Is Diane Abbott right that only Black people experience racism and other ethnic groups experience prejudice?

Yes, you have Ashkenazi jews and Sephardic jews, as two examples - whose ancestors migrated to different parts of the world after they had been banished from their home land.

For legal purposes Jews are considered a race.

Hitler believed that a person's characteristics, attitudes, abilities, and behavior were determined by his or her so-called racial make-up. In Hitler's view, all groups, races, or peoples (he used those terms interchangeably) carried within them traits that were passed from one generation to the next. No individual could overcome the qualities of race. All of human history could be explained in terms of racial struggle.

In formulating their ideology of race, Hitler and the Nazis drew upon the ideas of the German social Darwinists of the late 19th century. Like the social Darwinists before them, the Nazis believed that human beings could be classified collectively as “races,” with each race bearing distinctive characteristics that had been passed on genetically since the first appearance of humans in prehistoric times.

These inherited characteristics related not only to outward appearance and physical structure, but also shaped internal mental life, ways of thinking, creative and organizational abilities, intelligence, taste and appreciation of culture, physical strength, and military prowess.

https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/victims-of-the-nazi-era-nazi-racial-ideology

Jewish is both a race and a religion. The Jewish people originated in North Africa and were then enslaved by the Egyptians. They escaped and went to the Middle East where they conquered Israel. Then they were invaded and carried off into slavery into Iraq/Iran by the Babylonians. This was their great diaspora which lasted until after WWII, when Israel was resurrected so they’d have a homeland, the Jewish people were forced to flee from region to region. Over the Millenium, they intermarried with locals in every continent (or Jewish women were raped by locals) and as you only need a Jewish mother to be Jewish, this then meant over the millennia that the Jewish people became physically diverse and visibly mixed race. So if you look at the DNA of a white Jew or a black Jew, they will have the same DNA associated with the original Jewish ethnicity from North Africa.

The Jewish people are a great example of how racism is not based on skin colour alone, and skin colour alone isn’t what determines your ethnicity.

You are doing what Diane Abbot was doing - talking about Britain as if it was America. It isnt. Anyone's son can pull in to the wrong driveway in the UK without being shot for it.

The difference here is that female violence is a minor issue compared to male violence and far fewer women are weak and power less than men. But discrimination against some groups in this country is higher than against black people. Jews in London, even in DAs constituency, experience high levels of violence and she minimised that. Risk in other places in the world is not risk for the people she is paid to represent.

As for the black women being more likely to die in pregnancy and childbirth their are many reasons for that and if you focus exclusively on skin colour you harm the people you claim to be trying to help. That is actually the message of woke racism - too much focus on language and too little on dealing with the problems. "Almost all of those who died during or after pregnancy had multiple issues such as mental or physical health problems, were victims of domestic abuse, or were living in a deprived area. More than half of those who died were overweight or obese. Cardiac disease represents the largest single cause of indirect maternal deaths." Claiming, as some people do, that this is about racial bias is unhelpful. The interventions needed are likely to be things like extra and local antenatal care, signposting to domestic abuse refuges or more visits post delivery to pick up problems sooner.

And yes, what is 'other black'?

To my mind the percentages seem high. Annoyingly they don't say what they mean by 'prior to the pandemic'. A month prior or all their previous lives?

@NotHavingIt Jews are a race. In legal terms too. The Jews have not been persecuted throughout history because they are religious. You don't have to be a religious to be Jewish, or to to suffer persecution and stereotyping. There is also a very definite 'jewish' look - which not everyone conforms to, but many do.
All the googling I am doing suggests Jews are not a race. They are multi race orioles who follow Judaism. There are black Jews and white Jews so how can Jews be a race? There are literally people if different races who are Jews.

Passing isn’t about ‘hiding’, it’s about whether going about your day to day life will expose you to bigotry because your ethnicity or religion is visibly obvious. So this will be very high risk for black peoples and Orthodox Jews. Much lower risk for somebody with an irish grandparent or Rachel Riley.

What is unexpected is that the graph in the Guardian article shows the highest percentage of racist insults, property damage or physical attacks prior to the pandemic.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/apr/15/racism-in-britain-is-not-a-black-and-white-issue-it-is-far-more-complicated

in order from the highest:

Gypsy traveller
Other black ( what does that mean?)
Jewish
Mixed white/black African
Mixed white/black Caribbean
Roma
Black Caribbean
White Irish
Bangladeshi
Pakistani
Overall
Black African
Other mixed/multiple
Indian
Chinese ( this was pre the pandemic so might it have increased?)
Mixed white/Asian
Other Asian
Other ethnic group
Arab

I can't comment on that suggestion, but from what I have heard and witnessed I would say that it is a genuinely held belief amongst those Black activists who hold that view.

