Currents

The United Kingdom recently emerged from widespread political turmoil as far-right rioters spread violence and fear all around the country. And yet, the media coverage of the carnage leaves out an important aspect of the story. To read prominent outlets such as The Guardian and the BBC, one would think the mayhem was purely anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim. But the refugee communities under attack are home to more than just ethnic or religious minorities — they include LGBT asylum seekers too. As a trans refugee from Ukraine living in South Yorkshire married to a bi refugee from Russia, I take these attacks personally. I know what societies look like when minority groups come under violent mob attacks. This is bigger than xenophobia or anti-Muslim bigotry. It’s an assault on freedom.

It all began near Liverpool in the town of Southport in late July, where news broke that three young girls were brutally stabbed to death by a mysterious attacker. Ten more people were injured. There was nothing particularly special about the assailant — nothing that would turn him into a symbol and boogeyman to spark riots across Britain, except for his age. As a 17-year-old, he was protected by law as a minor, and his identity was hidden from the press. Without any information, people, especially those on the far-right, began making assumptions about the killer, assumptions that soon turned into conspiracy theories. By the time more details came to light, the fact Axel Muganwa Rudakubana was British-born and Christian did not seem to matter. Rumours and disinformation spread online about the killer being a Muslim refugee and asylum seeker had taken root; the fact that Rudakubana is black and has a foreign-sounding name was proof enough.

Thousands of far-right hooligans erupted into violence all around the country, gathering in force and attacking mosques, asylum hostels, and organisations helping refugees. This turned into mindless looting, arson, and uncontrolled attacks on anyone who did not look like a “stereotypical” British person. Over 1,000 people have been arrested, with property damage likely to reach into tens of millions of pounds.

As bad as the Southport riots were, they could have been much worse. Counter-protesters came together in huge numbers, sometimes preventing deadly violence or even reaching out to rioters and trying to reason with them. Among the counter-protesters were LGBT activists and organisations, which is easy to understand considering the fact that these far-right thugs attacked not just Muslim people, refugees, and people of colour, but also the LGBT community.

“LGBTQ refugees, and the wider LGBTQ community are also affected [in these attacks],” one of the main coordinators of LASS (Lesbian Asylum Support Sheffield) — a group that helps lesbian, bisexual, and trans women refugees — told me. “As we know, far-right groups often include homophobic rhetoric and attacks.”

The vast majority of LASS members come from countries where non-heterosexual orientation is prosecuted by law, and where LGBT people face official discrimination and, in some places, even the death penalty. These violent riots targeting refugee communities are starkly reminiscent of the authoritarian societies many LGBT immigrants escaped.

This hit extra close to home for me in early August, when, in the sleepy town of Rotherham in South Yorkshire, a mob of far-right protesters attacked a hotel housing asylum seekers. Rioters tried and failed to set the building on fire in an effort to burn the inhabitants alive, but were thankfully thwarted by the police. What was so surreal was that it easily could have been me in that building. I was an asylum seeker myself for five years until my claim was accepted at the end of 2023. For the first month I was in the UK, I lived in a similar hotel in a nearby town. Scarier still, many asylum seekers come to the UK with their families. In the urban house where I spent that month, I remember lots of little kids, including babies and toddlers.

Thousands of asylum seekers come to the UK each year fleeing anti-LGBT persecution. They come from countries such as Brunei, Iran, Mauritania, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen, where same-sex relationships and contact can be punishable by death. Others come from places like Russia, Rwanda, and Syria. Of course, the rioters did not limit their hostility just to refugees — it was extended to immigrants as a whole. That’s more than 10 million people, including over 350,000 LGBT immigrants.

But the issue is not just about immigrants and Muslim people who happen to be LGBT.

The ideological godfather of the 2024 British far-right riots is the activist Tommy Robinson. He has been behind nearly every large anti-immigration protest in the UK in the past decade, and, though he has fled the UK due to legal troubles, he played a key role in fanning the flames of the current rampages from abroad. Robinson, emblematic of UK far-right activism in general, is infamous for his anti-LGBT bigotry. Despite insincere past attempts to make common cause with LGBT people in his anti-Muslim agitating, Robinson never could quite hide his vitriol. He has cracked jokes about “gay trains” on Pride Month, incited violence against trans people, and expressed outrage that the new Doctor Who is bisexual and black. This ties into a larger pattern: Wherever the far-right goes, anti-LGBT bigotry follows. In 2023, Stonewall reported that during the past five years, hate crimes against LGB people increased by 122%, and 186% for trans people. Many of these hate crimes were committed by thugs inspired by far-right propaganda.

Despite all their professions of “patriotism", the recent rioters have shown through their uncritical acceptance of lies and the alacrity with which they have rushed to violence that they do not believe in the core liberal values on which British society is based. Time again, they have expressed that they do not believe that people have the right to be themselves, live as they wish, and peacefully pursue a better life. They do not believe that all human beings should have equal rights.

Violence, and especially mob violence, is the tool of authoritarians everywhere. And virtually all authoritarian regimes, whether right-wing or left-wing, from Nazi Germany to Joseph Stalin’s USSR, to modern-day China and Russia, are anti-LGBT. This is an issue that transcends politics. One need not be a leftist to stand up and oppose far-right thuggery. I’m a classical liberal, and like many of my friends, I participated in the counter-protests. There is a growing regressive backslide in many parts of the world, but it can only spread if we sit by as passive observers. The time is now for everyone, LGBT or not, left-wing or not, immigrant or not, to stand unified in defence of universal human rights.

Published Aug 19, 2024
Updated Sep 27, 2024