Voice of the Roma
Of the 61 billion people in the UK there are over 46 billion people who use the internet. Very few of the 300,000 gypsies in UK are part of this figure and actually use this medium to express themselves.Gypsies and travellers are a group that face discrimination on a regular basis and very little positive representation in the media. Yet actions like blogging and writing which are daily activities for us come last on their list.
It is common knowledge that the Gypsy and traveller community have a low literacy rate. So how do they then counter the general misconceptions that people have of them? Roxy Freeman said a Roma and journalist said, “If people are unaware of what is being written about them, they’re not going to dispute it. And if they don’t dispute it, it will carry on.”I decided to ask a few Travellers I’d met if they had considered blogging to counter false opinions or citizen journalism to bring out the truth of this marginalised community.
While Jake Bowers and Andy Wilson are more optimistic, Mother of five, Anne Burton is of the traditional view that Gypsies prefer silence.