Today marks ten years since the assassination of Humanists UK member Jo Cox MP by a far right extremist: a dark day in the history of our country, and a wound in our public life that has not healed.
It is hard to believe that a decade has passed since we were deprived of such a bright, compassionate, and courageous voice in our politics. For many people at the time, Jo’s murder felt at the time as though it must become a turning point. In the immediate aftermath, politicians, communities, and citizens came together in grief and solidarity, united in their rejection of the hatred and extremism that caused her death.
Yet, ten years on, we cannot say that the forces Jo stood up against have disappeared or even diminished. The far right has been emboldened. Christian nationalism and other exclusionary ideologies are winning new relevance. Racism, misogyny, and contempt for minorities drive too much of our public debate. The racist violence and intimidation we have seen in places such as Belfast are frightening reminders of what happens when fear, rumour, and resentment are cultivated by those who seek to divide rather than unite.
As a country, we know the damage caused when communities are set against one another and when fellow human beings are spoken of not as neighbours but as threats.
But progress has never been linear. It is tidal. It advances and retreats. It is won, defended, lost, and won again. Jo’s murder sometimes feels like yesterday and in the wider history of humanist and democratic progress, it almost is. But if we step back, we can also see a society that has, over generations, moved forward. We are a country where human rights, safeguarded by the European Convention on Human Rights, have been established. A country with equality laws that protect those most vulnerable to discrimination. A country whose best instincts of generosity, pluralism, democracy, and humanity have left their stamp on many institutions of our national life.
That progress was only ever made because of people like Jo, both inside and outside Parliament.
We need more of Jo’s courage in our politics today. She had what public life so urgently requires: moral seriousness, practical compassion, and the conviction to speak plainly for those whose voices are too often ignored. As chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Syria, she was a tireless advocate for Syrian civilians and refugees. She championed the Dubs Amendment, led by her fellow humanist Lord Dubs, himself a former child refugee who came to Britain on the Kindertransport. That amendment led to the safe transfer of 480 vulnerable unaccompanied child refugees from Europe to the UK.
Would such a proposal pass today? It is a question worth asking. Speaking up for refugees and supporting them in their call for asylum and assistance still requires courage. It provokes backlash. That is also why remembering Jo must mean more than mourning her. It must mean encouraging others, in Parliament, in public life, and in communities across the country, to stand up for what is right, especially when doing so is difficult.
Jo embodied so many humanist values. Compassion without prejudice, solidarity across borders, confidence in human beings, and a commitment to building a better world in the here and now. She lived a life rooted not in doctrine, but in care for others. She had a humanist wedding, reflecting values of love, equality, and shared human commitment. Her politics, too, were animated by a belief that every person has dignity, and that our responsibilities to one another do not stop at national, religious, or cultural boundaries.
We must actively foster that same courage in others. We must encourage a new generation to stand up for what is right, to defend our shared human rights frameworks, and to confront hatred with reason and empathy.
As we move forward in that obligation, we can find no better guide for the path ahead than the enduring words of Jo’s own first speech to Parliament:
‘While we celebrate our diversity, what surprises me time and time again as I travel around the constituency is that we are far more united and have far more in common with each other than things that divide us.’
In an age of polarisation, those words call us to recognise an essential truth. They are a humanist manifesto for a better world, a reminder that our shared humanity will always be stronger than the forces that seek to tear us apart.
