It is an image I will not forget in a hurry. That of 70-year-old Diane Abbott, Britain’s first and longest-serving black MP, rising to her feet in the House of Commons no fewer than 46 times to speak about the violent racism levelled against her, only to be routinely, and pointedly ignored.
If ever there was a metaphor about the contempt in which black women are so often held in public life, then surely it is the abject humiliation of Abbott being forced to listen to men from both parties speaking over and about her, using her pain to score cheap political points, all the while being rendered voiceless herself.
