Sabrina Miller: The Bristol scandal will not go away
I spent three years fighting for the university to look after Jewish students — and still we wait
IT HAS been almost 200 days since my namesake, Professor David Miller, publicly attacked Jewish students at the University of Bristol. The university, which promised a thorough and efficient investigation, has completely let down its minority students by failing to say or do anything about the situation. Consequently, Jewish students continue to suffer at the hands of Miller’s actions and Bristol’s inaction.
Looking back at my early articles on Miller, it is frustrating to see how much of what I and other Jewish students feared has come to fruition. In February 2021, when the conversation about Miller restarted, I warned that if the university did not hold Miller to account it would set a dangerous precedent.
Miller is now back teaching his infamous Harms of the Powerful module. It is a slap in the face for Bristol’s Jews who have been standing up to him for years. His actions, ideas and theories have been given a rubber stamp by the university who continue to legitimise his crank teachings and conspiratorial nonsense.
Bristol has sided with the abuser. With every day that passes the University of Bristol grows ever more complicit in the antisemitism directed at its students as a result of this case. Hugh Brady, Bristol’s Vice Chancellor, has clearly concluded that it is better to sacrifice Bristol’s Jewish students and drag the university’s name through the mud than to fire Miller. The university, a once reputable institution, is both responsible for and OK with its students getting attacked.
As the JC reports, those who have been emboldened by the university’s apathy and betrayal of young Jews are once again accusing Bristol JSoc and UJS of whitewashing the “Zionist colonisation of Palestine” and “manufacturing hysteria”. And when Bristol’s Jewish students dare to call for justice they are continually hounded by cranks and Electronic Intifada stan accounts.
This will only end when my alma mater decides to end it. In 2019, I pleaded: “You’ve ignored me and other Jewish students time and time again and I say enough is enough.”
Despite multiple petitions, testimony from young Jews, statements made in Parliament and letters from MPs and Jewish communal groups to the Vice Chancellor, the university continues to do nothing. The university has no interest in protecting its Jews. It has chosen silence. Bristol intends to drag this investigation out for as long as possible, hoping that the scandal will blow over and will be forgotten. Given the university’s manipulative tactics, I urge this whole community to keep calling out antisemitism wherever they see it, but especially on campus. Bristol’s failure to act means we Jews must look after ourselves. Bristol must not be allowed to bury its Miller problem in the sands of time. We must keep pushing. We must keep fighting. We must keep writing articles, protesting, tweeting, speaking out and letting our pain and frustration be heard.
I know that this is challenging. In 2019, when writing my first article about David Miller, I confessed that I was getting “really bored of talking about this issue”. Already in my first year, conversations about David Miller had eaten “into my summer, ripping away chunks of time that I’d rather spend with family”. In my third year the abuse I was receiving started to grind me down. Having graduated from Bristol, I am still talking about this same man and it is exhausting.
However, no matter how boring or repetitive these conversations get, no matter how many times we feel like we’re taking up space or being a nuisance, no matter the abuse we receive or the hatred we have to stomach online, it is imperative that we Jews raise our voices and have them heard.
This has all been so predictable — the university’s inaction, the harassment of Jewish students and Miller’s continued insolence. But one thing the university was unable to predict is the persistence of its Jewish students.
Mark my words, Bristol. Jewish students will not stop until David Miller goes. I may no longer be a student to see the day antisemitism is rid from Bristol’s campus, but there will be Jewish students there to see it. Jewish people will always prioritise our safety so don’t you dare think that you’ll be able to shake us off that easily. Antisemitism must never be tolerated and Bristol University has played a huge role in facilitating abuse and racism. Though I am confident that justice will prevail, Bristol and its Vice Chancellor should hang their heads in shame.