To refer to a black man as a black man

[ShakeRattleNRoll]

The other day i was talking about this black man who lives down the road to a neighbour and she said it was politically incorrect of me to say 'you know that black man who lives there' after I had said it.I thought well i never.What's wrong with calling him a black man when he is a black man? How should have I described him? TYIA

fifi669

'Don't give me the balls about centuries of persecution. That may have happened to their great grandparents or something but not to them'

'Them' you refer to had their history and culture decimated when they were stolen and kidnapped. Dont even know their own names or which African country theyre from. From then until this day, theyve been persecuted via active media bias, institutional racism, racist attacks leading to maiming & death.. we also have to avoid the avalanche of black enslavement films that seem to be out there with people labouring under the impression that black people either want to see that, or watch it and feel absolutely fine with it.

So do excuse me if I see centuries of persecution as a little different, and the words and tone of your dismissal of it as very offensive. Whether we want to forget it or not, we get constant reminders. Complete with the outpourings from oh so pc people who want to oh so succintly remind black people that THEY know best how we SHOULD feel about racist namecalling, etc..happy to put up comments about they/family being accused of racism, as if that somehow cancels out the experience of black people/the black man woman or child feeling insulted was wrong to feel that way (but then they always are, arent they? Its not their remit to know how they feel)

Black people werent giving you the 'balls' about that - this thread is white people tying themselves up in knots about being called black. You could put yourself on rewind and read the thread if you had a mind.

I couldnt really give a shit if someone hates on another due to colour - as long as they dont cause harm or distress to that person, or impede their progress in life. When its clear this happens regularly and there is a mass denial of it coupled with attempts to drag up 'reverse racism' examples to wring the hands over, then it seems pretty clear to me that attitudes are entrenched and that yes, there is an issue thats being sidestepped. Elephant in the room syndrome to a T

This thread is bordering on offensive, and thats saying the least

The point being that while racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination still exist, taking it upon yourself to say it's not acceptable to say someone is black because donkeys ago they were made to be slaves? Is it not the same as to not be able to say someone is a woman as we were treated as second class citizens and a mans commodity?

Hey fifi, since you ask, no, it's not the same, your argument is completely fallacious. It is not acceptable to call someone black when it is not relevant or it is reductive, and that is because race and skin colour is still the basis for both systemic and individual racism. More interestingly, the fact that race and skin colour is still the basis for unwarranted discrimination is what motivates irrelevant and reductive references to race. In the same way, yes, again since you ask, it is not acceptable to refer to someone's sex where is is not relevant.

Examples were given upthread.

I have a good friend whose expartners mother was a professor of some sort, very intelligent etc but she genuinely believed that black people were a different species to white people

Well I did tell DS he was.... He did seem confused. It's called humour. Much like telling him the moon is made of cheese.

People have posted you should never describe someone by the colour of their skin. It's just such a stupid thing to say. Why ignore the obvious? Going round in circles to say the tall one with the brown eyes, likes Apple crumble, buys basic beans.... When you can say the black man. If that's the obvious difference between him and all the other neighbours.

As I mentioned before, DP is brown (he is of course many other things). He has looked at the thread and doesn't know why people are getting worked up over nothing.

I'm not ignoring that slavery and black persecution existed, to say its institutional now, I see no evidence of that. No we shouldn't forget, but we should learn our lessons and move on. It's stupid to tread on eggshells and be afraid to use a descriptive term. To say its offensive to say someone is black is saying being black is offensive which is quite obviously ridiculous.

"People have posted you should never describe someone by the colour of their skin"

Well, a couple of people have said they have been told that. And everyone else on the thread has been carefully explaining to them that it's nonsense. That if the best and most convenient way to describe someone is by the colour for their skin, then that's fine.

Are you by chance reading a different thread?

"The key point is that these people in your wonderful rainbow nation of friends are using those words to describe themselves. People often do this pre-emptively to defuse any potential tension, and to reassure white/straight people that they are not threatening. Maybe you could find a way or reassuring your friends that they don't have to be so self deprecating in your presence?"

Perhaps not always - I'm old and mixed - growing up in the 70's my Indian side was that I had to call certain aunties and uncles 'fatty aunty', 'pock skinned uncled' 'alcoholic guy' etc. Normal. Not for everyone. I'm pretty sure my neices and nephew call me 'fat bellied tired aunt' (not that I'd call myself that at all - obviously).

Think it happens in europe too as dh southern european and they have for years had this sort of 'rap' culture and fil and mil had/have nicknames that we in the UK wouldn't tolerate. I won't name them.

People don't just refer to themselves as things that we a brits don't call nice because they're lowering themsleves, there's a culture and irony too in some cases.

This is why my mixed parents who are ancient are just horrified how britain's multicturism has turned into a semantics.

Now - ds has bf with this kid and his mum and I are close. There's a banter - ds is a apparently a hybrid of 'crap' stuff' and she's got a name like taliban. And we laugh. Racist much? Nothing at all.

Or do we only get away with it because because 'we is not completely white'?

