I saw Ade Adepitan’s film about his visit to a “whites-only” town in South Africa. It was observant, astute and shocking. Its revelation of the depth and subtlety of the racist attitudes embedded in residents there was sickening. Worse still, however, was to read excerpts, in his subsequent article in the Guardian about making the film, of the messages posted on social media attacking him for being who he is – a black, disabled man – in words and conceptions that were so diabolical that I had to read them several times to grasp their full intent and force myself to wake up to the fact that there are still people out there who harbour such hatred and disdain (Visiting a whites-only town in South Africa was difficult. Even sadder was the racist backlash in the UK, 26 March).
Today we are so caught up dealing with accusations and scorn of “wokeness” and exhortations to be nicer about each other that we are losing our awareness of the insidious persistence of vile, unadorned racism. Instead, surely, we should spend our time condemning and trying to root out disgusting racism and hatred.
Gillian Dalley
London
