To Think This Is A Racist Comment, even for the DM?

[RubyFakeNails]

A friend alerted me to this article in the DM.

This section I think is particularly crass, with one sentence being racist.

"The highlight was undoubtedly an hilarious sketch featuring the Queen and James Bond which saw her Majesty ?parachute? into the stadium.

But it was the absurdly unrealistic scene ? and indeed one that would spring from the kind of nonsensical targets and equality quotas we see in the NHS - showing a mixed-race middle-class family in a detached new-build suburban home, which was most symptomatic of the politically correct agenda in modern Britain.

This was supposed to be a representation of modern life in England but it is likely to be a challenge for the organisers to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family in such a set-up.
Almost, if not every, shot in the next sequence included an ethnic minority performer. The BBC presenter Hazel Irvine gushed about the importance of grime music (a form of awful electronic music popular among black youths) to east London.

This multicultural equality agenda was so staged it was painful to watch.
And Conservative MP Aidan Burley was right to point out on Twitter that it was a load of 'leftie multicultural c**p'. Yet predictably he has been castigated by Twitter's Guadianista brigade.

Unfortunately the kind of politically driven multiculturalism we saw last night is the kind of social engineering we have come to expect."

I'm really offended by this as I can't see what evidence they have to make that comment, and as a white educated middle-aged woman living with an equally educated black man in a happy family set-up, maybe I am biased. Would like some opinions.

AIBU to make a complaint about this?

the thing is,people are using the term 'multicultural' as a kind of PC term, when 'multiculturalism' is actually a political and educational doctrine that all cultures should be equally celebrated and valued. It is not a synonym for 'mixed', as Crispycod said.

Dh and I just find it upsetting that people make judgments about us just based on being of different skin colours.

I realise how upsetting it is, but it's getting better. Very few people in London, or big cities like Manchester or Birmingham would bat an eyelid. Even in mostly white areas, if a mixed couple arrive, they'll blend in pretty quickly. My parents live in a 99% white area, but a mixed Filipino/Iraqi family (an unusual combination by any standards!) have recently moved in and had no problems locally.

A neighbour's daughter married a Chinese man she'd met as a student a few years ago. The parents were devastated, almost cut her off, didn't want her to breed as it 'wasn't fair on any children' etc. Well, she did have a child who looks 100% Chinese and now it's all "Have you met our beautiful granddaughter?".

People dislike and fear what they don't know or understand or haven't experienced. Once they are confronted with the reality, they settle down pretty quickly.

That Mail article is an aberration - it's not what most people are secretly thinking.

DP was so incensed by the article that he's composed a letter of complaint. Part of which debunks the nonsense that mixed race, middle-aged, middle class couples are an unknown quantity. In our village, there are several families fitting this criteria. And this is in an area which is not usually perceived as multicultural, when compared to London and other parts of Britain.

It was a disgraceful and racist excuse for journalism. Starting with "banana republics" and continuing throughout the entire shameful tirade.

I mean , shouldn't the Mail be attacking gay marriage?

Opposing mixed-race marriage - it's so 1950s darling!

That Mail article is an aberration - it's not what most people are secretly thinking.
absolutely, catkins, the times they are a changing.....good grief even in this far staging post in the wild west a mixed couple with kids has moved in....and my first thought was...oooh I have not seem them before....

Sorry I didn't make myself clear really, thankfully we know most people don't judge it's just more of that sinking feeling of 'actually there is this group who are judging and almost resenting you'

I think the article just smacked of the sentiments from the now infamous Stephen Gately article by Jan Moir. It made big leaps without any evidentiary support to just push its own bitter agenda, but I think we can all take comfort in the large angry response to it. It's just one guy who wrote it but hundreds of people have been complaining how wrong and offensive it is.

Also yes I am using multicultural in the wrong way, I never really use it so I think it must be the use of it in the article that has re-entered it into my vocabulary. I really mean many or mixed cultures which I find in most areas. I think I'm yet to walk about an area in the uk and not see Asian, Black, White and people of other cultures and ethnicities, although I must admit I actively avoid don't ever venture into the countryside

catkins. Don't get me started on the whole gay marriage issue !

