THE MOLE
First published onStandpoint MagazineI have just returned to London, where I have lived since I was 11. I have been away for four years,living as an ethnic minority in a monocultural part of the world, amassing a host of stories to tell todisbelieving friends. On the whole, I am glad to return. I shan't miss some locals' assumptions that, being a white woman, if I was outside after dark, as I occasionally was, usually to walk the fewmetres between my house and the church, I must be a prostitute eager to give them a blow job. Ishan't miss the abuse my priest husband received: the daubing of "Dirty white dogs" in red paint onthe church door, the barrage of stones thrown at him by children shouting "Satan". He was called a"f***ing white bastard" more than once, though, notably, never when in a cassock. I will also notmiss the way our garden acted as the local rubbish dump, with items ranging from duvets and TVsets, to rats (dead or twitching) glued to cardboard strips, a popular local method of vermin controlto stem the large numbers of them which scuttled between the rubbish piled in gardens and on pavements. Yes, I am very glad to have left Britain's second city.For four years, we lived in inner-city Birmingham, in what has been a police no-go area for 20years. We know that because some plain-clothed cops told us when they asked to use our vicarageas a stake-out to bust drugs rings that pervade the area. Having heard a parishioner's tales of whathis neighbours did to him when he was wrongfully suspected of having grassed up a cock-fightingring, we refused, explaining that we had to live here, they didn't. Even during this time we saw thearea change. When we arrived, the population was predominantly Pakistani. Now Somalis are therein equal number. Most of the run-down Irish pubs were turned into mosques during our time.As a woman, it was difficult for me to gain many first-hand impressions of the Muslims. I wasgenerally ignored by both men and women, and on the rare occasion that I had to interact, when for example a car was parked illegally and blocking my gate, I was addressed as if inconsequential. Myhusband, however, faithfully reported conversations which you may find somewhat alarming. Oneof our favourite dinner-party pieces is this: opposite our vicarage there is a "library" which hassome computers, some burkas and occasionally tracts that say offensive things about Jews andChristians. My husband did his photo-copying there, and got on rather well with everybody. Oneday he was chatting to a man with a passing resemblance to Lawrence of Arabia, who had justarrived from Antwerp — one of an increasing number of Muslims who are arriving here with EU passports. He asked him why he had come to Birmingham. He was surprised at the question:"Everybody know. Birmingham — best place in Europe to be pure Muslim." Well, there must bemany places in Europe where Muslims are entirely free to practise their faith, but I suspect there arefew places in which they can have so little contact with the civic and legal structure of a Westernstate if they choose. It seems to be particularly easy to "disappear" if that is their intention. A parishioner once described a lorry pulling up outside his house, the side opening to reveal stackedmattresses full of sleepy, and presumably illegal, immigrants, who staggered out into broadBrummie daylight. We heard tales of how houses are exchanged for cash payments in our area. An
untaxed car was once clamped by a frightened-looking official at 8am, but within hours the owner of the vehicle had organised the clamps to be sawn off, and he sped away.Another instance of separation from the Western world is revealed in the following: my husbandfrequently chatted to a neighbour who could be described as one of the more questioning Muslims,and who has often provided an insight into the locals' mindset. Even this man, however, believeswhat the whole community thinks: the 9/11 planes were organised by Jews. Everybody knows therewere no Jewish people in the World Trade Centre that day, as they had been tipped off. Oh, and theMumbai terrorists had been kidnapped and brainwashed by Indian people. The tendency towardsdenial is strong. When my husband mentioned the "dirty white dogs" graffiti to a local Muslim, theresponse was, "One of your people did it." I have to say that the police's response was no better when the local Methodists complained about the same thing. They chose not to believe it hadhappened, since we had removed all sign of it with the buckets of anti-graffiti chemicals we hadstocked since we arrived. They asked, somewhat pathetically: "Are you sure it was racist?"To a London reader, born and bred with multiculturalism, I know that my stories may come acrossas outlandish and exaggerated, and that I must surely be a BNP voter — I have observed people'sexpressions as they have listened to my tales of life in Brum. When I recently told a friend how alarge Taliban flag fluttered gaily on a house near St Andrew's football stadium for some months, her cry of "Can't you tell the police?" made me reflect how far many of our inner cities have beenabandoned by our key workers: our doctors and nurses drive in from afar, the police, as mentioned before, have shut down their stations and never venture in unless in extremis — they and ambulancecrews have been known to be attacked — even the local Imam lives in a leafier area.Only the priest remains, if you can get one — the thriving but clerically-vacant church down theroad has had no applicant in two years. In their absence, we get stabbings that never make the news,dog- and cock-fighting rings, cars torched as pranks and cars used for peddling heroin. (One of themore amusing moments of our time came when a local lad provided one reason people often gaveus stares when we drove past such deals: "Two white people wearing seatbelts — you've got to becops.") In their absence, we simply have the witness of those who are unlikely to be heard, who,through a variety of unfortunate circumstances, have not been able to move out: the elderly, theinfirm, the illiterate, the chronically poor. Indeed, some of the Muslim residents deeply regret theflight of the non-Muslim population. It is they who now have to live in a crime-ridden ghetto.On holiday in Germany recently, we watched a TV documentary about how schools were copingwith Essen's growing Muslim community, and how the community itself felt. When it was over, weturned to each other, and said simultaneously (a drawback of having been married for a while),"This could not have been made in Britain." At the moment, also in Germany, the whole country isdebating Thilo Sarrazin's controversial book
Deutschland schafft sich ab
("Germany abolishesitself"), in which the author — a former member of the board of the Bundesbank and the GermanSocial Democrats — examines research about immigrant communities and then makes specificrecommendations about the integration of the Muslim community. I have only seen scant referenceto this in the British press, which usually dismisses it, wrongly and lazily in my view, as good oldGerman racism. This has nothing whatsoever to do with race. The Muslim community inBirmingham, for instance, is made up of people from many continents and races, includingAfghans, Yemenis, Pakistanis, Indians and Somalis.There is no doubt in my mind that we need to have the same openness in discussing what ishappening to many cities in Britain. If current demographic trends continue over the next fewdecades, the West Midlands, as well as other parts of the country, will become a predominantlyMuslim area. Much more needs to be done to integrate the communities among whom I lived, andwe need to be much less negligent of our own values too. Frankly, if we happened to walk downBroad Street on a Friday night, where mobs of identically undressed and mostly aestheticallyunpleasing gals and lads were on the piss and pull, it was almost a relief to drive back to our ghettoenclave.
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