To wonder how the hell this country got so racist and narrowminded?

[smokinaces]

There is a photo of a letter going round on FB. Basically showing that Aslyum Seekers are getting their gas and electric paid for over Christmas. My god. The comments people are coming out with.

to quote a few:

"What about ones that come over here and get new cars mobile phones etc and we get fuck all. They wouldn't do the same for us if we was that poor and froze we would have our kids taken off us we wouldn't get help to heat our houses up."

"Yeah but a lot of the asylum seekers r terriosts half of them are working for wants his name"

"every tom dick or Harry are allowed into our country to first take all our jobs for half the pay us English need to be paid to pay for our gas electric and every other bill we get thrown at us, secondly to take our placements from our first choice schools cause they got homed near a school of our choice, homed for free!"

"there are english children in this country that dont even have a warm winter coat to wear coz their parents or parent cant a ford to buy one coz most of their benifits go on tryin to heat damp houses and feed them with at least one hot meal a day even if it is only beans on toast.....ive yet to see an under feed immagrint whether asylum seeeker or not and as for designer clothes that under privalaged english child only dream of owning but u see them on the backs of people that dont deserve them (imagrants asylum seekers)"

"im sick to death of working my tits off 6days aweek when im off sick or unable to work and ask for help all i got was £26 a week what a load of bullshit im english born and bred worked from the age off 17 and pay tax all my live and people walk in to this country and get free this free that f##king crap an 90% of bristish people think this to blood sucks, think of the people that fought for this country all them years ago BORN AND BRED"

Seriously?? How the fucking hell did we get to the point where this is what people think? Honestly?? I dont even know what to say to the last two - I tried arguing constructively earlier in the day, but cant even be bothered to waste my breath on the last two. They called me a "goody two shoes" and seem determined to blame everything on "immigrants".

I'm actually ashamed to live in the same town as some of these people.

AIBU to wonder where this country goes from here when this is what crap they spout? Is it the media's fault? or education?

(the worst bit? at least 1 of these people quoted are a 3rd generation European "immigrant" but thats different of course )

And that letter is a fake from the BNP. Check the Salford City Council page on Facebook. They had a comment from the council leader about it.

It's very disappointing how often I have to challenge this kind of crap. And then you get "oh but we don't mean you/your DH. You're different." Bollocks.

What AKMD said.

I started saying a few years back that we're heading into the 1930s. And that was before the banks crashed...

Thank you lubey I have bookmarked that page. Exactly what I was arguing but didnt have the right words. I loved every line on that page, we should be embracing the multiculturism we live in, and realise how lucky we are to live in a country with things like a free NHS and child benefit (though granted thats no longer for all)

Humans are naturally "racist and narrow minded", it's tribalism, basic anthropology. In fact most pack animals show the same traits, people "like us" are less likely to be a threat than people who are different; this is instinctive and broadly true.

What I don't get is in the UK we fight so hard against it when a lot of cultures embrace it. So we bend over backwrds for them without a hope of being treated the same way in return in their countries and, sometimes, in our country too.

It would be lovely if all countries and cultures where broad minded and believed in equality but that seems so far off.

No problem smokinaces I'm fresh from the fight myself so am well armed at the mo - well not fighting exactly because I don't rise to it but I've been inviting them to educate themselves with the facts and calmly quashing their views. while biting my nails down to the elbow and headbutting the desk in frustration

I'm not sure racism is dying out in this country. I worry that between The Daily Hatemail and its other right-wing-rag-cronies a whole new generation of people are growing up to believe that all their problems are someone else's fault, and that someone probably looks different to them. What worries me even more is the number of people who just don't question what these parts of the media tell them. Not knowing what an asylum seeker or refugee is is a good example. They hear or see 'forrin' and assume terrorist or scrounger or both.

HappyCamel, I've found many countries very welcoming and lovely to people from the UK, although obviously work visas have to be in order all over the world.

In fact, at least one country had had a bitter war for independence against the UK in living memory. Yet the people were actively welcoming and hospitable.

It makes it all the more shaming, actually, to see a woman like that vile racist bint on the Croydon tram video.

This has been posted on mn loads of times but it's still funny:

smokinaces it hasn't happened in this country yet but genocide is alive and well in several parts of the world. That we don't intervene is a disgrace and it should be a lesson to us that it is not consigned to the history books - it can happen here and none of us should be complacent and think otherwise. It is very, very dangerous to have a large section of society who feel powerless, disadvantaged by the system and feel that others have unfair advantages and this is being exacerbated by the current economic climate.

