Your say / UWE Bristol
‘Don’t play into the racists’ hands’
You only have to look back across the last decade of right-leaning mainstream media coverage of refugees and immigration to witness a tinder box growing in scale and flammability.
The appalling conflagration of violent rioting and disorder that has broken out over recent days has a long and deeply troubling back story.
And of course, there are the fire lighters.
is needed now More than ever
We’ve seen Stephen Yaxley-Lennon – who goes by the pseudonym of Tommy Robinson – sunbathing in Cyprus while posting on X, creating tens of millions of post views that are whipping up much of the disgraceful violence on the UK’s streets.
But he and his networks go a long way back.
Born in Luton, Robinson was at one-time a member of the far-right British National Party and a founder of the English Defence League (EDL).
He also had connections to football violence and was convicted of leading fans in a brawl in Luton in 2010.
In the past week, he has used social media, including a previously banned X profile that was reinstated under Elon Musk, to promote falsehoods about the identity of the Southport attacker.
With Robinson and others now fuelling online disinformation and galvanising extremist right-wing groups intent on creating disorder following the deadly knife attack on a children’s event in Southport, this is now as much an online campaign as it is a series of street-based riots.
Created in 2009, it is worth remembering that the EDL emerged in Luton, where community tensions had risen after five Muslim men accused of yelling abuse at British soldiers and calling them rapists, murderers and baby killers during a homecoming parade were found guilty of a public order offence.
The Bedfordshire town was already associated with Islamist extremism, because it was home to a small number of adherents to Al Muhajiroun, an extremist group implicated in the 2005 London bombings.
Online tactics are almost as old. Matthew Feldman, a specialist on right-wing extremism, said in 2011: “This is direct-action politics, disseminated and coordinated via the new media – ranging from Facebook to mobile phones, and digital film to YouTube.”
Today, experts say the EDL has evolved into a diffuse idea spread mainly online.
Its Islamophobic and xenophobic stance has become an “ideal that people self-radicalise themselves into”, said Sunder Katwala, the director of British Future, a non-profit that researches public attitudes on immigration and identity.
The EDL are not alone. Other far-right agitators spreading information about violent disorder on social media include British Movement, a neo-Nazi group.
We have witnessed how appalling damage has been inflicted on specific locations in our cities and towns, from places of worship to libraries and hotels that accommodate people seeking asylum.
The actions of those with anti-immigrant and Islamophobic ideologies have generated fear and harm at the individual and community levels.
Hate crimes hurt at a number of levels, from the individual to families, to whole communities and wider society. Hate crime is corrosive. It undermines people’s safety, well-being of individuals and social cohesion.
We are seeing that writ large right now. I know many Muslims who are fearful today of stepping outside their front doors into their neighbourhoods.
And that against a backdrop of hate crimes that are sadly part of the everyday life experience for people of colour and faith.
With trends suggesting that police have improved their recording of hate crimes, Muslim hate crimes accounted for 3,400 (44 per cent) of those recorded.
So what can be done? Firstly, allyship in all its forms is absolutely vital at this time.
The scenes of far-right violence, intimidation and criminality we have witnessed across the country do not in any way match our values as a society or as a city. We must stand in solidarity with those most affected.
In Bristol, organisations such as Stand Against Racism & Inequality (SARI) provide services to support victims of racist hate crime, and Avon & Somerset Police will record hate crimes to risk assess incidents.
It’s also worth remembering that violent street rallies, a core part of the EDL’s rise, often serve as a recruiting tool for extremist groups, according to experts who specialise in the history of radicalism and extremism.
As Paul Jackson from the University of Northampton says: “They are ‘performances’ that can reinforce the perceived senses of injustice and being ignored by mainstream voices to followers.”
We may be approaching a tipping point. We have heard from the prime minister and the National Police Chiefs’ Council that 4,000 extra officers will be on Britain’s streets and that the police will use lessons learned from the 2011 London riots.
Rapid convictions and tougher sentencing may yet prove the most effective deterrent to further violent disorder in the coming weeks – for example using enhanced penalties for racially or religiously aggravated crimes.
Finally, aggressive, violent counter-protests are likely to further fuel violence and cause more harm.
We can support people in our communities with empathy and by reporting acts we perceive as prejudicially motivated to the police or SARI or Stop Hate UK.
We can all be good allies and take peaceful but meaningful action.
Constructive interventions can include directly confronting perpetrators about their behaviour, using distraction or interruption, and offering support to those on the receiving end.
Vilifying and agitating the far right plays into their hands. We must not fight hate with hate.
This is an opinion piece by Dr Corinne Funnell, a racist hate crime specialist and a senior lecturer in criminology at UWE Bristol
Main photo: Rob Browne
Read next:
Our top newsletters emailed directly to you
