Another day, another prominent politician using a racist slur and then claiming that they had no idea that it was actually racist.

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This time it’s the turn of Jacob Rees Mogg, who has apparently referred to the Liberal Democrats as the ‘Yellow Peril’. This is a racist slur that is often used to describe the people of East Asia – I’m not really sure what kind of point he was trying to make by saying that, but naturally people are pissed off about it and calling him out on it:

I am v grateful to @ThangamMP who raised JRM’s use of racist language in the house as a point of order.

There is simply no excuse for it and it was made worse by the fact the only two MPs of ESEA descent were sat on the front-benches as the words “yellow peril” left his mouth.

— Sarah Owen MP (@SarahOwen_) July 22, 2021

This was in the Commons about 10 minutes ago

— Jonathan Walker (@jonwalker121) July 22, 2021

Classic politicians feigning ignorance and apologising for stuff that they didn’t realise they did. You can almost set your watch by it with this government.

I doubt anything is going to happen to Rees Mogg for this – or anything else that any politician does that can ever be constituted as racist – but it’s important to highlight these incidents so people stop using this language and understand why it’s offensive and shouldn’t be part of their vocabulary. Doubt Rees-Mogg or any of the others are going to listen, but what’s new there?

For more of the same, check out Rees-Mogg saying that Grenfell victims lacked basic common sense. OK mate.