Guest 650- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 542
14 February 2009
10:4215430There have been a lot of good points made on this thread, and quite a variety of views. For BarryW, yes, what Prince Harry said may seem trivial, more so, maybe, given the the context. It's clear, nevertheless, that some people do feel very strongly, maybe also having experienced or seen disadvantageous discrimination by "race".
There are other discriminations too. In case anyone missed my point about the vulgar word, it's not just Ron Atkinson who used it. It's been used on this thread as a pejorative, and yet a poster here has suffered significantly through a related prejudice.
Discrimination and prejudice exist in many ways, and certainly not solely about "race". When reading this thread I can see several examples of other negatively-evaluative discriminations, and at least two occasions where muting has occurred.
It isn't sufficient to decry one form of discrimination yet condone, even perpetuate, another. Discrimination and prejudice are not solely about "race". They're also an attitude of mind. My point about the person who dressed up as that poor kidnapped child is that he was totally lacking at that moment in empathy and understanding, in the idea of walking in another's shoes. From such fundamental lacks are discriminations built.
Prejudice doesn't go away merely because we condemn one form of it, or a particular word (though doing so certainly exposes issues for question and challenge). The roots are far deeper, and discrimination and prejudice can easily shift focus or be used as a tool, perpetuating the harms. It's a tricksy thing, and challenging/condemning prejudice means doing so in all its forms and fundamentals.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
14 February 2009
11:0615436Are we not getting to the whole point here Maggie.
Too many people get far too worked up and upset about what are trivial matters. When you do so issues of real abuse and discrimination get downgraded and can become just more of the same. It is these people who get worked up about nothing who need to get a sense of proportion and a life otherwise where will it all end? I find it appalling that people feel they have to walk on eggshells all the time in case a minor comment is taken out of context and blown up out of all proportion.
People who dont have a discriminatory bone in their body get vilified in some quarters. You then cannot blame someone if reading this kind of thing, shrugs their shoulders, thinking of what they themselves think and say the same kind of thing and deciding to bracket themselves with rascists (for instance) therefore, making it in their eyes acceptable....They might as well go and vote BNP!!! By their very actions these people who promote pc and get outraged by minor and harmless comments are acting as recruiting sargeant for the real nasties in politics.
14 February 2009
13:2015453Trivial? Words are the bedrock of discrimination and need to be taken seriously! It is words that cause people to band together in a common cause, and that may be against another group - Nazis, Jews, hello? Words are the tools used to perpetuate hatred and villification - it is words that create the environment in which violence grows and develops, words that encourage vigilante-ism, words that cause individuals and groups to retreat into themselves and fester the rebound hatred that ends up in the Gaza or the 6 counties of Ireland. They create and cause Real Abuse and discrimination, so please do not say we are focussing in the wrong area - this is absolutely the right area.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
14 February 2009
20:3915475i wonder if prince harry would take umbrage at the word tw*t that he has been accused of being on here.
i know that many people, particularly women, are offended by this word.
thankfully, i doubt that the same people would annexe the sudetenland or invade poland.
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
14 February 2009
21:1315480dont tell me adolfs on the rampage again,i thought he topped himself 60 odd years ago.
14 February 2009
21:3615481Howard - yes, it is about power as much as anything else.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
15 February 2009
00:1815487Bern - where was Harry's so called abuse. He said in a friendly manner, 'my little Paki friend'. No abuse there only an imagined slight because he shortened Pakistani to Paki.
Incidentally, today I notice some very nice golliwog dolls in a Dover shop. I just wish I could find a small golli badge, I would wear it simply to give the royal two fingered salute to the pc brigade!
Guest 653- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,540
15 February 2009
08:2715492Here Here Barry.
I saw those golliwogs too, they are beautiful and so well made and dressed. How anyone, who and whatever they are, can take offence at such a beautiful doll is beyond me.
I wanted to buy one and carry it around without a bag (but I couldn't afford it), showing people that it isn't an object of hate, discrimination or insult, but a golliwog doll - pure and simple.
In these 228 or so postings, every aspect must have been discussed and argued over and we still haven't got anywhere and we never will.