I thought there was a disproportionate amount of non white people in the ceremony (if it was meant to represent the british population because in fact non whites make up such a small amount of the population) but I think it's a good thing. We should be showing people of all races on tv because they do represent Britain as a whole. Multiculturalism is positive and if the media can normalise it then hopefully people will be more accepting and we can have even more of a mix as time progresses.

Thing is though, they were all volunteers, weren't they, probably mostly from the local area - which is a very diverse multiracial area. So the mix was probably right for the locality of the Olympic stadium, if not the whole of Britain. I thought it was actually brilliant that it was so multiracial (if I'm allowed to use that word in this context). Really felt like everyone was part of it.

Terrible article. That people think this way really boggles the mind.
I thought the multicultural aspect of the whole thing was, as well as representing modern Britain, because the Olympics is a global event and as such the ceremony wanted to celebrate all that is traditionally British as well as the unifying of cultures. Isn't that what the Olympics is all about?

Absolutely disgraceful - YANBU! You can make a complaint here:

www.pcc.org.uk/complaints/form.html

Just to note, the PCC Code is directed at individuals but you can still make a complaint even though you are not the one affected.

I think he might have a point about the 'set up thing' because nobody with a loft that size would not have converted it ages ago. (On the other hand maybe if it was supposed to be a bit 60's 70's retro, I can accept the inaccurate portrayal of a loft).

It is the London Olympics, and I think the racial mix of the volunteers reflected Londoners. To be honest, I failed to spot the overtly multicultural bits of the opening ceremony.

I think the Daily Mail cynically use people with nutty and ill informed points of view to write opinion pieces to attract people to their website. Only the DM would be bizarre enough to publish a piece in support of Aiden Burley. Unfortunately this strategy seems to be working for them.

Oh - I see grime music. How many generations do you have to live somewhere before you can start producing music that is 'local' rather than 'multicultural'.

When I saw the title of your thread I thought FIL had some competition from your mother!

Even in leafy commuter belt, held up as an example of middle class living, I can think of a number of families who would disprove their theory. Not so sure about the need for grime music, especially as the dc have requested it on replayer for the third time, but imagine that is more a generationaal thing!

The Games are in East London so the ethnic mix was representative of the local area. If anything, it may have been too white.

The article is racist and snobbish, suggesting mixed race marriages aren't the done thing amongst 'nice' middle class people.

YANBU

Just read the first paragraph.
Immaculate. Not reading more, you shouldn't either..

Inaccurate, sorry

Yanbu op.... I didn't even notice any multiculturality in the opening ceremony. After 42 years as a Londoner I think I'm just colour blind now.

But there was a whole bit about the industrial revolution, the unions and rural life? Did it really matter that some of the volunteers happened to be non-white? Apart from the Grime music were any other parts of the ceremony particularly Londony?

Horrible horrible newspaper, they own several local rags too, my local rag is awful, always publishing stories to get readers wound up about things like immigration.

I thought the opening ceremony was wonderful,and tbh I didn't even notice what anyone looked like, why would I, I was just watching the show. It didn't even enter my head until I read this.

Horrrible article, horrible man.

The thing is, the diversity of the cast was probably not even deliberate - as someone said upthread it reflects on the local area/London as that is where the majority of the volunteers came from, The lead girl was beautiful, effortlessly graceful and I thought just perfect - I'm sure she was picked for her qualities and abilities not the colour of her skin, and the family then picked to make sure it fitted in with her mixed race background. To the organisers, and to most of us, that was nothing unusual.

What a sad, lonely, closeted life that writer must lead if he doesn't think there are families like that out there.

I wish they had included Rita Skeeter in the villains from Children's Literature. She could have done a lovely job of representing the DM.

I live in Devon (not v. multicultural) and even here I know several mixed race families (doctors, mathematicians, ...) like the supposedly mythical one described here. V. happy, stable families with parents contributing to society in a big way. The DM really does spout hateful shite.