Sorry - obviously being one of the professionally unoffended - I was trying to not get involved ...
But when slavery comes up ...
When you say 'black' are you talking about just the descendants of slavery? - Most people of West Indian/Caribbean descent and those traded directly to Britain?
What about the black Africans? The ones who may well have had ancestors complicit in the slave trade - the ones who did the kidnapping from the interior -and made fortunes and built empires selling their own 'kind' (other black people)? -

or the North Africans/Arabs who increased existing internal the slave trade centuries before the Atlantic slave trade started?
(or even the Romans before that who also increased the internal black slave trade - as well as enslaving Britons -and most other Europeans...the word slave comes from Slav - as in central Europeans)
Not saying white people/Europeans are innocent in this - far far far from it - they made it more worthwhile for the black slave traders, encouraged its growth, got rich off the proceeds and the money from slavery stopped the natural development of the west coast - meaning the economy of that area was pretty much devastated when the British decided to abolished slavery...so much so that more than one black African king/ruler argued against it...
And during the Atlantic slave trade - 'racism' as we know it didn't exist - the black slaves were treated as inferior - the black traders were respected and treated as equals ...

The slave trade itself was nothing to do with racism - as in colour of skin - the main lesson I think we need to learn from it is more that human beings of all races and colours have done some pretty awful things to their fellow humans...and we should treat each other equally.
The consequences of slavery - what had happened since the abolition- the last 180 yrs or so -or in more recent history - since 1950-60s - are a different matter...

Crikey and luv-a-duck - is this thread still going?!!!

The PC brigade must have waaaay too much time on their hands!

DS isn't mixed race, DP is an exceptional man who has taken on him as his own from 6 months old.

Yes some posters have said you can never mention skin colour, funnily enough that's what I responded to. There are people that agree with me on here and don't try to find offence in everything. I didn't need to respond to their comments.

DP being brown doesn't make me an authority on what black people think (if I'm allowed to say that). In this thread black people have themselves commented it's not offensive. This is what I pointed out. It just seems to be white people getting offended on their behalf.

So much fuss and all OP said was the black man when trying to describe which neighbour she meant!

"Yes some posters have said you can never mention skin colour, funnily enough that's what I responded to"

Show me one!!!

Jesus wept. I've read the thread. All of it. Beginning to end. Dreadfully sorry if my input wasn't at an appropriate time for you. I just wanted to put my two penny worth in. If it goes against the flow on conversation it's because I joined in late and read the whole lot at once so it all seemed current.

Amberleaf has made such comments I believe but it's late and I can't be assed to trawl through.

fifi669 you say you are trying to conceive? do any potential mixed race child you may have a favour and educate yourself.

Don't pass all that shit onto a child.

Maybe read this thread fully for a start.

ooops I think I've opened a can of worms

Think you need to read it properly fifi669.

I didn't say 'you can never mention skin colour'

unlucky83 ...yawn...yet again trying to find reasons to blame black people for being the orchestrators of their own destruction. You have 50 questions for Africans (again) but sweet f.a. to say about the constructs of white racism and its impact on Africans.

So...some Africans were involved in the slave trade. That means, all Africans are bad bad people does it...? based on the actions of some, not all, then its 'oh well some Africans enslaved their own so Africans in the diaspora cant complain'

That old chesnut was played out a very long time ago.

Africans dont hold the powerbase that keeps racist media & institutions flourishing to the detriment of how black people are viewed in society. Hence your 50 questions are mis-directed.

Your racism and prejudice screams out from your comments, you're trying to couch it in some kind of touchy feely speak. You claim to have mixed race DCs..now since you chose to mention that, I assumed them to be half African. Yet, look at how you speak of Africans, the lengths you will go to, to put out that racism is meaningless and the African experience doesnt matter. Tell that to your children, then sit back and see if that will protect them from experiencing racism. Oh and if they do experience it, then you can find a way of explaining it all away nicely, after all they wont feel any way about it despite having different life experiences from yours in society. Failing that, use the old failsafe - ignore any white prejudice you may come across, just blame Africans. Let them internalise your, and other those that would be offensive regarding skin colour's, view of Africans.

To be honest I dont actually believe you voice your thoughts in reality because if you do, the only black people who would listen to you are those who lack any shred of self-respect.

& before you twist that & come back with some gloop (when you could just type 'racism doesnt really exist - its mostly black people's fault, they look for it - my DCs will be above all that)' - ALL races have people who dont respect themselves; its not just black people.

oh and MrsDeVere - well said MrsDeVere

Black people always say black - it's the liberal lot who try & create problems where there are none.

Are you in South London & does he ride a Norton & hang out with a blonde hairy guy who wears hairy jumpers amongst other leather glad vintage bikers ?? - if so he really wouldn't care that you reference him as black - he's very proud of it actually & why shouldn't he be :)

Blonde hairy SCOUSE guy that should have been - or is that controversial too :)

& if I'm right, his name is unusual, so people often font remember it

NK493efc93X1277dd3d6d4 precisely.

They dont fool me at all

The 'so called' liberals..they know far more about being black than black people do and will go to great lengths to tell you exactly how and why..being cornered by them at the pub or party slowly drains the very soul of the will to live...