Tag: anti-racists

12 Days of Christmas – December

12 Days of Christmas -some of my favourite pictures from those I made in December 2025.

Various minor problems prevented me from working much in December and with other committments all these pictures are from a single day, 13th December.

12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13th Dec 2025. Hundreds of riders took part in the 11th BMX Life Santa Cruise London dressed as Santas (with a few elves, snowmen, Christmas trees and reindeer), a charity ride to raise money for the Evelina Children’s Heart Organisation. So far BMX Life have raised over £200,000 through their rides. They stopped for lunch on Horse Guards Parade. Peter Marshall.
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13th Dec 2025. Anti-racist campaigners came to Downing Street in a protest called by Stand up to Racism and Care 4 Calais to oppose Tommy Robinson and his extreme right supporters and remind us at Christmas that Jesus was a refugee and state that we are one community of love against hate and will not let the far right divide us. They say Jesus preached love not hate. Peter Marshall
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13th Dec 2025. People sang and some danced. Anti-racist campaigners came to Downing Street in a protest called by Stand up to Racism and Care 4 Calais to oppose Tommy Robinson and his extreme right supporters and remind us at Christmas that Jesus was a refugee and state that we are one community of love against hate and will not let the far right divide us. They say Jesus preached love not hate. Peter Marshall
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13th Dec 2025. You can’t be a good Christian IF… Anti-racist campaigners came to Downing Street in a protest called by Stand up to Racism and Care 4 Calais to oppose Tommy Robinson and his extreme right supporters and remind us at Christmas that Jesus was a refugee and state that we are one community of love against hate and will not let the far right divide us. They say Jesus preached love not hate. Peter Marshall
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13 Dec 2025. A large rally in Whitehall opposes the current government’s intention to introduce digital ID. People from across the whole political spectrum say it is an attack on our rights and our autonomy, and that it could be used as an Orwellian system of total control. It would turn us into a highly controlled checkpoint society, would be open to abuse by hackers and foreign powers and discriminate against those with less access to online services. Peter Marshall
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13 Dec 2025. A large rally in Whitehall opposes the current government’s intention to introduce digital ID. People from across the whole political spectrum say it is an attack on our rights and our autonomy, and that it could be used as an Orwellian system of total control. It would turn us into a highly controlled checkpoint society, would be open to abuse by hackers and foreign powers and discriminate against those with less access to online services. Peter Marshall
12 Days of Christmas – December
London, UK. 13 Dec 2025. A large rally in Whitehall opposes the current government’s intention to introduce digital ID. People from across the whole political spectrum say it is an attack on our rights and our autonomy, and that it could be used as an Orwellian system of total control. It would turn us into a highly controlled checkpoint society, would be open to abuse by hackers and foreign powers and discriminate against those with less access to online services. Peter Marshall

So this is the end of a little look at my photographs from 2025. If I went though them again I would quite likely come up with many difference choices. I’ve made this selection entirely from the events I’ve covered to submit work to an agency and there are also some interesting images from outings with friends and family.

All of those featured were made with either Fuji-X or an Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark III camera. I like the Fuji-X system, but every now and then get frustrated with the cameras which seem to develop random faults. Mostly this year I’ve gone back to using the Fujifilm X-T1 rather than the XT-30, usually with the Fuji 12-24mm. If I need anything wider I do have a fisheye in my bag, but it’s become a little tricky to de-fish images since Fisheye-Hemi went out of business and their plugin no longer works.

You can still do the job – converting from a circular perspective to a Panini (Vedutismo) one – and its even possible but rather tricky event in Photograph, but it lacks the one-click simplicity of the old plugin.

24mm on the Fuji is equivalent to 36mm on full-frame. The reason for carrying the Olympus is the 14-150mm Olympus lens – equvalent to a 28-300 on full frame. It’s a remarkably small and light lens for its specifications and while not wide aperture (f4.6-5) it’s good enough when you can work digitally at higher ISO.

