"What's this weeks petty irrelevant moral panic we'll all sit around discussing in pubs and on the BBC's Daily Politics show?", I often wake up asking myself.
Oh yes, right on cue, Dianne Abbott is now a reverse racist, because of one of those cheap easy stories the press are dining out on at the moment, that requires no journalistic effort at all, a Twitter quote has come to light. Now of course, let's all turn this twitter gem in to a major crisis where we can all play out the seasonal Panto charade of:
"Look! We live in a REAL democracy, to exemplify this look at this trivial, menial, political debate...it is in fact far more than this, don't be fooled...it is in fact a crucial issue defining our democratic future...honest guv...we care on principle about this issue...not just the media frenzy it creates for us "
And yet, simultaneously, despite the uproar, our national discourse remains utterly ignorant of the real meaning of racism today in Britain and the world. In this instance the truth is too offensive. When people allude to that truth (racism) it makes too many people uncomfortable, so they jump up and down on it like a conflagrating bush fire.
The staples of any moral panic stories today consist of the following components:
Firstly, the Chernobyl catastrophe of a quote - ''White people love playing 'divide & rule'" - must be viewed in complete isolation in Guantanamo style quarantine, unable to associate with its brother and sister quotes that provide that special little word, context. Context is a slutty noun, and if it opens it's legs to a more holistic accurate truth, then the moral panic might be exposed as the pointless hyperbole it is...god forbid.
Secondly, whilst the offending quote is held in isolation deprived of the dignity of an historical or social justification and context; the journalistic charlatans squawk around like seagulls (the difference being seagulls perform their role to society admirably) and disseminate the significance of Abotts remarks. "will you resign?" "should she resign?" "when will she resign?" "this is unacceptable" "do you agree it's unacceptable?". Notice how during these crisis media commentators always define for us what is and isn't acceptable, without explaining why and assuming everybody instinctively agrees.
The third component of course is a man of leadership that substitutes his titanium spine for one made of Daily Mail paper mashie. A man who embodies the post Tony Blair model of a male politician, that violently swings like a weather vein to the right whenever a manufactured storm blows his way and threatens his electoral potential. To hell with political convictions Ed, make sure the prowls say the right thing at those poles and keep the condemnations coming. Which means curiously in England at present when someone's convicted of racism people wear T-shirts in solidarity and Kenny 'it's still 1980' Dalgish publicly defends you like a martyr. However if you're a black minority shadow Health minister, for a party supposedly founded on socially progressive values, who happens to speak out against real racism, then you grovel and beg for forgiveness whilst your boss joins in the kicking.
The fourth component in this particular instance, are the smug anti PC freedom fighters that all pat themselves on the back and say "ohhhh, typical, so they can say that about us but we can't say anything about them". As though it's a race battle. Or as though racism doesn't disproportionately affect those with skin of a more noir variety, and as though white people in the UK, in all honesty, feel truly threatened by racism against themselves.
How incredible, that in the week of the Steven Lawrence trials verdict (that once again indicates institutional racism in the UK) that reactionary political opportunists can show so little humility and restraint when a black politician has the audacity to speak the unspeakable reality; that many white people are racist, and our country has been historically racist. God forbid she go further and tell us that conservative and Labour politicians alike (as the farcical reactionary public PR diatribes after the London riots showed all too clearly) evidently could care less about the plights of under privileged discriminated minorities, that are driven to such desperate actions partly as a consequence of such nationwide racism (according to a Guardian investigation). In reality she should and could say far more...but the establishment doesn't want to hear it.
The fundamental truth is this. Most people are ignorant of racial issues, which is why they get so hot under the collar when a black woman such as Abbott calls white peoples bluffs. They may know it's wrong to call someone a nigger, or deny them equal treatment on racial grounds, but they do not truly understand racism because they do not, and probably will not, ever truly experience it. Racism for me is not just a verbal put down; it is systemic economic and social deprivation affecting disproportionately those of an ethnic minority. Those who so often brandish the name of Martin Luther King with admiration would do well to remember what he actually frequently preached until death, and what today is more frequently forgotten: That racism is the language of the oppressor, the language of the colonial imperialist and economic dominator. The subtleties of this exploitation today may be greater than decades since, but the basic realities remain true. Blacks disproportionately suffer, whilst whites relatively prosper, fact.
Perhaps to combat this ignorance as a nation and atone for our appalling colonial past of pillage and genocide (which, shock horror, consisted of the very real, very deliberately instigated policy of 'divide and rule' over those black folk we ruled and exploited) we should be reeducated. Perhaps if people read books like The blood never dried: a history of the British empire and were less inclined to view shows like Caroline Quentins series of jolly apologetics for the British Empire throughout India, or ingest Gordon Browns outrageous claim we should be "proud" of our past, then perhaps Abbotts quote would seem less unacceptable.
How funny that the political establishment (seemingly in collusion with he BBC) staged such a Valliant fight against the BNP on Question Time, who peddle such insultingly racist ideas. Yet smelt no sense of irony when they universally condemned a black female MP for the outrageous crime of speaking about equally as unacceptable past and present racism.
Racism obviously is wrong in all its forms, against whites as much as blacks, I would not dare say otherwise for it would be to abandon intellectual integrity. But until the white population and political leaders generally take a good hard look at themselves and say we have acknowledged our racist past and are doing our upmost to alleviate our racist present, they have no right to falsely claim to be the victims of inverted racism. You are not. You never have been. And all this exaggerated trivial palaver for what is in reality cheap political point scoring between the two pantomime parties of today, smelling blood and votes in the water, is a sham. Such misplaced hysteria does a great disservice to what is a very serious pressing issue now, as much as it was 50 to 200 years ago. So let us gain a sense of proportional perspective and righteousness before we cry victims against one of the few politicians left in our country people can bare to stomach.