> Don't conflate woke identity politics with racism. They are fundamentally different. British people are right to reject your America-centric obsession with finding racism in everything, given the UK's excellent track record.
Again, this is what I mean by British people refusing to engage with my experiences as a brown person living in UK.
Building up a strawman, then assuming I'm part of that strawman, then dismissing it does no one any good.
In Primary school in UK I (and all the non-white) kids were segregated in seating. I was always assigned seating near other brown kids.
When out shopping with my parents, in smaller stores we were "stalked" to make sure we didn't steal anything. This did not happen to our white friends that we asked to keep an eye out for this behavior.
In school plays, the non-white kids were always assigned the side-roles and the "peasant" roles. E.g. I was assigned to be a "chimney cleaner", which involved the makeup people spreading black ink all over myface and essentially making me do blackface.
But sure, this is just woke politics and you know everything about our lives.
> we need to recall that the UK/British view of race is heavily influenced by the fact that skin color is not the only way in which folks in the UK experience racial discrimination.
But that's true of lots of places, including the US, antisemitism being the obvious example.
> For centuries, the Scottish and Irish natives have been variously oppressed by the British
I'm not sure it make sense to talk about Scots being oppressed by the British: Scots are British (though many are not particularly fond of the label). Did you mean to say English?
> And yet where do the life and death decisions get made? In political arenas, not cultural ones.
Look at the UK government demographics. The cabinet especially is more diverse than the actual general population.
> For a long time, they were. (Trust me, I'm English, I'm painfully aware of this.) Many of them in power still are - just look at the GOP, for example, or UKGOV.
I'm English too and this is a complete mischaracterisation of our cultural history.
You can't judge the past by today's standards. To do so is childish and un-empathic. Remember, the British were the one to end slavery because our culture battled with this opposing idea (it goes against our core belief in individual freedom) for a long time.
Not to mention, every single culture on Earth would've done exactly the same if they had the chance.
> I mean, "punching down" is bad no matter who does it.
You're missing my point.
Saying that white people are punching down is racist, because it implies a hierarchy where white people are on top. It's a white supremacist viewpoint, albeit with a guilty conscience.
> Because it's still picking a side - "I don't want to get involved" is just an implicit picking of the side with the most power.
No - you don't get to judge people for staying out of this shit flinging contest going on in today's politics. Most people just do not care and they never will.
I will concede that the current UKGov is less white male than it has been but UK politics has always been much more progressive in that regard.
> You can't judge the past by today's standards.
In some aspects, absolutely. In things like "did they invade, subjugate, enslave, and pillage?", you absolutely can. Just because they didn't have porcelain toilets and lightbulbs doesn't mean what the British Empire got up to was ok, for example.
> every single culture on Earth would've done exactly the same if they had the chance
Not exactly a justification.
> Saying that white people are punching down is racist, because it implies a hierarchy where white people are on top.
In terms of political, cultural, etc. power, they are, that's the point - you don't pick on people with less power than you (see also: British Empire.)
> you don't get to judge people for staying out of this shit flinging contest going on in today's politics.
Of course you do. "It has been said that for evil men to accomplish their purpose it is only necessary that good men should do nothing." (Reverend Charles Frederic Aked, 1916)
> Find your pride in your accomplishments, not in a property like skin color or nationality.
And if I don't care about pride, but preserving my kin? Should I keep my mouth shut while the media claims my country was always diverse*, there is nothing to preserve?
Do you know I am not British? That my country was at one point divided among several others, that even forbade us from using our language in the territory they took? It was rallying around our ethnicity that allowed us to present a united front, and survive as a people. Without what you hastily call racism, we would have been absorbed into neighboring countries with hostile regimes. In many nearby places, these exact conditions led to genocides.
*Please spare me the argument that, because ethnicity is fuzzy at the edges, it means people are completely interchangeable, and there is no difference between a Britain with 10% or 50% ethnic Indians.
They probably would recognize me too, but I would decline association to be honest, regardless if it is the US or British variant. Also racism to me has a very specific definition. To believe people to be inferior because of extrinsic properties or ethnicity. Not every form of prejudice is racism of course.
The only person I have ever met that though I was too brown was my dermatologist. Sure, others face racism, but it is also used to justify discrimination and I think that is moving backwards. The US has better understanding on multiculturalism but they changed course recently. It is progress as that is inevitable, but I don't see it improving anything.
> All the individuals listed are American, but most of the people who have shared this on my timeline are British. In trying to express their solidarity with black Britons
Aren't they trying to express their solidarity with black Americans? Just because it's happening outside of your country of residence, doesn't mean your compassion and empathy ends at the border.
