No Hierarchies in Prejudice: Why Diane Abbott’s Words Matter
The recent suspension of Diane Abbott from the Labour Party has reignited a debate that resurfaces periodically but never comfortably: what counts as racism, and who gets to define it?
Abbott’s original Observer letter in 2023, in which she argued that Jews, Irish people and Travellers face prejudice—but not racism—provoked outrage, including from within her own party. Her defenders insisted she had simply been clumsy, or that her point had been lost in the noise. But earlier this month, in a BBC interview, she chose not to walk that statement back—in fact, she doubled down, saying: “I don’t regret writing the letter” and standing by its core argument ().
At the heart of the controversy lies a damaging fallacy: that only some forms of hatred qualify as racism, while others are somehow lesser. It’s a framing that invites a hierarchy of suffering, where people are encouraged—explicitly or implicitly—to prove the depth of their oppression through visibility or historic scale.
But racism isn’t the exclusive preserve of any one group. It comes in many forms, across different cultural and historical contexts. The racism faced by Black people in Britain is not the same as that experienced by British Jews. Nor should it be. But it is still racism.
What Abbott’s framing overlooked—perhaps carelessly, perhaps revealingly—is that antisemitism has always been racialised, even when it is also religious or cultural. From 19th-century pseudoscience to the Nuremberg Laws, Jews have been persecuted not in spite of appearing “white,” but often because they were not seen as white at all.
The idea that Jewish people can avoid racism because they “don’t look Jewish” misunderstands both how prejudice operates and how Jewishness is perceived. Many Jews are recognisably Jewish—because of names, accents, features, neighbourhoods, or simply walking into a kosher shop. Others choose to visibly express their Judaism through dress, ritual or symbolism, and are targeted precisely for doing so.
But more fundamentally, this argument assumes that avoiding hatred is a matter of concealment. If a group can choose to “pass,” the logic goes, their suffering is optional. But this is a chilling standard: it asks people to bury part of who they are in exchange for safety. If you can’t hide your identity, your oppression is valid. If you can, it’s negotiable.
That’s not nuance. That’s erasure.
There is also a common assumption—particularly on the left—that antisemitism is primarily a problem of the past, or a phenomenon rooted in far-right ideology. But ask any British Jew whether antisemitism is gone and you’ll hear the same story, over and over: physical attacks, verbal abuse, security guards at schools and synagogues, hostility in social movements, “purity tests” around Israel, and the lingering sense that, somehow, Jews have to prove their oppression is real.
It is no coincidence that Jewish institutions today require intense security, especially during times of geopolitical crisis. What other minority is routinely targeted because of perceived connections to a foreign state, regardless of their actual beliefs or affiliations?
None of this is to deny the severity and persistence of anti-Black racism, nor to diminish the unique histories of colonialism, slavery, and ongoing structural injustice. It is only to say this: racism is not a competition. It doesn’t become more real because it is more visible, and it doesn’t cease to be racism when directed at Jews, Travellers, Irish people or anyone else whose marginalisation doesn’t map neatly onto postcolonial frameworks.
Our challenge is not to weigh suffering, but to understand it. To affirm difference without denying truth. And to build a politics that recognises oppression in all its forms, even when they are uncomfortable, even when they don’t fit the script.
Diane Abbott’s political career has been marked by courage, and she has endured racist abuse that few in public life could withstand. But with seniority comes responsibility. When speaking about race, power, and identity, words matter. Her decision to stand by the letter—rather than acknowledge its harmful framing—was a missed opportunity to lead with humility and solidarity.
If we want to challenge racism, we must first refuse to grade it. There is no ladder of legitimacy. There is no threshold of visibility below which prejudice becomes forgivable.
The real work begins when we stop asking who suffers more, and start asking how we can ensure that no one suffers alone.
