Labour's 'control immigration' mug
In the aftermath of the terrible murder of Jo Cox, part of the media seems to have woken up to the fact that racism remains strong in our society and that the culture it sustains can have dramatic consequences. When discourse is turned into action, violence usually springs from the most extreme fringes of the far right, as was the case in Birstall. However, while scrutinising and combatting these groups is essential, it is no longer enough as racism has seeped back into the mainstream after a long process of sanitisation.
I began to research the mainstreaming of far right discourse in 2007 as I witnessed the ways in which anti-immigration, anti-refugee and anti-Islam rhetoric became commonplace in political campaigning, and denouncing them as racist was increasingly seen as extremist. Ever since, this trend has continued and, while distraught, I was not surprised when I heard the news on Thursday. As the saying goes, you reap what you sow, and the responsibility for the tragedy goes far beyond the act of an individual.
