JARED O'MARA has been suspended by the Labour party whilst they investigate the misogynistic and homophobic comments he allegedly has made. The MP for Sheffield Hallam has apologised for the remarks made in 2002 and 2004 however, following the revelation that more comments had been made more recently, Jeremy Corbyn acted quickly by suspending him during the investigation.
The remarks made are clearly unacceptable and if the more recent comments do turn out to be true, then he is not fit to represent the people and Corbin's quick acknowledgement and manner of dealing with the issue, should be highlighted and praised.
Hypocrisy within UK politics
Nothing can be taken away from how bad O'Mara's remarks were and the situation is being rightly dealt with, but there is a distinct hypocrisy over the reaction from the public and the media compared to similar remarks made by senior Tory MPs. In fact, those who have supported the likes of Phillip Hammond and Boris Johnson are now calling for Jared O'Mara to resign despite not doing the same for their own colleagues.
Boris Johnson has said a plethora of racist and sexist remarks, notably he remarked on Tony Blair's globetrotting by referring to commonwealth nations by saying they have 'flag-waving piccaninnies' and 'watermelon smiles'. Picaninny is a racial slur that refers to dark-skinned children and the watermelon was used as a symbol of freedom when slavery was abolished in the US however, the white supremacists responded by claiming it was a symbol of black people's perceived uncleanliness, laziness, childishness, and unwanted public presence.
Johnson has also said the only reason women go to university is to find someone to marry, then blamed women graduates for the rise in house prices claiming, 'assortative mating' was a 'well-documented' phenomena amongst the middle-classes to 'entrench' their economic advantages. He continued and blamed those women graduates for anti-social behaviour and the economic disadvantages of low-income families, saying that women should stay at home so that their children don’t get neglected.
The inherent prejudices within the Conservatives
The problem is that it's not just Boris Johnson, because Phillip Hammond said that "even women can drive them" when saying trains were easy to drive. David Cameron defied sanctions in 1989 and went on a trip to apartheid South Africa, financed by a firm who lobbied against those sanctions.
In February 2009, Bolton Tory Councillor, Bob Allen, posted a picture of a Gorilla alongside a critical comment about an Asian Labour councillor. In December 2011, Tory MP for Cannock Chase, Aidan Burley, helped organise a Nazi-themed stag party, in 2014, he was cleared of any racism or anti-Semitism.
Philip Davies is a notoriously sexist MP, he has filibustered several bills to prevent them from going through parliament, notably the ratification of the Istanbul Convention which has been described as gold standard in tackling violence against women and a bill put forward by Caroline Lucas, which sought to make sex and relationship education compulsory. He has also called for the word 'women' to be removed from the women and equalities committee, voted against equalities legislation legislation, argued against equality targets in the workplace and has even tabled a bill which would have repealed the Sex Discrimination Act 2002.
All political parties should be held to high standard
Jared O'Mara's comments were awful and if his behaviour hasn't changed much since then, he has no right to be a public representative. This is much like every Conservative example stated above and the considerable amount that hasn't been stated. Many 'journalists', the term is used loosely, have used this to claim that Labour have a sexism problem, which is simply untrue. The Conservatives have an inherent problem with sexism and racism, yet they can get away with it because it is common. Perhaps O'Mara has been targeted because he is also disabled?
Society has become numb to the Conservative's being racist and sexist has become numb to the Conservative's being racist and sexist because of overexposure but hold Labour to higher standard.
It is like the 'boys will be boys' nonsense argument when defending sexism in men. Every single political party should be held to the exact same high standards yet all the examples above are from current serving Conservative cabinet ministers, MPs and councillors, if Jared O'Mara should lose his position as a public representative, then every MP, councillor or anyone who has been voted by the public should be held equally to account.
