Photography: In a Land of Milk and Migrants (@tyfaruki)

Recently I embarked on a per­son­al quest to uncov­er some of Britain’s migrants and deliv­er their per­son­al stor­ies with the aim of the pro­ject to demon­strate how Britain’s diversity has con­trib­uted to its bet­ter­ment and amp­li­fied uni­on with culture.

The pro­ject asked many ques­tions but also recog­nised signs that racism had taken a turn in vari­ous dir­ec­tions, often in the guise of reli­gion and cul­ture. Bri­tain has always spoken to many corners of the world, and in spite of our government’s harm­ful for­eign policy; this island con­tin­ues to attract an enorm­ity of many inter­na­tion­als seek­ing safety, edu­ca­tion and what we like to call demo­cracy. In a bewildered pop­u­la­tion of ‘nat­ive’ people, gov­ern­ment has gen­er­ated a nation of tired domest­ic Brits and happy immig­rants. But one thing we all have in com­mon, is a frus­tra­tion with the rul­ing élite. Rule is a tire­some word. We would rather replace this word with Why? Why should we let you rule? After all, it is our rule of law and the major­ity of Bri­tons would gladly accept a rule without crowns, pres­id­en­tial or min­is­teri­al rooms. We share a fond­ness for free­dom and lib­er­a­tion and right now it appears it is giv­en away too much, not caring or won­der­ing what the future holds without it.

Our pen­chant for the rais­ing of Brit­ish her­it­age clubs is cel­eb­rated in schools, smudges his­tory and her­alds the com­ing of new kings and queens. His­tory became genet­ic, over shad­ow­ing the his­tory we imposed across the world, an unwanted account we refuse to acknow­ledge by turn­ing to and accept­ing our down­fall in home­land attacks and allied res­cue mis­sions. But it was through wars that the rise and accept­ance of immig­ra­tion became import­ant in shap­ing and rebuild­ing the UK. Even today, we can­not shrug the quint­es­sen­tial real­it­ies it has brought to our shores and our bond with migrants is one of hypo­crit­ic­al tend­ency and its value, underrated.

Immig­ra­tion must hap­pen in order for the world to pro­gress and shape itself. We must see through the lan­guage and skin bar­ri­er, reach out more and integ­rate. This is not just a prob­lem on the side of those who migrate but also domestically.

Racism is not an exclus­ive char­ac­ter­ist­ic of white Brit­ish nat­ives, it is one shared across a vari­ety of cul­tures and eth­ni­cit­ies, often hid by com­munit­ies in a shroud of every­day duty. We neg­lect to see the way for­ward sever­ing ties with learn­ing to bond with one anoth­er, habitu­ally clos­ing doors to a shade much dif­fer­ent to our own. If we are to dis­card intol­er­ance and elect new under­stand­ing, a nation both polit­ic­ally and com­mun­ally must draft path­ways for social liv­ing in accept­ance. Rad­ic­al change appears to be many hori­zons from arrival, while we allow par­lia­ment to talk big on immig­ra­tion, dis­respect­ing an arriv­ing tal­ent car­ried to a nearly there Great Britain.

I often worry about the uncon­struc­ted cri­ti­cisms being shelled at those who come here to make an hon­est liv­ing. Sig­ni­fic­ant num­bers are bring­ing fac­tu­al bene­fits to a land cata­pul­ted by Romans, raided by Vik­ings and watched by Bankers. Before we joust each over, cry­ing wolf to those who look and sound the same, I ask you to start a con­ver­sa­tion with one who may not. You may seek solace in con­trast for once.

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Rishma

Edit­or / PR Con­sult­ant at No Bounds

Rishma Dhali­w­al has extens­ive exper­i­ence study­ing and work­ing in the music and media industry. Hav­ing writ­ten a thes­is on how Hip Hop acts as a social move­ment, she has spent years research­ing and con­nect­ing with artists who use the art form as a tool for bring­ing a voice to the voiceless.

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