Lee Anderson’s ugly words shame Britain
Published
by
Richard Kuper
JVL Introduction
In a short, powerful letter to the Guardian, Rabbi Alexandra Wright takes Tory deputy party chair, Lee Anderson, to task for his grotesque words about asylum seekers.
There were two additional letters, also reposted below.
Steve Bell adds his mark!
This article was originally published by the Guardian, letters page on Thu 10 Aug 2023. Read the original here.
Lee Anderson’s ugly words shame Britain
Loading article text…
I’d speak of unintended consequences. Our people, seeking refuge have heard the denial of succour from our current ( Tory ) government. Hopefully they will be generous in the face of this disgusting behaviour but I doubt that. It’s a stupid government that would turn people seeking safety into people harbouring resentment.
I don’t know much about Rabbi Alexandra. From a sermon I found online, she would like peace between Israel and palestine and an end to the occupation (though she cites its uniting of Palestinians as a reason for it to end, as I understand her words). In any event, when I hear a Rabbi call for the right of return of Palestinian refugees from the Naqba, from 1967 and from numerous less numerous expulsions, I’ll listen to them/him/her moralising on other refugee issues.
In response to Will King’s short letter, Anderson’s constituency might tell him where to get off to, but unfortunately I don’t think his ranting against refugees will be the reason for rejecting him.
Lee Anderson and his former boss, former Labour MP Gloria De Piero, are both on GB news now.
I find it disgusting that the Labour Party leadership have not condemned Anderson remarks in the strongest possible terms. The softly softly approach to language by the Party makes it more acceptable in the public arena.
These letters reminded me of Gary Lineker’s tweet which caused a lot of controversies. Media and some politicians who spoke against his tweet wrongly accused him of drawing parallels with 1940’s holocaust but in fact Lineker tweeted about the language used in 1930’s. The German propaganda using inflammatory language turned the German masses against the Jews. Even in the UK there was a full page spread in the Daily Mail of 1932 against the Jews. The language used by the Tory politicians is turning the UK masses against the asylum seekers.
The power of Propaganda, is well understood by the Tory Government and the majority of the British Press.
ie, they blamed the EU migrants for wage decline, housing shortages, pressure on Schools and NHS etc, they never mentioned the EU rules for free movement (which they ignored) that you could use to control the numbers.
Now, it’s the Asylum Seekers who are the enemy, they are being used to boost the Tory votes at the next GE, they are the Party that’s going to control the numbers. Starmer who I suspect agrees with there policies on asylum seekers, will have been advised to stay neutral and to never oppose their policies, they’ll be accused of being soft on immigration. This is why Starmer is almost silent on the issue and wavering with his answers when being questioned. He should be calling out the reasons why thousands will take the risks involved in travelling hundreds even Thousands of miles to find a place of safety from wars and famine, where they can work and settle in their families into where they end up.
“Why choose the UK”? The answer is simple, wherever you travel in the World, you’ll find the most used language is English, so that’s why so many aim for the UK, they don’t have to learn a new language.