When I made my post yesterday about St Georges Day, I had not realised what Diane Abbott had written about. She had made another, huge gaffe. Now the abuse that she gets based on her skin colour and her being a woman is out of order. But the abuse she gets for her own words, that is a different thing. Here words are below, but she has apologised for them and stated that they were a draft which she had not intended to send.
"Tomiwa Owolade claims that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people all suffer from “racism” (“Racism in Britain is not a black and white issue. It’s far more complicated”, Comment). They undoubtedly experience prejudice. This is similar to racism and the two words are often used as if they are interchangeable.
It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice. But they are not all their lives subject to racism. In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus. In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote. And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships."
I understand that this was a draft, but to forget that six million Jews died due to racism in Nazi controlled Europe, let alone the antisemitism that they have faced in Britain and abroad for centuries is absurd. The Irish and Travellers face racism, though this was worse in the past in the UK. But this racism for Travellers still exists now. Looking at pre-civil rights America, yes, these groups were not subject to slavery on the levels that those from Africa experienced, nor were they required to sit at the back of the bus, but racism did exist for the Irish and Jews. I am not aware of Travellers facing racism in pre-civil rights America, but considering the understandable controversy over the joke by Jimmy Carr, to forget that Travellers were executed by the Nazi's based on their race is inexcusable.
Antisemitism exists today, in the USA and in the UK, including, sadly, in the Labour Party until recently. Action should be taken about this, and while this was a mistake, it is the level of the mistake which means stronger action needs to be taken than over the words of Angela Smith. I guess the issue is when or if should she be allowed to have the Labour Whip returned to her.
My statement pic.twitter.com/Wu2h4nNOvN
— Diane Abbott MP (@HackneyAbbott) April 23, 2023
