Laura McCartney-Gray retweetledi
Local media report that a group of 20 to 30 individuals put up dozens of flags across Norwich, including outside the Islamic community centre on Dereham Road, in what many residents described as an act of intimidation. The group chanted aggressively, revved motorbikes, and shouted slogans like “whose streets, our streets” while filming the entire display. Videos posted online included racist language and footage of members confronting locals. Here's the full response I gave.
“Everyone should watch the video for themselves. One member of the group laughingly refers to somebody as a ‘black cunt’ and threatens to ‘knock them out.’ They cheer the fact that they’re outside ‘a mosque’, then climb a ladder to hang a St George’s Cross flag from a lamp post, weaponising a national symbol to try to intimidate part of our community.
There’s no ambiguity here. This is racism, pure and simple. These are the tactics of the far right, overt racists and fascists. From Oswald Mosley’s Brownshirts in the 1930s to the National Front in the 1970s, and now here in our city, the pattern remains the same.
And let’s be clear: the same people turn up at so-called ‘protests’ outside temporary accommodation for asylum seekers. They wrap themselves in the language of protecting women, defending British pride, or being ‘just right, not far-right.’ But the mask always slips. Watch the video; it’s not about women’s safety, it’s not about patriotism, it’s not about common sense. It’s about racism and intimidation, scapegoating vulnerable people to divide our communities and poison our politics.
We’ve seen this story before, and we know where it leads. Our city is better than this, and we must stand together to say: not in our name, and not on our streets.”
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