This was in The Times today, amongst a column by Hugo Rifkind. Unfortunately, I can't find a link on their website to this story. I wish all publicists were like that...
Yeah, I heard the news too... Celebrities are just as stupid on average as the general public I guess... And to answer the question, I used to get really angry at racists, and try to argue back, the problem being that the logic that brings people to being racist is not one that can be argued with, they have their own personal truth and there's usually no arguing with it, because they just end up more convinced they're right and you just end up angrier and frustrated and possibly in prison for pounding them to death with the nearest blunt object. Ok, second nearest, you can't really pound anyone to death with themselves. Now, I just blow them off, at worst I call them something not very nice and walk away, at best I just mentally label them as stupid dorks that aren't worth bothering with and ignore them. The hardest circumstance is when you have to put up with them, if they are your boss or manager, or part of your family. In that case, I aim for avoiding them as much as poossible and ony ever engaging a conversation on something that won't end up going that way... And yeah, nice reaction from the publicist... Edit for spelling... Gee, it's not that easy to do a Garner-rant, who would have thought it...
I found this link to the Manchester Evening Post at this address http://www.manchestereveningnews.co...233363_celeb_bb_complaints_hit_2000_mark.html Here are one or two others RTE http://www.rte.ie/arts/2007/0116/celebritybigbrother.html Mid Day http://ww3.mid-day.com/news/nation/2007/january/150125.htm This story appears to have circled the globe already. I feel disgusted at Ms Goody, her boyfriend and some others she seems to be manipulating in her totally blissfully unaware state of Celebrityness (?) that she has shown, on several occasions, she cannot handle. In our area we have several 3rd and 4th generation Asian, Indian, Pakistani and West Indian families whose sons and daughters are in fact British by birth and have married local residents, so racism tends not to be a problem except from a minority of severeley retarded morons who will go out of their way to cause trouble, no matter what. The majority of racist remarks however, seem to come from the older generation who are into their 70's and 80's, and were brought up in an era believing that anyone who was not British was an inferior race. I am reminded of the way Terry illustrated this attitude with the incident involving Yo-less and the newsagent in Johnny and the Bomb. I suppose my feelings are more like aggression rather than pity to these people. I remember one incident which left me fuming. I was helping my friend, Ali load some stuff into his car when he was moving house. Quite unexpectedly, another car pulled over from the opposite side of the road. A woman stuck her head out of the window and simply said, "You foreign bastards should **** off home where you belong,' in a very liquid Welsh accent. I felt a bit racist myself when I found myself saying, 'Excuse me you're Welsh, aren't you?' 'Yes', was the reply. 'Well why don't you **** off back to your country and leave us English in peace.' Maybe not the most tactful of replies, but I would like to think she got a taste of her own racial prejudice. No offence meant to the Welsh, I have a few friends in Wales and I think they would have said the same thing under the circumstances. And I agree with Katcal, a good reply from Miss Shetty's publicist. Personally I think Ms. Goody was lucky not to have been sued for her ingnorant comments.
Same as Katcal really, they just go on my ignore/ignorant list. I haven't met a single one that could be converted, and I have tried a few times in the past, which I guess is because of their nature, being pig-headed ignorant. If I'm in someone else's house and they are racist, making comments about whatever, I just inwardly cringe and bear it, seeing as it's their house and all, but if they confront me directly on my opinion I always say that I totally disagree with them. The whole idea of racism comes off as very childish to me in most circumstances, no real reason behind it.
sometimes i wonder... i have a musical prejudice against rap. perhaps i say it sounds unintelligent as an excuse for my personal dislike of the genre, but it really does sound unintelligent... but then, so does most popular music, anyway. there's a kid's show my little brother watches called Maya and Miguel, with all sorts of enthusiastic spanish dialogue scattered throughout, and i find myself disliking it too. at my last job i was in charge of printing a magazine for Latinos and i hated it for its ugly, low-brow, chock-full-of-horoscopes approach. does all that make me racist? i'm kind of afraid it might. maybe i'm just altogether a snob. but does that make it sound any better? hmm. [edit. missing letters]
Meh, I don't think that's racist, it's personal cultural taste... I personnally don't particularly like spanish culture in general ; the food, the music, the traditions, but hey, it's just because it doesn't "click" with me, I won't go around calling latino/spanish people rude things or telling them to "go back home", or making widesweaping generalities about them, [b:68eff48ef5]that [/b:68eff48ef5]would be racist... The same goes for rap music, like any music, you can dislike it, I don't particularly like it, but there is a difference between not liking a part of a culture and being racist towards it and its people.
