Racism and power
The trial of those accused, and now convicted, of the racially-motivated murder of Kriss Donald in Glasgow revealed details of such sickening brutality that I’m reluctant to discuss it in any detail. Suffice to say that such exceptionally bestial crimes by their very nature do not reveal a ‘pattern’ of anything, no matter how much racists might wish otherwise.
But I’m led to comment because I’m not happy about some of the responses to this appalling case.
One species comes from racists like the BNP who have – largely unsuccessfully, I’m happy to say – been trying to stir up trouble in Pollokshields on the back of this crime. They are beneath contempt; this can’t be said often enough.
But while obviously not of the same nature, neither can I agree with those who seem to be collapsing the racist nature of this murder into a general analysis of Glasgow’s ‘gang culture’. This was, as Martin Kelly rightly says, a ‘very Glaswegian murder’. But I was left wondering what the purpose of making this point was.  It’s not as if Glasgow gangs are exactly strangers to racism – so I don’t see how a murder somehow becomes proportionately less racist if you can attribute it more to territorial violence.
I also can’t agree with those arguing that the focus on this case distracts from the ‘wider problem of institutional racism’ – because what they really mean is that it distracts from the narrower problem of institutional racism.ÂÂ
Everyone who isn’t Nick Griffin understands the point that Julaybib makes about black and brown people being more likely to be victims of racism than white people but this collapsing of the problem – or the ‘significant problem’ – into ‘structures’ simply won’t do. I have never been happy with the psuedo-Marxist and frankly racist notion that ‘racism is all about power’. If it wasn’t clear already, the murder of Kriss Donald shows that this idea has to be given up once and for all. It is dangerous to do otherwise because even if we sorted out all our gangs and reformed all our institutions we would still be left with this problem and what this case shows is that it requires very little power indeed for it to be a literally lethal disease in our society.ÂÂ
Shug,
My apologies if my point wasn’t clear.
What has disturbed me in relation to the Shahid/Donald murder has been the emphasis on race to the exclusion of all other factors in most reporting – with the principal other factor being Glaswegian gangs’ historical habit of stabbing and slashing people who don’t come from ‘their bit’.
Both race and sick local culture were critical to the commission of this offnce – and to focus on one and exclude or minimise the other fails to do justice to this horrible crime’s true ghastliness.
Well… yes and no. Although I do believe that our traditional ways of looking at racism have to be challenged, it cannot be denied there is an element of power here. Who frames the debate and the legislation? It is the media and the politicians. If they do not understand minority communities and the latter have no power to push for legislation that helps them, then the dynamic can work against minority groups.
I’m just saying that the power dynamic cannot be ignored, but needs to be applied in context.
Sunny – I’m not suggesting there isn’t an element of power, I’m merely trying to dispense with the notion that it’s ‘all about power’ and that it’s exclusively something that the white majority to to ethnic minorities. When I were a lad in the eighties, anyone who wanted to verify their PC cerdentials would argue that it was impossible for black or brown people to be racist. I thought then, and still think, that this is completely absurd.
Martin – mine to you. I take your point and agreed with you that this was indeed a ‘most Glaswegian murder’. I suppose it depends what you read. Much of the stuff I came across did emphasise the gang element. I was taking issue with the idea that seemed to be implicit in this that the relationship between gangsterism and racism was somehow a zero-sum game. I see now you weren’t doing this.
I agree that the tendency to camouflage the true nature of crimes (that appear to be racially motivated) by using non-inflammatory umbrella terms such as “gangs” may be a cop out – but it’s an understandable cop out.
Problem with objectifying these particular perpetrators in racial terms and drawing attention to the nasty underbelly of this crime, is that you will then have all sorts of far right lunatics who will immediately seize on this as justification for beating up a Pakistani granny on her way home from Tescos.
Let’s face it, the Kriss Donald murder, horrible though it was, was an exceptional case that included levels of pathology rarely acted upon to quite this extreme. So, while it is important to ensure justice is done, I think there needs to be temperance when it comes to fanning flames that haven’t yet been doused.