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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

No British - No Women

415 replies

MrSpoc · 20/01/2011 15:13

I have just come across this article:

www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Huntingdon-St-Ives-St-Neots/Playgroup...

am i being unreasonable to be disgusted at how this can be legal.

OP posts:
fedupofnamechanging · 20/01/2011 19:20

Have to add that when I lived abroad I didn't expect peoples tax money to be spent setting up groups for me to attend. I'd chosen to live there, so it was down to me to make friends, not the taxpayer to facilitate it for me

giyadas · 20/01/2011 19:21

As was already pointed out further upthread, if you want an all white group there are plenty that are white by default. You don't need another one.

mattahatta · 20/01/2011 19:22

the problem is that there are already several English mums only groups, even if the official paperwork says otherwise, there are lots that discriminate against non brit, non whites attending, the mothers themselvesmake that quite clear...
also as somebody said earlier the article does not state whether this is purely a 'play group' or if the members have 'talks' and receive lessons or support in integrating

mrsruffallo · 20/01/2011 19:23

Not where I live,giyadas,and this could be all white for all you know.

God,MN is joyless of late!

PatFig · 20/01/2011 19:24

As was already pointed out further upthread, if you want an all white group there are plenty that are white by default.

Yes by default not by the rules of the group

giyadas · 20/01/2011 19:35

isn't that enough?

for mrsruffallo
TheEvilDead2 · 20/01/2011 19:35

WOuld all the people on this thread who agree with the group tell me one thing.. if you lived in Japan would you join a group that specifically didn't allow Japanese people. And if a member brought their Japanese friend and that was friend was told to take their baby and leave, would you really not walk out?

Because I would.

fedupofnamechanging · 20/01/2011 19:37

I would too TheEvilDead2

ISNT · 20/01/2011 19:41

I don't understand this argument.

The group was set up for non british people. They then decided that sometimes they would let british people in, depending on how they felt (?) possibly based on skin colour (!) or some other unstated criteria (?). Clearly the rules as stated are not being applied and in fact it is up to the people running it whether they let people in or not based on god only knows what criteria.

How is that a good thing?

mrsruffallo · 20/01/2011 19:44

Why, thank you giyadas. Feeling better now (although I did eat 3 jaffa cakes whilst listening to it)

HopeForTheBest · 20/01/2011 20:05

This reply has been withdrawn

This has been withdrawn by MNHQ on request of its author.

TheEvilDead2 · 20/01/2011 20:12

hope if one of those groups is TT they claim to be native english but it does actually have a very high percentage of germans and they are invited to all the meetings.. As well as it not being publicly funded

ccpccp · 20/01/2011 20:53

This is an odd thread.

If I'm reading it correctly, the people who are opposing the 'no brits allowed' group are being called racist?

Only on MN...

ISNT · 20/01/2011 21:07

Hope what if the organisers of the group for foreign women let some german women in, but not others, with no clear reason why some are allowed and some are not. Is that OK?

HopeForTheBest · 20/01/2011 21:43

This reply has been withdrawn

This has been withdrawn by MNHQ on request of its author.

TheEvilDead2 · 20/01/2011 23:14

*Toytown- but must not be!

TheSecondComing · 20/01/2011 23:31

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MIFLAW · 21/01/2011 10:42

"However much, or little money it has cost, the fact remains that it has been part funded by the people who are not allowed to attend."

As a male taxpayer I presumably part-fund NHS midwifery services and smear tests which, with the best will in the world, I will struggle to to take full advantage of ... Are you suggesting I should be up in arms over this on principle?

Someone earlier suggested that I thought the law on this went too far. I don't at all. I think it's a brilliant law. But that doesn't mean we should be seeking to prosecute every single infringement of it, and more than we prosecute 16-year-old boys for consenting sex with their 15-year-old girlfriends.

Of course there are lots of flaws with the group - it's funded by the council and run by amateurs - a child could predict that it would be full of flaws. But that's not the point, is it? This is a case about a pittance (in public finance terms) being spent on making some women a bit happier in their daily lives. You might not like it but to make this big a deal of it smacks of concerns far beyond a genuine worry for the public purse or the moral fabric of the nation.

MIFLAW · 21/01/2011 10:45

"They just want British people put first. They probably overlook the vast racist tones of the party."

Wanting British people put first IS the vast racist tones of the party!