Well, at work i get a variety of English borderline racists. People call me "jocko" or just "jock" quite often. Near hogmany, they get patronising about "hogmany" and having "a wee dram" I've had people ask if anyone there speaks english. (as they mangle the language in their hideous dialects) I've had people ask how many asians we supply. One woman was like "i don't want to be racist, but i can't understand you lot. You know, asians" Another time, one guy was like "it was some asian guy that said he'd do that, so I'm really not surprised it's not been done. AHAHAHAHA!" I told him I didn't appreciate his racist humour, and he shut up. Just yesterday, some guy was telling me how scottish people ran about hiding behind bushes, killing and eating pheasants. Twat. So, over all, racisim pisses me off majorly. I'm sure most people don't mean to be racists wankers, but they fail.
I sympathise, Doors. Some people just don't understand the phrase 'one time only'. I actually found that post quite amusing, just because these people come off as such...well, jokes. Personally, I feel sorry for you Asians. (Also: Doors wears a skirt. Lol.)
Bold text added by me, because that's an opinion, Plaid. I don't think rap and other pop genres sound unintelligent. Regarding the Latino papers, given the financial status of most Hispanics in the States, I imagine the paper is aimed at working class people. It sounds like it's a class thing that happens to have a racial highlight. Garner's a real class snob, too. It took him a good while to get used to the idea that I have a tattoo and a body piercing, because, where he comes from, only the low class girls have those, it seems. The thing to remember is that prejudice is one thing and discrimination is another. I think that prejudice is unavoidable for the average human. It's really hard not to make judgements based on our existent knowledge and experience. I think the important thing is to always keep in mind that you could be wrong about things and that every person is different. I have a new friend, who I met on my college course. She's an English Muslim. Spending time with her has been interesting. I didn't know before how ready ordinary people in Hastings are to throw insults at strangers. It's quite an eye-opener for me. I think I'm definitely a little bit racist - I have a lot of racial stereotypes in my head, especially for other Europeans, and I tend to make assumptions based on race (not so often on ethnicity, though - here in Hastings it's been less easy than in other places to tell anything about someone's background simply by the colour of their skin). However, I try to meet each new person with an open attitude, and never to discriminate based on my prejudices. It's hard, and I find it harder to admit to myself at times that I'm not always the open-minded person I'd like to be. Edit to add: I crossposted with Doors and Chris. It would never have occured to me that a Scot would get racist abuse from an English person, but given the kind of stuff I hear from Scots directed at English people down here, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised.
I can't speak as generally as this about music. Aside from the fact that my musical tastes don't really involve rap so much, the lyrics themselves of rap - well, I think some are intelligent or just decent lyrics, but I also think some is absolute crap. But of course, the same is true across the different genres. This is deviating from the point a bit, but I think to call any genre of music 'intelligent' or 'unintelligent' is generalising too much. Although it could be possible that someone just likes all music indiscriminately.
I think calling a genre intelligent or unintelligent is meaningless - hence my comment to Plaid. I could be said to like all musical genres indiscriminately but not all music. Of course, as improbable as it is that someone would like all music indiscriminately, there is at least one absent Boardanian who loves films.
i am guilty of being careless with words again here, so i'm sorry for that. my comments about music were overgeneralized, yes. snobbery it is then. perhaps i will think about what i ought to do about that. pride is such a funny thing. back to the subject at hand, i met a woman in england who was very adamant about immigrants getting out of her country. it was interesting, listening to her talk. i always wonder what it's like to be other people. nevertheless i don't do a very great job of putting myself in other people's shoes and being empathetic. ah well.
