4849

Huh makes sense then since I’ve always subscribed to the “I’m a big bag of shit” theory of self realization. :D

4850

Most folks can’t even go this far, hence hating/blaming other people.

4851

All slang terms for nations and peoples are slurs, from “yanks” on down.

The demeaning power of the slur is in relation to the power and marginality of the people being slurred, so “yanks” as a slur just makes white Americans laugh (especially I suppose if they’re from the south) because America is rich and powerful. But “pakis” or whatever has far more effect when they are a marginalized and oppressed minority population in a country where racism and xenophobia is mounting fast.

4852

It originally was.

It got it’s connotations as shorthand for anyone who looks vaguely Indian or Pakistani, because “nigger” doesn’t cover it.

I got called a paki once, when working in a pub, on a Sunday morning.

The Sunday morning customers were typically a bit of a weird crowd, older gents alone (running away from the wife I suppose) playing on the slot machines.

One got the hump over his beer or something, called me a paki.*

I can’t raise my eyebrows so imagine a facial expression of someone trying to raise one’s eyebrows but unable to do so.

No big deal to me, quite a pitiful specimen of humanity all round, so I wasn’t too fussed.

My manager however, who was this short, fat white guy, absolutely lost his shit.

I’ve never seen someone get thrown out so quickly.

Manager and I didn’t even like each other, but guess the guy had some principles.

  • I’m mixed race white and black African, and my birth country has it’s fair share of racism against Indians, so it was mildly confusing and funny for me to be lumped together with people from the sub continent.
4853

image

'Cause you don’t have any!

4854

Touché!

4855

Phew! - That’s a lot of material you linked. I won’t comment on them all but I did read them.

The difficulty with using media articles to judge Boris (and politicians in general) is that they are under constant attack by the opposing political faction. This makes questioning the content all the more important. It’s extremely difficult to get an unbiased factual representation.

I realize the futility of attempting to defend Boris Johnson in a heavily left leaning forum. Honestly, my default setting with all politicians is one of distrust. I’m no great supporter of Boris Johnson. I’ll make the distinction that I’m not trying to influence anyones political stance or opinion, only that I’d seek to challenge the idea that there is some kind of crypto-racist plot.

My basis for this is that it simply does not reflect my own experiences of life in modern Britain. There is a massive discrepency between what is purported in the articles and what I myself encounter on a daily basis. Britain appears to me to be a very tolerant, multicultural and fairly moderate place to live. If I were outwardly racist or expressed racist views in my own social group then I’d be immediately reprimanded, shunned or at the very least receive stern challenge to my views (and rightly so).

Tommy Robinson, a high profile racist islamaphobe recieved 2.2% of the vote in the European elections and was openly mocked and ridiculed. Even 2.2% is still too much but it’s a good indication of the intolerance of racism in the UK.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/tommy-robinson-european-election-results-video-yaxley-lennon-north-west-a8931451.html

Racism does exist in the UK but if it exists in large numbers then I’m not seeing it.

With regards to the reported links between Steve Bannon (who appears to be a real nasty piece of work) and Boris Johnson. I could only find a single article from Buzzfeed that makes this claim.
Boris wrote a rebuttal which I find reasonable if not conclusive.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2019/04/14/proper-brexit-can-spare-us-toxic-polarisation/
“As for the so-called association with Steve Bannon, I am afraid this is a Lefty delusion whose spores continue to breed in the Twittersphere. Of course I met Mr Bannon a couple of times when I was foreign secretary and he was Trump’s chief of staff. But not since. So I find Lammy’s suggestion that I am “with Steve Bannon” a bit perplexing.”
VERDICT: No evidence

Taking some of the reported examples of Boris’s racism:
“letter boxes” and “bank robbers” burka article.
An official investigation was launched due to this article, their verdict was:
The independent panel, chaired by Naomi Ellenbogen QC, found his use of language in the column could be considered “provocative” but claimed it would be “unwise to censor excessively the language of party representatives or the use of satire to emphasise a viewpoint, particularly a viewpoint that is not subject to criticism”
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-cleared-burka-niqab-bank-robber-letterboxes-conservative-party-a8693761.html
VERDICT: provocative, perhaps insensitive but not racist

“Part-Kenyan Obama”
I’ve been unable to find a copy of the original article. Boris’s full quote is:
In relation to the removal of a bust of Winston Churchil from the Oval Office.
“Some said it was a snub to Britain. Some said it was a symbol of the part-Kenyan President’s ancestral dislike of the British empire – of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender”
This article was written at the height of the referendum campaign when Obama was supporting Remain and making pro Remain statements. It’s difficult to tell but it’s possible this was a political barb aimed at the (absolutely ridiculous) claims that were circling Obama at the time regarding his heritage.
VERDICT: Idiotic, badly written, insensitive but not racist

“Picanninnies and watermelon smiles”
This is from a frankly bizarre anti-Blair article written in 2002. I urge anyone who believes this to be an example of racism to read the full article. It’s written in an usual style and starts right from the beginning with a whole raft of strange terms and stereotypes.
VERDICT: Terrible writing, bizarre style but not racist
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/3571742/If-Blairs-so-good-at-running-the-Congo-let-him-stay-there.html

In todays media landscape it’s remarkably difficult to create an unbias model of reality especially when it comes to politics. I think you can absolutely make the case that Boris is insensitive, lazy, oafish, unstatesmanlike, a buffoon and a poor candidate for Prime Minister. However in the linked articles I found no evidence of him being racist or of holding racist views.

