Of course you can be English if you’re not white. So why can’t the right leave the question alone? | Jason Okundaye
The Guardian · 10d ago · New
Mainstream story
Even Jacob Rees-Mogg pushes back on defining Englishness in exclusively ethnic terms. But the endurance of this discourse is still deeply troubling Can you be English and non-white? It’s a question that keeps stubbornly resurfacing in our political discourse.Last weekend, the former prime minister Rishi Sunak gave his view in a column in the Times, arguing that national identity should not be turned into a DNA test. After leaving office, Sunak, the UK’s first prime minister of colour, was subject to claims by a prominent podcaster that he was not English because he was a “brown-skinned Hindu”. Reflecting on this, Sunak described it as a “reverse Tebbit test”: the sociological concept measuring the loyalty of immigrants – and their children – in the UK depending on which cricket team they supported in international matches. “Once we say that this or that person isn’t really English or British because they are not white,” he wrote, “then we are on a very slippery slope. Some people will argue that English is an ethnic identity and British a civic identity. Though if you think those nuances are heard by most people, I fear you are being rather – perhaps even wilfully – naive.”Jason Okundaye is an assistant Opinion editor at the GuardianDo you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here. Continue reading...
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