Not In Our Name

Thank you for your kind comments on yesterday's blip. You're a good bunch, you are.

I wrote it to try to convince myself that it hadn't bothered me but it did. I woke up this morning still feeling beat up. Thankfully Dr T is back from London and whisked me away to Glasgow for the march to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. There's nothing quite like focussing on the bigger picture to put one's own problems into perspective.

What a great march and rally! The organisers brought together a wide range of speakers from across Glasgow to speak out against racism, fascism, Islamaphobia... all sorts of bad things. It was great to see a lot of fellow activists and feel part of something positive.

One of the highlights for me was the speech from local MSP (Member of the Scottish Parliament for those of you outwith Scotland) Humza Yousaf who is also the Minister for External Affairs and International Development. He spoke strongly about how Scotland welcomed his grandfather in the 1960s, how the people of Glasgow stood up for asylum seekers who were subject to dawn raids about a decade ago, about the horrors of the detention centres that still exist and about how the UK Government used the language of racism last year with its Go Home campaign. Humza knows what he's talking about.

I've been going to demonstrations since I was 15 (yes, over 30 years now) and rarely have I seen a Government Minister stand up for the things we were protesting about. What a change! When I mentioned this to Humza, he said that Malcolm X said that if you have a platform you have to use it. This was another first - a Government Minister quoting Malcolm X!

We ran into Graham from last Saturday's march and went for a pint and a blether. Dr T and I then meandered around Glasgow, found a hidden treasure of a veggie restaurant/record/book shop and then made our way home.

I imagine I've bored you with links already but here are a few more shots from today.

:-)