Red head racism

[364daysinaweek]

One of Caroline Gardiners latest card reads" Dear J.K Rowling,
your books are entirely unrealistic, I mean a redheaded kid with TWO friends?"
Now, replace the term "redhead" with black, Irish, Scotish and it suddenly seems to reveal how racist, ugly & bullying this is. It breads intolerance & superiority. Also its ignorant. Racism against the redheaded coloured Celts is steeped in the history of Great Britain, to marginalise and ridicule.
The MD of Satchi in NZ was recently sacked for a similar slur.
It's unacceptable!

[364daysinaweek]

Breads= breeds!

[usualsuspect]

I agree, it is unacceptable

[Eskino]

But being red-headed isn't a race its a hair colour.

[HaroldLloyd]

It's not acceptable but its not racism.

[AlanMoore]

Hmmm. I think at the root of it it is. When I've had people shout stuff about red hair, it has generally come with some slur on the Irish, occasionally the Scots and once, the welsh...also I think 20 years ago anti-Irish sentiment was very accepted but now it's much less so (and other groups are the bogeymen now), so if you want to get some good digs in go with the hair.

I think schools need to deal with it the way they deal with anything racial. It is NOT ok to mock/tease/namecall/bully on the grounds of hair colour (which to me is a part of my Irish/scots heritage).

[wearingpurple]

It's a stupid prejudice that should be dying out rather than reinforced with questionable 'humour'.

My red-haired dd is popular at school and has never been teased about her hair colour, so she'd find that card both upsetting and mystifying if she saw it.

[ImTooHecsyForYourParty]

good point and possibly something in it, I think, but are the scots etc a race? I thought race is ethnicity (black, white, asian...) not nationality.

So roots in anti celtic sentiment that probably goes back a bloody long way in this country, perhaps but racism, no.

That isn't to say that makes it ok! Deriding someone on the basis of a physical characteristic makes you a wanker.

[piprabbit]

Why are there are so many red shades of home hair dye? If everyone thought that being red was such a terrible fate, you wouldn't expect anyone to voluntarily go red.

I really don't know why people like Katie Hopkins think it is OK, or even funny, to be rude about red-heads. But then again, I don't think it is OK to laugh at anyone's physical appearance.

[364daysinaweek]

Well I believe it is racist. The origins of stigmatising Celtic colouring goes back to 1600's & Bonnie Prince Charlie. To Irish immigrants during the potato famine and then through the troubles. The MD of Saatchi in New Zealand was recent sacked for a similar "joke".
It has become a passive rascist slur that is passed off as being socially acceptable.

[ImTooHecsyForYourParty]

My question was are the celts a race, not saying the act is not discriminatory. My understanding has always been that for something to be racist (as opposed to, say, xenophobic) the group in question must be a race. I was asking if the celts are a race, as my understanding has always been that race=ethnicity not nationality. Are celts an ethnic group separate from other Caucasians, was my pondering. I was not trying to say that such comments from people are not discrimination.

although we're all the same race (human!) anyway. It was just a question about racism v xenophobia put out there from a desire to learn.

[364daysinaweek]

Ah yes. I see. I think we were at x purposes! I was simply meaning its racism because its prejudice against colouring.

[AlanMoore]

I don't know about definitions, or whether the irish or scots or whoever are a race, what I do know is I look very Irish (not just the colour of my hair) and people have been rude to me about it, so IMO it comes from the same place as any other slurs about ethnic characteristics and is wrong.

[364daysinaweek]

My understanding was that the Celts were originally an ethnicity of Europe in the Middle Ages.

[AlanMoore]

Btw I am not trying to overstate or be dramatic, it's only been a big problem once (in a workplace) but it wasn't dealt with as well as it should have been. Apparently calling someone a "mick bitch" and a "terrorist" and refusing to deal with "the fucking IRA" is just banter (or it was in the 90s).

[364daysinaweek]

Well let Caroline Gardiner know! I agree!!

[ImTooHecsyForYourParty]

You know, I've been thinking about this and really, I needed to be told not to be so hairsplitting.
I can be like that sometimes, fixate on an irrelevancy of terminology or something and when that happens, people are sometimes kind enough to tell me I've missed the point by a mile.
This is one of those times. What 'ism' it is does not matter. It is one.

[Roshbegosh]

Who tf is Caroline Gardiner?

[364daysinaweek]

She is card maker see beginning of thread :-)