Saw some open racism tonight and I’m a bit ashamed of my reaction. What would other people have done?
I was out for a walk tonight by the river in Rotherhithe and there was a Chinook flying quite low overhead. Naturally I started filming, and so did a South Asian couple nearby.
A white guy saw us all and started talking to the couple, I didn’t pay any attention at first but he got more and more aggressive and started ranting loudly about how they were putting lives in danger by filming our country’s military equipment and how they must be spying and shouldn’t be in the country. It was clearly to do with their race because I’m as white as you can get and was right there doing the same thing without him saying a word to me.
I’m very embarrassed to say that at that point I walked off without saying anything. I’m a man in my 20s and the racist guy was older so there wasn’t any physical danger, and a passer-by did call him out and got into it a bit with him, but I chickened out. I think of myself as anti-racist, and thinking about it I feel like I should have backed the passer-by (who was also Asian) up and called the guy out, or at least stayed and made sure the couple were okay, so I’m genuinely wondering what other Londoners would have done in the situation. Not looking for validation, honest views please!
(sorry if this doesn’t really fit the subreddit, I couldn’t really decide where to put it!)