AIBU to find it disgusting that gypsies have taken over a school playground

[Adizzylass2014]

whilst attending my best friends wedding today in a little village I was horrified to see that gypsies had taken over the school playground. There was rubbish all over the floor, children and dogs running all over the place and scantily clad women puffing away.
why a school playground, these people have no morals. The poor caretaker is going to have his work cut out for him as there was at least 15 caravans!

TheFormidableMrsC that was absolutely atrocious.

But surely you're not blaming an entire race of people for that awful thing?

See that's the difference. I absolutely reserve the right to moan about the filthy individuals who park up, leave shit and rubbish everywhere, churn the local graveyard up, beat the living shit out of some of the local kids because they're not travellers...and generally bring mayhem to the area for a couple of weeks.

However, I can't say that about every single traveller because I haven't met them all.

Doing so, would make me racist. Surely you can see that?

Blue (from Google)

Gypsies and Travellers - race discrimination. The Equality Act 2010 says you mustn't be discriminated against because of your race. If you're a Gypsy or Traveller, you may be protected against race discrimination.

Citizens Advice - Gypsies and Travellers - race discriminationvwww.adviceguide.org.uk/england/discrimination_e/discrimination_protected_characteristics_e/ge6_gypsies_and_travellers__race_discrimination.htm

some of them are completely vile and intimidating in my experience. But I have only met a small amount of them and that is who I am referring to. I think we are all so scared of being branded a racist when making a stand against these people, the thing is a lot of people have seen the mess and destruction some of them leave behind which in turn Make people think negatively of all of them.

It's local authority property - should be quicker to evict than from private property.

The erosion of local authority specified sites is an interesting issue...

It wouldn't really matter who was doing these things.

anyone leaving disgusting litter, beating a horse etc. should be feeling the full force of the law.

I don't care whether the perpetrators are ethnic minorities or not - behaving as if you are feral is not on whoever you are.

Although not every traveler is bad the ones I've come across have all left tonnes of waste. Some excel themselves and do things like smear poo on children's slides and dump asbestos.

Those people were disposable TheFormidable and yes, boils on the arse of humanity.

But like we don't assume all white men with black beards are Peter Sutcliffe or all Muslims are terrorists, let's not assume all Travellers are animal abusing arseholes.

Where do they spend the winter?

In my job the ones I have come across have been lovely. That a said, they are settled so not sure if that makes a difference re: some of the above posts.

Cross post with Worra.

Arse. Dispicable not disposable. Although...!

"I remember a couple years ago a group left asbestos 10 m away from a nursery shock. It cost 50 k to clear up."

Even worse here, they took over some land 200 metres from where I live and the result of their house and site-clearance business meant scrap and all sorts of refuse was chucked over the fence into the river. So much of it, it turned into a dam. The asbestos has never been cleared and the land left fallow for fear of disturbing it.

Another piece of land they took over in front of where I live was left in a truly disgusting state. All cleaned up and paid for by people who pay local taxes after other people who pay none. Meanwhile they jog on and make someone else's half-decent neighbourhood into a filthy slum. Not to mention the grubby, barefoot kids knocking on the door at all hours of the day and night trying to flog naff shit a blind man wouldn't give house-room to.

Travellers aren't a race.

There are many permanent sites fir revellers and you honestly would never know they were there. Of course there are decent traveller communities.

There are offers who are horrendous - I've also seen the results of illegal traveller encampments, horses loose on busy A roads, piles and piles of rubbish left for people to clear up.

They need more permanent sites but local communities oppose them
Whenever permission is sought.

It's a tricky one. But the travellers do not help themselves by behaving as if the settled community dies not matter at all.

There is a large traveller community near us, many of the children attend dd's school

The children I've met have been keen to do well at school and try hard

The community is fairly transient, sometimes caravans come onto the local playing fields if the site is full and occasionally there have been issues with rubbish and dogs but on the whole they are apologetic about it and if the council provides bins they do use them

Generally the overspill is only for a few days if there is a wedding or something -our local Catholic Church probably wouldn't still be running if it wasn't for the traveller site

Sometimes there have been issues with taking horses and carts into town and sometimes the teenagers clash with the local kids but on the whole we all rub along well enough

There is a shortage of traveller sites but there is very much a sense of 'not in my back yard'

Slightly off topic, but if the school is an academy or a trust school, the land won't belong to the local authority; it will be owned by the school.

Doesn't matter if it's a school or public car park, they are equally off limits

Whether you've been negatively affected by a group of individuals or not Worra it doesn't excuse demonising an entire minority group. These threads never end well because, for some reason, categorising and demonising gypsies and travellers is the one type of discrimination that is still socially acceptable. It's one of the few areas where MN-users find themselves agreeing with Top Gear (see the recent pikeys case).

And if you doubt that there are generalisations on this thread then substitute gypsies/travellers for black, disabled, any other minority group and you'll see how unacceptable and prejudiced most comments on this thread are.

If people are causing a public nuisance or parked illegally or creating a health and safety hazard then there is legislation in place to deal with all those issues. If your local authority or police fail to implement that legislation then that is an issue you have to raise with them.

As for the comment that 'they should just buy land and live there'

1. A lot of travellers do buy land and do live there
2. There is no inherent planning provision for residential caravan sites. If you meet certain criteria you are almost guaranteed to secure residential planning or commercial planning but planning permission for residential caravan sites is not protected in this way
3. planning applications for residential caravan sites are the only planning applications where you have to include the ethnic group of the people who will live there. If you build houses, you don't need to specify. If you build a caravan site, you have to say if it's for travellers. It's enshrined bigotry.

And before anyone asks, yes I've lived beside travellers. Yes, I work with them to provide support and help them through lots of these processes. Yes, I think they have a right to safe, stable housing; access to healthcare and education.

It's also worth pointing out that bigotry against travellers isn't a victimless crime. In the last decade, bullying of traveller children has increased to levels not seen since the 1960's.

Perhaps it is time for MN to consider a campaign promoting tolerance and awareness.

Are all travellers looking to settle Coco or are there those who always want to be on the move? Is it a case of not enough sites?

Bitter that sounds awful

I agree KateAdiesEarrings

TheFormidableMrsC I've had exactly the same experiences (minus the horse incident) on and off for the last 20 years.

However, I still wouldn't write off an entire race because of the cuntish individuals I've experienced.

You've probably experienced nice and 'normal' travellers too when shopping in town for example, but because they're not wearing a T-Shirt saying "Look at me, I'm a traveller", you'll be blissfully unaware.