In the words of the great George Carlin. Context matters.
WARNING: Very, very NSFW - open at your own risk.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUvdXxhLPa8

4856

I maintain that this is an example of Politcal correctness gone mad.
In this instance PC is being used like a club when it needs to be a scalpel.

Indeed, an independent inquiry returned a verdict along those lines.

4857

So when judging a blustering boorish blonde bad-haired buffoon, the standard must be that if he hasn’t actually been thrown into jail for anything yet, everyone must give him the benefit of any doubt and wave away the myriad warning signs that have accumulated over the years?

As an American, that takes me back to the halcyon days of 2015. (Yes, yes, I know. He’ll become more, er, Prime Ministerial once he’s in. I remember that one, too.)

4858

Whether or not you think Johnson is racist is irrelevant. What matters is that Muslim women and black people know him to be racist.

The notion that a white man is not racist until a white man defines him as such is laughable.

Non whites “that’s not racist”
Non LGBs “that’s not homophobic”
Non Muslims “that’s not Islamophobic”
Non trans “that’s not transphobic”
Non Jews “that’s not anti-Semitic”
Men “that’s not sexist”

Right wing politics in one.

The majority, the oppressors, erasing the experiences, feelings and perceptions of the minorities in their insistence that only they can define minority oppression.

Jess, as always, gets it.

4859

This is a strange basis for understanding the world you live in. If I have e.g. not (yet) been mugged, that fact doesn’t nullify the experiences of other people. It doesn’t nullify the responses to polls which indicate racist attitudes. It doesn’t nullify the actual reported racist incidents. If you have never experienced racism, it’s probably because you aren’t the sort of person who would be a target of it; and if you have never even seen it, and it would not be tolerated by your friends, then the best anyone can say is that you’ve been lucky.

4860

I don’t know, personal experience as a basis for understanding the world is surely better than creating your world view because of the media?

I would strongly suggest to alot of people in Facebook echo Chambers, for example, to ditch those and go through their actual own experiences.

Ofcourse the best method is to compare what the news says, what your friends say, what everyone else says, and what you have experienced personally.

If all 4 of those point to the same thing, chances are that’s the truth.

In fact if go so far as to say your own experience is probably the most valuable out of all of those, with the caveat that a mature functioning adult be aware of the limitations therein.

4861

And “watermelon smiles”? Or to branch out from Johnson, is it political correctness gone mad that leads us to frown upon Hollywood gollywogs? (freaking autocorrect)

4862

It’s the language of the Fifties, the last embittered gasp of colonialism and imperialism as its subjects broke free of Empire with the modern slant of faux outrage that they aren’t able to live out their nostalgia for the age when white man ruled and the darkies knew their place.

4863

If it leads you to dismiss data because the data isn’t consistent with your personal experiences or the anecdotes your friends tell, then no, it isn’t better.

I don’t get any of my understanding of the world from Facebook posts.

4864

hence “for example”

I think I covered that?

4865

Immediately after the paragraph you quoted I also gave an example of factual data to support my view :)

In my post I wrote about building a mental model of reality. We do this by processing all of the data available to us (from as many sources as possible), analyzing it, judging it for bias and weighing it accordingly. My point was that political articles have a strong bias and that my personal mental model of reality does not match up with what is being purported in the media.

We (as an online community, as British citizens, as a society), if we’re at all rational and have any degree of intelligence all agree that racism is a terrible thing. We seek to prevent it from occurring and this is good. It is of very high importance.

What we don’t seem to have agreed upon is that a certain amount of hysteria has somehow become involved. I am not saying that racism should be ignored, I am not saying that racism should be minimized or left hidden or unopposed. What I am saying is that I believe accusations of racism have become weaponized. This is most evident to me when leveled at Leave supporters. “If you support leaving the EU then you are a racist (or supportive of racism).”

Due to the abhorrent nature and our disgust of racism as a society, a weaponized accusation of racism has a similar effect as an act of racism itself - they both demean, devalue and dehumanize their target.

4866

Yes, whenever there are racists and people who decry racism, it is the latter who are the problem. Really, I can’t take this nonsense seriously, and it does not do you any credit to repeat it.

4867

weaponised racism

“stop bleeding over me”

4868

But not nearly to the same extent.

Also, it’s easy to avoid an accusation of being racist or supporting them: Don’t be a racist, and don’t support them. Don’t engage in a coalition with them, in which you get what you want, and they get what they want. Reject them at every turn. Don’t forgive a politician’s open pandering to them, because that normalizes and encourages their behavior.

If you’re in league with racists, most people will conclude you’re either happy or at least comfortable with their behavior and goals. And most people would be right, because you’re demonstrating it with your actions.