A mixed-race Bethesda family has described suffering casual, racist comments towards them, saying a small minority “still live in the ’50s”.
These have been in the form of jokes and being socially excluded.
Medwen Edwards, 43, lives in Bethesda, Gwynedd, with partner Lamin Touray, 39, who is originally from The Gambia.
Microaggressions are “everyday slights, indignities, put downs and insults” people suffer in their day-to-day life, Race Alliance Wales said.
Medwen, a mother of nine, has three children with Lamin – Leo, three, Koby, two, and nine-week-old Aminata.
“I’m very lucky to have him in my life, and the children are too. He is so kind and loving towards us all,” she told the Newyddion S4C programme.
Having grown up in the Ogwen Valley, Medwen explained racism was a rare occurrence on the whole, but her family had experienced microaggressions several times.
“I still get comments now, it’s like some people still live in the ’50s,” Medwen said.
“We only get a few slight remarks. Comments and things like that, but otherwise everyone here is lovely with him.”
She met her partner at the gym in 2017 after the data analyst moved to study computer science at Bangor University.
She believes saying you are anti-racist is not enough, adding: “It’s easy enough to say you are, but it’s usually a different story when it’s time to show it, isn’t it?”
Among the comments include people saying they cannot be a “proper family” because she has white and mixed raced children.
“Your children can’t love each other because they are a different colour to each other,” has been another comment.
Medwen and Lamin decided to share their experiences after their friend Ebehitale Igene was racially abused and assaulted in a nightclub in Bangor.
Medwen says that racism exists in all languages, adding: “I think if a person is going to be racist, then they will be racist, if they speak Welsh, English or any other language.”
Since the racist abuse at the Cube night club, Ebehitale has been suffering from depression and anxiety, and Medwen urged people to consider the feelings of others before making nasty comments.
“It makes them feel like they are worthless. They get so low in themselves, then they are depressed. And it’s not fair at all, just because of the colour of their skin,” Medwen added.
“I want to see tougher sentences so that people have to serve a certain amount of time in prison, and raise the price of the punishment as compensation for victims. We need to show that it’s not acceptable.”