Like Doors', my work crops up a whole spectrum of racism. From the blatant: "You're not indian, are you?" to the slightly cloaked: "Ah, finally, an english voice." to the bizarre: "Are you a real person?" (to which I long to answer, "If my fairy godmother grants my wish...". Stupid professionalism.) I can see where the people are coming from when they say they find it hard to understand the Indian accent of our technical support team (based in India). Although personally, I haven't had a problem that a single repition hasn't solved. The hardest people to understand for me are those who speak too fast or very quietly. The fast ones are usually the angry ones who don't like to be asked to repeat themselves, which makes it awkward. The angry ones have a UK accent 99% of the time. There are some people who think they have a divine right to speak to someone in the UK and a common argument is that we need the jobs - but don't other nationalities too? What about those countries that don't even have an office in their country? Nigerians would have to call France for sales support (what I provide for the UK and Ireland) and then India for technical. We are lucky in many respects. Anyhoo, back to the topic in hand. In an ideal world, I would avoid the racists like Kat and Mal, but it's not always possible. My mum will make the odd comment about 'the asians' up the road, which is ok because we don't know their names and they are the only asian family up the road. However, she will occasionally make sweeping statements about their culture based on the small parts she observes, which I endeavour to correct, usually using the example of the (white) boy next door who hangs about with those asians who partake in negative behaviour. She's never racist when meeting someone, she'll happily talk to a person she meets regardless of race, it's just those odd comments she makes in private - but I can hardly avoid my own mum. Similarly, some of my friends will make the odd racial sterotype joke, which I occasionally do myself (I bet those darn frenchies invented it). Sometimes it will edge close to the plain insulting, occasionally it would be, in which case you have to say something - normally they'll deny they meant it, but I find they don't repeat the joke, at least not in my hearing... I think the trick is to make them think about it, provide examples of how people of their own race display the negative traits ("bloody immigrants!", "yeah, that's what the spanish say about the english."). There are a few people who aren't prepared to (or who aren't mentally capable of) listening to reason, but those are few and far between. In my experience anyway, maybe I'm just lucky to come from a town with a history of a high percentage of ethnic minorities, so everyone knows at least one person with Carribean, Pakistani and Indian (and more) heritage(s) and probably went to school with them too.
Like Ben, the kind of casual racism I've encountered in every day life has been from ordinary people who I spend most of my time with. When I worked at the accountants, I seemed to be constantly countering racist jokes and reminding people to think. When we heard we were going to have a Chinese girl in the office, there were constant jokes and poor imitations of Chinese accents. Most of it was harmless, but sometimes things would get ugly. I wasn't there on the occasion when one of the partners (the unpleasant one who everyone hated, if any of you have heard me talk about him before) got drunk at lunchtime and, passing a black person on the way back to the office, yelled at him to get back where he came from. Apparently only [i:e2a81af454]one person[/i:e2a81af454] with him made any comment - something along the lines of exclaiming his name and giving him a small frown. No one else dared say anything. I don't know what I would have said if I was there, but I like to think I'd have said something. Most of the people I know feel strongly about immigrants being treated better than natives. Although I often challenge their views, a lot of it is based in fact. I try to remind them that if immigrant workers illegally get jobs because an employer can pay them less, it's not the fault of the immigrants. This town is full of asylum seekers and other immigrants, so it can be a bit of a sore topic. It's certainly not possible to avoid what I would call low-level xenophobia round here. And let's not get started on the fact that I live with an American. Garner used to tell me off for telling Irish jokes, because apparently they're racist too.
I've had this conversation with an English imigrant in Portugal. He also complained that some of the shopkeepers still didn't understand him. So I asked him how his Portuguese was, but he didn't really speak Portuguese... He'd been living in the Algarve 4 years.
They ain't jokes lady, they are true stories !! :shock: Besides, it has nothing to do with the Irish, you can adapt them to any country by changing the "Irish" to "Belgian" or "French" or "English" or... whatever the nearest criticable neighbour is... Unless of course there's a shamrock or a leprechaun in the joke. Or Rinso.
I disagree that the immigrant workers are not to blame. I think that the employer should be held even more accountable, but the immigrant worker is still at fault. If I smuggled myself into England and then started working, I would be at fault for doing so.
If you were starving and living in a box or a squat and all you got offered was an undeclared job, man, you would take it. There are times when you can choose to do what's right or eat. It doesn't excuse things, but it helps to understand why... I don't exactly call it a career choice to have to choose between begging in the street or accepting an illegal job. It is a choice to decide to take on an illegal worker because it's cheaper...