The media do have to take a lot of the responsibility for these ignorant views held by a significant minority of people but it's impossible to stop a newspaper or TV channel from taking a certain slant unless you bring in regulation and that's a whole new can of worms. Even if they are being continually sued for libel or racism people will still remember the original story better than the inch-long retraction and apology.

fortyplus, thank you for introducing me to that!

Britain racist? You should see the others...

I do get tired of the endless 'send them all back' stuff about immigrants, what with my husband being one and all. I just brightly say (if some older lady on the bus starts spouting on about immigrants) 'oh, that's funny, my husband's an immigrant' and leave it at that. I don't start arguing or discussing the point, I just make a statement of fact.

Most people don't rant on like this, and I have never experienced anything more than raised eyebrows at his accent in real life. It's easy to think the rantings of a few on the internet represent what 'everyone thinks' but actually it's very exaggerated. Keep away from people who post this type of thing, I can't imagine anyone thinks that's acceptable.

It's not just the racism in this that gets me down, but the apparent inability of people to think for themselves, and not just spew forth some uninformed rant. That, coupled with the general illiteracy of most of the comments, really makes me worry about the level of intelligence of great swathes of our society, and the problems this brings up (and will lead to in future) It is ognorance in its broadest sense, and pretty depressing to witness, for more reasons than just the inane content.

ognorance??? Meant ignorance, of course!

i think its nice that some people think it was ever not narrow minded.

I don't know but I was surprised at how many people on here thought it was unreasonable for someone to want visitors to take their shoes of when entering her house for cultural reasons.

Obviously we are not as tolerant of others race and cultures as I thought

I think the photo of the letter was fake - someone prove me wrong.

Let's face it - I doubt the government have enough money to just give away thousands and thousands of pounds every... month or 3 months was it? Can't remember but seemed very unrealistic. For that reason alone, I've ignored it.

I also didn't see anything in the letter that made it look genuine. It wasn't worded very well either.

Italy is the posterboy for modern day tolerance in the EU and makes Britain look like the SS arm of Robert Mugabe's state sponsored land grab bureau.

Some of these recent threads on here have been an attempt to remind us Brits that we owe the world a living and we should remember the faults of our great grandfathers etc.

We owe the world nothing we're in a shit state and i'm not going to kick us while we're down because of a few mindless idiots spouting unqualified hate at anyone non white.

But we have to be honest it's all over the news you know?

Immigration is a problem and it needs sorting.

The far right will use this gem for their own ends.

We as a nation need to address this problem now before the 'Mighty unwashed' use the ballot box to allow Nick Griffin and his jackboots into power.

If the family live in a rented house or flat with pre-pay meters then they'll need the gas and electric cards topped up somehow as they won't get much cash each week.

If the letter is genuine, the amounts seem high to me but we don't pay for gas and in a small flat so we don't use a lot of electricity.

am with holly and custardo Facebook adds a whole new side to people I've known (or thought I had known) pretty well for years. Had a fair few conversations with friends after certain links/photos/chain-statuses about their views and now hear 'I'm not racist but...' a lot more than I ever remember hearing it before. The power of the media,social media included, is a very dangerous thing. It's easy to be swayed be other opinions you read or perceive others to hold if your opinion on something isn't something you believe to your core.
Not sure I agree with the point you're making happycamel humans naturally racist?

This is probably a whole new thread but why is it never acknowledged that its not only white british who can be racist? I've grown up in North London and experienced many instances of "white trash" "white bitch", the apparent tensions between Caribbeans and Africans, between Turkish and Greek. The racism by non-whites is never addressed or could it be its too PC or precious when they (the ones being accused of racism) are on the receiving end.

Someone will be on shortly with the pertinent handbook to enlighten you happy :)

Its odd actually, the first time I have come across out and out racism plus the graffiti stuff is down south.

I lived up north and the racism I suppose was more subtle. My dp is from the South and he was surprised that the Asian people who lived round here had taken on the accent .

I can't say that the North is a haven of tolerance, it is odd to me though that immigrants in the North seem to integrate a lot more than in the South.

Maybe we can adopt a 'one out one in' policy on immigration. Every time some fuckwit posts this kind of shit on Facebook we could deport them and give their passport to an asylum seeker. That way we avoid any alleged overcrowding issues and raise the average IQ.

So every time someone suggests that the government said and they did immigrants and asylum seekers are wandering around Britain unchecked they should be a fuckwit?
Some people don't have the education to articulate themselves in a manner where they will make a difference.
Immigration and asylum in this country is disorganised at best and falling to bits at worst.
The government have admitted that this is so.