

Well, there are lots of answers. But the basic one, underpinning all others, is that Jews are the only objects of racism who are imagined – by the racists – as both low and high status. Jews are stereotyped, by the racists, in all the same ways that other minorities are – as lying, thieving, dirty, vile, stinking – but also as moneyed, privileged, powerful and secretly in control of the world. Jews are somehow both sub-human and humanity’s secret masters. And it’s this racist mythology that’s in the air when the left pause before putting Jews into their sacred circle. Because all the people in the sacred circle are oppressed. And if you believe, even a little bit, that Jews are moneyed, privileged, powerful and secretly in control of the world … well, you can’t put them into the sacred circle of the oppressed. Some might even say they belong in the damned circle of the oppressors.

Well that looks persuasive, but then I remember that lying, thieving, and stinking are also often uses prefixes to 'Arab' as well as 'Jew' in this country. So that isn't quite as true as presented.

Also in regard to high and low status, I think he misses the point. They are seen by bigots to be all low status, it's just that the rich ones are seen to be undeserving of their wealth because they are perceived as low status. In other words, all low status. They deserve to be poor and do not deserve to be rich.

I've heard the same applied to Indian people. There is an expression I've often heard levied on Indian people 'Jews of the East'. Such is the structural racism in our country.

 

[winjim]

Genuine question here, how does Baddiel look jewish rather than say, arab?

There is more genetic diversity within the continent of Africa than in the rest of the world combined.

 

[theclaud]

I sure wasn't suggesting that you thought that anti-Semitism isn't a form of racism, and I apologise if you read it that way. Two strands of thought about the last part. The biggest criticism of the Labour Party as a whole, and of Corbyn as an individual was concerned with anti-Semitism, and secondary to that, Starmer married a Jewish woman, meaning that Starmer has greater emotional investment in anti-Semitism than other forms of racism? This with this near impossibility of being able to criticize the leaders of the state of Israel without false accusations of anti-Semetism is problematic. The disagreement between Margolyes and Baddiel on this point was revealing.

No apology necessary. I didn't actually know that Starmer's wife was Jewish, but I can't say I've witnessed any evidence of emotional investment in anything except anti-Corbynism. And anyway, I'd make a similar point to winjim's above - that he's the actual Leader of the Opposition and he's determinedly ignoring a report by a distinguished black KC into the racism and factionalism of his party, as well as throwing left-wing Jews out of the party having proscribed support of Palestinians or opposition to the Israeli occupation. I think Baddiel has shown himself to be a useful idiot with an inflated sense of status as some kind of public intellectual. He's probably still pissed off because Rob Newton is the smarter, funnier one. I know the blackface thing is a long time ago, and if he weren't so grudging and belated in his acknowledgement of it, he'd be cut a bit more slack, but he's just one of many people now piling in on Abbott who, given their own past or current credentials, need to Sit the Fuck Down.

 

[theclaud]

I absolutely don't want to minimise the extent of the racism that Abbott herself has been subject to. In my first post on the topic I also aconowledged that her perceptions of racism would be different to mine. In fact it's precisely because the topic is so complex, nuanced and emotional that a two paragraph letter is probably the wrong medium to use to enter the discussion. I wonder if she could have contacted the Guardian with a view to writing a more substantial piece.

At the end of the day, regardless of the complications around the subject, I'm trying to hold her to the standards I would expect from a Home Secretary, which is what she would be if I'd had my way at the last election. What would we think had it been Patel or Braverman, both of course ethnic minority women?

I get that, but I don't think it's fair, given that quite a lot has happened since she had any prospect of actually holding that office, including being abused within her own party.

I'd prefer to see the current Shadow Home Secretary held to some basic standards of anti-racism.

 

[monkers]

No apology necessary. I didn't actually know that Starmer's wife was Jewish, but I can't say I've witnessed any evidence of emotional investment in anything except anti-Corbynism. And anyway, I'd make a similar point to winjim's above - that he's the actual Leader of the Opposition and he's determinedly ignoring a report by a distinguished black KC into the racism and factionalism of his party, as well as throwing left-wing Jews out of the party having proscribed support of Palestinians or opposition to the Israeli occupation. I think Baddiel has shown himself to be a useful idiot with an inflated sense of status as some kind of public intellectual. He's probably still pissed off because Rob Newton is the smarter, funnier one. I know the blackface thing is a long time ago, and if he weren't so grudging and belated in his acknowledgement of it, he'd be cut a bit more slack, but he's just one of many people now piling in on Abbott who, given their own past or current credentials, need to Sit the Fuck Down.

I agree on Baddiel. He has used the word 'pikey' in reference to another racial group also. I alluded to something in an earlier post. This might prove to be bold but I'm going to say it, because Baddiel is making the same mistake (IMHO).

I believe that the Holocaust was as real and as horrific as anybody else, and because of this I think that Jewish ownership of the word 'Holocaust' is wrong-footed. Among the people who were murdered were, Roma people (called Pikies) by Baddiel. Also murdered were black people, disabled people, free masons, trade unionists, gay people, physically disabled people, people with learning difficulties,'asocials'. prisoners of war. I hope I haven't missed a group because otherwise I'm 'doing a Baddiel'. His complaint is 'exclusion' and the compaint is valid, yet the other groups are rarely mentioned, or at least not so nearly as much, as Jewish people. I can't help it, it niggles me.