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Is Britain a racist country?

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derben Flag 06 Jun 15 1.23pm

Quote legaleagle at 06 Jun 2015 1.16pm

The question I asked is quite clear.You just aren't addressing it

Where would you draw the line personally in terms of what is acceptable or unacceptable within the UK in terms of people discriminating between people on grounds of race/racial difference in a negative manner (in the wider context meaning of "discriminating" akin to differentiating between in a negative manner).

You don't wish to answer,fair enough. Move on.

Acceptable or unacceptable to whom? Me? I don't think people should discriminate on the grounds of a person's race. How is that not answering the question?

If you want to cite a few examples I could say whether I think they are acts of discrimination on the grounds of a person's race.

 

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View serial thriller's Profile serial thriller Flag The Promised Land 06 Jun 15 1.28pm Send a Private Message to serial thriller Add serial thriller as a friend

Quote Stirlingsays at 05 Jun 2015 8.06pm

Quote serial thriller at 05 Jun 2015 5.39pm

Persia and Rome were Empires, not nations, and Henry V's Britain was a Kingdom. History shows that identifying primarily with your nation didn't really occur until the American and French Revolutions, ie. when popular movements formed around national autonomy arose. Up until then, people were far more likely to identify with their region, religion or town.

It may sound like I'm just being massively pedantic but it's actually incredibly significant. National identity is a product of technological progression. If you're a peasant in 16th century England, you probably will never leave your town in your lifetime, you will hear little to no information about other parts of the country, and the only time any unified national authority over you would be taxation and war. When railways, printing press etc. begin to crop up, information becomes more widespread and easier to transport, thus the emergence of national identity.

And that's why the idea that nationhood is an innate quality is a load of bollocks.

Not only are you being incredibly pedantic you're also being wrong.

Nationalism is an emotion tied to tribalism. It exists whether you talking about a city-state, state, empire or nation.

Rome had nationalism....And by the way it was a nation state. You were a Roman citizen just as you are a British citizen...To argue the difference is just to play on words.

Persia became an empire.....It built up over time. Also again, to say it had no nationalism is once again to ignore what nationalism is.

And again, the idea that there was no nationalism back in the days of kings because communication was slower is to take a massively simplistic view of society. Communication may have been far slower but people still had a sense of their nation and while news took longer to travel it still bleeding traveled for goodness sake. There is evidence to prove it......Once again, read Shakespeare.

Indeed go back far far further to the ancient Greeks and read what they thought of other nations compared to themselves.

Nationalism is as old as the hills.


See here's the thing. If the ideology of the nation state - born out of, as I've said, the prevailing philosophies which determined the Revolutions in America and France, based in democratic autonomy, common ancestry and shared cultural values - is only around 300 years old, how can you possibly see nationalism as anything other than of a similar age.

The examples you give are of various forms of loyalty, ranging from loyalty to the republic in Rome's case, loyalty to the monarch in the case of pre-modern Britons and loyalty to the polis in the case of ancient Greeks. This may be a pedantic point but it's important, because this whole argument began after I challenged Jamie's point that nationalism existed a priori.

You can't have a go at me for conflating concepts of discrimination under the umbrella term of racism, then just bracket all forms of loyalty to authority under the term nationalism.

 


If punk ever happened I'd be preaching the law, instead of listenin to Lydon lecture BBC4

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View serial thriller's Profile serial thriller Flag The Promised Land 06 Jun 15 1.43pm Send a Private Message to serial thriller Add serial thriller as a friend

I just wanna make a couple of more points.

What is racism? Well of course racism is about discrimination on the basis of one's race. As a couple of posts earlier in the thread stated though, it is often something that one is unaware of, and thus must constantly challenge, because it can be pervasive and insidious.