I do not think the solution to racism, alienation and discrimination lies in identifying every single minority and trying to bring this group's mistreatment into focus in media, government and job markets. I think the error with this approach is to label people as belonging to a specific group. "Bob here is an african, Tom is homosexual, Dave over there is a buddhist." I believe that this actually is adding to the problem, that we like to categorize people, and then applying group-wide properties to single members of the group. "Immigrants are subject of racism. Therefore, Jenny here, who is an immigrant, is subject of racism." What have we done here? We've pointed out Jenny as different from the majority, are starting to consider how to treat Jenny differently to make right the wrongs, and we're just in a new kind of discrimination, even though it is a positive discrimination. This might be a good temporary solution, but I believe it will not benefit in the long run. I believe the solution lies instead in treating every single person equally, and stop focusing on racism, which I believe is a manifestation of a deeper problem. If I've broken my leg, I would like some painkillers, yes thank you, but obviously I can't just solve the problem by keep taking the painkillers. The pain I am feeling is a manifestation of a deeper problem, I can fight the pain with drugs but I can't fix my leg with drugs. The pain is a signal that there is something wrong that I should try to fix.
i was reading over a friend's resume/CV, and it listed her educational qualifications with a degree in social work, emphasis on queer studies. i questioned that, saying "maybe i'm still just a backwoods redneck, but round here queer's an insult." she said it's the current word for embracing a large demographic of alternative sexualities or something along those lines. well, that's what she MEANT, what she said was 'it's what they call themselves' or 'its what we call ourselves', i can't remember the exact phrasing. i replied 'hell, whatever happened to callin 'em/everybody human?' i was so pleased with my witty comment that i relayed it to a friend who was a politically active (or leaning that way) 'queer'. she listened to the story and then replied 'well, i think that denies us our struggle.' i've maintained ever since, if that aint the POINT of your struggle, then the whole thing's just gonna go on forever. now, recently california tried to put through a law that would ignore ethnicity and race and stop collecting such information. i thought that would be a step in the right direction. a black issues cartoonist did a strip about this, however, that brought up something i hadn't considered: some of that race based data is *vital* in tracking health issues. black men are more likely to get heart attacks than white men with the same lifestyles. the cartoonist also mentioned that such data is vital in tracking discrimination issues. now, i think we all remember what happened to France, the nation that had NO racism because it didn't track it and thus didn't have to deal with it. so, what's the solution? try to make everybody be treated as equals? probably a good idea... but what about the fact that there ARE differences? my health care provider ought to know what i'm at risk for, oughtn't she? men and women are built differently. our physiologies are different, too. its rather counter productive to try and pretend otherwise. and then there's cultural differences. a rumor of pork fat used in greasing rifle cartridges once caused colonial armies in india to revolt. knowing what the cultural taboos are is important to getting along with other folks. so, i'd say the solution is education: knowing what the differences REALLY are, and knowing that everyone's also a human being too. if we understand the social and legal complexities that mean an asylum seeker can get exploited by scummy businessmen, maybe we'd be more likely to lobby our governments for fairer practices, rather than throw a brick into the window of a young family trying to start over with a new life in a new, and often times difficult, land. i find racism distasteful. but, often times, i tend to pity the racists and the life/environment that created them. and, i'd like to believe that over all, on the whole, we're making a lot of progress as a species and a society to really think of ourselves in global terms and not be so xenophobic against everybody different from us.
Oh, that's a great line. I reckon I could get away with it if I used the right tone of voice. Yeah, I've heard all those things. Stupid people. Generally, I think that apathy is a winner when it comes to beating racisim. If no one really cares about things like race, colour, religion - then it ceases to be a problem. Not ignoring the differences, but not really caring.
A guest columnist, Thomas Sowell, was printed in our paper's opinion page. The title was, Columnist shares random thoughts*. The article as a whole was very interesting, but one section stuck out in my mind: I know that it's not entirely on subject, but it reminded me of it. *My eyes must still be a little blurry from sleeping. When I read the title my first thought was, "I don't remember it being called that." That's because I read it as "Communist shares random thoughts". Katcal, if I was starving or my family was starving there's not much I wouldn't do to save their lives. I would steal, kill, or whatever it took to provide for them. This still does not mean that stealing and killing are appropriate measures for the poor and neglected to take. If I or anyone else takes these measures then we are duly responsible for the consequences of those actions. I've got to go to work right now, but there's a book I've been reading lately called The Pig that Wants to be Eaten. It's a philosophy type book. It has some comparable ideas in it.
