Ableism is rife enough in real life – of course disabled people need protection from online abuse too

Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

The online and offline worlds are both important, and people need to be treated equally in both spaces. They also need to be taken seriously when they say a crime has happened online or offline.

For too long, people with learning disabilities and autism have been excluded from digital spaces out of a fear of abuse – particularly in the form of grooming or so-called mate crime.

When victims do report mistreatment, they are not seen as credible and their perceived vulnerability is given more attention than the motives of the perpetrator. Today’s Petitions Committee report makes a clear call for change.

If we don’t take the issue seriously then people with learning disabilities and autism won’t report abuse because they will think it’s not important enough.

But hate crime limits people’s lives, it stops people going out and ruins their confidence. These recommendations are a good start and I really hope the government starts tackling the problem of online abuse and hate crime more broadly.

Mark Brookes, campaigns adviser for Dimensions
Reading

No wonder Brexiteers don’t want a Final Say

Months ago, Tory Brexiteers argued that a hard border on the island of Ireland could be avoided by using established technology and modifying existing arrangements. Yet another of their attempts to mislead us.

Because, if this was true, they would not now be opposing the inclusion in Theresa May’s deal of a backstop to protect the Good Friday Agreement.

No wonder these Brexiteers don’t want us to have a Final Say.

They fear the “will of the people”. But we’ve had enough of their lies and would welcome the chance, as “true Brits”, to tell them where to get off.

Roger Hinds
Surrey

A Brexit misunderstanding

Oops. In response to Penny Little (Letters, 21 January), I am afraid my sarcasm was too subtle. As a passionate Remainer I agree with her; Brexit is and was ever as clear as mud. No one can honestly claim they knew what they voted for.

Simon Watson
Address supplied

Theresa May leading a council? No thanks

I have no quibble with James Moore’s opinion on the unsuitability of Donald Trump and Theresa May as leaders of their respective countries. However, why use language that suggests disdain for the provincial (presumably meaning anything outside London) in his description of May as “a provincial bigot, better suited to running a county council than a country”?

Moore is displaying the sort of contemptuous attitude that led many in the shires to vote for Brexit as a protest against the urban liberal elite.

I suspect that even most of us country bumpkins would baulk at the thought of the current prime minister leading one of our councils!

Ellen Frain
Wellington

I stand with Diane Abbott

My MP is Diane Abbott. I am not in the Labour Party but I think she is absolutely correct to call out the sexist and racist bullying she was subjected to on the BBC’s Question Time as “the political version of the Jeremy Kyle Show”.

Audience members have since claimed that they were subjected to a number of anti-Abbott “jokes” by way of a “warmup” to the main event.

These “jokes” have been said to have come from both Fiona Bruce and members of the production team. That is contemptible and, in my opinion, renders the BBC’s claims of “impartiality” worthless.

Nigel Farage has made a record 32 appearances on Question Time.

By allowing Farage a disproportionately regular platform, the BBC has helped to normalise his racism and xenophobia.

The courtesy he’s been afforded contrasts violently with the abuse directed at Abbott, and it further highlights the disgusting levels of racist and misogynist abuse that she is forced to endure on a daily basis.

Sasha Simic
London, N16

Diane Abbott needs to get over it

In regards to Biba Kang’s article on Diane Abbott and BBC bias on Question Time all I have to say, is, really?

I have just watched QT again and since Abbott was given plenty of opportunity to comment throughout and actually had the final word, I cannot understand her sudden anti-BBC nonsense.

She was a regular This Week contributor for a while and spoke well (also on the BBC).

But once more, a politician has thrown up the “bias” of the BBC when they receive opprobrium from the public. The same BBC service set up to provide balance, speak truth to power and give all of the public a voice.

Today it is Labour, yesterday it was the Tories. Tomorrow, it’ll be both.

Politicians must remember that we, their voters, reflect the “will of the people”, even when it’s uncomfortable for them to hear.

I’m sorry if Abbott was subjected to hostile pre-programme abuse. But now is the time for us, the public, to fight back and voice our feelings about politics. Abbott still has a better platform for her views than we do. Perhaps she is uncomfortable about us disagreeing with her?

John Sinclair
Pocklington