Some people will get offended over the most trivial word, where no intent of offence was meant and people will have to start a sentence with sorry all the time - just in case.
Roger
Guest 674- Registered: 25 Jun 2008
- Posts: 3,391
15 February 2009
09:0315495Whatever the view on the dolls, as i keep saying,the one posting everyone should read is mandies, on her childrren/husband.
I suppose only if your in that postion can you appreciate the hurt.
Guest 655- Registered: 13 Mar 2008
- Posts: 10,247
15 February 2009
10:4015506Keith - my sypathy would be firmly with Mandie and her daughter over that. To call someone who is a Sikh or of similar non Pakistani extraction a 'Paki' is indeed nothing more than deliberately causing offense if, in such instances, after being corrected they dont apologise or carry on with it. Once again context and intent is very important.
15 February 2009
11:3815510It is barely credible that bright people can so very much miss the point. Unless they want to. Even if Prince Hs friend was not offended ( although his Father obviously was ) Prince H used a word - yes, a word - that has caused immense pain, suffering and abuse for many people. Apart from the fact that because of his responsibilities he should know better (although clearly we are now aware that he doesn't and probably never will know any better than a lobotomised frog) there needs to be a real recognisiton that WORDS HURT!!!! Words encourage a mind set, they develop hatreds, they confirm prejudices, and they can be a death sentence, literally. Words matter.
Guest 650- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 542
15 February 2009
12:3615514In these last posts there are more good points. BarryW suggests a danger of hardening of attitudes and I'd add, the potential for what he terms "pc" itself to become an ideology.
Bern points out that words emphatically shape thought and have real effects. I agree. At the same time, though, words are tools. There are fundamental roots of prejudice of which words are a manifestation. It may help weaken the plant of prejudice to chop off one branch (eg racism and associated words) but it doesn't kill it. Other shoots may continue to grow quite happily behind the garden shed while we're not looking. (That did happen on this thread.) Racism, sexism (thank you, howardmcs, for your comment here), ageism, ableism etc etc grow from the same roots - and yes, a fertiliser is power. In challenging prejudice it's not enough to condemn one, yet allow another to pass condoned. The focus has to be on the roots too, not just the branches.
The golliwog, again! Some people do understand golliwog dolls as a much-loved toy. Contributory to this understanding is experience and also background cultures (eg age, ethnicity, class, etc). So - is condemning a person for having affection for a golliwog toy in itself discriminatory? (I'm prepared to say it is - because it is devaluing a particular experience and its cultures in favour of others (and, ironically, using a racism discourse to do so).)
Keith notes that "-isms" are experienced differentially. That's a well-made point -one person may not feel a hurt, where others genuinely do. There has to be room for this understanding and empathy. A related problem is that in debating discriminatory "-isms" there are attempts to find an overarching solution and approach, ie a "one size fits all" fix. (Incidentally, this approach is also cultural, and doubly so as it's historical within a particular set of cultures (and is certainly being successfully challenged).) It won't and can't work, just because there is such a variety of background, culture, and experience - and indeed, way of expression. This thread so well underlines this.
So is there a solution? One part, which I think all of us here will have, would be a fundamental respect for other people. With that, would be also acceptance that their views differ and may not coincide with one's own, an understanding interest in why this should be so, and a self-critical (if necessary) reflection. They're some of the ingredients for a good prejudice weedkiller (and, especially for Brian, will help the roses bloom!).
This is an emotive thread, and tricky - but I do think it's been positively productive in that it has been a good exchange of views, and allowed a good chance thereby to further understanding. Thank you.
Guest 645- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 4,463
15 February 2009
14:3615517I've read the above postings with interest.I can see both sides of the argument.I am married to a Filipina and our daughter ,Natascha, is a Euroasian.I picked her up from school on Thursday and noticed that she was quieter than normal,
"Everything Ok stinker?" I enquired.