You mean those riots like ones that never happenned in any other country in the world, ever ? Oh, yeah, of course, silly me... :roll: As I have said before to Roman, it's strange the difference between how they were portrayed abroad and how it felt being here at the time... The riots weren't about racism, they were about poverty, unemployment and poor living conditions, it can be linked at times, but it's not the same thing. There were plenty of white kids out there burning cars, and the cars were burnt because there came a point, quite early on, where it was no longer about anything political, it was because the guys down the road had burned a car, and they didn't want to be left out... Edit, just to get back to the original garnerism, there is racism in France, as there is in many, if not all countries, but it is not fair to say that it's "not tracked" or denied or not dealt with, there are many very active associations against racism, and there have been quite a few good projects over the last 15 years to try and improve things, some even came from the government... But the "riots" of 2005 are not a good example, and I honestly don't think that France is any worse for racism than most European countries...
I'm supposed to be replacing Garner, man I'm doing my best ! (sorry, it may have been sarcastic, but it wasn't meant to be snarky )
This is a bit off track, but... When I first read the "Big Brother" article, my first thought was "Some celebrity that Jade Goody is! Is she an actress, or a singer, or what?" Aaaaand a bit further down the text, it turned out that her only claim to fame was having been abused and mistreated on another season of Big Brother, when she was pretty much a nobody - apparently a fat and uneducated nobody, that everyone picked on. Here's the actual text "There is a precedent for the most abused resident of the "Big Brother" house to emerge as the winner. Goody was lampooned and vilified for her weight and her lack of education while a "Big Brother" contestant in 2002, and at one point, demonstrators carrying "kill the pig" placards surrounded the house. She went on to win the hearts of the public and emerged from the house a celebrity who has earned millions of dollars through TV appearances, an autobiography and an exercise video." Honestly, after reading that, I was more pissed off at the show's producers than at that silly boor of a woman! They have exploited her earlier, and now they brought her back (probably knowing that she's not the most tolerant person in the world), threw her into the mix with an Indian woman, and are now sitting back, enjoying the fight and watching their ratings climb. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!! (And of course, someone somewhere is going to use THAT situation to rile up a match-up-their-butt mob against the West. Or the East. Or whoever.) <---Mowgli angry!!!
making celebrities out of victims is nothing new, sadly. re: racism in france, yes those riots. to be fair, my knowledge of such was provided by roman, and we all know how unbiased a source HE is... but, to be fair, its my understanding from a number of sources that the gendarmes have a well deserved reptuation for being heavier handed with the blacks than with whites.
Gendarmes not so much, but police yes... there's a difference in France, gendarmes are military, and they are the police outside urban zones, the Police deal with the towns and cities... But then I still get the feeling that police forces all over the place are accused of being anti-immigrant, it's not specifically French I don't think...
I think Garner's response is interesting because it's not what he used to think when we discussed this on the old boards - which suggests he actually listens to me sometimes! We can't call everyone people and be done with it because it's not that simple. Garner and I got into a lot of arguments early on when discussing race, because I kept bringing up nationality when he was trying to talk about skin colour. The thing is, when you talk about nationality, social class, geographic origin and so on, there are very real differences to consider. There is also, potentially, a world of difference between genders. Should a straight person always be treated the same as a gay person? If nowhere else, there are going to be differences when it comes to parenting and adoption. Katcal, regarding racism in France - there have certainly been riots like those in Paris in other parts of the world. However, not all countries are the same. My black and Asian friends who have been in France think of it as being very racist. There are countries that seem to have obvious problems with racism from abroad - South Africa and the USA come to mind. But the ones that surprised me when discussing them with friends who had been travelling were France and Australia. I don't think any country is free of racism, because the combination of real differences between people and a lack of education about them creates ugliness. But different countries have different levels of various problems and different attitudes to dealing with them. I don't think the way that Brits bitch about asylum seekers is typical to this country at all, but the arrogance about learning other languages that Bauke described is fairly typically English. We have racism here, but it was in Georgia, USA, that I noticed all the cleaners I saw were black. So, while racism - and related issues such as poverty and civic unrest - is not limited to one country, it will have a different profile in each country. And I do think the lack of data on ethnicity in France has, rather than avoiding racism, hindered dealing with it. Nate, regarding the illegal workers, that's an interesting one. You're talking from a moral realist perspective. I would say that, although it's true the immigrants are working illegally, I don't think it's their fault. Everybody always has a choice - but sometimes we only have one good choice. If your choice is, as Kat put it, between starvation and illegal work, I don't think it's your fault that the situation exists. If the French people in 1789 rioted due to poverty (sticking with a theme here), they may have been wrong to riot (arguable, again), but it wasn't their fault that the situation existed, was it? Edit: 1789, not 1782.