The video I posted originally is brilliant because Akala very acutely and intelligently highlights how racism is not just an individual act, like some drunkard shouting n***ger, but is institutionalised in a way which is much harder to determine. Interestingly this is backed up by this piece recently, which shows how even one of the most prominent institutions which makes up the British state - the police - is not only institutionally racist but to some degree self-aware of it: [Link]

When we are trying to determine whether Britain as a nation is racist, the prejudices of other countries are irrelevant. It becomes an easy deflector for our vices, just to come out and say 'but they're worse'. There either is discrimination against people of differing ethnicities or there isn't, and when you see the stop and search numbers based on ethnic background, you realise that a broad acceptance that people who are black and brown are more dangerous is still very apparent, not just in terms of police but in terms of the public in general as the chief of police says above.

You can accept that this country still has a racist hangover from our imperial history and still love this country. In fact, caring enough to realise social deficiencies is a fundamental part of wanting to achieve the best for us. As I say, racism, sexism and all forms of prejudice are something we constantly have to be looking out for not just in others but in ourselves.

 


If punk ever happened I'd be preaching the law, instead of listenin to Lydon lecture BBC4

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derben Flag 06 Jun 15 1.50pm

Quote serial thriller at 06 Jun 2015 1.43pm

I just wanna make a couple of more points.

What is racism? Well of course racism is about discrimination on the basis of one's race. As a couple of posts earlier in the thread stated though, it is often something that one is unaware of, and thus must constantly challenge, because it can be pervasive and insidious.

The video I posted originally is brilliant because Akala very acutely and intelligently highlights how racism is not just an individual act, like some drunkard shouting n***ger, but is institutionalised in a way which is much harder to determine. Interestingly this is backed up by this piece recently, which shows how even one of the most prominent institutions which makes up the British state - the police - is not only institutionally racist but to some degree self-aware of it: [Link]

When we are trying to determine whether Britain as a nation is racist, the prejudices of other countries are irrelevant. It becomes an easy deflector for our vices, just to come out and say 'but they're worse'. There either is discrimination against people of differing ethnicities or there isn't, and when you see the stop and search numbers based on ethnic background, you realise that a broad acceptance that people who are black and brown are more dangerous is still very apparent, not just in terms of police but in terms of the public in general as the chief of police says above.

You can accept that this country still has a racist hangover from our imperial history and still love this country. In fact, caring enough to realise social deficiencies is a fundamental part of wanting to achieve the best for us. As I say, racism, sexism and all forms of prejudice are something we constantly have to be looking out for not just in others but in ourselves.

What should we do if we find ourselves thinking discriminatory thoughts? Turn ourselves in at the nearest police station and confess a thought-crime? (Oh, I forgot, that's no good is it - the police are institutionally racist themselves) Who do we turn to? Surely in this day and age, the time has come for some new sort of organisation that we could throw ourselves on for mercy - could call it Ministry of Love perhaps.

Also "all forms of prejudice are something we constantly have to be looking out for". We are prejudice when we vote in an election, we do not vote for someone on the grounds of his political beliefs. We are all prejudiced on here in favour of Crystal Palace FC.


Edited by derben (06 Jun 2015 2.56pm)

 

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View Stirlingsays's Profile Stirlingsays Flag 06 Jun 15 2.50pm Send a Private Message to Stirlingsays Holmesdale Online Elite Member Add Stirlingsays as a friend

Quote serial thriller at 06 Jun 2015 1.28pm

You can't have a go at me for conflating concepts of discrimination under the umbrella term of racism, then just bracket all forms of loyalty to authority under the term nationalism.


If that logic holds then you are accepting that definitions of racism need to actually adhere to what the word means and not evolve.

I think you are perhaps right. I have been adapting the word nationalism to cover what are in fact very similar emotions and practical outcomes from more ancient times.

I think its word play and that these older systems give practically the same result in an individual's relationship with them. I view it as word play but fair enough, I take your point.

People can not accept egalitarian ideas around all groups within society and not fit the definition of being racist/homophobic or whatever because in real life people's views exist on a spectrum and not on extreme ends.

Language is sometimes quite poor at expressing this.

