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<\/p>\nA few months ago, I was walking down an alleyway, past a collage of Bristol graffiti, when I was struck by a stencil of Rishi Sunak. Underneath, in definitive Helvetica, it said \u2018TWAT\u2019,\u00a0which made me smile, cos, well, he is a twat.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I stopped to take a photo to put in the group chat. It was only when I paused to angle my camera that I noticed someone had written \u2018paki\u2019 next to Rishi\u2019s stupid grinning face. I had a visceral, horrified reaction. Rishi is a twat. But he\u2019s no \u2018paki\u2019. Two things can be true at once. I guess it can be easiest described as the \u2018I can cuss my mum but you can\u2019t cuss my mum\u2019 rule of kids\u2019 snaps.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But also, it\u2019s racist.\u00a0<\/p>\n
What shocked me was not the racism, nor the surrounding acronyms of far-right groups. It wasn\u2019t the proximity to my home, or that no one had thought to daub out the slur. I was shocked the twats were still using such ye olde racist slurs. \u2018Paki\u2019? Mate. What is this? 1991? I mean, I\u2019ve heard much more contemporary, up-to-date, millennial, gen z\u2019icle slurs during my time as a minor public figure.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But that word, and the reason I\u2019m liberally using the word, is because I was shocked this scrawler hadn\u2019t moved on. Or that they were using retro words. Or, as I always suspected, that sentiment never ever fucking went away and I fucking told you this is what people thought and screw all those gaslighters who tried to convince that it was just a few idiots, just a thing of the past, things were better now, of which there are a bunch in my life. Because I warned you. I told you this was going to happen. So many of us told you.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Even when you were shocked at the race riots last year, we told you this was going to happen.<\/p>\n
I just hadn\u2019t been called that specific word in a while. And it stuck with me.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It was a real reminder for me to look up more in my city. I\u2019ve lived in Bristol for fifteen years, I know it\u2019s not that long, but my kids were born here, they identify as Bristolians, and this is their city as much as it\u2019s my city as much as it\u2019s yours. The city does not belong to the racists, the transphobes, the elites, the misogynists. The city belongs to the people.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It may be obvious for me to say this, especially in The Bristol Cable, but it\u2019s worth repeating these things. It\u2019s worth reevaluating our ownership of such feelings, because if we don\u2019t, we can take it for granted.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t want to take that feeling for granted. If anything, I want to constantly affirm it, recognise it, seek it and nurture it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Which is why I\u2019m so incredibly honoured to join The Bristol Cable team as a columnist. It\u2019s a news source I\u2019ve long admired, something that\u2019s always raced to the top of my reading pile when it\u2019s landed on my doorstep. I think its honesty, its seriousness, its ability to see the city not only for what it is but for what it could be, is to be lauded.<\/p>\n
And that\u2019s what I plan to bring to this column. I\u2019ve written fiction and non-fiction, for a variety of audiences. I\u2019ve written Spider-Man comics for Marvel, YA books that are studied in Bristol secondary schools, a collection of essays read the world over, and I even started a youth project at Watershed, called Rife Magazine, that helped to launch the careers of many writers and filmmakers. I\u2019m so proud of all of these things.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But this column isn\u2019t going to be about the past. I\u2019m going to use this space to follow my curiosity. I want to move around the city and see the projects, the people, the movements that strive to ensure this city belongs to us. I want to interrogate what it is that brings us together. Because maybe by putting such things under the microscope, by shining a light, we can widen their reach. I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m troubled, as so many of the Cable\u2019s readers are, by the way things are heading. Whether we feel like we\u2019re heading backwards, or sliding into something. Whether we feel like everything\u2019s on fire and there\u2019s nothing to look forward to, it\u2019s worth looking up and seeing what is happening and asking who is making good work or doing good things or pushing back in a meaningful way against power structures.\u00a0<\/p>\n
As James Baldwin said in No Name In The Street: \u2018Yet, hope\u2014the hope that we, human beings, can be better than we are\u2014dies hard; perhaps one can no longer live if one allows that hope to die. But it is also hard to see what one sees.\u2019<\/p>\n
I\u2019m excited to go on this journey with you, dear Cable readers. Let\u2019s all look up together.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
About the Author<\/strong> Nikesh is the editor of the bestselling essay collection,The Good Immigrant, which won the reader\u2019s choice at the Books Are My Bag Awards. He co-edited\u00a0The Good Immigrant USA\u00a0with Chimene Suleyman. He is the author of three YA novels,\u00a0Run,\u00a0Riot\u00a0(shortlisted for a National Book Award),\u00a0The Boxer\u00a0(long-listed for the Carnegie Medal) and\u00a0Stand Up.<\/p>\n Independent. Investigative. Indispensable.<\/p>\n Investigative journalism strengthens democracy \u2013 it\u2019s a necessity, not a luxury.<\/p>\n The Cable is Bristol\u2019s independent, investigative newsroom. Owned and steered by more than 2,500 members<\/b>, we produce award-winning journalism that digs deep into what\u2019s happening in Bristol.<\/p>\n We are on a mission to become sustainable, and to do that we need more members. <\/b>Will you help us get there?<\/b><\/p>\n
Nikesh Shukla is a novelist and screenwriter, currently working on a\u00a0Spider-Man India\u00a0comic book miniseries for Marvel as well as numerous television projects. Most recently, he released his first children\u2019s book, called\u00a0The Council Of Good Friends. He is the author of\u00a0Coconut Unlimited\u00a0(shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award),\u00a0Meatspace\u00a0and the critically acclaimed The One Who Wrote Destiny.<\/p>\n