The Black Lives Matter movement has provoked many revelations and discussions of institutional racism in various fields, not only criminal justice but also education, sport, media and culture; we cover a selection of these below.
Our regular calendar of racism and resistance can be viewed here.
PROTESTS AND POLICE RESPONSE
See also anti-fascism and far right; media and culture; electoral politics.
3 June: Thousands protest at Helsinki Senate Square, Finland against racism and police brutality, in solidarity with the protests across the USA. (Helsinki Times, 3 June 2020)
3 June: Following protests against police violence, French interior minister Christophe Canaster announces that disciplinary action will be taken against racism in the police. (Connexion France, 3 June 2020)
4 June: At least 4,000 people march to the headquarters of West Midlands police in a peaceful protest against police brutality and the death of George Floyd. (BBC News, 4 June 2020)
5 June: Fifteen thousand people gather in Oslo’s Eidsvoll Square, Norway in solidarity with those in the US protesting against police brutality. (The Local, 5 June 2020)
5 June: As 66 UN special rapporteurs issue two joint statements condemning the ‘fundamental racial inequality and discrimination’ and ‘racial terror in state sponsored and privately organised violence’ experienced by Black people in the US, half a million people sign a petition and 166 MPs from every political party write to the international trade secretary calling for an immediate end to the export of British riot gear, tear gas and rubber bullets to the United States, in response to a petition signed by half a million people. (Guardian; Independent, 5 June 2020)
5 June: In response to Black Lives Matter protests, police and the German federal interior ministry insist that institutionalised racism and racial profiling in the police is not a problem. Jörg Radek, deputy chairman of the GdP police union, says that anyone accusing police of ‘latent or structural racism was either ‘showing serious gaps in their knowledge about how the police works, or is trying, from the point of view of the GdP, to exploit the measured response of forces for party political purposes.’ (Deutsche Welle, 5 June 2020)
6 June: Tens of thousands protest in London’s Parliament Square and outside the US embassy, Downing Street and the Home Office. Fourteen people are arrested in total. 15,000 demonstrate in Manchester, and many thousands more attend protests in Cardiff, Glasgow, Leicester, Milton Keynes, Newcastle, Sheffield and other UK towns and cities. (Guardian, 6 June 2020)
6-7 June: Protests supporting Black Lives Matter take place across Europe, with around 23,000 protesting across France, despite a police ban, 15,000 in Berlin, and many thousands more in cities across the country including Stuttgart, Munich, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Cologne and Hanover. In Hamburg and Stockholm, where thousands gather, police use pepper spray against demonstrators (watch a video here). Thousands protest in Rome, Milan, Naples and Bari, where a student sit-in is staged, and in Spain, Cyprus and Hungary, where hundreds gather outside the US embassy. (Al Jazeera, 6 June; Euronews; The Local, 7 June; Guardian; TRT World, 9 June 2020)
7 June: Protests against racism are held in Parliament Square and outside the US Embassy in London, and in UK towns and cities including Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Nottingham, Cardiff, Bristol, Sheffield, Newcastle, Carlisle, Dumfries, Derby, Chester, Wolverhampton, Middlesbrough, Lytham and Wrexham and the M6 near Warwick, making an estimated 200 protests in the UK over the weekend. Another 22,000 people worldwide join an online rally addressed by George the Poet, the MAMA Youth Project, Dope Black Dads and BLM UK. (BBC News; Guardian, 7 June 2020)
7 June: Ten thousand people gather in Brussels’ Place Poelaert to protest against police brutality and racism in Belgium and in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement in the US. Many hold banners remembering Semira Adamu, Mawda, Mehdi and Adil, all of whom died in Belgium. In Spain, thousands at a rally against racism and police brutality in Madrid’s Colon Square hear speeches linking Donald Trump, Vox leader Santiago and Spain’s current harsh immigration policies. (Brussels Times; El Pais, 7 June 2020)
7 June: French interior minister Christophe Castaner launches an investigation into a private Facebook group with 7,240 members, most of them serving police or gendarmes, for ‘insults of a racist nature’ and ‘public provocation of racial hatred’. The website StreetPress infiltrated TN Rabiot Police Officiel, which amongst other things mocked those who have died in police custody and made racist jokes about the Black Lives Matter movement. (Guardian, 7 June 2020)
