On Racism And Xenophobia, From The Granddaughter Of A Refugee

To start this one I'm going to have to give you a little family history. When people look at me, they see a white girl with a working class background. That might be all they see, because 'white' has certain implications. Privilege. English. Inability to understand racism. But here's the thing, when I saw signs being posted telling 'Polish vermin' to go home, and saying refugees aren't welcome, I cried.

Why?

Both my grandfather and my husband's were Polish refugees after the second world war. Both had been taken by the Nazi's to work as forced labour in Germany. Neither ever saw their families again. I'm the granddaughter of a refugee who came to Britain to escape war and persecution.

I don't know all of the ins and outs of why our grandfathers came to Britain, although I think my granda received a letter from home telling him not to go back. He later lost communication with his family entirely, after they were relocated from their home. Some documentaries show that the Russians were executing returning Poles as traitors because they'd been forcibly taken to Germany, so maybe that was part of it. However, my granda was also 'Polish Ukrainian', born in Poland but having Ukrainian language and culture. He was a minority. When he lost contact with his family, the Polish government were in the process of forcibly relocating Ukrainians. Forcing them from their homes. We suspect this is what happened to my great-grandparents, because they were a minority.

Having been taken from home by invaders as a child, my granda couldn't return to a home still caught between the Russians and other discriminatory forces. As a result he came to Britain as a displaced person. Unable to speak the language. Unable to go home. Having survived a war. He came here, met my grandmother, learned English. He married, worked in British mines, worked at the local miners welfare hall right until his death in his eighties, helping to provide a service for the community. He also took British nationality and changed his surname to something more English.

That will shock some of you. It might even horrify you.

Why change a surname? To fit in. To ensure his children fit in. Many reasons. The first of his children were born with their Polish suname which was later anglicised, the younger were born with the English surname. The oldest of granda's children, my aunt, then changed her name back again, because despite how it sounds, we've always been proud of our heritage. In the past it might have been easier to fit in, but we're the sort who are proud of our roots. Look at who we support in the world cup, look at the food we like to eat, look at how openly proud we are of what granda survived, and at what his family survived...

A son taken by the Nazi's to Germany. A daughter in Siberia because her husband opposed the Russians. A family relocated for being a minority. Children taken from home and forced to work. Wife's punished. Relocation. Does this sound familiar?

My granda was lucky, the family he lived with in Germany were good to him. But that was luck. Many others sent to the farms and mines were treated appallingly, and the scrap of luck granda had doesn't make up for what he lost. Nothing could. So when I look at refugees, I see my granda. When I see immigrants learning the language and trying to forge a life here, I see my granda. When I see the signs saying 'Polish Vermin', I'm actually relieved my granda isn't here to see that, to face it. He always had an accent, would he have been attacked in the wake of Brexit? My aunt has a Polish name, what about her? If I walk down a city street and say I have Polish-Ukrainian heritage, and that I'm proud of it, what about me? What about my children who have two Polish great-grandfathers in their heritage?

In addition to the Polish Heritage, both my husband and I have Irish and almost certainly Scottish heritage. We have an Irish surname. How many jokes are the Irish the butt of? I'm not going to make a mountain out of a mole hill about that, but it adds to the picture. I'm a working class woman with mixed heritage, whose ancestors were persecuted. Does that tally with how some look at me if the see me sitting on the bus with a safety pin on my shirt?

In many cases, apparently not.

There's been a campaign in the wake of Brexit to get people wearing safety pins as a symbol of solidarity with immigrants in the UK. For the most part it's been met with approval, after all, while it won't change the world it is a symbol of hope in a world where messages of hate are being spray-painted onto walls and hurled at people in the street. It's no more divisive than a charity pin. Yet some claim it is.

On twitter, I've seen people claim it makes the situation about 'us' and 'them', white and BAME. But it isn't, because it's not about skin colour. It's about accepting everyone, British, foreign, black, asian, ethnic minority, eastern European, European, African, Indian, American, everybody. In claiming that it's divisive, people are creating a divide which wasn't there at the campaign's conception. And it's happening based on skin colour, because thusfar the uptake of the campaign is mainly by white people. In my opinion, we should all consider the message of the safety pin and why people of ALL races could wear it.

Let white communities, show solidarity with refugees.
Let black communities, show solidarity with threatened and abused Eastern Europeans.
Let Eastern Europeans show solidarity with Syrians.
Let Christians with Muslims.
Let Muslims with Jews.
Let everyone, show some solidarity here.

We are all more than our colour or religion. I'm a mixed heritage, pagan, in-the-closet-due-to-fear LGBT, woman. The only part of me that theoretically doesn't fall into a group enduring persecution is my skin colour. Yet I am judged for that when my desire to were a safety pin in solidarity is turned into a symbol of white privilege.

I'm not a white British imperialist or a white fascist thug, so how about we all stand together against those two categories of people in solidarity, rather than attacking each other and making assumptions about each other? Won't that get us further? Isn't that what this is about?

Just this morning I saw a black person on twitter claim that the safety pin is just a way for white people to feel absolved. Absolved for what, exactly? For the crimes of people who weren't necessarily our ancestors? I don't think the populace of Germany need to be absolved because of the Third Reich. The general populace of modern-day Germany didn't take my granda from home in his early teens. It's pretty clear than my heritage has a lot of working class miners and peasant farmers in it. Not land owners and invaders. Don't place other peoples' crimes on me because I'm white, when I don't judge anyone based on colour or religion. Don't claim I have sometning to be guilty about are need absolved for. The EDL and Britain first don't speak for me. Slave traders didn't create me. Crusaders didn't create me. Imperial invaders didn't create me. But a minority group is in my heritage and it has influenced who I am and how I think. And I think prejudice and hatred are wrong.

We are all human. We are all in this together. We all have stories. So let's stick together to stamp out hate, rather than creating divisions based on the colour of someone's skin, or their religion, or what you presume their ancestors may have done to yours. Love and friendship, not hatred and division. It's the only way forward.

Peace and love, people.

Carmine Raven
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