The United Kingdom has recently experienced a wave of rioting and blame is placed upon people referred to as “the far right.” The individuals who fought police, looted, burned mosques, and physically attacked African descended people, are of the right wing politically, but they should be called racists. It is racism that has been accepted and amplified by the British political class and the media. It is racism that has created feelings of grievance among so many white people there. Britain’s politics have long been motivated by white supremacist thinking, and today’s rioters should not be let off the hook with a euphemism that doesn’t fully explain their actions.

It is literally true that the sun never set on the British empire. Sixty-five different countries celebrate days of independence from that hegemon, from Jamaica to India to Malaysia to Ghana, millions of people lived under British imperial subjugation. Their freedom was hard won, such as in Kenya where thousands of people were incarcerated in prison camps or killed during the independence struggle in the 1950s. The crimes of torture and murder were covered up when records regarding Kenya, Guyana, and other countries were moved or destroyed.

Britain’s history of invading most of the world must be remembered whenever its white population complains about immigration, as they are doing right now,........

© Eurasia Review