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

[IwantToRetire]

Diane Abbott has been suspended as a Labour MP pending an investigation into a letter she wrote about racism to the Observer, the party has said.

The politician said "many types of white people with points of difference" can experience prejudice, in a letter published on Sunday.

But they are not subject to racism "all their lives", she said.

She later tweeted to say she was withdrawing her remarks and apologised "for any anguish caused".

Labour said the comments were "deeply offensive and wrong".

Suspending the whip means Ms Abbott will not be allowed to represent Labour in the House of Commons, where she will now sit as an independent MP.

In the letter, she wrote that Irish, Jewish and Traveller people "undoubtedly experience prejudice", which she said is "similar to racism".

She continued: "It is true that many types of white people with points of difference, such as redheads, can experience this prejudice.

"But they are not all their lives subject to racism.

"In pre-civil rights America, Irish people, Jewish people and Travellers were not required to sit at the back of the bus.

"In apartheid South Africa, these groups were allowed to vote.

"And at the height of slavery, there were no white-seeming people manacled on the slave ships."

She had been responding to a comment piece in the Guardian questioning the view that racism "only affects people of colour".

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-65365978

Just a point about the genetics, Jewish people in general (sweeping generalization coming) are relatively similar genetically, suggesting they have kept in smaller communities and not inter-married as extensively out of the culture as much as some other groups in the past 600-800 years, it's a complex argument though that even geneticists don't agree on, but there is a genetic coherence there. Icelandic people are also very genetically similar as well.

I've also seen awful racism towards Roma/Romani people in Europe, mainland and Eastern Europe, and non-Roma people in those countries are highly attuned to their looks to be able to spot them as again they have different genetic/ethnic groupings from different areas prior to migration, so it is not true that only black African/Afro-Caribbean groups are identifiable genetically or by their appearance- and I do think that makes groups more vulnerable. Romani people in my husband's country are terribly discriminated against and often live in awful encampments, are openly looked down on and so on.

To that extent, I know what DA was trying to say although she made a pigs ear of it and managed to insult/dismiss racism against other groups as well as drag red-heads into it...

DA is not only a racist she doesn’t even know what racism is so she’s ignorant and not particularly intelligent.

“Racism is prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group”

Not colour of skin.

This.

But the truth isn't always pleasant or acceptable.

Great point!

What's this got to do with FWR?

Great point!

I find these comments really baffling.

It is about a woman, it is also about women who have experienced racism having the as much right to talk about their experiences.

mnhq might have thought they could turn FWR into a single issue because some of the frilly pink type of "feminists" only wanted to talk about "nice" things so they were given their very own space.

But nobody but mnhq thought or thinks like that.

Much more importantly is why anyone would think the issue of racism and the treatment of a woman politician isn't about feminism and women's rights.

I waited with eager anticipation to hear from those who think this issue isn't relevant.

And if it is all too difficult you have the whole chat section to discuss less contentious things.

Sure. If you've arrived here from the 18th century.
RTFT, better people have addressed this waaaay back.

You can quite clearly tell if someone is a Hasidic Jew at first glance

Once again DA proves herself to be the racist that she is.
She is the one who can only see 'black or white '.
She said Jews weren't forced to sit at the back of buses in America, that's true, but it was standing room only in the cattle trucks across Nazi occupied Europe.
I know which transport I'd have feared most.
She needs to go before she offends again.

Because race is a social construct in that we draw lines between ethnicities wherever we want to (we being any society in any time and in any place). There are far more races than what you have listed.

“The irony of Diane Abbott being criticised for apparently saying there is a hierarchy (this doesn't seem to be an appropriate word) of racism is exactly what Starmer has done in his response with his own hierarchy.

So whether DA wrote something that in fact was to address some internal Labour party dialogue, Starmer has done the same by saying the Labour Party wont tolerate anti-semitism and that is why she has been suspended.”

I took it as Starmer addressing the antisemitism because it has been a chronic issue with the Labour Party. I didn’t take it as doing a hierarchy, and it’s no where near the same as what Abbot did.

Seems quite fitting tbh. Many 'feminist' women have been itching for a chance to call DA every name under the sun but hitherto never got the chance because it wasn't fitting with their persona but now that opportunity has arisen. An opportunity to deride, mock and ridicule the first Black female parliamentarian who broke all manner of barriers to get to where she is, is clearly not to be missed. The language used in some of these posts is frankly astonishing - thing is that people hold these views of DA is not new, but the relief that many have experienced of being freely 'allowed' to air them is incredibly visceral.

So you think this thread has been created to prove that feminists are racist?

It is actually true. The Jewish people did not arrive into the Levant region until 1300 BC at the earliest. Prior to that they are recorded as nomadic and living on the southern shores of the Mediterranean- which is North Africa. DNA studies have shown that the modern day Jewish population have on average 3-5% ancestry from subsaharan Africa- which they would have gotten from the Africans directly to the south of them.

I agree! It's so obvious

There's an AIBU thread too, some of the comments there are also terribly personal and unnecessary.

Please report any name calling to MNHQ - it’s against talk guidelines.

