Oncoming Tsunami Of Racism

Anti-racism work is a long game, if it is to work, it must be a life long commitment. You can’t suddenly expect centuries of systemic beliefs, entrenched in the history, the education system, and the laws of a society to change overnight. 

That said, I believe we are facing a disaster, and I believe it’s just around the corner. 

I believe that the aftershocks of the global pandemic will be awful for anyone not in a secure financial position, and devastating for anyone in our community who is not protected by the privilege of the ideology of white supremacy; for they will be scapegoated and demonized. Simple people need someone to blame, and when humanity masses, our ability to understand nuance dissolves.

 I believe that privileged people will protect their privilege at all costs, and unscrupulous groups will use racism to do so as resources become more scarce in the UK, and indeed globally. I believe that all of this is coming at us like a tsunami.

 I see an impending disaster. I see no avoiding it. 

Anti-racism work isn’t going to be over in a year, it’s not going to be finished in 10 years; the mantra of a good friend of mine is that, “it’s a marathon, not a sprint”. But the next 14 months will be particularly dangerous. The next 14 months, at least, will see further fuel added to the fires already burning, as the far-right use increasingly difficult circumstances to blame anyone, not in a position of privilege. 

 BLM has raised the profile of the anti-racist movement, and internationally anti-racists have raised their voices. The noise made has brought all the closet racists out of their hiding places to counter the movement. The racists and the fascists have a conveniently packaged common enemy. They now rail against BLM, saying that it “makes things worse” that it is, indeed, BLM that is the racist movement. That black people are asking for greater privilege, that the whites are the oppressed. The rise in racist abuse after the BLM protests is well documented.

Anti Sikh crime has risen by %70 in the last 2 years, almost entirely due to the racism spouted by Trump, and then validated by Borris. This will increase, and worsen, as financial markets crash, and Sikh’s become targeted for their success, blamed for their losses.  Anti-Semitic hate crime is at a record high, and even here in ‘sleepy Stroud” a holocaust denier was invited to speak, shuffled into the public domain covered by the cloak of a “freedom rally’ preying on the fear and mistrust of people feel towards the erratic treatment of Covid by the government, and the natural rankling against the loss of public freedoms.  

 If you can’t see the emergency, immediately in front of us, you’re not looking.