Colin Sheridan: Institutional racism wears a necktie
What Diane Abbott has endured — death threats, racial abuse, and now professional exile — is not the price of politics. It is the price of being Black and outspoken in a country that only pretends to be post-racial, but is in fact, racist — at an establishment level at least.
Diane Abbott has become a symbol. Not the type celebrated with flowers or praised from podiums. No, her symbolism is quieter, crueller. She is the canary in Britain’s coal mine of racial hypocrisy. And, as with most canaries, the point is to ignore them until they fall silent.
This week, as the Labour Party — Keir Starmer’s now heavily rebranded Labour Party — tightened its noose around Abbott’s political career, a strange silence has settled over many progressive circles.
Take us with you this summer.
