A Nation in Denial: How Britain’s Aversion to Self-Reflection Fuels Racial Tensions
Mila Edensor delves into the tactics used by Britain’s elite to gloss over racial tensions, and avoid meaningful introspection and change.
Van on fire during the 2024 Southport Riots, via Wikimedia Commons
Britain’s always found it hard to talk about his emotions. Therapy is wet and a bit gay. Why would he need to go? He’s not broken! So what if the kids don't speak to him anymore? So what if the missus found someone else? (A passionate lover with a taste for the arts; she feels seen). All these swirling feelings can be locked away. Shut down, dealt with, and then we can swiftly move on…
Of course, ‘moving on’ in such circumstances is not a digestion of the issues at hand, a diagnosis of the problem, an analysis of the cause - but instead a desire to suppress, to ignore and to swiftly glaze over.
It’s been a month* since the UK experienced some of the worst acts of racial hatred seen since the days of the National Front. And yet, now that the highstreets have returned to their usual low hum, to the slow swinging doors of a charity shop, and the pitter patter of sensible shoes walking into a Prett, apparently all of that nonsense was just last month’s news. The BBC puts it as such: ‘Who are the rioters and what jail sentences have they received?’
*this article was written in the summer and was featured in last term’s print edition
See! All the rioters have been caught. And jailed. And dealt with. All those swirling feelings, those ‘Seven days of disorder (...)’ (BBC) were apparently shut down with the swing of the judge’s gavel.
And looking towards the future, we have been given our solution! Punitive policing and a ‘standing army’ of officers - ensuring that future violence, organised on a national scale, may be dealt with by an equally national scale of force. If you’re not wearing your glasses, sure - this is a great solution! (in the most short sighted sense of the word). We should sleep easy knowing that when it happens again the government can deal with it!
Left-wing protestors in Liverpool on 3rd August 2024 during the 2024 United Kingdom Riots, via Wikimedia Commons
The racial hatred seen during the summer was most certainly not an isolated affair as the government response would have one think. Academics and activists who have consistently highlighted where systemic racial discrimination exists in the UK have long been treated as if whining nags. Furthermore, the UN experts who found that structural, institutional and systemic racism persists in this country are yet to hear an adequate response addressing their findings. Instead, our government has chosen to double down on its physical capacity to repress ‘disorder’, rather than work with these groups to address where this ‘disorder’ finds its source.
In a blisteringly stupid analysis, the narrative provided by the powers that be is one that sees no connection between media and governmental rhetoric and last month’s attacks. Instead, violence is depicted as a spontaneous spattering of ‘thuggery’ within a country that’s otherwise perfectly fine. Ours is a cross-party consensus that treats outbursts as a problem to be dealt with and introspection as an exercise to be avoided and feared.
For example, as a response to the 2020 BLM protests, the incumbent Tories commissioned an inquiry into the state of racial discrimination in the UK, concluding that while “outright racism” exists in Britain, the country is not “institutionally racist.”
And again in 2024, when questioned on whether the rioters were racist, Starmer replied: “I think the far-right – there was racism there… It was totally illegitimate…” Later in this interview adding: ‘“I don’t think we’re a racist country. I think we are a country of decent people, tolerant people.”
In this view, racism is the remit of the poor, a spontaneous export belonging to the working classes, and a prejudice not to be found within our institutions (run of course by the not-so-poor). On the other hand, racism when articulated with an RP accent, when written into headlines by Oxbridge graduates, and when concretised within law by MP’s donning tailored suits, is most certainly not indicative of institutional and systemic racism (how very dare you!) for we are a country of ‘decent, tolerant’ people…
See, Britain has never been good at processing his emotions, thus why he’d rather gaslight his nearest and dearest than engage in constructive conversation. (Babe… you’re being crazy right now - it’s not even systemic like that… it’s not (!)…)
Zara Sultana MP tried her best to get him to engage in some much needed introspection. However, after pointing out on Good Morning Britain how the Daily Mail has consistently pushed anti-immigrant rhetoric for decades, she was quickly shut down by the other two panellists (Andrew Pierce - a consultant editor for the Daily Mail, and Ed Balls - a wet wipe). They demanded that she pluck an exact headline out of thin air - a difficult task for live television - ultimately refusing to engage in the conversation, and consequently escaping discussion on how media rhetoric shaped and inflamed the riots.
Publications like the Mail were perfectly happy to encourage suspicion surrounding immigrant communities, publishing headlines such as Why your takeaway delivery rider might well be an illegal immigrant: Legal loopholes and lack of checks mean many migrants are delivering fast food in grey economy, expert says (16th of August). And yet, when racial tensions were at their peak, and rioters began enacting said suspicion, the Mail attempted to distance itself! In the same month, on the 29th, we see: Riot Yob Caught on camera stopping cars to ask driver ‘Are you white? Are you English?’ faces long jail sentence.
It is correct that such malice is punished - attempting to burn people alive in mosques and hotels shows the face of an emboldened, organised and dangerous far-right. But what should not be allowed to occur is the use of classist caricatures, embodied by the terms ‘Thug’ and ‘Yob’, to obscure the culpability of the institutions that perpetuate systemic racial discrimination in the UK.
A political class that has privatised asylum seeker accommodation, described immigration as an ‘invasion’, and recently promised to ramp up deportations, should not be allowed to view itself as disconnected from the violence on our streets we saw last month. A media elite that has consistently pushed rhetoric of Britain being ‘swamped’, and that has pushed an image of a violent, predatory and parasitic migrant - should not be allowed to turn around and declare the rioters to be the sole source of such discourse.
‘Stop the Boats’ made for a catchy political slogan, a flashy headline, and a punchy chant for the same reason: systemic and institutional racism makes itself seen on all levels of society.
So, in order to achieve societal healing, we need an accurate picture of what is really going on. In reality, the riots were far more complicated than simply ‘disorder’ and ‘thuggery’. Lilah Tameah, a muslim PhD student, told the Middle Eastern Eye: ‘It’s not the guys who were robbing bath bombs from Lush that we’re scared of, it’s the ones attacking us’.
Focussing on ‘disorder’ and ‘criminality’ presents these groups as one and the same, and circumvents the much needed conversation about systemic racism, and about why specific communities were being attacked in the UK. But even during the riots, and despite the specific request, Labour's Communities Minister did not feel the need to meet with the Muslim Council of Britain, because a serious conversation about islamophobia and anti immigrant rhetoric was never the intention.
The riots were not a complicated affair, they would tell you. They were simply criminal. They were not a mixture of social and political disenfranchisement articulated through a rhetoric of hatred, racism and xenophobia - a rhetoric, of course, provided and promoted by the more powerful. They were simply thuggish. Disorderly. Yobbish and spontaneous.
Britain’s always found it hard to talk about his emotions… and why would he need to? For the problem’s been caught, their mugshots published in the papers, and their sentences made clear for all to see! We can stop talking about it now… why do you keep bringing it up?
(Babe… it’s not that deep… it happened; get over it… you’re being crazy… I’ve said sorry ok! I’ve said sorry! Ugh!)