Edited by Stirlingsays (06 Jun 2015 2.59pm)

 


'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

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jamiemartin721 Flag Reading 06 Jun 15 4.16pm

Nationalism really is just paying greater preference to differences between nations, than to similarities. The mistake is to believe really that one of the two is true or somehow innate.

 


"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
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jamiemartin721 Flag Reading 06 Jun 15 4.19pm

Quote TheJudge at 05 Jun 2015 9.47pm

Quote jamiemartin721 at 05 Jun 2015 1.05pm

Quote TheJudge at 05 Jun 2015 12.29pm
You are not talking about numbers. The Romans and Normans influenced the country because the took control of government by force.

Because no one actually has any real knowledge of the actual numbers. Certainly the number were presumably sufficient for say William to defeat Harold militarily and put down the Northern Rebellion shortly after.

And of course once settled they brought family over and servants, and over time began to marry into the local populations.

The roman army of Claudius invasion was four legions, about 20,000 troops and around 20,000 auxilleries.

The estimated population of the UK at the time is around 4m. Which is pretty big.

Notably when the Doomesday census put the population of England, during the 11th century at between 1.5m and 2m - Estimates of Williams Army are between 8,000 and 12,000 men. Later backed by about 8000 initial settlers given lands and titles by William etc.

So not exactly insignificant numbers, with a population even of 2m.

Edited by jamiemartin721 (05 Jun 2015 1.10pm)


But these people were an invasion force. It has no relevance to today other than the fact that no one voted for it.

That's not what you said though, it was about numbers - they weren't insignificant.

Actually we all voted for it, we elected the political parties that were part of the EU agreements. We didn't have a referendum, but no one actually really seemed to care about it, until the economy bit it (ie when there wasn't a competition for the jobs).

 


"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]

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View serial thriller's Profile serial thriller Flag The Promised Land 06 Jun 15 5.34pm Send a Private Message to serial thriller Add serial thriller as a friend

Quote derben at 06 Jun 2015 1.50pm

Quote serial thriller at 06 Jun 2015 1.43pm

I just wanna make a couple of more points.

What is racism? Well of course racism is about discrimination on the basis of one's race. As a couple of posts earlier in the thread stated though, it is often something that one is unaware of, and thus must constantly challenge, because it can be pervasive and insidious.

The video I posted originally is brilliant because Akala very acutely and intelligently highlights how racism is not just an individual act, like some drunkard shouting n***ger, but is institutionalised in a way which is much harder to determine. Interestingly this is backed up by this piece recently, which shows how even one of the most prominent institutions which makes up the British state - the police - is not only institutionally racist but to some degree self-aware of it: [Link]

When we are trying to determine whether Britain as a nation is racist, the prejudices of other countries are irrelevant. It becomes an easy deflector for our vices, just to come out and say 'but they're worse'. There either is discrimination against people of differing ethnicities or there isn't, and when you see the stop and search numbers based on ethnic background, you realise that a broad acceptance that people who are black and brown are more dangerous is still very apparent, not just in terms of police but in terms of the public in general as the chief of police says above.

You can accept that this country still has a racist hangover from our imperial history and still love this country. In fact, caring enough to realise social deficiencies is a fundamental part of wanting to achieve the best for us. As I say, racism, sexism and all forms of prejudice are something we constantly have to be looking out for not just in others but in ourselves.

What should we do if we find ourselves thinking discriminatory thoughts? Turn ourselves in at the nearest police station and confess a thought-crime? (Oh, I forgot, that's no good is it - the police are institutionally racist themselves) Who do we turn to? Surely in this day and age, the time has come for some new sort of organisation that we could throw ourselves on for mercy - could call it Ministry of Love perhaps.

Also "all forms of prejudice are something we constantly have to be looking out for". We are prejudice when we vote in an election, we do not vote for someone on the grounds of his political beliefs. We are all prejudiced on here in favour of Crystal Palace FC.


Edited by derben (06 Jun 2015 2.56pm)


Why the f*ck would you need to tell the police if you're thinking racist thoughts? If you catch yourself being a prick, just have a word with yourself and move on.