> North America's attitude towards people of colour, absolutely disgusts me. I simply do not understand why that a country that was founded on on the principles of freedom continues to act this way.
North america isn't a country. And the US wasn't founded on principles of freedom. Slavery existed back then ( slavery brought to the colonies by the british ).
> Yeah, the UK (my homeland) has it's problems, but in the main, racial in-equality is not one of it's major ones
Where minority soccer players get bananas thrown at them. Where masses of white children are raped and police do nothing because of fears of racism. Where a half black woman is paraded around by the british press as some lapdog of your "prince".
No country is perfect so lets stop with the finger wagging. Has the UK ever elected a black leader? Go read about or watch black people's/minorities' recent experiences in europe. They've been spat at, had racial epithets thrown their way, been discriminated against, etc.
> That idea was never put forward. Again, a nation is a people.
"A nation is a people" does not say anything. It's a totally empty phrase given that the notion of what makes up "a people" is totally fluid, and changes dramatically over time, as I pointed out. You won't find anyone in England who consider themselves Germans, for example, but most of them are descendants predominantly of Germanic tribes. And despite "British" as an identity is even more of a fabrication you'll find plenty of people who see no distinction between English and Scottish people, for example
And it changes rapidly: Even surveys of what nationality people in the UK consider themselves to have shows massive shifts over even the last 30-40 years. These things can not be measured meaningfully in "hundreds of generations" - they often change dramatically in as little of 1-2 generations.
The irony of what one finds in such surveys is that contrary to your earlier attempt to paint this as something lasting, families of recent immigrants to the UK tend to show much stronger feelings of national belonging than "ethnic British" people, and are largely accepted as British. Unsurprisingly given how much of the culture of many of these immigrants have become an integral part of British culture.
> It seems rather arrogant to tell other people what their beliefs are and what they are about.
Not when there is plenty of evidence.
> Would you tell Indians that they were evil racists for being "afraid" of the British invaders?
I wouldn't tell anyone they're racist for being afraid of people who are actually invading and taking their country. That you even try to equate this with immigration says enough.
> dictate to them who is allowed in their country?
You're the one assuming I am suggesting I should have a right to dictate to them. People are free to be xenophobes and bigots if they wish. That does not make them any less so, and I'm equally free to call them out on it.
> being so much more wise and experienced know better than they do
In terms of the UK for example, as I pointed out, it is not at all about my experience. It's about the fact that anti-immigration sentiments linked to opposition to the EU was strongest in the areas where people have the least personal experience with it, and in fact opposition to the EU in general was largest in areas with the least immigration. If they had actual experience of it, I'd have slightly more sympathy for their position, but most of this xenophobia is linked to lack of experience.
Living in London, as an immigrant, the vast majority of British people I meet are equally exasperated over the xenophobia in "Middle England", because most people here know immigrants, work with immigrants, or are in relationships with immigrants.
> The only way your comment makes sense is if you're suggesting it's a problem that white British being a minority is a problem.
Why don't you tell me - do ethnic minorities without a country of their own face any challenges or dangers due to that? Is there reason to believe that native Britons won't face those same dangers? Perhaps because they are so beloved by other nations they now share their country with, there are yearly riots of gratitude held in their honor?
They're not even a minority yet, and we already have a preview of what's to come:
> I have kids and live in an area where the class divisions are pretty stark
How do you mean? I was asking for an illustration of the "class system" that you find oppressing to your person.
> most of the population is bombarded every day by outright racism and hate.
Well that's not true is it.
> The British upper classes make a joke of it
What might be considered Victorian upper class constitutes practically no one. If you don't like the media don't consume it.
Honestly I do not understand this unhealthy fixation on class that you have and frankly reject your assertions regarding it. At a guess you are using it as a simplification to understand a landscape you can't fully understand without it.
> It's disappointing to me that some people defend racists and xenophobes against being called racists and xenophobes. This is what they are, and it's completely appropriate to call them that, and worse.
In your opinion, is it racist or xenophobic for people in Britain to believe that the laws that govern them should maximize the prosperity of people in Britain, and not that of anyone else?
> In Britain, if you want to see racism, try being a white boy dating a non-white girl
Try being a non-white boy dating a white girl. Do you think racism doesn't rear its head in that case?
In any case, this is pretty blatant whataboutism. The article is about the UK, not about other countries, and racism in other countries does not make racism in the UK less bad.
