A Dr Who episode that gives an interesting history lesson

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Spoiler Alert: This is about the Dr Who episode broadcast by the BBC in the UK on 21st October. The new series of Dr Who came up with a brilliant episode this week. The Doctor (played by Jodie Whittaker) and her three companions land in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1956. The plot centres on their struggle to ensure that Rosa Parks gets on the right bus, driven by the right driver, so that she can make history by refusing to give up her seat to a white person. Apart from the tension of a well-written episode, I was greatly impressed by the stress laid on the issue of racial prejudice in the Deep South. This was helped by one of Dr Who's companions being black and another being mixed-race. The young black man is constantly made to feel unworthy in a community run by whites, but the young woman can get away with less abuse - as she says, these people don't know what somebody with a Pakistani parent looks like, so they don't give her too much trouble. The episode brought home to me - and I hope to everyone who saw it - the reality of being made to feel a lesser human being because of the colour of your skin. Unfortunately, such attitudes are still with us in many places. They were horrific and absurd in 1956, and no less so today.