Your say / Racism
‘My roots in the UK run deep but I still face attacks and abuse’
It’s frustrating for me to hear the police describe an incident of a nine-year-girl being shot by an airgun in Brentry as a “one-off”.
The awful shooting of this young girl has triggered painful memories of when I was shot in the leg with an air rifle on May 31 2022, on what should have been a peaceful summer evening in the countryside near Bristol.
The incident was reported to the police by supportive friends, and I also gave a statement, but although my friends followed it up because I knew pursuing it would be pointless, I never received any feedback from the police.
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On another occasion, I remember being out running and hearing the sound of monkey noises from a car directed at me.
I assume these racial taunts were intended to belittle and dehumanise me. Sadly, they reflect a painful reality that I and many others have learned to endure.
These attacks are not one-offs but regular occurrences for people from marginalised groups like me.
As someone of mixed Welsh and Barbadian heritage, who grew up in the UK and went on to serve my country as a sergeant in the UK armed forces before becoming a civil servant, I know my roots here run deep.
Yet despite this, I still find myself facing attacks and abuse.
It’s particularly unsettling that the attacks have focused on the most vulnerable: a young girl and a woman in her 50s in my case.
Also, both incidents occurred in broad daylight, showing a disturbing lack of fear for the law.
When the police dismiss these ongoing threats as one-offs, it leaves me feeling unprotected and unsettled.
How many more incidents have not been fully investigated by the police because they are deemed to be one-offs?
How many more do we have to suffer before this pattern of violence and abuse is taken seriously?
Are they waiting for something worse to happen, like a shooting with a real rifle?
This is an opinion piece by Loretta Kayser, a British military veteran, civil service accountant and mother of twins, with Welsh and Barbadian roots
Main photo: Martin Booth
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