> It is until after I got better at English and started immerse into the Western medium of discourse, that it became apparent that my beliefs of equality by judging people upon their virtues/vices are considered wrong by many who prefer to insist on categorizing people only by their superficial features and use that as a basis of the debate
Don't confuse mostly American language and culture with "Western". The UK sometimes follows some of these things, but not always, and the rest usually don't. For instance in France It's forbidden for government entities to categorise people by how they look. There are no quotas or statistics per skin colour. There's still racism here and there of course - be it in some police actions/accidents, or political parties, or whatever. There are poor neighborhoods (which tend to be prevalently with immigrants or close descendants of immigrants, be they from Africa, Asia or Eastern Europe), and there are efforts to help the people living there ( improve schools, provide jobs, etc.), not "people from Arabian/Western African descent living there".
What is inaccurate about the claims. The English are an ethnic minority in London. That is a fact. You can say oh Englishness isn't the same as the Ethnic English, but to do that you are stripping English people of their ethnic identity and their culture.
> nobody says he shouldn't have the right to make such claims
Yes, please do believe that. Lots of them. It may shock you but in much of the world there isn't free speech. Imagine that. Do you think in China you can go around criticizing the government?
> people have less tolerance for such inaccurate and unfunny claims and will call him to task for such nonsense is a bit silly
No, they are claiming the speech itself is unsafe and trying to cancel people. There is a huge difference which you don't seem to get. And it's not silly. It's primarily about intimidation and fear that if you say the wrong thing you will lose your job, get cancelled, ect. Tolerance to intolerance is not tolerance.
I sometimes wonder, do people who think like you actually know how many people died in the so called "cultural revolutions" around the world (such as in China and Russia) which happened during just the last century. It's in the tens of millions. Intellectuals and dissidents rounded up to be killed or put in gulags. People forced to pledge loyalty to causes and leaders and to be re-educated.
The cultural revolution leaders in our country have already started to get rid of any kind of meritocracy (racist tests they claim). UC schools functionally banned the tests just recently. My brother was telling me that UCSF med school removed standardized testing from its admissions and in one year the Asian population went from 60% to 20%. Across academia now your ability to get in will be based on your ability to show how you contribute to the goal of diversity (via skin pigmentation of course).
>I.e. it's not about immigration, it's explicitly about racism?
Not really, since first racism implies considering the other race inferior (except of merely unwanted in your own country), and second because foreign cultures usually don't grow on a domestic population, but come in trough immigration.
Of course some immigrants can perfectly adopt the local culture, but those are not the kind of immigrants the anti-immigrant people worry about or what they believe is happening in any large number.
>Define "traditional British culture".
Like all cultures it's a constellation of things, not all present or shared at all times by all members of it, that has developed historically.It doesn't have a mathematical style, absolute definition, but one knows it when they encounter it, the same way they can tell Basil Fawlty, tea, shepherd's pie and Punch and Judy are in it and bluegrass, wabi-sabi, yodelling and Takeshi Kitano are not.
> But regarding the racism part: if you haven't noticed, the entire west is having a massive surge in racist ideologies. IMO it is one of two things, either a) it is not racism but classified as such by the left, or b) it is racism and the reason for its massive surge in the past few years are the current policies in place.
Its dissatisfaction with the distributional effects of the economic system and the lack of mainstream elites in many countries -- of either the left or the right -- even acknowledging, much less addressing, the problem. This creates an opportunity for all kinds of opportunistic demagoguery laying blame for the problem -- doing so based on race and religion is common, but not the only element of this -- to sell policies that have little rational connection to the problems people are having.
Brexit is far from the only example of a policy being sold this way.
>Moving from the UK to the US I was shocked by the pernicious levels of institutionalized racism and the undercurrent of subtle racism. It's everywhere.
I am white. I get called 'brit' or 'pom' or 'white guy' and so on all the time by colleagues of various ethnic or cultural backgrounds. I take it as friendly jibing unless I can see there is clear intention to upset.
Again, this is what I mean by British people refusing to engage with my experiences as a brown person living in UK.
Building up a strawman, then assuming I'm part of that strawman, then dismissing it does no one any good.
In Primary school in UK I (and all the non-white) kids were segregated in seating. I was always assigned seating near other brown kids.
When out shopping with my parents, in smaller stores we were "stalked" to make sure we didn't steal anything. This did not happen to our white friends that we asked to keep an eye out for this behavior.
In school plays, the non-white kids were always assigned the side-roles and the "peasant" roles. E.g. I was assigned to be a "chimney cleaner", which involved the makeup people spreading black ink all over myface and essentially making me do blackface.
But sure, this is just woke politics and you know everything about our lives.
reply