Can white women be allies to BME women?

My problem starts with the concept of 'allies' and how they are expected to behave. You see it in transideology - allies are expected to promote someone else's agenda above all else, to not question the narrative set before them, to follow instructions regardless. Allies are expected to be subservient to the decisions made by those in charge of the cause and to recognise their inferiority.

Ultimately allies will fail, they will not be pure enough. They cannot be pure enough.

There's a thread on here at the moment where a BAME woman from a deprived is talking about being downgraded in her professional job.

She has been questioned as to why her ethnicity and her background are relevant by many posters. It's really depressing.

Should we all admire "Shaman" (lol) Durek just because he is from an ethnic minority?

www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-7682775/Norwegian-Princess-shaman-lover-say-lived-past-life.html

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7832243/Princess-Martha-Louises-bisexual-shaman-boyfriend-fire-flirting-girl.html

@missyoumuch Thanks for posting, and I'm sorry you're getting some dismissive responses.

I'm a white woman, and would never suggest that feminists are incapable of being racist. That's clearly nonsense. Nor am I stupid enough to insist to myself that I am incapable of unconscious bias. Everyone is, and we all need to challenge ourselves on this.

I would never ask you to pick a side. You can only fight on so many fronts at a time, and it's up to you to decide what is most important to you, and where to focus your energies. I would, however, think it was ok for me to respectfully question your choices.

I now live in a very white area. Unlike when I was a child, I don't have any black friends, and my understanding of racism is the poorer for it. I'm listening OP, and other PPs. Please tell me more.

a lot of the rhetoric around white women seems to me to be an excuse to hate women. Its the whole karen thing.

The Karen thing is not about all white women though only the racist behaviour of some who are suspicious of minorities. Anyone using it any other way than that is using it incorrectly, often purposely. It’s more of an American term anyway and happens there more often than it does here.

Branleuse I think you would really like the Triggernometry interview with Ayishat Akanbi.

Dare I mention...Meghan Markle?

I am no fan of anyone who is part of the new elite linked to the New Thought movement

Meghan Markle's circle of friends are central to this new elite and it needs to be noticed.

Also see, Oprah Winfrey, Gwyneth Paltrow, Catherine Oxenberg, Princess Märtha Louise of Norway and various jade egg promoting, plastic shaman endorsing, brainwashed celebrities.

You don't get a pass for promoting batshit cults just because you belong to an oppressed minority.

Re doxxing of Pragna Patel

It was actually targeting of a female MP for supporting an event with Pragna in, on the basis that Pragna has spoken at a WPUK event.

Text from Julie Bindel’s tweet is below:

‘I have worked & campaigned alongside the formidable
@SBSisters
@ Pragna Patel since 1990. SBS holds the police & other state agents to account and are the best feminists and human rights activists imaginable.
@CatherineWest1 is my MP & I applaud her for supporting the event.’

Yes, verybritishproblems, I too find it very uncomfortable to see these tick boxing exercises, the narrative that a proportion of jobs and roles and opportunities must automatically go to a BAME person. I like the term mentioned in some of the videos I posted - it's called the soft bigotry of low expectations. I think this sort of identity politics does more harm than good in the long run for people from a BAME background. And I don't particularly like the BAME label.... It's like a catchall phrase that doesn't distinguish the variety of opinions that black, Asian and other minorities have on these topics.

a lot of the rhetoric around white women seems to me to be an excuse to hate women. Its the whole karen thing.
There is apparently no way that a white woman cant be a massive racist no matter what as there will be some way she has benefited from being white in the UK.
I personally find it very hard to navigate, so I will just carry on as I was, speaking up if I see racism and try to check any inherent biases in myself.
I dont know if it makes me enough of an ally, but I like to think im anti racist and just doing what I can

Dare I mention...Meghan Markle

I have got to agree with you there.

Watching the interview with Ayishat Akanbi now.

There has been many threads on here where black women have raised issues about race/their experiences and they have been shouted down and the threads always ends up the same - BLM bashing, racial animosity. As a black woman, support goes both ways.How will things ever change when our voices are so often silenced. Mumsnet really is not a safe space for black women to talk about their experiences.

