Prejudice against travelling communities has its roots in the collapse of the mediaeval feudal system. Governments have always preferred their population to remain in one spot, where they can be more effectively taxed, categorised and controlled.
Before the end the of 14th century, no-one outside the ruling class would leave their town or city without permission from the landowner. During the intervening centuries successive laws sought to limit the ability of people to move around. In the modern day, travel is fine, as long as there is a permanent address to which to return.
But with this compromise, the mediaeval disapproval of a mobile workforce is echoed in the media bias of today. The inherent fear of strangers and 'foreign' cultures is consistently stoked to enflame prejudice against gypsies and other travelling communities. After all, if it's easy to avoid council tax and other settled living costs by not staying in one place, everyone might be tempted to do it.
Uncharitable Intiimidation Against Travellers in Smalltown Britain
The bottom shelf book looked interesting, so I crouched down to inspect it. Thus I was hidden from view behind the carousels of clothes, as the next customer entered the charity shop. She was indignant, announcing her arrival with a waspish, "I've just seen those gypsies again!" The word 'gypsies' was spat out.
Behind the counter, the shop's volunteer gasped, "Did they touch you?"
"No," came the response, though her tone didn't match her words. The story went on. She had merely seen them in the street and rushed into the house, intent upon inciting her husband to deal with their presence. He had been too busy watching sport on the television, so she had marched out to deal with them herself. There was no context here. No way of knowing if this was a huge encampment or a couple of people walking along the pavement. "I gave them a piece of my mind and you know what they did?" There was an expectant silence. She finished on a definite note of triumph. "One of them spat on me!"
The shop volunteer was sympathetic. "They came in here last week. Two of them." She tutted. "They kept trying to haggle! Picking up things! Saying they were too expensive!" She spoke in shocked bullet points, lacing each word with horror. "You know where the door is, I told them. Get out now!"
It was at this point that I decided that the book wasn't nearly as enticing as the spine had suggested. I replaced it and stood. As I turned, there was a sharp intake of breath from my fellow customer. I have never felt so undesirable, as her disapproving once over took in my dreadlocks and the patchwork jacket that I bought at the Glastonbury Festival. I felt intimidated, especially as she snapped, "You look like one of those New Age Travellers!"
I smiled sweetly and said, "Thank you very much." Then felt their eyes upon me, as I slowly weaved in stony silence through the carousels and out of the charity shop.
Anti-Traveller Sentiment in Britain After Dale Farm
I should have said more. I should have discovered the context and whether their ire had any foundation outside the saturated media bias concerning the recent eviction of travellers from Dale House Farm, in Basildon, Essex.
Typical of those stories was the Daily Mail opinion piece entitled Dale Farm Eviction: The REAL Victims of the Illegal Gipsy Camp, dated October 22nd 2011. The eponymous victims were framed as being the young children of non-travelling families in the area. They were being denied an education, because their parents had been 'forced' to remove them from primary school. The reason being that the 'so called traveller mothers' were also sending their 'feral' children to the same school.
The article rages, 'The tragedy is that while the gipsy children have been given their precious ‘human right’ to an education, the children of Basildon tax-payers have scandalously been denied their right to one.' In other words, if the travellers would just stop educating their children, then decent families wouldn't have to resort to not sending their kids to school. There is no word of condemnation of settled families complicit in truancy. It is seen as thoroughly understandable.
As tabloid headlines urged anti-traveller sentiment upon their readers, Amnesty International opened a file.
Amnesty International Campaigns Against Forced Eviction in the UK
The November 2011 Amnesty Magazine features the Dale Farm community, as part of a wider investigation into the plight of Roma, travellers and gypsies in Britain. Four counts of violations under international human rights law were duly noted and a campaign launched to help the victims. The article concludes that they 'face widespread discrimination in employment and access to essential services.'
After Dale Farm, 80 families had been made homeless. They moved just 200 yards down the road, living in 50 caravans on an over-crowded legal site. Legislation in the 1960s, requiring councils to provide adequate sites for travelling communities, was stripped away by the Conservative government in the 1990s.
"They won't leave us to travel around." A Dale Farm traveller told Amnesty International. "They won't leave us to settle down. What are we to do?"
Silence Means Approval
I wished I had said something in that charity shop. I justified my silence with an endless chain of excuses - I wasn't feeling well; I've never been good with verbal confrontation; I wasn't 100% sure of the facts and I could just be jumping to conclusions here. But the fact of the matter was that I was intimidated by their tone, expressions and ultimate silence.
It is attitudes like mine that led to an estimated 80% of the European population of Gypsies being executed between 1944 and 1945 by the policies of the Nazi Third Reich. It could so easily happen again, when people are cowed into silence.
Jo Harrington - Jo has a BA (Hons) in History and Philosophy and a MA in History. She has a book published on the history of Wicca.
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