I seldom use very long lenses but hen I first got this lens I was about to go on a job where I knew I neede at least a 300mm. I tested this against a Nikkor lens more than twices a big and probably three times as heavy – and would give me 450mm in DX mode. Rather to my surprise it gave sharper and more detailed results than the Nikkor, and since then as been my choice for longer focal lengths.

The Olympus OM-D E-M5 Mark III camera is also perhaps the best camera I’ve ever used. It came out in 2019 and I bought it to replace the very similar Mark II which had suffered an unfortunate impact with a pavement putting it beyond economic repair. I was going to buy a secondhand version, but found a grey import cheaper than the local secondhand price. They are still sold secondhad for only a little less than I paid.

It’s also my holiday camera – with a few other lenses to go with it, depending on exactly how light I want to travel.

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EDL Saved by Police in Slough

EDL Saved by Police in Slough – 1st February 2014.

Berkshire Anti-Fascists were among those trying to stop the EDL marching

I don’t often go to Slough. While I wouldn’t entirely share John Betjeman’s sentiments “Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough! It isn’t fit for humans now” it isn’t one of my favourite places, and although its only a fairly short bike ride or bus journey away, I seldom feel moved to go there.

Back in the 1990s I did go to take pictures, particularly on the trading estate, the largest industrial estate in single private ownership in Europe. I was then working on a project related to Thatcher’s de-industrialisation of the UK, as well as beefing up the almost non-existent selection of industrial buildings in one of our national collections.

And later in the 2000’s I rode there a couple of April Sunday mornings to photograph the annual Sikh Vaisakhi procession from the Gurdwara in the north of the town, always a very enjoyable experience. Most recently I went to reclaim my phone which I’d dropped on a bus journey and was handed in at the bus station after the driver found it at the end of the route. And I’ve been driven through Slough a few times on the way back from walks in Burnham Beeches and other sylvan walks in the countryside on its fringes.

But on February 1st eight years ago I was there for a very different reason. A couple of hundred EDL supporters from around the country had come to march to a rally in the centre of Slough in an anti-Muslim protest over plans for a new mosque and Islamic community centre.

Large numbers of local people along with a few activists had gathered to opposed them, probably outnumbering them by around 10 to 1. As well as local Asian youths and trade unionists there were black-clad anti-fascists and supporters of Unite Against Fascism. There were two distinct large groups both holding rallies and hoping to prevent the EDL from marching through the centre of the town to hold their rally.

Unusually, as I wrote:

The EDL seemed determined to show they could behave rather better than on many previous occasions, and had banned drinking on the protest. There were plenty of EDL stewards on hand having an occasional word with anyone who seemed to be getting out of hand. A man who started to shout out their well-known chant “Allah is a pedo” was greeted by shouts to stop and quickly grabbed, though later things seemed to get a little out of hand with a large group if not the entire protest joining in with chanting “Allah, Allah, who the f**k is Allah.”

EDL Saved by Police in Slough

There was also a very large police presence, including a number of mounted police, and they very physically cleared a way for the march, with a number of charges by police horses and some very rough handling. As I wrote: “There were a number of minor injuries caused by police and protesters, and I was hit by a barrier thrown over by EDL supporters as well as a plastic bottle thrown by an Asian youth, as well as getting a few bruises from the pushing, mainly by police.”

The barrier hit me as I was attempting to photograph the EDL rally from outside the barriers and police around it. It hit me on one ankle and was extremely painful, and for a few minutes I could hardly walk. But soon I decided nothing seemed to be broken and managed to hobble around and take just a few more pictures.

Then I decided I’d done enough and needed to rest my ankle. Fortunately I’d come by bus, as cycling home would have been agony, and I was able to leave the town centre and sit on the bus for the longish ride home. Fortunately it isn’t a very long walk from the bus stop.

More on My London Diary at EDL Saved by Police in Slough.