Daftpunk is dead - long live Daftpunk!

fedupofnamechanging · 21/01/2011 11:48

MIFLAW we all pay for things that we might never use. However, if you are a parent then you have made use of the midwifery services (albeit indirectly) and if you are married or have a female partner or a sister/mother/daughter, you are taking advantage of the smear test services, because they are helping to protect the people you love. No one is telling you that you can't use certain facilities on account of your colour, you just don't have the relevant bits! Should you grow a cervix and I'm sure someone will be happy to smear test it for you Grin

The playgroup might be making some people happy and I don't take issue with it's existence if it is privately funded, but it made two women very unhappy because they were excluded on the grounds that they are white. You can't argue it otherwise, because their non white (British) friend was not told to leave.

I object to public financing of a flawed group run by amateurs and think that the council have more important things to spend money on.

It's not about putting British people first, to the detriment of others who live here, it's about not putting them last!

ThePosieParker · 21/01/2011 12:48

MIFLAW.........so it's racist if a person completely ignorant of the actual racism that exists in the BNP joins the BNP but not if a playgroup bans British people. What a ridiculous set of double standards you live by.

Look I am not defending the BNP, I loathe the BNP but they prey on the vulnerable and very hard working poor who feel marginalised. It is these people who hear stories like this playgroup and think that noone is taking care if them and their interests.

TSC....Posie.

MIFLAW · 21/01/2011 13:06

"No one is telling you that you can't use certain facilities on account of your colour, you just don't have the relevant bits! Should you grow a cervix and I'm sure someone will be happy to smear test it for you"

I don't think anyone here is saying it's about colour either - for example, if Black British mothers of Caribbean origin had turned up they may well have been asked to leave too, we just don't know - but, even if it is all about colour, then your argument holds good there too - if these women grew a brown skin instead of me growing a cervix (both equally silly things to say) then they could go to the group.

And here's a radical thought for you - perhaps, if (however illogical it may seem to us) attendance at this group makes these women a bit happier and more positive about living in Britain and participating in society the other 166 hours a week then, just as I am "benefitting" from my partner's smear tests, then we are ALL benefitting from this use of public money? Perhaps that's what (dare I say it?) actually, you know - matters?

"I object to public financing of a flawed group run by amateurs and think that the council have more important things to spend money on. " Then write to your Council because it will enable them to halve their budgets. Are you aware of how many Council services are delivered, at Council expense, by what some people might describe as "amateurs"? And, thanks to the recent cuts, that's going to increase. As for how much of it is flawed - quite simply enormous.

rockinhippy · 21/01/2011 13:06

I read the article in the News, & was pretty disgusted by it TBH, how on earth can you intorgrate people into communities, if you exclude ANY part of that communtity...I'm glad they raised a complaint & its hit the news, it might make others think twice, as IME this isn't a 1 off, & probably more common than people realise Hmm

I had a similar experience when DD was a toddler, went along to a local toddler group & though wasn't told I couldn't stay as I wasn't the same nationality as the others, they might as well of, as I was excluded in every other way, NO-ONE spoke any English there at all or made any attempt to speak to either myself or DD , staff running it includedHmm, but all chattered away happily in there E/U language, & even when I made the effort & spoke with them they just blanked me,,,,I'm stubborn so did go back again out of principal Hmm but again funded by Government money as a parent Toddler group, but very much an exclusive 1 nationality none English speaking group.....they were just a bit brighter & didn't actually say itHmm

MIFLAW · 21/01/2011 13:13

Posie

I challenge you to find a member, or even a voter, for the BNP who is completely ignorant of the racism that exists in the BNP because the BNP.

When you do, you might want to put them in a room with your collection of rocking horse shit.

"Look I am not defending the BNP, I loathe the BNP but they prey on the vulnerable and very hard working poor who feel marginalised." So do all political parties, especially the Communists. To say that these people have no choice but to follow the BNP is ridiculous.

Also, let us not forget that, before the Second World War, when times were so much harder for "the vulnerable and very hard working poor," the British Fascist Party was defeated at Cable Street by members of "the vulnerable and very hard working poor". And they were defeated because they were reviled, and they were reviled because they were fascists and racists and everybody who cared to open their eyes knew it.

The only excuse then for joining or voting for Fascists was a fundamental view, however you express it and however extreme the circumstances that have driven you to it, that, purely based on ethnicity and/or nationality, some people are worth less than others.

And it's the only excuse now too.

giveitago · 21/01/2011 13:14

I'm sure that groups that cater for British women are groups that cater for women living the UK. I don't see how integrating non Brits with each other helps them get to grips with UK life. It's a toddler group surely and if it has the extra benefits of advice and support, why can't it be given within the context of a universal playgroup.

Sounds daft.

Doesn't really go with our multicultural ethos does it but rather than trying to further marginalise people from overseas.