8 June: The French interior minister announces that the police’s chokehold restraint will be abandoned, after a weekend of protests against police brutality and after the country’s police watchdog received 1,500 complaints against officers in the last year, half alleging violence. (France 24, 8 June 2020)
8 June: Netpol accuses the Metropolitan police of unlawful behaviour at the protests, citing the actions of mounted police and the ‘kettling’ of protesters until after midnight. Protesters were filmed and forced to provide their names and addresses to be released, despite a legal ruling that using public order powers for intelligence gathering is unlawful. Some 86 arrests were made for offences including violent disorder, affray, criminal damage and breaching lockdown. (Netpol, 8 June; Vice, 9 June 2020)
8 June: London mayor Sadiq Khan calls on the Met police to examine policing measures disproportionately targeting BAME people, such as stop and search and the use of tasers, while home secretary Priti Patel condemns the ‘vandalism’ by ‘thugs and criminals’ over the weekend, saying 137,500 people attended protests, 135 were arrested and 35 police officers injured. Boris Johnson, writing in the Voice, acknowledges the ‘undeniable feeling of injustice’ behind the protests, but adds that those attacking property or police will ‘face the full force of the law’. (Guardian, 8 June 2020)
8 June: Supt Andy Bennett, the officer leading Bristol’s police operation on Sunday, when officers stood by and allowed protesters to throw the statue of slave trader Edward Colston into the river, defends his decision, saying attempts to guard the statue would have led to violence. ‘No one got hurt and we had no arrests … 10,000 passionate people – Bristol should be proud of itself’, he says. (Bristol Post, 8 June 2020)
8 June: Six days after launching a fundraising drive, Black Lives Matter UK says it has received £750,000, with donations to other groups providing legal and mental health assistance taking the total to over £1 million. (Guardian, 9 June 2020)
9 June: Neville Lawrence, the father of Stephen Lawrence, says black people are still treated as second-class citizens in Britain and police have broken promises to reform made two decades ago, citing stop and search figures. (Guardian, 9 June 2020)
9 June: Britain’s most senior BAME police officer Neil Basu, head of counter-terrorism, denounces racial bias ‘built into the very fabric of our institutions and society’, seen in the ‘huge disparity in young black men in the criminal justice system’ and the disproportionate enforcement of lockdown rules. (Guardian, 9 June 2020)
10 June: Amidst increased scrutiny of technology companies over their contacts with the police following the crackdown on Black Lives Matter protests, IBM pulls out of the facial recognition market and calls for a dialogue on the use of technology in law enforcement. (Guardian, 10 June 2020)
10 June: Thousands across the UK take the knee in a protest organised by Stand Up To Racism (SUTR). (SUTR, 10 June 2020)
11 June: Police officers in Paris, Toulouse, Nice, Grenoble and elsewhere in France symbolically gather and ‘throw down their handcuffs’ to register their opposition to the minister’s anti-racist and anti-police brutality measures. The protest is organised by police union Unité SGP Police. (Connexion France, 12 June 2020)
11 June: Seven organisations in Belgium launch a campaign, ‘Not Normal – Stop Ethnic Profiling’, to stop the police use of ethnic profiling. (Brussels Times, 11 June 2020)
11 June: German Interior and Justice Ministries are preparing a commission to look into the issue of racism in the police force. (The Local, 11 June 2020)
11 June: Amnesty International (AI) launches an interactive website detailing the abuse of tear gas in riot control, warning that UK-manufactured tear gas is at risk of ‘being used against BLM protesters in dangerous and highly inappropriate ways’ and that a shadowy and poorly regulated global trade in tear gas is fuelling human rights violations against peaceful demonstrators. (AI, 11 June 2020)
12 June: British courts prepare to fast-track prosecutions of BLM protesters under plans drawn up by the home and justice secretaries, Priti Patel and Robert Buckland to get offenders in court and sentenced within 24 hours of committing criminal damage or assault on protests. (Telegraph £, 12 June 2020)
12 June: After rapper and community activist Jermaine Scott, known as Wretch 32, shares a video of his 62-year-old father, Millard Scott, being Tasered by police at his home in Tottenham, north London, during the lockdown, the case is referred to the IOPC. Millard’s brother, community campaigner Stafford Scott, points up the irony of the Met police publishing a statement by chief constables in support of the Black Lives Matter protests as countless people have died at the hands of the British police and no one has been charged. (Guardian, 10 June; Guardian, 12 June 2020)