Passing isn’t about ‘hiding’, it’s about whether going about your day to day life will expose you to bigotry because your ethnicity or religion is visibly obvious. So this will be very high risk for black peoples and Orthodox Jews. Much lower risk for somebody with an irish grandparent or Rachel Riley.

I don’t know, I’m not her advisor am I?

MissMissive - sorry was your comment aimed at me?

Do you understand what is meant by 'passing'?

It's up to each individual to educate themselves. I suggest you do so before manipulating my words. In fact your comment is so deeply offensive, it's worthy of reporting.

I will explain briefly to give you something to think about. Some protected characteristics are obvious ALL OF THE TIME. There is no time that those individuals will not be treated as 'other' Some people's protected characteristics/ identities are not obvious. It makes their identity and experience of that group no less significant, but means that they will not be treated differently ALL THE TIME.

Please remember you are replying to other human beings (using their words no less) Be more thoughtful and less ignorant in your responses.

I am a bit suspicious as to why this thread is in sex and gender.

If its the most recent bad thing, the Birmingham 6 trumps sitting at the back of a bus.
It was more recent and it actually happened in Britain.

What matters is here and now - how are people treated in the U.K. today?

Then why was DA citing the transatlantic slave trade and US Jim Crow laws?

40% of Irish people in the UK report having experienced this.

Thank you scrolling leaves.

Explanation of the graph is you did not click it open.

^More than a third of people from ethnic
and religious minorities have
experienced some form of racist assault
% experiencing racist insults, property damage or physical attacks prior to the pandemic^

As a reminder, here is the article DA was responding to, and also an interesting graph related to racism/prejudice in the U.K.

Racism in Britain is not a black and white issue. It’s far more complicated | Tomiwa Owolade | The Guardian
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/apr/15/racism-in-britain-is-not-a-black-and-white-issue-it-is-far-more-complicated

I’m talking about here and now. Every country on Earth has a racist nay-on-genocidal past. What matters is here and now - how are people treated in the U.K. today? It’s very very clear that black people suffer worse racism than any other group, far far worse than somebody with an Irish grandparent. When was the last incident of police racism against Irish people? When was the last time an Irish person was attacked?

Jews are a race. In legal terms too. The Jews have not been persecuted throughout history because they are religious. You don't have to be a religious to be Jewish, or to to suffer persecution and stereotyping. There is also a very definite 'jewish' look - which not everyone conforms to, but many do.

“We are arguing the same thing, I meant you cannot group anyone's experience together and say they are the same. It just doesn't work that way. I wasn't making a case that prejudice is the same as racism or otherwise”

Sorry! I thought you were doing exactly that. 🤭

”I am not sure anyone can categorically say that there is an exclusive group that is more at risk. It depends on the context, such as the place and time.“

Exactly. That is why racism cannot be compared to sexism. Whereas women have been universally oppressed, we cannot say the same of any race.

@AP5Diva
We are arguing the same thing, I meant you cannot group anyone's experience together and say they are the same. It just doesn't work that way. I wasn't making a case that prejudice is the same as racism or otherwise
There is a case for some types of racism as being worse when the threat is to their lives. But I am not sure anyone can categorically say that there is an exclusive group that is more at risk. It depends on the context, such as the place and time. Are Jewish people killed in the streets in the US for being jewish? I have no idea. But the threat feels more real to a black person in that country. However in other parts of the world the danger is different of course.
There is no point in arguing on a phenomenon which changes context so hugely, perhaps its better to address things in a considerate way and educate as far as anyone can?

Personally, one of the resons I no longer identfy with the term 'feminist' is because I no longer buy into the intersectionalist style analysis that suggests that all men are responsible for what some men do or for how some men behave, or have done or behaved in the past. The suggestion that all men are part of the problem - form some sort of 'patriarchy' which is an intentionally constructed institutionalised oppression of women. That women are victims by definition.

I bought into that somewhat in the 1980's - but not anymore. A lot of what passes as feminism seems to me now as nothing but hatred of men in general - with sweeping generalisations. The other day one poster wondered whether it was even posssible for men to be decent human beings. That I sad I knew lots of lovely, decent men was met with total cynicism and the suggestions I must have low standards.

And their current persecution in Russia.

And genetically, there is more variation within “races” over-simplistically categorised by skin tone than between them.