On Monday, 15 June, while grand ceremonies take place to celebrate the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta, human rights campaigners will be protesting outside 10 Downing Street from 1pm to 3pm. A legal British resident remains in chains in Guantánamo Bay camp in his 14th year of unlawful imprisonment without charge or trial. How can the US declare that Magna Carta is fundamental to its laws, when it continues to deny freedom and justice to Shaker Aamer?
Joy Hurcombe
Worthing
• Magna Carta was sealed, not signed (Editorial, 13 June), as we here in Faversham have been at pains to point out to visitors to our exhibition Magna Carta Rediscovered. To those of us immersed in Magna Carta 800 celebrations, such a faux pas ranks alongside a certain Old Etonian’s ignorance of the Latin phrase (theguardian.com, 27 September).
Jackie Westlake
Town clerk, Faversham, Kent
• If gender is a performance, a view the Guardian seems to support in its reporting of gender reassignment, then why can race not be performed (Strange case of the black activist who is white…, 13 June)? I might decide to become a First Nation of North America person. I can darken my skin, plait my hair and wear tasselled suede. This is the stereotypical idea of a “red Indian”. How is that different to the idea that wearing stilettos, false nails, a pout and silicone breasts construct a woman? Mixed messages indeed.
Juliette Newsham
Burley in Wharfedale, West Yorkshire
• While 34% of the vote was enough to get first past the post (Letters, 12 June), should not the eventual winner of the national bird vote have stood under its full name – the European robin?
Tim Walker
London
