To think Lord Sugar should be sacked from the BBC for his tweet?

[BlondeSea]

Earlier today Lord Sugar tweeted a photo of the Senegal football team with a caption along the lines of "I recognise these from the beaches in Marbella selling sunglasses!"

He doctored the image to add pictures of sunglasses. People challenged him online and he insisted it was funny and refused to apologise however since then he has apologised - he's obviously been forced to.

I won't add the image here, it's now been taken down but you can see it if you google it. AIBU to think this is disgusting, not funny, and he should be fired from the BBC?

We have moved on. Massively. Hugely.
No we haven't. We may have moved on a tiny bit, institutional racism is still rife, casual racism too. It's still acceptable to behave in the manner of Lord Sugar, look at the people defending him here. Your concept creep is warped, because if you are other, what you is happening now is a seemingly inexorable slide back to that. It may be slow, but it's happening.

Oh dear, sorry.
to laugh... at a colour of skin and identify that as somehow less valuable, not equal.
In any case, it was rude. Not funny.
BBC should not renew The Apprentice contract. (For all kinds of reasons)

It may well be difficult (for some people) to tell the difference between people of the same race, but we do know that people look different. So yes, people might genuinely mistake me for another mixed race person and that’s not racist. But, to make a joke in this vein is, because if you are aware that white people all look different, you should be aware that other races do to.

These days though, we are much more exposed to different races through TV, even when living in a homogeneous area - so more likely to be able to actually tell the difference between people.

he said he wasn't racist for the very fact he wasn't putting a footballer as any better than a street seller...all therefore equal.
so now im really confused.can someone explain to me?

For most in the black community there is a far higher want for black people to be hired etc than there is for people to not make a Joke.

Why does it have to be either/or? Surely what is desirable is that black people should be treated fairly in terms of employment, and that they shouldn't have to put up with racist jokes?

I think concept creep works the other way round. Every time someone in public life makes this type of "joke" and isn't called out on it, or gets excused because "it's just banter", people should "lighten up" etc - it helps to foster the perception that racism is perfectly acceptable. We need to call it out every time, otherwise other people start to follow Sugar's lead, and that's the way to a society where bigotry is the norm and it's perfectly fine to treat people as inferior because of the colour of their skin.

kateandme he's backtracking.
He made an unacceptable joke, using skin colour.
Yes, selling hack goods on a beach doesn't make you less worthy than a skilled professional footballer.
Unless you are judged by the stereotype that has always been in place

thanks rosamacrose so was he saying the footie teamed looked scruffy.not up to par then comparing it to street sellers and them being so?

mooncuplanding it’s racist. He’s apologised because it is racist. Clearly. Lots of mental gymnastics in your post somehow trying to justify this tweet.

People who find bigoted jokes funny usually are bigots. But they can’t bring themselves to just own it

kate you are overthinking the joke. It is literally just that he noticed the footballers were black, and he noticed most of the people who sell sunglasses on the beach are black. He was implying the footballers look like the sunglasses sellers because of their skin colour. Nothing to do with their scruffiness.

If you look at the photo you will see that the footballers weren’t scruffy at all.

kateandme I think he was saying, their skin is black.
Therefore: they are all the same.
Therefore: it doesn't matter what they do.
Their skin is black.
Therefore: No matter what country.
Their skin is black.

That’s still kind of pretty shit

howshallihandlethis i know, I was clarifying that it is just a straight-up racist joke based only on their skin colour and any talk about scruffiness etc is just a distraction from that

kateandme I've grown up from the 60s and seen some changes. That this attitude is being challenged is good.
No, you can't make that kind of lazy, easy joke now.
And that's good.
I'm really glad it's caused discussion.

Oh yes. I see that now. Totally agree Sloth
I don’t really see how it’s in any way justified. Lazy casual racism.

There is so much crap on here. The vast majority of street and beach sellers here (southern Spain) are Senegalese. Their racial characteristics are the majority of men have very black skin, are tall and of slender or slender/defined muscled build. I have no idea what Sugar was trying to say, but I think he very quickly realised his irony, if that's what it was, was racist or could be interpreted as racist and it was withdrawn and he apologised. I think the clue is in the title. Twit(ter). Perhaps we could spend the evening in a more worthwhile way, thinking up acronyms for example, Trendy with it, terrible twit, easily rich. Tardy wally in treacle, terrible esoteric rhythms. Twisty worker in television, terrible endemic riches.

I have no idea what Sugar was trying to say, but I think he very quickly realised his irony, if that's what it was, was racist or could be interpreted as racist and it was withdrawn and he apologised

Actually - he very quickly double downed on his 'joke' when people were telling him it was racist. He just dug a deeper hole.

It took a while for his apology. I wonder who had to explain it to home?

Lets face it it’s a losing battle. More people back sugar than care about what he tweets just the same as clarkson. He posted what he saw as a joke/something funny. People pointed out is was not a joke or funny but more people will of decided it was, shouting at or labelling those people won’t change their views just shove them underground.

What’s the answer? I don’t know. But the bbc certainly won’t fire him and he wouldn’t care if they did, who would honestly care considering the tiny amount he would be being paid compared to what he already has? the bbc don’t exactly had a good rep anyway