"Daddy some of the children have been calling me names...cos I.m not white like them"
Ignore them" I said.Rise above it and remember the old ryhme my father taught me when I was at school and got called names for being a Pole"Sticks and stones etc"
The point being that if a super rich privileged role model kid thinks it acceptable to address a friend as he did,then obviously kids in the playground also think its acceptable without realising the consequences it may have resulting in me having a tearful child in the back of my motor some four hours after the incident.
BarryW its important that adults try and teach children whats acceptable and whats not acceptable behaviour.Harry has had the benefit of a private good education and should therefore know better regardless of how endearing his remarks were mean't to be.Its OK for you a big hairy arsed successful businessman to brush aside Harrys words but try explaining that to my 9year old daughter.
We need to set standards for our children otherwise society will continue its downward spiral unabated.
Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter)
15 February 2009
14:4415518Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
15 February 2009
15:5015519Surely the point is that the remark was a private one and if the person concerned was not bothered, that is the end of the matter.
To be honest, considering the amount of vilification I have endured because of my German roots, I get rather upset at the level of kow-towing to certain ethnic groups who seem to get all the limelight.
It is still considered OK to insult Germans on the basis of their nationality because we started a war with them seven decades ago. I have a friend who is also half German who was repeatedly called "Hitler" by her PRIMARY SCHOOL TEACHER.
Whether Germans are further removed ethnically from the British than Irish people is a moot point, but how close or distant you are from the white British, ethnically speaking, is irrelevant in my opinion when it comes to determining racism.
I also of course have to endure (like the rest of our community) the misguided perception that Dover is a hotbed of racist ferment. I think we all know how that feels.
To be honest it is getting to the point where I feel if I hear one more person moaning about being offended then I will scream.
You cannot force heartfelt tolerance and harmony - you CAN force a veneer of compliance for while.
But what is supressed must sooner or later bounce back.
Former Yugoslavia is a case in point - one the UK would do well to note.
15 February 2009
19:0415523It is not the end of the matter, and if you had read the posts carefully you might understand that. And your friend being subjected to anti-German racism by her/his teacher does not make it right. What twisted logic makes private comments which are rooted in racism right because a child was subjected to racism by a primary school teacher? Racism is not and can never be a "private matter".
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
15 February 2009
20:1015525andrew, you must remember "ve are ze masters now".
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
16 February 2009
21:5815567I have read the posts carefully and I do understand Bern. I wasn't applying any twisted logic either. Where did I say either was right? But is a jokey private remark to a friend worse than serial abuse by a teacher of a seven year old child?
I repeat that a private remark should not necessitate a public apology and I think that people are as offended as they choose to be. They should stop making SUCH a meal of things.
The remark was a private one- the main fault lies with the person who publicised it, otherwise no-one would have known.
I agree wholeheartedly with Barry W that people without a racist bone in their body get vilified now and all because the hysteria of the PC lobby has not been challenged enough.
I also agree with Howard's comment that discrimination and prejudice exist in many forms - to listen to some lobbyists, you would think it is only one or two vociferous groups who suffer.
I think I speak for the vast majority of the UK population when I say that this hypersensitive self-appointed victim mentality is really starting to grate.
In fact I think what is really going on is colonial revenge - some people with a grudge about being under British rule in the past seem to have an axe to grind and want to make us all suffer and dance to their tune. And boy, do we! And they are aided and abetted by an ostentatiously "guilty" coterie of white liberals who have grabbed power very successfully using the figleaf of promoting "tolerance".
Ross Miller
- Location: London Road, Dover
- Registered: 17 Sep 2008
- Posts: 3,696
16 February 2009
22:1415568Except when that private remark is released into the public domain
"Dream as if you'll live forever. Live as if you'll die today." - James Dean
"Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength,
While loving someone deeply gives you courage" - Laozi
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
16 February 2009
22:2215569Released by whom? And what about the intent behind it? But he has apologised and we can now sleep safely in our beds.
And have the families of the victims of 7/7 - senseless spiteful mass murder by brainwashed Islamofascists of Pakistani origin - received sufficient apology from the Pakistani community? Highly questionable.
Now, I heard that 33% of the Islamic community in this country supported the suicide bombers and that they are commonly referred to as the "fabulous four".
Now THAT'S offensive.
