In a recent interview with Forge Press, Minesh Parekh, Labour councillor for Crookes and Crosspool, spoke out about his experiences receiving racial abuse online amid a national rise in anti-migrant behaviour.
Parekh recalled a series of targeted comments towards himself and his colleagues on a Facebook group ‘Sheffield Online’ following a council motion on the situation in Gaza.
He told us: “Most of the comments were full of racist bile of ‘deport them all, look at all these councillors’ names’, inferring that the only reason we cared about Gaza was because some of us were politicians of colour.”
“There’s a lot of euphemistic language of, look at their names, look at his name, this is the reason why he’s doing it. People don’t want to say, “this is a brown person” so they’ll just infer it.”
Minesh has observed hostile behaviour since his election in 2022 and believes it has significantly worsened in recent years.
“I don’t think, five years ago even, we would have had this same level of unchecked and unrestrained racism. I think that speaks to a number of things.”
Facebook currently does not monitor comments manually, meaning that racial abuse and other harmful behaviour can easily go unchecked. Minesh pointed out that many other social media platforms don’t have safety features that filter online hatred.
The councillor explained: “It’s significant that they are targeting politicians. If they think they can get away with it towards a politician, they will think they can get away with it towards ordinary people of colour in the streets. That’s the signal of where we’re going.”
He added:
“They are trying to intimidate me, they are trying to intimidate my colleagues, they are trying to intimidate others. Things will be far, far worse for the ordinary person who doesn’t have a platform, can’t speak up, can’t resist and oppose this.”
“I think we’re seeing a huge shift in the political culture where people feel more emboldened, and they feel like they can demonise migrants and people of colour and there is no consequence to that, and I think that’s a really worrying direction we’re heading in this country.”
Statistics released by the Home Office signal a 6% rise in the number of racial hate crimes since March 2024.
Additionally, there was a 19% increase in religious hate crimes targeted at Muslims in the same time frame, spiking at the time of the Southport stabbings and the national riots that followed.
Minesh believes that this rise in attacks is due to several factors. Alongside unmonitored online comments, he also attributes a significant portion of the issue to the government’s “toxic legislation” and a “huge push globally towards the right.”
He said: “If you look at the rise of Trump, the rise of Farage, there’s a lot of money behind this rise of the right, which is about cutting taxes for the wealthy just as much as it is about making conditions worse.
“I think a lot of people are taken by what they see as false solutions, because they see a country that’s living conditions haven’t improved in the last 15 years. In fact, it’s gotten a lot worse. They see the rate of change isn’t progressing as quickly as they want to under a Labour government.”
“You have this group of people that want to see this country improve, see it’s not getting better, and will turn to false solutions.”
Minesh also draws a difference between those spreading the hate deliberately and those who get caught up in the behaviour due to a “broader despair of not seeing things get better in their own lives, and their own working conditions getting worse.”
Referring to anti-migrant language from the Government and the media, he said: “If you’re told by someone repeatedly, and by the press repeatedly, that someone else is causing the problems, you may not even believe it yourself, but if that’s the only solution you’re being offered then people might turn to it.”
This year saw a wave of hostile behaviour aimed at migrants and asylum seekers. In September, over 100,000 people took to the streets of London to march in a “Unite the Kingdom” protest, led by far-right activist Tommy Robinson.
Additionally, a false social media post claiming that the Southport murder was a muslim asylum-seeker last year led to nationwide racist riots, protests and anti-social behaviour.
Although the harm has been done, Minesh believes that there’s still time to win back those who’ve been misled and to change their mindsets.
He said: “I think there’s the Nigel Farages and the Tommy Robinsons who are doing this deliberately and cynically, and know that they’re doing this deliberately and cynically, but there’s also people who probably 5, 10, 15 years ago who never would’ve thought or said anything like this, but have been caught up in this because of that generalised lack of progress as a society.
“The way we speak to those people and win them back, which is really important to do, is by this country and Government refocusing on economic justice, raising all communities up, and delivering improvements to people’s living conditions.
“That’s what we have to be doing, that’s what a Labour Government should be doing, and I think the fact that we’ve gone so off track, too far away from that central message, is turning people away, and they’ll find false prophets in whatever direction because of that.”