Tigerfeet3 · Today 22:09
Once again DA proves herself to be the racist that she is.
She is the one who can only see 'black or white '.
She said Jews weren't forced to sit at the back of buses in America, that's true, but it was standing room only in the cattle trucks across Nazi occupied Europe.
I know which transport I'd have feared most.
She needs to go before she offends again.

Upthread someone posted a series of articles related to Jewish people and the question of whether they can be considered a race. One article was about Whoopi Goldberg who said that black people experience racism but the Holocaust was a white on white crime. She also said the Klu klux Klan would ‘see’ her but not a white Jewish person.
What she did not realise was that it wasn’t just the Nazis, the Klu Klux Klan went after Jews too.

So she was making the same mistake as Diane Abbot really in thinking of Jewish people as a version of white, and white people as not being affected by racism in the same way as black people.

.... the genetic composition of Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Mizrahi Jewish populations show significant amounts of shared Middle Eastern ancestry. According to geneticist Doron Behar and colleagues (2010), this is "consistent with a historical formulation of the Jewish people as descending from ancient Hebrew and Israelites of the Levant" and "the dispersion of the people of ancient Israel throughout the Old World". Jewish groups also show genetic proximity to Lebanese, Palestinians, Bedouins, and Druze in addition to Southern European populations, including Cypriots and Italians.

Jews living in the North African, Italian, and Iberian regions show variable frequencies of admixture with the historical non-Jewish population along the maternal lines. In the case of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews (in particular Moroccan Jews), who are closely related, the source of non-Jewish admixture is mainly southern European. Behar and colleagues have remarked on an especially close relationship between Ashkenazi Jews and modern Italians. ...

Anyway, apart from quoting various reports about research that may or may not be true, in terms of the Holocaust it was totally about family, qho you parents were, who their parents were etc..

So clearly the Nazi thought it was about race, not what you wore, how you worshipped, or what you looked like.

I am somewhat doubtful that what DA meant was that black people are more visible. They are not more visible than Asian people, or even redheads, or many others who she was including among those who she says don't experience racism. So I don't see how that can be what she means.

I'd also point out, the fact that some groups have differernt propensities to some genetic diseases doesn't make the concept of race scientifically accurate. It means there are groupings that share some genetics. "Race" is all about drawing lines, and the lines it draws are largely arbitrary.

Even with genetics it isn't as straightforward as some thing. When people do those DNA tests, for example, results aren't nearly as specific as many people think. (And the marketing would like you to believe.)

I took it as Starmer addressing the antisemitism because it has been a chronic issue with the Labour Party. I didn’t take it as doing a hierarchy, and it’s no where near the same as what Abbot did.

You've actually agreed with the point I was making that Starmer is prioritising the internal discussions in the Labour Party (which I was speculating DA may have been doing) but in doing that has made a public statement that only cites her insult to Jewish people as being a problem. ie in failing to equally acknowledge the insult to the other groups she refered to, as a public statement he is doing the same.

In the same way as she didn't get someone to check what she had written, he didn't get someone to check what he was saying as a public statement. Not just thinking of some cringe making ingratiating posture politics to gain support within the Labour Party which he did to oust Corbyn.

He is totally useless, and the Labour is totally hopeless as it flops from one side to another depending on which clique is in power at any one time.

I wouldn't trust anyone them.

This is the man who has stood by whilst women have been expelled from the Labour Party for saying they know that women are biological females.

An intersting and timely article by Meghan Murphy, which mirrors very much my direction of travel in recent times, and I think is true for a growing number:

https://open.substack.com/pub/meghanmurphy/p/why-i-moved-away-from-feminist-the?r=clsg2&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

There was a definition of racism ruptured which was correct which basically removed discrimination by skin colour from the formal definition (or at least it wasn't exclusive). I think this begs the question whether we need a new word or language to describe hostility based on skin colour which definitely is a feature of some of the modern UK. I think if someone sat down with DA the point she would make was that preventing discrimination against black people may be hindered by a definition of racism that captured a whole spectrum of discrimination so allowing those that wish to belittle anti black racism to engage in 'what aboutery'. I read an interesting article in the guardian suggesting that anti-Semitism is a definite form of racism but do we need the equivalent terminology for anti-black or people of colour racism?

upthread

It’s all true, the studies are simply measuring different points in time for what was a nomadic people/race for most of their history.

Most scientific “origin” genetic studies (with which I am familiar) are measuring back to 2,000yrs ago or later. They tend to want to take a snapshot of Roman Empire, and where everyone was then as their ethnic homelands. The one you quoted specifically is showing where people’s were around 300 BC during the ancient period.

As I’ve just posted, the Jewish peoples arrived in the Middle East around 1300 BC, which is 3,300yrs ago. A genetic study that defines “origin” as where an ethnicity was 2,000 yrs ago will of course show the Levant as their “origin” because they’d been there over a 1,000 yrs by then.

The concept of “originally from” depends upon what date you pick to take your genetic snapshot in time. The different commercially available ancestry/ethnicity DNA tests measure from different points in time too, with the majority measuring where your ancestors were 200-500yrs ago as your “origins.”