Playing the race card seems to be coming more popular again recently. First of all, two black [Labour] MPs, along with Stephen Lawrence's mother, are claiming that Boris Johnson, the likely Conservative candidate for Mayor of London, has a "1950s attitudes to race". On what is this based? On a 2002 article by Boris in which he "referred to the Queen being greeted in Commonwealth countries by "flag-waving piccaninnies"" and "during a mooted visit by Tony Blair to the Congo, that "the tribal warriors will all break out in watermelon smiles to see the big white chief"." These can hardly be described as racist, but more like satire.
There's also Ali Miraj, who claimed today in a Sunday Times article that “I have never upheld playing the ‘race’ card” - despite having quite obviously done so when he was evicted from the selection for the PPC in Witham - despite that later being won by Priti Patel. Even with this article, he is, as Dizzy points out, playing the race card by not playing the race card:
"Rather than saying "you're a bunch of racists" it's essentially saying "you're a bunch of racists because you're only doing this to send the message that you're not a bunch of racists"."This renewal of the playing of the race card is a bad thing for politics and the country as a whole. "Race" is again seeming to become a political play-thing, with the rolling out of Stephen Lawrence's mother and two MPs specifically selected because of their ethnicity. If this sort of shallow colour-focused rather than colour-blind politics becomes important again in Britain, then it is nothing but to all our detriment. The race card should not be played by anyone, no matter their own "race". It is as bad when played by a black person as by a white person - colour blind politics should be actually colour blind.
Sources: BBC, Sunday Times
