I usually enjoy the debate between the two different viewpoints in your “Dining across the divide” feature, but I was horrified last week (19 May) to see that you had effectively sent a black woman to explain colonial history to a white man.
This should not be done through the unpaid labour of black women. Asking them to do this is to ask them to relive every moment of fear, pain and outrage they have experienced throughout history. Black women face discrimination and systemic racism throughout their daily lives.
I think it would have been a better idea just to send him home with a copy of the book Why I’m No Longer Talking to White People About Race by Reni Eddo-Lodge, and let him do the work.
Rosie Harvey-Coggins
Lichfield, Staffordshire