The fight against hate crime is one we must win
ANAS Sarwar is brave. Brave in that selfdeprecating – and particularly Scottish – way, in which he would utterly reject such an idea, shrug it off and say he’s just doing what needs done. He’s brave in calling out racists and Islamophobes, warning that the temperature of the nation is rising and working to pull people from across all backgrounds, faiths and politics together to do something about the problem.
He’s brave in his choice of career. Growing up as a small boy in Glasgow, he saw his father elected as the first Muslim MP in the whole of the UK and he witnessed the hate mail that followed – threatening the whole family.
But he also saw at first-hand the work political representatives do, the difference they can make to communities and the service they give. And he wanted to serve, too.
I don’t share Anas’s politics but I respect, admire and like him.
He is an impressive figure, a good speaker and a committed parliamentarian. He’s the only Scottish MP who, when they lost their seat in the SNP tsunami of 2015, immediately put their shoulder back to the wheel for Labour and continued to serve by getting elected to Holyrood a year later.
He is Glasgow to his bootstraps and loves his home city in a way this East Coaster will never fathom. The idea he is being told to ‘go back to Pakistan’ and called ‘a brown-skinned heretic’ is disgusting. The fact he claims one of his own councillors told him that ‘Scotland wouldn’t vote for a brown Muslim Paki’, is alarming.
Anas Sarwar has watched and witnessed and been subject to racism and anti-Islamic threats all his life – and when he says the
abuse and the hate is getting more prevalent, we would all do well to listen. He knows politicians and people in public life can set the tone. But rather than copy the Trumpian politics of division (which he sees as a symptom, rather than a cause) he has set up a cross-party group in parliament to tackle the problem.
As part of Holyrood’s crossparty group working with the University of Newcastle, last week he launched the first public inquiry into Islamophobia in Scotland. He has sought help from all of Scotland’s political leaders to sign up to a recognised definition of Islamophobia.
As well as the politicians, he is taking on the social media giants, demanding that they crack down on persistent offenders and remove abusive posts.
Scotland is an incredibly white country. It is probable large numbers of people have never witnessed a single incident of Islamophobia. Don’t think for one second that means it doesn’t exist. The conviction this week of Alexander Agnew of the New British Union of Fascists for threats against Mr Sarwar proves this.
As do the more than 5,300 hate crimes reported to the procurator fiscal last year – the great majority racially motivated. It would be easy to leave the fight to Anas and others – to nod in sympathy, shrug, and then just get on with our day.
BUT at a time language is getting coarser, threats more frequent and abuse is migrating from the social media swamp and onto the streets, we cannot allow ourselves to turn away. Whether that’s from Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, gaybashing or any other kind of hate.
Because it is not only the immediate target who suffers, we all do as our country becomes a harder, less welcoming place.
The aim of people seeking division is to force people to pick sides. I know which one I’m on. I stand with Anas.
IT’S not unusual for sports teams to go on tour before the season starts – or even to play a friendly against a team from home many miles away. But baseball is doing it differently this year. Yesterday, the Boston Red Sox and New York Yankees were in London to play the MLB’s first regularseason tie in Europe. With both teams making a 7,000-mile round trip, that’s what I call an away match. PANDEMONIUM in the Holyrood garden this week, when the parliament’s bees staged a breakout from the hives dotted around the grounds. The swarm coincided with the warm weather, meaning members and staff had to shut the windows and swelter inside. It seems that everyone – including the yellow and black bumbles – is ready for a holiday.