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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To be shocked at casual open racism

119 replies

WanderingFairy · 08/02/2017 19:31

Our having quiet dinner and some precious me time whilst DH spends bonding evening with DS. Greying couple in their 60s sitting next to me discussing all sorts of topics. Elderly gentleman makes casual disparaging comment about Muslims then brushes it over and starts talking about something else.

I'm shocked and saddened that racism is so acceptable and commonplace now. All muslims are evil, backwards etc and it's fine to make sweeping statements about an entire community. Has it come to this that we are so openly hostile and hateful?

OP posts:

SleepOhHowIMissYou · 09/02/2017 01:08

They are not being 'ignorant' AntiqueSinger, many elderly people have not benefited from immigration to their area and so they are speaking their own truth. The truth varies according to each person's experience. Your truth is clearly not the same as theirs.

And you make assumptions about me. You assume that because I can rationlise others opinions then I must share their characteristics too? How very reductive of you. What colour my skin is, or what religion I do or don't follow is irrelevant when I ask you to be truly equal in your thinking, to give equal credence to all members of society rather than promote one section and belittle another.

ShoutOutToMyEx · 09/02/2017 01:14

I think people should own their behaviour. If you don't want to be called racist, don't say racist things.

It's not nothing to do with being elderly. My nana in her 80s once referred to my friend as 'coloured'. I told her we don't say that anymore, 'black' is fine. And she said alright then, and she never said coloured again.

Because she was a decent, kind lady who wouldn't want to offend, and recognised that not using one word wasn't a hardship.

ShoutOutToMyEx · 09/02/2017 01:20

Not nothing! I did not just write that!

I have spent years training myself to stop using double negatives. I must be tired!

doubleshotespresso · 09/02/2017 01:30

Unfortunately the voices of SOME Brexit leavers and SOME Trump supporters are now no longer afraid to say what they think out loud as it has become "normalised".

You know how they voted and that they are Trump supporters then? Wow.

I find largely since the Brexit vote we have a very good idea of how they voted as they all seem to post hourly on social media ridiculous and inaccurate facts emblazoned with "SHARE IF YOU AGREE/THINK IT'S A DISGRACE" . Quite easily spotted I find.

melj1213 · 09/02/2017 03:02

But that doesn't mean that your experience is every experience. Yes it is an offensive word now but it wasn't always - just like how "retard" and "cripple" were once medical terms and now aren't ... words change meaning but you can't berate people for using terms that were appropriate when they were growing up but that we have deemed racist now.

When my nan met my ex, who was black, and called him "coloured", I was mortified when she said it and told her that we don't use that term any more but she was absolutely mortified when I said we use the term black, as it had been drummed into her as a child that black was a very offensive term and shouldn't be used.

Eventually my ex stepped in and said she shouldn't worry because he understood she didn't mean it to be offensive. Yes, he would have preferred it if she had referred to him as black or a PoC, but he understood that black was the offensive/dismissive term when she was growing up and she was actually trying to be polite by using that term.

A few years later with that ex, when my DC was born, some stranger in the street actually got offended that we referred to her as being "mixed race" as that was offensive now and we should be using the term "dual heritage"! Neither of us is offended by the term mixed-race and it is a term we are both happy to use with and about our DC ... and yet some random person decided that we were being offensive by using a word we do not take offence to to refer to our child!

derxa · 09/02/2017 03:03

Our having quiet dinner and some precious me time whilst DH spends bonding evening with DS. Bleugh!
Greying couple in their 60s Bleugh!
Elderly gentleman Bleugh!

I'm sure there are plenty of racists in this and every country. I just hate your phraseology.

SingingInTheRainstorm · 09/02/2017 03:12

I agree it is really sad that people feel the need to be nasty in anyway, racism, sexism, bullying. They joke that older people can get away with speaking their minds, but I think it's s bad example to set for those around you, which could include racism.

I remember being 2 or 3 and a black friend came to my parents house, I came out with 'Oh it's the N' totally innocently not knowing it was bad. I'd obviously picked it up from my parents. When I was 8ish I wrote a diary like thing for school, I put that we went to the C (derogatory term for Chinese) I was told it was a bad word.

I lived in a village where it was predominantly white, it was rare to see anyone of colour. Now the same village has many different nationalities, I dread to think of the talk at the Retired Pensioners Club.

SingingInTheRainstorm · 09/02/2017 03:33

I hasten to add, when I was a young adult I did the thing of following your parents beliefs. Then I got a job where I worked with many different races, my mind was totally opened as it wasn't in the least how my parents described.

As I grew through my 20's & 30's I got more liberal, my motto is we're all human at the end of the day, treat others how you want to be treated. In every part of life you will get idiots, it isn't specific to anything.

I know not to talk politics with my family, as I don't want my DC to hear their views. I'm open too, to the fact my children might not take on my beliefs, but they better bloody well behave and be nice to others.

I'm accepting of everyone and respect everyone's right to have an opinion, it doesn't mean we'll agree, but each to their own. I do struggle though with people who support Britain First, I think it's by pure luck we ended up born where we were. Who am I to deny another person what they consider to be their dream, which they'll have worked hard for, to get the money to escape poverty and war torn countries.

It shows as I share a birthday with someone I went to school with, born in hours of each other. She had well off doting parents, I had the opposite. That's how much of a lottery it is.