13 June: France’s highest administrative court lifts the ban on gatherings of more than 10 people to legalise public protests of up to 5,000 people, as long as they wear masks, saying the freedom to protest is a ‘fundamental right’. Later, riot police fire tear gas into a crowd estimated at 120,000 people marching to condemn France’s racism and police brutality, organised by the campaign Justice pour Adama [Traoré], a young man who died in police custody in 2016. (Al Jazeera, 13 June; La Meute; Connexion France, 15 June 2020)
14 June: An estimated 20,000 people form a socially-distanced human chain stretching nine kilometres, from the Brandenburg Gate to Neukölln, in south-eastern Berlin, with solidarity demonstrations also held in Leipzig and Hamburg. (Euronews, 15 June 2020)
14 June: Two of the most senior black officers to have served in British policing reveal that their careers were blighted by racism, and warned that the misuse of stop and search was leading to black men being treated as ‘property’ by officers. (Guardian, 14 June 2020)
14 June: Labour backs government plans to jail those defacing war memorials and other monuments, after 100 Conservative MPs indicate support for a backbench proposal for a maximum ten-year sentence under a desecration bill. (Independent, 14 June 2020)
15 June: Belgium’s interior minister Pieter De Crem calls on local authorities to limit public gatherings to 20 people or to ban them, in response to the 10,000-strong anti-racism protest held in the Place Poelaert on 7 June. (Brussels Times, 15 June 2020)
16 June: The French government suspends the ban on police chokeholds after pressure from police officers. National Police chief Frederic Veaux says ‘the technique known as a chokehold will continue to be used with restraint and discernment’ until there is ‘clarification of the new framework’. (The Local, 16 June 2020)
16 June: After a weekend of BLM protests across Scotland, a fundraising drive by the family of Sheku Bayoh, who died in police custody in 2015, raises over £50,000 for legal costs at the recently announced public inquiry. Sheku’s sister Kadi Johnson says that while she understands the symbolism of civic monuments targeted by BLM, it is important that police violence and racism, not bringing down statues, should be the focus of protests. (Sunday Post, 14 June; Daily Record, 16 June 2020)
16 June: Protests in Switzerland against police brutality and racism in honour of George Floyd also chant the name of Mike Ben Peter, a 37-year-old Nigerian man who died in Lausanne in March 2018 during a violent arrest by six police officers after he refused a police search. The case garnered little attention at the time, beyond a local demonstration against police violence. (The Local, 16 June 2020)
16 June: Thousands in Spain and Morocco sign an online petition calling for a re-investigation of the death of Ilyas al-Taheri, 18, described as ‘the Moroccan Floyd’, who died a year ago in a juvenile centre in Almeria, after a video emerges showing him being violently held face-down on a bed by six officers for 13 minutes until he stops moving. (Al Jazeera, 16 June 2020)
ELECTORAL POLITICS
12 June: Prime minister Boris Johnson provokes anger after claiming that anti-racist protests have been ‘hijacked by extremists intent on violence’, and sending out eight tweets condemning those calling for memorials with links to slavery and racism to be taken down. Sculptor Anish Kapoor calls his opinion ‘bullshit’ while the Lib Dem home affairs spokesperson accuses him of stoking division and fear. (Guardian, 12 June 2020)
11 June: More than 30 BME Labour MPs accuse Priti Patel of ‘using’ her own experience of racism to silence debate about institutional racism, writing that it does not make her an authority on all forms of racism. (inews, 11 June 2020)
DISCRIMINATION
12 June: The day after Flemish lawmakers resolve to ‘map’ racism by monitoring biased or discriminatory incidents across activity sectors, e.g., in companies or labour markets, Flemish Minister of Living Together, Bart Somers, organises a guide for ‘field tests’ to expose racial discrimination in housing by using fictitious applications to see if estate agents or landlords are guilty of discrimination. (Brussels Times, 11 June; Brussels Times, 12 June 2020)
13 June: French government spokeswoman Sibeth Ndiaye argues in Le Monde newspaper that France should begin collecting race data to see ‘reality as it is’, drawing ire from cabinet colleagues. Since 1978 is has been illegal to collection data on a person’s race, ethnicity, political or religious opinions in national census or other surveys. (The Local, 15 June 2020)
