Hi, it’s Karen here. I just want to share how I’m feeling at this moment in time with everything that’s going on.

These riots, these marches, whatever you want to call them, it’s making me feel quite depressed, anxious, and I’m quite frightened, to be honest. I’m quite frightened to go out, and I’m frightened for my loved ones to go out as well.

This has been coming for a long, long time, and I think the government should have done something about this years ago. Not sure what they could have done, but they knew that racial tension was building and nothing, nothing at all has been done.

Now, three little girls that were stabbed, and the guy that stabbed them, as far as I know, was a Christian. He was born in Wales. It was atrocious what happened, and no doubt it was his mental health. But all this has just been an excuse for the EDL and the far right to just kick off. It’s an excuse. They’ve been looking for this excuse, I think, for a long, long time. They’ve never once thought about the people, the families of Southport. They just went shortly after all this happened and trashed the place, basically.

And those people had just had the loss of the children. They’d witnessed a vicious attack on the children at a Taylor Swift get together. These thugs, and that’s what they are, just came in and thought, “Well, we’ll trash… We’ll add insult to injury.” That’s what they did. And then all I’ve seen since is on the TV, are videos of just gangs. If there was a cause that they were fighting for, they don’t even know. They don’t even know why they’re rioting, half of them. They’re absolutely thick. They’re just following what’s being said on social media and all the platforms – Twitter, Instagram, Facebook – and they just believe in it.

People, far right, they know what they’re doing. They know that they’re just stirring it. A lot of politicians, and we know who those politicians are, they’re loving this and they’re really stirring it up. They’re fuelling it. That’s what they’re doing. And a lot of people that are taking part, they’re just like football hooligans from years ago. They just want trouble. They just want fights. They just want destruction. I really just don’t know what is wrong with these people. They’re uneducated, they’re misinformed, and they’re just following like sheep.

What upsets me is the fact that you get tarred. We spoke about stigma not long ago, and everybody gets tarred with the same brush. These are a minority of white English people. It’s a minority and they’re extremists, and they’re giving everybody else a bad name. When other people retaliate, it’s gone on in history, it’s always a minority and it’s always the extremist. And they spoil it for the main masses of human beings from all nationalities, religions, etc, that can get on together. And that’s what we should be doing.

As a Christian, I’m a pacifist, I want peace. I just feel that we should all be getting on together. If things happen, they should be discussed and sorted out without violence. And as a woman that’s experienced domestic violence and trauma throughout my life, this is something that is really triggering me. I’ve had many days; I just keep crying. I’m frightened. I’ve said to my son, “Don’t go into Stockport, don’t go into Manchester.” He just said before he’s going to the library and Hyde. I’m worried to death. He’s 41 years old. I’m saying to him, just text me. He thinks I’m overreacting, but that’s just the way it makes me.

The last time I felt like this was in my 20s when I lived in Northern Ireland. My ex-husband was a soldier. It was between the Catholics and the Protestants, and it was horrendous. I was there in 1980 when it was really at its height. That fear for the first time has come back now. I feel exactly how I felt all them years back, 40 odd years back. It’s just a horrible way to feel.

We’ve got a few neighbours on this estate that are Muslim. Wonderful, lovely neighbours. We all get on really well. I saw them walking past yesterday morning, taking their little girl to school. I just thought, I wonder how they feel. I wonder how they really feel. Because some idiot on this estate will pick on them because of their religion, because of the colour of their skin. It’s just not making any sense to me whatsoever.

I’ll just leave it there. I just wanted to say how I feel. I know that a lot of us will be feeling like this, especially people who are asylum seeking, who are Muslim, who are black. Because the beating in Piccadilly, in Manchester the other weekend, they absolutely just set upon this black guy just because of the colour of his skin.

If it made sense, I could try and understand it. It’s absolutely making no sense. I don’t know what the answer is. I really don’t. But it must be awful. It’s bad enough for me being white and English. I feel bad enough. I feel quite ashamed to be white and English. I think that’s what’s upsetting me. I feel like saying to everyone, “We’re not all the same, please don’t think we’re all the same.” But I also feel for anyone who is on the other end that is being attacked, that must be horrendous. I’ll just leave it there. Thanks for listening.