In hospital there was a HCA who did 10 years in medical school in his home country. He was telling us that to be considered for a nursing position, he'd need to score crazy high in an IELTS test, that I doubt most of us could not pass. Then he can set about being recognised as a Dr. All the patients told the Sister and Matron how amazing this guy was, how it was crazy he had to jump through so many hoops. I'm sure he said you were allowed to get 1 or 2 questions wrong, then it was a fail and resit. Whilst he needs to know English for treating people, it's the skills that don't require word perfect English that were being wasted.

I'll jump off my soap box.

Sammygold · 09/02/2017 03:40

Sleep, I absolutely agree with you. Trying to achieve some level of understanding rather than launching into an immediate condemnation of people of the older generation who hold these views is far more constructive. And this is coming from me as a Black woman.

WrongTrouser · 09/02/2017 07:05

Who am I to deny another person what they consider to be their dream, which they'll have worked hard for, to get the money to escape poverty and war torn countries

Do you want totally open borders Singing ?

SuperBeagle · 09/02/2017 07:10

Might not be relevant to the OP, but I think a lot of people confuse wanting tighter immigration laws/not wanting open borders with racism.

Fairylea · 09/02/2017 07:17

I moved from South London to South Norfolk and I was shocked 10 years ago by how racist people were in Norfolk and it's not changed since really. I would get absolutely flamed for saying that because everyone always says "I don't mean to be racist but..." and somehow that makes it okay. We have a very large Polish population in our town and although on the surface people are nice enough to them under the surface people are always moaning about how many polish people there are / how the schools are "overrun" with Polish children and I've even heard several incidences where people have pulled out of house sales to Polish people because they think they don't understand the ways "we" do things and may drop out.

As an ex Londoner who went to school in Brixton which is very multi cultural it is the aspect of Norfolk I really struggle to cope with.

My ex mil and fil (who also moved from London to Norfolk) always make a joke that they can tell when they are back in London again because they struggle to find the "white faces".

People who think the world is becoming more tolerant etc have no idea how much racism there is in certain areas.

BusterGonad · 09/02/2017 07:32

I agree with Bertrand why mention their age and hair colour?
I totally agree with SleepOh and Super too.

Perfectjob · 09/02/2017 07:32

I was in a taxi earlier and for the whole 15 minute journey the driver was going on and on about Brexit and how happy he was that those foreigners can't come here anymore to steal his houses and his jobs. Then finished by telling me he's retiring soon and planning to move to Spain with his wife!

You couldn't make it up could you.

BusterGonad · 09/02/2017 07:36

Perfect but I'm sure the taxi driver is buying his own house in Spain and living off his saved money so in his mind it's not the same at all. He's not going to be living off of benefits or getting a council house there which is probably what he's referencing too.

SpackenDeDoich · 09/02/2017 07:40

I'm surrounded by casual racists. I do not and never will understand their behaviour.

diamondsforapril · 09/02/2017 07:53

I do think we are suffering the impact to an extent of being such a densely packed island.

EnormousTiger · 09/02/2017 07:55

Also my parents born in the 1920s never once made any racist or homophobic remark ever by the way (they both had further education - met when my father was at university so may be it is a lack of education thing for some older and younger people).
The worst example I found was on a voluntary thing I do where even the ex Pakistani was complaining about immigrants and all the jews most of whom were only here because we'd sheltered their families in the 30s and 40s. I don't mind people stating facts they believe like there are not enough jobs because of huge immigration of course, but it's when it strays into racism. Mind you the only people locally who have tried to bribe us have all been from countries where bribery is ripe so some comments are not so much racism as fact.

I don't think this is particularly racist - more a fact "My ex mil and fil (who also moved from London to Norfolk) always make a joke that they can tell when they are back in London again because they struggle to find the "white faces"" (I am minority white where I live in London and I am not racist to say so).

BusterGonad · 09/02/2017 07:56

My husband wore his England football shirt to a school sporting event, he was called a racist! Wtf...why can't he be No1 a football fan and No2 proud to be English without being branded a racist.

fakenamefornow · 09/02/2017 07:58

SIL thinks that Islamic faith schools should be banned in the U.K.

As do I. Along with all other faith schools, they just segrigate children, very often by race as well as faith.

BertrandRussell · 09/02/2017 08:00

"My husband wore his England football shirt to a school sporting event, he was called a racist!"

What did he say while wearing it that led to him being called a racist?

BusterGonad · 09/02/2017 08:01

Bertrand what are you implying?

diamondsforapril · 09/02/2017 08:03

It isn't a lack of education at all. Real racism, and I differentiate between concerns about levels of immigration and actual dislike of those who are not white British - stems from fear and from ignorance. The areas the BNP thrived read like a list of social deprivation in the U.K.

Fear has spread from those areas because of terrorist attacks, because of situations like Rotherham and because of unprecedented immigration levels.

Putting those people in university won't make any difference whatsoever.

picklemepopcorn · 09/02/2017 08:04

Buster taxi driver might be driving up the cost of property so locals are priced out, using local health services, etc.

BusterGonad · 09/02/2017 08:06

Pickle I'm not sticking up for the taxi driver. I'm just stating the view point I expect he was coming from.

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