15 June: Boris Johnson’s new commission on racial disparities in education, health and criminal justice, announced in a Daily Telegraph article, is strongly criticised for being ‘overly vague’ and adding delay rather than urgency. The IRR points out that the adviser appointed to set it up, Munira Mirza, doubts the existence of institutional racism, and David Lammy MP urges no more reviews, saying ‘Get on with the action… You’re in government – do something.’ (Guardian; Guardian, 15 June 2020)
ANTI-FASCISM AND FAR RIGHT
4 June: The mother of the murdered British soldier Lee Rigby posts a strong message on social media urging right-wingers not to use images of her son to ‘fuel arguments against the Black Lives Matter protests’, adding that they are in complete opposition to what her son stood for. (Left Foot Forward, 4 June; MSN News, 5 June 2020)
13 June: In London, a crowd of around 5,000 from football and far-right groups, including Britain First, fight police, with 100 arrests made during a ‘Day of Patriots’ ‘defend our memorials’ protest organised by the Democratic Football Lads Alliance ostensibly to defend the boarded-up statue of Winston Churchill. In Glasgow, far-right and loyalist groups gather in George Square, fighting police and bystanders. Other ‘defend our memorials’ protests are reported in Bristol and Newcastle and in Bolton, counter-protesters attempt to disrupt a BLM rally. (Guardian, 10 June; Morning Star; Mirror, 13 June 2020)
13 June: As BLM activists gather in Paris, far-right activists unfurl a banner with the words ‘anti-white racism’ from the rooftop of a building overlooking the protest, only to witness it being ripped up by residents using knives and scissors, from the balconies below. (Al Jazeera, 13 June 2020)
14 June: In Leeds city centre, far-right activist and football hooligans clash with the police after charging a number of Black Lives Matter activists. Mounted police are deployed. (The Sun, 14 June 2020)
14 June: Patrick Hutchinson, a Black Lives Matter activist, is interviewed on Channel 4 after receiving widespread praise for carrying a white counter-protester who had been badly injured to safety during the protests in London. (Guardian, 14 June 2020)
EDUCATION
5 June: As Oxford University is accused of delaying publishing admissions data on diversity of students in light of ‘world events’, Christ Church college orders staff and students to undergo training to combat racial bias after a student made a joke at a virtual hustings linking protests over the killing of George Floyd to flour shortages. (Guardian, 5 June 2020)
10 June: The National Education Union calls for changes to the curriculum and a review of teacher training to defeat racism; youth movement the Black Curriculum collects signatories for a demand to make black history compulsory in schools; and a cross-party group of over 30 MPs write to education secretary Gavin Williamson seeking a re-evaluation of the history syllabus led by BME leaders and historians to ensure ‘a better understanding of the historical injustices contributing to institutional racism that persists in the UK and elsewhere’, such as Britain’s colonial and imperial past and its legacy of abuse and exploitation. (Guardian, 8 June; Guardian, 10 June 2020)
11 June: A Guardian investigation finds that only a fifth of UK universities are committed to reforming their curricula to confront the harmful legacy of colonialism. (Guardian, 11 June 2020)
12 June: Black students at Oxford University say they are so disillusioned by its failure to tackle racism that they no longer feel comfortable working on outreach programmes to encourage others to apply there. (Guardian, 12 June 2020)
14 June: Over 250 former pupils at the prestigious, expensive Westminster School sign a letter demanding that it combat the ‘toxic culture of racism within the student body’, promote the teaching of black culture and confront its links with the slave trade. (Observer, 14 June 2020)
EMPLOYMENT
8 June: Temple Coffee and Donuts café in Kirkstall, Leeds, which released a special Black Lives Matter donut over the weekend, is criticised by a former staff member who says the café did nothing to protect her from persistent hateful racial abuse by another staff member. (Leeds Live, 8 June 2020)
MEDIA AND CULTURE
3 June: A statue of former Belgian king Leopold II in Ekeren is set on fire after being smeared with red paint over the weekend. Statues of the king, notorious for his reign of terror in the Congo in the 19th century, are also defaced in Halle, Ostend, Tervuren and Ghent, where red paint graffiti over the bust read ‘I can’t breathe’. (Brussels Times, 5 June 2020)
