By Gabriel Princewill-
Both Conservative MP Nadine Norris, and Alibhai Brown, are wrong about their position on the Royal Wedding. Norris and Brown became embroiled in a twitter spat about comments the latter made about the Royal wedding.
Alibhai Brown, a commentator on immigration and diversity, and multiculturalism wrote: “Is it safe to be back on twitter? Have people – including royal wedding journalist junkies – run out of breath yet? Proof again that GB is an infantilized, escapist nation.”
Ms Dorries replied: “Yasmin, why don’t you just try to be nice? Maybe appreciate just a little the country and the people you have chosen to live, work and benefit from all of your life.”
. The criticism that Alibhain should instead focus on appreciating the country she has “chosen to benefit from”, has been construed to be racist. Well, the statement is partly reasonable and partly flawed. Reasonable in the sense that unless Yasmin Alibhai has any good reasons why she was undermining the celebrations of the Royal family, she is deserving of criticism. In the absence of providing a reason why she should not join Britain to celebrate the marriage of the newlyweds from the Royal family., her remarks were unnecessary and reprehensible.
The comments ” the people you have chosen to live, work, and benefit from all your life”, can be seen to imply that Alibhai Brown made a choice in living in Britain, as opposed to Britain being her home( since Alibhai was born in Britain.) The idea that Alibhai Brown benefits from the British people also implicitly suggests she doesn’t contribute to Britain, or that she is a recipient of the benevolence of the British people.
However, sober judgement demands careful analysis. In assessing racism, we would have to ask whether Norris could rationally have made the same statement to a white British born woman, without the statement being out of place. If she can’t, then her comments would be racist. However, I think she can, because a white woman born and bred in Britain can still be told to appreciate the country she has chosen to live, work and benefit from. A white woman born in the Uk is not bound to work in Britain, and could work elsewhere.
Norris’s comments were a bit harsh and negligent, and could possibly have had racist sentiments underlying it. Only she knows if she did, but on the strength of her precise comments, she was harsh and reckless in her choice of words, but right about the fact that Alibhai Brown should not have been disrespectful about the Royal Wedding.
Every wedding is worthy of celebration, except in the face of strong grounds to object to any given marriage.
Ms Alibhai-Brown left Uganda for Britain in 1972, where she completed a Master of Philosophy degree in literature at the University of Oxford in 1975.
On Monday morning, two days after the wedding of Prince Harry to Meghan Markle, the prominent commentator on immigration, diversity and multiculturalism wrote: “Is it safe to be back on twitter? Have people – including royal wedding journalist junkies – run out of breath yet? Proof again that GB is an infantilized, escapist nation.”
Ms Dorries replied: “Yasmin, why don’t you just try to be nice? Maybe appreciate just a little the country and the people you have chosen the live, work and benefit from all of your life.”
The pair then became embroiled in a Twitter spat and Ms Alibhai Brown questioned why the MP believed she was not entitled to have an opinion on Prince Harry’s marriage to Meghan Markle over the weekend.
“Below you to play the race card, you’re better than that,” Ms Dorries responded.