And if you can't see the difference between supporting a different football team and hating someone because they're black/gay/a woman then I give up.

 


If punk ever happened I'd be preaching the law, instead of listenin to Lydon lecture BBC4

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nickgusset Flag Shizzlehurst 06 Jun 15 5.36pm

[Link]

Britain's top police officer controversially branded all sections of society ‘institutionally racist’ yesterday.

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said it is not only police forces which fail to represent the varied communities they serve.

The judiciary, medical profession, media and government are all dominated by the white middle classes, he suggested.

And the Scotland Yard boss admitted that there is ‘some justification' for people to think of his London force as a racist organisation.


Better have a word with him Redben

 

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View Stirlingsays's Profile Stirlingsays Flag 06 Jun 15 6.08pm Send a Private Message to Stirlingsays Holmesdale Online Elite Member Add Stirlingsays as a friend

Quote nickgusset at 06 Jun 2015 5.36pm

[Link]

Britain's top police officer controversially branded all sections of society ‘institutionally racist’ yesterday.

Sir Bernard Hogan-Howe said it is not only police forces which fail to represent the varied communities they serve.

The judiciary, medical profession, media and government are all dominated by the white middle classes, he suggested.

And the Scotland Yard boss admitted that there is ‘some justification' for people to think of his London force as a racist organisation.


Better have a word with him Redben

To keep or to gain their managemental jobs the top Police management have been echoing the lazy BS mantras of the liberal left for pretty much decades.

It's a highly politicized job.....Which is one of the main problems with policing.

They sing whatever hymns the left wing broadcast media tell them to sing......Any controversial stuff that gets noticed and kiss goodbye to your job prospects.

Edited by Stirlingsays (06 Jun 2015 6.08pm)

 


'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

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TheJudge Flag 06 Jun 15 6.08pm

Quote jamiemartin721 at 06 Jun 2015 4.19pm

Quote TheJudge at 05 Jun 2015 9.47pm

Quote jamiemartin721 at 05 Jun 2015 1.05pm

Quote TheJudge at 05 Jun 2015 12.29pm
You are not talking about numbers. The Romans and Normans influenced the country because the took control of government by force.

Because no one actually has any real knowledge of the actual numbers. Certainly the number were presumably sufficient for say William to defeat Harold militarily and put down the Northern Rebellion shortly after.

And of course once settled they brought family over and servants, and over time began to marry into the local populations.

The roman army of Claudius invasion was four legions, about 20,000 troops and around 20,000 auxilleries.

The estimated population of the UK at the time is around 4m. Which is pretty big.

Notably when the Doomesday census put the population of England, during the 11th century at between 1.5m and 2m - Estimates of Williams Army are between 8,000 and 12,000 men. Later backed by about 8000 initial settlers given lands and titles by William etc.

So not exactly insignificant numbers, with a population even of 2m.

Edited by jamiemartin721 (05 Jun 2015 1.10pm)


But these people were an invasion force. It has no relevance to today other than the fact that no one voted for it.

That's not what you said though, it was about numbers - they weren't insignificant.

Actually we all voted for it, we elected the political parties that were part of the EU agreements. We didn't have a referendum, but no one actually really seemed to care about it, until the economy bit it (ie when there wasn't a competition for the jobs).

But the Roman soldiers all went home as there weren't many Normans. The only real significance is that they both changed our culture enormously. What do you think the 318,000 arriving here every year will do ?
You are really arguing against yourself.

 

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View Stirlingsays's Profile Stirlingsays Flag 06 Jun 15 6.10pm Send a Private Message to Stirlingsays Holmesdale Online Elite Member Add Stirlingsays as a friend

Quote serial thriller at 06 Jun 2015 5.34pm


Why the f*ck would you need to tell the police if you're thinking racist thoughts? If you catch yourself being a prick, just have a word with yourself and move on.

And if you can't see the difference between supporting a different football team and hating someone because they're black/gay/a woman then I give up.


Here we see Serial actually promoting the concept of thought policing.

You can't make this crap up.

 


'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

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