I agree. How can you expect BAME to raise issues more when they’re constantly silenced, dismissed, or told their experiences are wrong and so and so isn’t racism. I’ve lived in the US and I live in the UK and what I noticed living here very quickly was the covert racism and xenophobia. It’s so polite that few would believe or see it as racist because too many people see racism to be in your face and someone shouting racist slurs. Covert racism is even worse imo than overt racism because it’s easier to dismiss.

I’ve had several instances of dealing with it but if I said how and what was said, it would get easily dismissed. I received it most often from mainly older middle class women or someone who is older than me. I’ve had instances at work, instances shopping, instances during both of my pregnancies from actual medical professionals (it resulting in injury with my oldest which didn’t appear until years later). I told my experience dealing with it during my birth and I was not only dismissed but excuses were made for why the doctors did it even though it was proven by the hospital that they were completely in the wrong, protocols were broken, and a doctor was pushed to resign and was told I was blaming the NHS. Why speak out when you endure one of the most traumatic experiences in your life and people want to dismiss it.

BLM was set up by three black women.

The US or UK version? Are black women centred in BLM because three black women started it?

One of the problems that I have with diversity targets is that there is an industry of diversity consultants running leadership training, organisational change and life coaching / personal development courses and that industry is fairly sinister and linked to the New Thought movement.

They run women's / BAME/ "survivors" leadership and "empowerment" summits and global conferences, all promoting various dubious thought leaders with unusual qualifications, very often linked to Reiki, LGATs and cults.

It will take me a while to dig though my old files and post about this

Just because our current society is deeply flawed, sexist, racist and unequal does not mean that it would be improved by an infux of well meaning, brainwashed, useful idiots who promote the New Thought movement.

Signalbox the interview with Ayishat Akanbi was really good!! I hope her voice gets more mainstream airtime in future

Fingers crossed. There definitely needs to be more diversity of opinion.
I'll check out those other links thanks :)

The vast majority of the population here is white. Why do people act surprised that therefore most groups and organisations and networks will be predominantly white?

80% white now. In some urban centres, where a lot of the U.K. population live, more 55:45 and many Universities in London, Birmingham etc have similar percentages for their student cohorts.

So it’s simplistic to say white peoples are the vast majority in all contexts. NHS is one of the UKs biggest employers- it’s is not vastly white.

I agree with you OP. It's unfair of white people to dictate what issues are important. If BAME women are pointing out injustices and inequalities they must be heard, acknowledged, and efforts need to be made to equalise the playing field.

As women we look to do that when we feel we have been discriminated against due to our sex and are outraged when the general population does not see it as an issue. How can we then pretend that another group of people oppressed for a different reason are not telling the truth. It's baffling to me.

If you look at who gets the most shit it is black women. Hibo Wadare gets so much abuse for speaking up about FGM from every possible angle.
There was a thread on here the other day about the Labour Party trying to de platform Pragma Patel.
Diane Abbot gets more abuse and hate mail than any politician. She is not allowed to open her own post anymore. Is she the one person in the whole of Parliament that deserves it ? Or is it because she is the first black female MP?
The penalty for speaking up is definitely worse for some people.

Look at the way some people (and by that I mean mainly left wing white men behave) they a very quick to drop all their pretence to have liberal values right away.

BLM was set up by three black women

Do you mean BLM UK?

Thanks for speaking up verybritishproblems. I'm a South Asian woman and I feel the same way.

I have been in so many meetings discussing diversity. How can we get more diverse people into the organisation, we are already spending more money this FY targeting schools with a high BAME intake. In fact in our last meeting it was decided by the powers that be that we wouldn’t do University fayres or the local private schools and we’d concentrate on the schools in the poorer areas. This isn’t right, we should be going to all schools. Why are we shutting out a part of society for what feels like a tick box exercise. It’s wrong and Im expected to agree as I’m BAME

I'm getting more uncomfortable with BAME as a term. It feels like essentially saying "non-white" and lumping together an extremely diverse set of people. I'm white tho so might be missing the mark.

I can see this & often I get confused where the lines are drawn. There was a thread about Priti Patel recently about the Guardian cartoon. I argued that racism is racism regardless whether the person targeted is worthy or not but others thought differently.