Reform UK’s ugly response to slavery reparations claims | Letters
It is not necessary to agree with the slavery reparations movement in order to see through the crude and threadbare logic of Zia Yusuf’s tirade against it (Reform UK would stop visas for people from countries seeking slavery reparations, 7 April).Britain’s prominent role in ending the slave trade and subsequently slavery neither absolves its involvement in those enterprises nor erases their effects.Endless reiteration of it does, however, encourage a sentimental attachment to a single, insular version of history.Similarly, to claim that advocates for reparations are using history “as a weapon to drain our treasury” is a wilful misrepresentation, designed to jolt the indignant reflexes of Reform UK supporters too lazy to engage with extensive argument.But the ugly coup de grace in Yusuf’s diatribe is his willingness to demonise whole populations whose governments have the audacity to question historical narrative or to possess opinions built on principle – a crime so heinous that it deserves the denial of visas for entry to Britain.
Typically, however, Reform’s right brain rarely knows what its left hemisphere is up to.So, Nigel Farage’s coincidental statement that “I think if we start banning people from entering the country because we don’t like what they say, I worry where that ends up” (with reference to Kanye West) ought to see Yusuf beat an ignominious retreat.But, unfortunately, this is unlikely, as Reform is as hypocritical as it is dishonest.Paul McGilchristCromer, Norfolk I am confident that my ancestor William Wilberforce would find the Reform party’s claim that the UK made “huge sacrifices” to end the slave trade both ignorant and tone‑deaf.Should we be lamenting no longer being able to profit from the labour of men, women and children denied their freedom and often treated appallingly?Enslavers and plantation owners had to be compensated handsomely by the British government to get the 1833 act that abolished slavery in the British empire through parliament.
These did not compensate formerly enslaved people for their enslavement, or take steps to rehabilitate them,Many were forced to continue working for their former enslavers in similar working conditions,The question of reparations is a complex one,To deny visas to members of the nations seeking them, many of whom will be descendants of enslaved people, is nasty and small-minded,Applications should be considered on their merits, and many to whom visas are granted will benefit this country in all sorts of ways.
Sebastian WilberforceTai Tapu, New Zealand European countries involved in slavery and the US should pay reparations (Commonwealth leaders vow to keep seeking reparations after Reform UK plan to halt visas, 7 April),The profits from slavery created vast wealth for white UK and US “owners” of enslaved people,None of the perpetrators of that vile crime were held to account – and none of the proceeds were confiscated,On the contrary, the UK government compensated the perpetrators and profiteers,Forty six thousand UK owners of enslaved people were compensated for their “loss”.
The government took out a massive loan (not fully repaid until 2015) and gave each owner, on average, about £400,000 in today’s values.African enslaved people were given nothing by the UK or the US – except, in the case of US freed people, the famous broken promise of 40 acres and a mule.Chris Hughes Leicester Have an opinion on anything you’ve read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
‘I got everything I dreamed of – when I had no ability to handle it’: Lena Dunham on toxic fame, broken friendships and her ‘lost decade’
Stardom came fast and hard for the wunderkind who created the hit HBO series Girls aged just 23. Now she’s written a tell-all memoir about why she was forced to retreat from the spotlight Lena Dunham on going to rehab: read an exclusive extract from FamesickIf there is something to be learned from the words people pick for their passwords and proxies, then Lena Dunham’s choice of aliases – pseudonyms that, as a public person, she has used over the years to conceal her identity when checking into rehab or ordering room service – give us a tiny glimpse into the writer and director’s self-image. Among her staples, “Lauri Reynolds” (after her mum, Laurie, with whom she is strikingly close); “Rose O’Neill” (after the American millionaire illustrator, who lost her fortune to burnout and hangers-on); and my favourite, “Renata Halpern”, an alias Dunham shares with readers of her delicious new memoir, Famesick, without explaining the name’s origin.“Has anyone else clocked the Renata Halpern reference?” I ask Dunham, who is in her apartment in New York, talking fast via video call while waiting for an egg-and-cheese bagel to be run up from the deli. On the brink of 40, she is in her dark-haired era – very Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes – which, this morning, is set against a bright orange shirt and the pale, glowy skin she describes as the single happy side-effect of hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a genetic condition of the connective tissue with which Dunham was diagnosed in 2019
Kimmel on Trump: ‘He talks about war like he’s bragging about women with Billy Bush’
Jimmy Kimmel expressed frustration over Donald Trump’s confusing statements on Iran while also expressing shock over Melania Trump’s surprise statement.The ABC host spoke about the ongoing war in Iran that is happening “for reasons known only to Donald Trump” and how we remain unsure over the strait of Hormuz and whether it is or isn’t open.Kimmel joked that with all the back and forth over it, “basically after all this he got us is constipation”.Trump has been teasing a “grand reopening” as well as a possible business partnership with Iran “which makes no sense”.Kimmel joked that “he’ll put it on his vision board and will it to be true” before moving on to his threats on social media teasing the military’s “next conquest”
Jimmy Kimmel on US ceasefire negotiators: ‘We’d be better off with Alvin and the Chipmunks’
On Wednesday night, late-night hosts reacted to Donald Trump’s threat to wipe out Iran, the trio who are leading ceasefire negotiations in the region and JD Vance’s trip to Budapest in support of Viktor Orbán.Jimmy Kimmel focused on the ceasefire that resulted from Trump’s warning that “an entire civilization will die” if Iran did not meet US demands to open the strait of Hormuz.“Once again, he made a big threat and backed off like your dad threatening to pull the car over and turn it around,” Kimmel said.“What a time to be alive. A man who has the nuclear codes written on his stomach in ketchup has the power to wipe a whole country off the map
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump’s Iran threats: ‘The most dangerous episode of the Celebrity Apprentice yet’
Late-night hosts reacted to a late-stage ceasefire with Iran, after Donald Trump promised “a whole civilization will die tonight” in an extremely alarming post.Tuesday was just “another crazy day here in the United States of America!” said Jimmy Kimmel, after the president promised, then called off, destructive attacks in Iran by 8pm that evening. “Probably the most dangerous episode of the Celebrity Apprentice yet. Today was D-Day – in this case, the D stands for dementia, but it was D-Day.”“We’re coming to you from Los Angeles for the local time’s just after 5pm, which was Trump’s deadline for Iran to ‘Open the F-ing strait or you’ll be living in hell,’” the host explained
Jimmy Kimmel on Trump’s posts: ‘The only president who teases a bombing the same way ABC promotes episodes’
Late-night hosts reacted to Donald Trump’s expletive-laden social media posts about the war in Iran and mocked his tonally jarring White House Easter egg roll.Much has happened since Jimmy Kimmel Live! went on a one-week spring break. “It’s hard to believe it was only a week off,” the host said on Monday evening. “It seems like we’ve been gone for a year. So much stuff happened while we were off
Eminem’s 8 Mile helped me survive abuse – and opened my eyes to a world outside of orthodox Judaism
My upbringing denied me access to the arts and led to me bottling up my feelings about what was happening to me. Then I saw Eminem taking control of his destiny, and decided I needed to do the sameAt 15, I had never been to the cinema, or even watched a movie. I grew up in a strictly Orthodox Charedi Jewish household, the daughter of a rabbi, in Glasgow, where we had next to no exposure to cultural influences beyond our religious world. The bookshelves were stacked with biblical texts and teachings, we sang in Yiddish and I only saw TV at my less religious grandparents’ house, where we could watch the end of the tennis if it was finishing as we arrived.By my mid-teens, my parents had moved to Jerusalem and sent me to live in Manchester, with a scholar who would later abuse me
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