5 June: Following anti-racist protests across the Netherlands in honour of George Floyd, Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte says the ‘Zwarte Piet’ (Black Pete) pre-Christmas tradition, involving blackface, is racist and he wants the custom to disappear. Mutte previously defended the custom. (Deutsche Welle, 5 June 2020)
5 June: In Glasgow, plaques bearing names including George Floyd and Sheku Bayoh (who died in police custody in 2015) are placed by street signs named after tobacco traders with links to the slave trade. (Glasgow Herald, 5 June 2020)
6 June: Former Church of England director of communications Rev Arun Arora says the church presents a ‘contradictory picture’, with many leaders responding on social media to the death of George Floyd using the hashtag #blacklivesmatter, while glossing over issues of institutional racism. (Observer, 7 June 2020)
7 June: During a Black Lives Matter protest in Bristol, a bronze statue of 17th-century slave trader Edward Colston is pulled down and thrown in the river, sparking a nationwide debate on the role of such monuments. (Guardian, 7 June 2020)
9 June: Council plans to remove a ‘racist caricature of a black man’s head’ in Ashbourne, Derbyshire, from a wooden archway in the town following a petition signed by 30,000 people are thwarted when a counter-protest involving 100 people remove the bust and hide it ‘for safe keeping’, dividing the town. (Guardian, 9 June; Guardian, 12 June 2020)
9 June: Thousands of protesters gather in Oxford to demand the removal of the statue of Victorian imperialist Cecil Rhodes from Oriel College, the subject of a ‘Rhodes must Fall’ campaign in 2016, now revived by the removal of Edward Colston’s statue. Earlier in the day, 26 Oxford City councillors signed a letter saying the statue was ‘incompatible’ with the city’s ‘commitment to anti-racism’. (Guardian, 8 June; BBC News, 9 June 2020)
9 June: Following a petition and demonstration from campaigners, a statue of 18th-century slave trader Robert Milligan is removed from outside the Museum of London Docklands in East London. After its removal, the local Tower Hamlets council announces a review of all monuments in the borough, with other Labour councils committing to do the same. (Metro, 9 June 2020)
10 June: The government’s business minister Nadhim Zahawi says ‘No slave trader should have a statue’ as local authorities, universities and other institutions across the country assess their public monuments. (Times £, 10 June 2020)
10 June: Activists across Europe organise petitions to remove statues. Belgium seeks the removal of King Leopold II, Northern Ireland asks that John Mitchel come down, the Republic of Ireland cover Christopher Columbus in black paint, Spain campaigns to remove his image from Barcelona and France calls for the removal of Jean-Baptiste Colbert. (Guardian, 10 June 2020)
10 June: Hundreds of Conservative councils come under pressure to review monuments linked to the slave trade, after Labour councils say they will examine statues and monuments and, responding to an open letter from students, the University of Liverpool says it will rename a building named after William Gladstone due to his family’s ties to the slave trade and his opposition to the abolition of slavery. (BBC News; Guardian, 10 June 2020)
11 June: As protective barriers are erected around the statue of Winston Churchill and the Cenotaph war memorial in (needless) anticipation of targeting by anti-racist protesters, Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospitals announce they will remove statues of Robert Clayton and Thomas Guy due to their links with the transatlantic slave trade. (Metro, 11 June; Evening Standard, 12 June 2020)
11 June: After comedians such as Leigh Francis apologise for ‘blacking up’ to play black celebrities and shows including Little Britain and The Mighty Boosh are removed from UK streaming platforms because of concerns about the use of blackface, in a BBC Radio 4 interview, Harry Enfield defends his use of blackface on TV shows, although saying he would not use it now. Presenter Nick Robinson apologises for Enfield’s use of ‘racially offensive language during the interview, while fellow interviewee Ava Vidal says, ‘it proves how deeply ingrained these attitudes are that he could utter that word without so much as a by your leave’. (Guardian, 9 June; Guardian, 11 June; Metro, 11 June 2020)
11 June: Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole council announce the temporary removal of a statue of Scouts founder Robert Baden-Powell after Dorset police confirm it had been listed as a target for removal. Baden-Powell is said by campaigners to have held racist and homophobic views and expressed sympathies for Hitler. (BBC News, 11 June 2020)
11 June: Music star Stormzy pledges £10 million to black organisations committed to fighting racial inequality and for justice reform and black empowerment in the UK over the next ten years. (Guardian, 11 June 2020)
