I expected a group of mature people - probably all were 45-65 year old, attending a creative writing group, to be able to handle themselves emotionally... Of course, they expected me to sit through a poem selected by the tutors, which was about racism, and repeated the racist tropes from skinheads... that I have heard in childhood, but I didnt burst into tears...

To be fair to Dierdre, I doubt she is pro-israel or anything like that... I think it was a matter of control.