Anti-Racism

The European Network for Solidarity with Ukraine delegation which visited Lviv on 3-7 May heard from feminist activists and campaigns for women’s rights. The war has had a profound effect on women’s lives. Sexual violence has been used as a weapon of war by the invading Russian forces, creating enormous suffering and trauma. The ability for women to access abortion is far from guaranteed. Though abortion is legal in Ukraine, those trying to get one can face social stigma and religious prejudice. Shamefully, many traumatised Ukrainian women who succeed in escaping to Poland discover that they...

Another far right terrorist gun rampage, this time in Buffalo, New York (14 May). Perpetrators of racist attacks don’t need burning crosses to advertise their deeds nowadays. They livestream the whole thing on the internet instead, with a white-supremacist “manifesto” thrown in as if to serve as “justification” for the cold blooded murder of working class people going about their daily business. The teenager who carried out the atrocity was from small town America — Conklin in New York State, population 5,000, 98% of which is white. His social interaction with non white Americans very probably...

Following up fast on the passing of the Police Act , and the announcement of yet more repressive legislation to come, Home Secretary Priti Patel is expanding police powers to harass people in the street through “stop and search”. She has announced changes to use of Section 60 of the 1994 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act. Now instead of a senior officer being able to declare they believe serious violence will take place in a given area, thus allowing searches without reasonable grounds, it will be a matter of declaring that violence “may” occur. The length of time the powers can be in...

Originally published on Media Diversified , a website for writers of colour. We republish with thanks. You can donate to Media Diversified here . I must have watched Bend It Like Beckham a dozen times – most recently on the twentieth anniversary of its release, last week. At the top of the UK box office for over three months in 2002, Gurinder Chadha’s film became a hit worldwide: the only film ever, believe it or not, officially released in every country, North Korea included. There are pages of statistics for its success. It undoubtedly had special resonance for British Asians. As a middle...

The question of who black American actor, singer and activist Paul Robeson was in anything beyond general outline hovered at the edge of my mind for several years. Earlier this year I googled for a book and found Australian journalist Jeff Sparrow’s No Way But This: In Search of Paul Robeson . I recommend it. It’s not a straight biography. Sparrow travelled to various parts of the US, Spain, London, South Wales and Moscow to engage with episodes and aspects of Robeson’s life (1898-1976), and a lot of No Way But This consists of his conversations with experts and activists in those places. At...

For some reason there was not much coverage on the left when Newcastle council leader Nick Forbes was deselected by local party members in February. This despite the fact that Forbes is (was) the most senior Labour Party figure in local government, leader of the Labour group in the national Local Government Association. He has been a Newcastle councillor since 2000 and council leader since 2011. Nonetheless, he lost his ward selection vote 13 to four. The Labour right in Newcastle has been trying to deny party members their democratic rights in selecting council candidates; activists have been...

Police officers in schools are called “safer schools officers”. But as many students point out, these officers make schools less safe for them. A 15 year old girl, Child Q, was assaulted at her school by Metropolitan Police officers two years ago under the premise of a strip search after a (false) accusation that she had cannabis. A local safeguarding review noted that racism contributed to the decision to strip search Child Q, who is Black. Over 5,000 children have been strip searched in London schools in the last three years. That figure only includes strip searches that took place after...

Neil Coyle, right-wing Labour MP for Bermondsey and Old Southwark, has been suspended from both Labour membership and the parliamentary party after being accused of making racist jokes to a Chinese-background journalist. According to Insider journalist Henry Dyer, Coyle joked about Labour MP Barry Gardiner — who has taken large amounts of money from a Chinese state lobbyist, Christine Lee — being funded by “Fu Manchu”. Fu Manchu is a fictional Chinese supervillain. When Dyer challenged the MP, saying that he was British-Chinese, Coyle responded he could tell “from how you look like you’ve been...

Nat Turner planning the rebellion In 1967, 136 years after Nat Turner led a slave rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia, the white US novelist William Styron published a book, The Confessions of Nat Turner . The book was written in the first person, Styron giving words to Turner and his story. Prior to the publication of Styron’s book the history of the Turner insurrection was not widely known. For several months Styron’s book received great reviews and grandiose praise. The novel won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1968. But within a few months universal acclaim had turned into a very...

Along with Harry Belafonte and a few others, Sydney Poitier was a pioneer in Hollywood when African-Americans found it difficult to get serious roles and were often restricted to playing cardboard cut-out man-servants, pimps, villains and so on. Poitier was the first African-American to win the Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field (1963). Although probably he became a somewhat marginalised figure with the rise of militant political black activism in the late 60s and 70s, his central role in establishing a meaningful black presence in Hollywood should never be...