“There is no such thing as Islamophobia, because anyone may convert to Islam”? The kind of remarks that are showing up in the Conservative Party, such as the comparison of brown people to dogs, are quite clearly about brown people. Making them about “Muslims” is the way of saying it without saying it. “Anyone can become a Muslim” is nothing more than the cover story, and it is barely even that. So yes, this is about racism.
Anyone may convert to Judaism, too, so that Jews are no more a “race” than Christians or Muslims are. As my friend, the late Rabbi Lionel Blue, once said to me of the Jews, “You only have to look at us to see that we are all the descendants of converts.” Therefore, anti-Semitism is a form of religious bigotry, and not, in itself, a form of racism. That Hitler thought otherwise is not an argument. But has anti-Semitism been bound up with various forms of racism? Of course it has.
Just as the struggles for economic equality and for international peace are fundamental and integral to each other, so the anti-racist and anti-imperialist struggle, which is indivisible in itself, is fundamental and integral to each and both of them. The class oppression in these Islands goes back to the Norman Conquest, while our particular form of capitalism was shaped by the slave trade, so that they both have racist and imperialist roots. Similar things can be said about several other European countries, about our respective former Empires, and about the United States.
Another hung Parliament is coming, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. It has become a local commonplace that I am on 30-30-30 with Labour and the Conservatives here at North West Durham, so that any one of us could be the First Past the Post. I will stand for this seat, if I can raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign. Please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.
Just as the struggles for economic equality and for international peace are fundamental and integral to each other, so the anti-racist and anti-imperialist struggle, which is indivisible in itself, is fundamental and integral to each and both of them. The class oppression in these Islands goes back to the Norman Conquest, while our particular form of capitalism was shaped by the slave trade, so that they both have racist and imperialist roots. Similar things can be said about several other European countries, about our respective former Empires, and about the United States.
Another hung Parliament is coming, and we need our people to hold the balance of power in it. It has become a local commonplace that I am on 30-30-30 with Labour and the Conservatives here at North West Durham, so that any one of us could be the First Past the Post. I will stand for this seat, if I can raise the £10,000 necessary to mount a serious campaign. Please email davidaslindsay@hotmail.com. Very many thanks.
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