11 June: Brexit party leader Nigel Farage leaves radio station LBC, where he had a weekday evening talk show, after provoking fury by comparing protesters toppling the statue of Edward Colston to the Taliban. Another LBC presenter, James O’Brien, tweets ‘We got our station back’. (Guardian, 11 June 2020)
12 June: Belgium’s Prince Laurent argues that King Leopold II could not have hurt the Congolese people as ‘he never went’ to the Congo. King Leopold declared himself the sole owner of the Congo free state in the late 1800s, which oversaw a brutal rubber trade and the deaths of an estimated 10 million Congolese. (Brussels Times, 12 June 2020)
14 June: President Emmanuel Macron condemns racism, but insists that France will not ‘erase any trace, or any name, from its history … it will not take down any statue’ in an address to the nation. (France 24, 14 June 2020)
15 June: Milan’s mayor rejects calls by BLM to remove a statue of journalist Indro Montanelli from a city park after it was painted red and tagged with the words ‘racist, rapist’. Montanelli, who died in 2001, admitted in 1969 buying a 12-year-old Eritrean girl to be his wife during Italy’s colonial occupation in the 1930s. He led a battalion of 100 Eritreans during the fascist regime’s colonial rule. (Guardian, 15 June 2020)
16 June: A bust of former French president Charles De Gaulle is splashed with orange paint and painted with the word ‘slaver’ in Hautmont, northern France. (The Local, 16 June 2020)
SPORT
7 June: As Black players in all sports talk about their experiences of racism, Sport England board member Chris Grant says structural racism in British sport is so deep and pervasive it amounts to ‘a kind of apartheid’, and urges UK Sport and Sport England to establish a kind of Truth Commission where the issue can be ventilated and tackled. (Guardian, 7 June 2020)
9 June: Former Brighton manager Chris Hughton, one of football’s few black managers, endorses Manchester City and England winger Raheem Sterling’s questioning of the lack of BME representation in football management, while England manager Gareth Southgate calls for change and says the blocking of pathways for black coaches, managers and executives is ‘the biggest crime’. (Guardian; Guardian, 9 June 2020)
12 June: After charity Sporting Equals calls for at least 20 per cent BME representation on the boards of all publicly funded sports organisations to tackle systemic racism, pointing out that the boards of the Football Association, Rugby Football Union, England and Wales Cricket Board, England Golf, Lawn Tennis Association, UK Athletics and British Cycling have one board member between them, the Sporting and Recreational Aliance, representing 80 sports governing bodies, admits not doing enough, while sports minister Nigel Huddleston says he will review the code for sport governance. (Guardian, 12 June; Guardian, 15 June 2020)
14 June: Monaco midfielder Cesc Fabregas says those shouting racist abuse in football stadiums should be sent to jail; former Manchester United and England defender, now TV sports presenter Gary Neville calls for action to reverse racism in the sport’s management; Real Madrid player Marcelo takes a knee in support of Black Lives Matter movement to celebrate a goal against Eibar. (Guardian; Guardian, 14 June; The Local, 15 June 2020)
VIOLENCE AND HARASSMENT
8 June: In the Hilltown area of Dundee, a mural of George Floyd is defaced with a white supremacist symbol painted over Floyd’s face. The word ‘Black’ was painted over, leaving the slogan at the bottom reading ‘Lives Matter’. (Dundee Born and Read Evening Telegraph, 8 June 2020)
8 June: Labour MP Dawn Butler reports to the police the torrent of racist abuse she received after defending the Black Lives Matter protest. One message said ‘There will come a time when you can’t breath[e], and we will all be happy’, followed by an abusive term. (Guardian, 8 June 2020)
13 June: Black Lives Matter and Antifa say that posters discovered in a Dundee park calling for white people, police officers and white MPs to be killed, and bearing their logo, are created by those who want to discredit the movement. (Evening Telegraph, 13 June 2020)
17 June: A racist attack on Chinese photographer Tommy Ga-Ken Wan during the far-right ‘defend the statues’ protest is condemned by the Scottish parliament. Tommy Ga-Ken Wang says he was called a ch**** and punched in the head by a large group of men who tried to steal his camera, but ‘the sole response of the police officers who witnessed this was to ask me to leave the area’. (Daily Record, 17 June 2020)
The calendar was compiled with the help of Laura Wormington, Aisha Rana-Deshmukh, Jessica Pandian, Joseph Maggs and Graeme Atkinson.