It's interesting, the way people's perceptions of race are totally cultural. Since I've moved to the UK, I've found it strange that Indians, Pakastanis and Bangladeshis are considered non-white. In the US, they are considered white. Yes, some of them have dark skin, but there are Italians, Greeks, etc. who have skins that are even darker. In the US, "Asian" means from the far east - China, Japan, Thailand, Viet Nam, etc. Once, I heard a black security guard call an Arab guy that I work with "brother" - in the "fellow non-white person" sense. The Arab guy looks like he could be my brother - and I am a very light-skinned Jew. In the US, one of the largest "racial" minorities is Hispanic/Latino - which doesn't mean anything - a white-skinned Argentinian whose grandparents came from Russia is Hispanic, as is a dark-skinned Dominican who was descended from West African slaves. It doesn't have to do with speaking Spanish, or "Latin" languages, because a light-skinned immigrant from Spain or France would be considered white, not Hispanic. It's all completely arbitrary and silly.
case in point, grace's friend Lesley, half dutch, half swazi, lives in england and, for all i know, travels on a british passport. once when going to america, they had a lovely encounter at immigration. there was no box to tick that came remotely close to describing her ethnic situation, so the INS official took one look at her and ticked the box for hispanic, cause she sort of looked hispanic. i once asked my boss what 'mixed race' really covered these days, and he thought about it for a second before giving up with a shrug and saying 'good hair.' but it's okay. he was black, so he could make that kind of joke. ... now, was that statement inherently racist, or indicative of a society that is inherently racist? edit: actually, lesley travels on a dutch passport. thanks grace. and i've been asked to clarify that the boss in the above annecdote was my boss in the states, not my current one.
Racism has always been a pain in my butt. I never could figure out how any one with a heart and a mind could look at another human being and decide that because of differences in appearence that person was inferior. It has to be some sort of cruel game, and I am sick of seeing it still being played.
A lot of racism/prejudice comes from negative experiences with other groups, and lack of positive experiences. For example, I have had really crap landlords who have been Jewish. If the only Jewish people you have ever met have been people who force you to live with rats and roaches and no heat in winter, then you could start to develop a negative view of Jewish people. As another example, for every person I know who has been a victim of a violent crime - and that's quite a few- in all cases except one case of gay bashing, the perpetrator was black. So if you don't have any black friends or acquaintances, and the only experience of black people you have are as muggers or rapists, then you could develop a bad view of black people. I'm not saying this excuses racism, because it's not acceptable to generalise in that way, but I think it's a bit more complex than just being ignorant. Actually, generalising in this way is part of how we survive. If every time you've eaten a fruit with red berries, you've gotten sick, you're going to avoid fruits with red berries - even though some of them might be perfectly healthy. In the same way, if every time you've been around a Chinese person, you've had a bad experience - you're going to develop a bad feeling about Chinese people.
My stepdad still hates black people because my mother left him for a black man 22 years ago, his marriage was a sham anyway because he's a total moron, which is also the reason he hates black people still.
I don't have any particular racial bias - I was mugged by a couple of black blokes while I was a student, at knifepoint - but that was an isolated incident. I know that these things happen. I should not have been walking through that area at that time of night... I have worked with people of different races, colours and creeds, and as long as they have been good workers I haven't really cared. There are lazy gits from all over the world. My step-brother & step-sister are of mixed race, and they are good people.
I grew up around a lot of different races. My (adopted) sister is Korean, one of my best friends, who I met when I was 4, is half Nigerian, half Dutch. I've always had friends that were of foreign descent. My girlfriend is of Capeverdian descent. I honestly think that I do not see skin colours as a way of distinguishing people. I'm just as weary of a group of white teenagers as I am of a group of black or Maroccan teenagers on the street at 2 AM.
Yes, good point. I think that's definitely true. I've known various people who've developed a prejudice that way.
I myself don't care about race or "class". I consider that "people are people" (is this a pratchett reference?) and that arseholes are in every culture/country/ethnic group. Looking at what I just wrote, I think I read as bitter. I guess I am. I'm pissed off at my own majority (anglo saxon or stupid white aussie take your pick) for its stupid views on "ethnic" and "poor" people. The Australian flag was just banned at the "big day out" concert on this thursday coming (25/01/07). Besides the general public outcry at this, it has encouraged all the arseholes regardless of race. Fuel on the fire. Good work concert management, I just hope you are held responsible for giving the idea to the arseholes. I also do not like rap music.
