Labour goes up against the BNP

A friend asked me this morning what I think of Justice Secretary, Jack Straw (Labour) going on BBC's Question Time with Nick Griffin from the British National Party. (The Liberal Democrats have also said they'll field a reprentative at the debate.) I've been thinking about that ever since the possibility was broached a couple months ago.


The BNP is, for anyone outside the UK who doesn't know, the party that wants "Britain to remain - or return to - the way it has traditionally been." According to their website, they don't mind ethnic minorities as long as they remain minorities and don't try to change British identity or culture. Britain must remain British they say and point to all sorts of statistics which they claim prove that immigration has resulted in higher crime rates, lower educational standards, more restrictive policing, higher levels of stress, in short everything that is wrong with the UK today. If the BNP gets in they will re-introduce corporal punishment, and "end the iberal fixation with the rights of criminals," make sure prisons are not pleasure resorts, etc., etc. If all this sounds familiar to Americans, well, yes, the BNP does have something of the flavour of the extreme right-wing of the Republican party. Tough on crime and ciminals, anti-what they call political correctness (but which is often simple human decency), pro a strong national defense, etc. they are the UK version of a party Rush Limbaugh would be proud of! (That's Mr. Griffin above arriving for a controversial debate at Oxford University two years ago after mainstream party members had already pulled out, protesting his inclusion.)


So the case has been made that the mainstream parties should have nothing to do with them and that appearing on the same stage with them gives them a legitimacy they don't deserve. Well, hold on here. Let's think about it for a minute. One of the things I've noticed in my short time in London is that racism and discrimination, though they exist in this country and are not limited to BNP adherents, aren't discussed too much out in the open.


In fact, everybody tries to pretend that Britain is free of it. It isn't. And ignoring the growing popularity of the BNP won't make them go away. It will do the opposite. Tackling them head on and appealing to what is still an innate sense of decency among the vast majority of British people will turn the tide against them. Perhaps more importantly it will also get people who have never questioned the racist underpinnings of some of their own dearly held opinions to possibly think again.

London Fashion Week is a Whiteout!

London Fashion Week is on. Not much into that kind of thing but The Sunday Times came out with a huge Style issue 20th September and I couldn't help noticing the lack of black models and the scarcity of those of colour. Yeah, alright, on pg. 100 you've got Eva Longoria in a L'Oreal ad and then on pg. 105 there's a Revlon ad with Jessica Alba (thank god for the Americans!) but that's about it. (The tiny pix of Lawrence Fishbourne on pg. 15 and the one on page 80 with Naomi Campbell among a group of models in a story on Christy Turlington don't count.)

So what's up with that? You've got 111 pages of ads and fashion news and nothing - not one ad, not one story features either a black model or a black designer. A story about weekend girls, girls who like to dress up on a Saturday night, again ignores black girls and girls of colour. They don't appear in the editorial photos accompanying the story and they don't appear in the story as a niche fashion clique all on their own either.

Selfridge's has a big two-page spread with more than 21 models -not one is black. Gucci has a big two-page spread with 10 models - again not one black one!

Apparently for the fashion world or for the corner of it that is represented by Style, black people don't exist. Oh, but wait, on page 110, women are invited to figure out how they would look in an afro! Yep, that's right. They've got a line drawing of a head with a big afro and you can go ahead and try it on for size so to speak by filling in your own features. Of course, the very fact that they never stopped to think their readers might already be sporting afros is telling. Guess this is why I usually ignore fashion.

Black Londoners in History

London didn't exist as any kind of major city until the Romans invaded it half a century before Jesus Christ was born. Julius Caesar, The Man himself, was part of the invasive force and wrote extensively about the people he met, the clothes they wore, the way they fought...A warrior and a writer, our man Caesar! Anyway, the Romans called in Londinium and it quickly became the largest city in England but it wasn't until around 1066 that it became the capital. The original city or much of it was destroyed by the Great Fire of 1666. By that time, London had seen teh Roman empire, Shakespeare, the Tudors, come and go. Notably, it had also seen black people come...and many stayed.

In fact, by the late 16th century, black people were so numerous and also so noticeable (picture it, the Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, the Arabs, had not arrived here yet to give us any cover!) that Queen Elizabeth I, Anne Boleyn's daughter, issued a proclamation asking for them to be deported. There you have it - I expect she would have been a charter member of the BNP or their royal patroness, if parties could have such!

Apparently though, nobody took the Queen's edict on and she, herself, didn't get rid of her black bugler who is pictured in one of the paintings of the time.

So black people have been in England for centuries, facing racism and varying degrees of discrimination according to the times and situations in which they found themselves. (Back in the 1700s, for instance, when there may have been as many 10,000 of them in London, they were not allowed to be in trade.) Many, if not most, were slaves but there were free people among them Their number dwindled over the next couple of centuries but swelled after World War II.

Today, blacks in London account for about 12% of the population.

An Intro

A little bit about me. I'm black, oh, you guessed that from the title, didn't you? And I'm now living in, that's right, London. Moved myself, lock, stock, and no, not quite, barrel, over here for a job and to check things out on this side of the pond (ever notice how the people who use that phrase always look so self-conscious and try to shrug it off with a laugh?).
It's great. No big complaints so far. I'm really digging the scene, so then I thought, yo, wouldn't it be great to blog it. I mean this lil blog won't end global poverty or contribute to peace in the Middle East (would be great if it could) but it might be helpful to some and might even give the one or two who read it something to think about - so here I am.
Black Expat isn't my first attempt at a blog but it will be the first where I discuss race and the black experience as I live it a lot more. But wait, don't stop reading yet, I'm also going to do fun things - you know, like reviews of new books by black authors in the UK. What? Not exciting enough? Ok. Well, I'll be giving tips on the best things to see if you're visiting this great city (just voted one of the best in the world - how cool is that!). I'll talk about movies, shopping, theaters, clubs too, though they're not really my thing (too many young 'uns there with jittery manners). I'll give my take on current events, sports, actually on whatever catches my attention. So anything could become grist for the mill that will be Black Expat in London. Stay tuned and enjoy the ride!