Diane Abbott on "white people dividing and conquering" - a case of racism, context and hypocrisy

I often take my place at the front of many so-called anti-racist 'witch-hunts'. When speaking out against those who I feel allow their masks of racist disguise to slip, I can usually rely upon my allies of the left for support. You cannot beat a bit of frothing at the mouth, pitchfork in hand, ready to dish out some anti-racist justice - fantastic!

However, the case of the Shadow Health Minister, Diane Abbott has seen me alone, fighting alongside an unreliable slurry of right-wing conservatives, whose calls for Abbott's resignation are probably driven more by political point-scoring than genuine outrage.

Meanwhile, instead of articulating a consistent message on racism, many on the left are using the 'context' argument usually deployed by the right to defend racist language, while accusing the right-wingers of hypocrisy. Yes, we have hypocrites calling people hypocrites.

This latest deployment of the context defence is despite the fact context is often misunderstood by those who lean so heavily on it when it suits their needs. After all, many on both the left and the right never quite 'got' the Alf Garnett joke because they did not understand the context it was located in, notably the mid-twentieth century wave of migration and differing attitudes between the archaic thinkers and the more enlightened. The right-wingers applauded the character as a sage, and the left rejoiced when his character ran its course.

So, enough reminiscing about the great racism debates of yesteryear. What has prompted this latest outrage? Yesterday should have been a great day for race relations in the UK as the two of the killers of Stephen Lawrence were finally brought to justice and sentenced. The Stephen Lawrence case is the singular example of racism at its very worst, with the added ingredient of gross injustice. It is a symbol of the worst that can happen to those victims of racist language. The vile words that fall out of the words of those racists, who often fall on the contextual understanding defence, are the same words that Stephen Lawrence would likely to have been subjected to by his attackers.

It is why the defence of Liverpool footballer Luiz Suarez prior to his eight-match ban for using racist language towards Manchester United's Patrice Evra never held much weight with me. His defence was that his repeated use of the word "negro" was in the context (yes, that word again) of the sort of language acceptable in Uruguay, and was meant in a friendly manner. This was rightly discredited by the video evidence witnessed by an independent commission to investigate the incidents.

I cannot see anything other than racism in a situation where one individual is constantly reminding a man of his skin colour as part of an acrimonious exchange. In this case, there is no place for context as an excuse.

Diane Abbott used the words "White people love playing 'divide & rule'" in a Twitter rant. Her defence? Her remarks have been 'taken out of context' (yes, that word again) and part of a Twitter debate following the Stephen Lawrence murder trial. She later added:-
"Refers to nature of 19th Century European colonialism. Bit much to get into 140 characters."

The 140 character defence is barely more persuasive than the Suarez defence. The last time I used Twitter (earlier today, as it happens) it was still possible to follow a posting with a posting, to clarify anything that could have been misunderstood. Does Abbott not review her tweets as she posts them? She has shown herself in Parliament and on the small screen as being intelligent, so I believe she is more than literate enough to understand how her tweet could have been understood. Or has she suddenly admitted being guilty of social incompetence? Maybe if she is not too racist for the shadow cabinet, then she is a little too incompetent.

Little over 40 of the 140 characters at Abbott's disposal were used saying "white people love playing 'divide & rule'", leaving her with around 100 characters to diffuse any potential explosion arising from a phrase she ought to have realised would be highly inflammatory. She chose not to at the time, and this is why as a Labour party member I share the view of leader Ed Miliband that the content of the tweet was unacceptable. Hopefully this will be food for thought for the leader at the next reshuffle.

Not that the Labour leader needs a great deal of food for thought. Abbott is unfortunately prolific at making statements about skin colour liable to those dastardly contextual misunderstandings, which often require one of those now worryingly regular clarifications at a later time. Sadly, entering "Diane Abbott go to the wall" on Google only returns articles of her previous transgressions, such as this one from sources including the Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph, and sky.com.

So it seems that not only have some leftists have left their well-used moral compasses in the backpack on this occasion to defend her, but the publications that often inform the left have gone strangely silent on her past contextual misunderstandings, such as "West Indian mums will go to the wall for their children," or describing David Cameron and Nick Clegg as "two posh white boys". The latter point about the coalition leaders is technically correct, but is risky in a society where people are still suspicious of the use of racial adjectives to characterise. At the very least, it is now time for Diane Abbott to realise that the precautions people are expected to take in communication apply to her as well.

For reasons that are clear, this latest incident surrounding Diane Abbott comes as no surprise to me. Sadly, neither does the crude politicking by those who condemn or defend because they have already taken their political sides prior to the incident. By casting politics aside and analysing the discursive actions performed by her on Twitter, I have been witness to a pattern denied by others on the left.

Analysis: How the England Riots split the left

This week the unthinkable happened - I was accused of being a Tory. I was not alone. In his excellent Friday night Talksport broadcast, leftist broadcaster George Galloway had the same absurd allegation levelled against him during an otherwise cordial exchange with a dissenting phone caller. Has left suddenly become the new right? And where are these cruel accusations coming from all of a sudden.

The explanation is as follows; the recent riots that occurred throughout England have created a point of intellectual separation between the liberal left and the more authoritarian left. By authoritarian, I do not mean the hardline position inspired by Stalin that the liberal left seem to be unaware of - remember, according to these types, the call for sanctions against those causing disorder is supposedly the preserve of Tories. Instead, I mean those who actually want to see the law applied substantively to the kinds of people who burn homes and businesses, attack and violate passers-by and, in some cases, commit murder.

The problem is there are some who believe that because the riots largely occurred in deprived areas, home to the impoverished, that in some way the perpetrators should be sympathised with. This position however represents an incorrect diagnosis of the cause of the riots as well as a misunderstanding of the character of leftist protesting and campaigning, both of which will be summarised in turn.

First, the diagnosis: This was not a confrontation against elites or capitalism. If it was, those rioters would not have been burning the cars and homes of their neighbours. Neither would they have been vandalising and looting corner shops, run by people working as many hours as possible to make ends meet. This was a confrontation against their fellow citizens.

Second, the position of the good leftist: It is virtuous for an active citizen to stand up for those who work hard for a living, as well as those who want to contribute to society but find themselves in a position of inequality, in turn lacking both financial and social capital. This is how workers' movements came about. It means supporting those who rightly condemned the riots, those who were killed and those who had their rather small enterprises torched.

To condemn the rioters as 'reliant on benefits' and without direction is not to metamorphisise into a Tory, nor is it to condemn those who face genuine need for welfare. Furthermore, this position of disapproval does not preclude the overlooking of the real social causes of the recent troubles, which should result in a review of youth unemployment and access to education.

It is dispiriting though that some people handle deprivation inappropriately, criminally and irresponsibly by becoming a predatory force upon those around them. Solidarity during these tough times is not defined by violating your own equals.

It is a shame those who are extreme liberal, or will stop at nothing to find an excuse for a scrap, cannot identify with this. Instead they choose to erroneously defend the actions of these rioters through the prism of left politics, blaming an admittedly incompetent government when these problems have been decades in the making. It is true however that Thatcherite politics resulted in the closure of many of the workshops of this once-great island. The jobs they created could help a few of the vast numbers of 18 to 24 year-olds currently out of work.

In the meantime, we have to deal with the predators and the rioters, safe in the knowledge that those in government setting the judicial discourse will have no objections to any accusations of them being Tories!