Well, I did get the portrayal in question from a French newspaper, don't remember if it was Le Monde or possibly Le Figaro at the moment. Really, it's all the fault of the French for making the paper available abroad for French folks I meet. :-b Anyways, French Jews I know tend to think France is very racist, and as for France not reporting racism, I have been told by aforementioned French Jews that very little is truly counts as a hate crime in France, which in turn is why France holds one of Europe's lowest counts of reported hate crimes, something I was very surprised to find out last year when the statistics on Europe were presented to us folks visiting the Ghetto Fighters' Museum, as part of a lecture. As for the riots, they're not something that's truly specific to France, but France *does* have a reputation for riots. ;-) Anyways, back to the matter at hand. Some Israeli Jews say moronic things like "If Arabs don't like it here, they can go live in Arab countries", and the same goes for the Israeli Arabs who say that Jews should all "Go back to Europe" or somesuch. Really, this sort of thing just gets on my nerves.
To get back to the original thought that inspired this thread, Ms. Goody got herself voted off the program and Tony Blair said officially that while he had not seen the progam in question, he did condemn racism. Well thankgoodness for that! I hope Ms. Shetty gets a decent picture to star in when she is let out of that Big Brother house. I got the info abot Jade Goody on the E-machine homepage news and I saw the Prime Minister on a Back In Black segment on TDS. It wasn't the most inane question he's ever had to answer, but I bet it came close.
Isn't Shilpa Shetty already a superstar in India? That probably means a lot of people think she starred in some decent films.
Now this may be topic related and digression at the same time, but I have been directed to this site that, at first look, seemed rather neat to me. NNDB: Tracking the entire world But then, it seemed a little silly to me to add these two things: Race or Ethnicity: Sexual orientation: Mainly because for one, for the modern times guys, there is almost always a photo, and for Cleopatra et al - who really knows? A picture probably says more about their respective skin colour -if you want to know- than the tags white, black, whatever, as they often don't fit where it gets more omplex (examples given above). Adding the sexual orientation though seems pretty silly to me. Who knows? How useful is it for me to know Terry Pratchett has been labelled as "staright" by this site, anyway? It gets completely silly if they sort people, for example, from ancient Greece into categories... How would they know? Praxiteles
I vaguely remember Ms Goody being interviewed by Michael Parkinson, after she had won the Big Brother 'Challenge?', stating she was proud that her fame would now mean she was an 'Ambassador for Britain'. Well doesn't that make you feel proud, after her recent 'diplomatic' statments? This has nothing to do with the point of this thread, but to show her character in its true light, she recently lost a considerable amount of weight and started promoting her new 'slimming diet book'. Only recently did it come to light she had actually paid over £4000 (sponsorship money) for liposuction. Bet she didn't mention that in her book! Personally, I would like to see Mizzzz Goody, and others like her, towed out into the middle of the Atlantic... and sunk!
I just meant that I hope Ms. Shetty got some good out of the hassle she has had to endure. It would be a shame if she took the time to reach out to her English fans and lost momentum on her film career.
That's sort of a crappy situation I feel... If she won it would be felt that it was just because she had been pestered, if she didn't then the voters were all racist bastards, either way the result will always seem tainted for some people... It's kind of the bad side of positive dicrimination policies in companies, if you are dsabled or "an ethnic minority" you're never quite sure if you were hired for your talents or to fill a quota... Annoying.
Should racism be made illegal? That is a question that has been running around in my head at work lately. I have some views about it, but I'm headed to bed at the moment. I'll try to get back on tomorrow.
Discrimination based on race is illegal in the UK (and I assume in most other western countries). How can you ban thoughts though?
With the Thought Police, of course. Discrimination based on race is something that can be made illegal (and, as Grace said, is to some extent, at least in some places). But the prejudice itself is not. I think probably the best thing you can do here is educate. Edit: rephrase of awkwardness. Changed 'at least in the UK' to 'at least in some places.' Probably more edits on the way until I, you know, make sense...
Once you ban ideas, some people will think that they have merit. The tricky bit is when it comes to incitement... How do you prove that what 'charasmatic' idiot X says to nimrods Y, Z, and Alpha caused them to harm others? How much would that be the leaders fault, how much the followers? Should we ban Mein Kampf and the like? Personally, I think that a society has a deeper problem than some kook shouting about killing some group when that kook is actually listened to.
