To think it's because I'm black?

[notamumsymum]

Walked to co op this morning as OH has taken my car today. So me DD and DS went to pick up some fruit & veg for today.
I don't normally shop at co op I normally go to Asda or Tesco sometimes M&S.

Anyhow one of the staff in there followed me around the whole time then proceeded to wait for me at the door. I was so frustrated at this point I said I'm not stealing anything! She said well we have to be sure. Then I thought let me go back in and see if she is still waiting by the door and shock she was gone.

Aibu and just paranoid? Or am I allowed to be this angry!

Oliversmumsarmy
You can be white and be the subject of racism. It isn’t just down to the colour of someone’s skin

Yes, except if you're white you can keep quiet and nobody knows. I had a lot of anti-Irish abuse when I lived in London years ago, got to the stage where I didn't open my mouth in public, I'd just point, or have the right money ready. I used to think "I can hide what I am by not talking, but you're banjaxed if your skin colour advertises that you're different" 😟

I'm white and often followed by staff/security guards in stores.

It could well have been because you were black...who knows? but also could have been for the same reason why white people are followed.

I'm afraid it's very hard to prove if you were followed because you were black.

Def sounds racist to me. I've walked around shops looking well scruffy with even scruffier looking people and always get side eye but to be so blatantly followed around I'd say that was racism.

People on mumsnet like to imply that racism isn't a massive problem in the uk because it gets to their white fragility but it is and it absolutely isn't ok.

Fight for your rights in court, and beat the shit out of those you can, period.

What?!?!

Yeah @Gbin and she deserved it. Why do people think that racist verbal violence rooted in years of oppression and hatred is ok but retaliating with pure physical violence isn't? Fck that. I'm with you @Gbin*

Don't know why my writing's done that but point still stands.

I think what people say when they say "the gap is closing" is simply "it's not as bad as it was" which isn't a reason to stop complaining tbh... Sure white people and black people can marry now, go to the same schools etc, but is that our baseline?

Just because women can vote now and marital rape is illegal doesn't mean sexism isn't still rampant.

Yes, except if you're white you can keep quiet and nobody knows

Not in every case. Just because you have white skin doesn’t mean that you don’t look “foreign”

We are an immigrant family and one of my memories is regularly standing on the side of the road after we had been stopped by the police so they could go through our van.

We hadn’t said a word. We must have just looked like a dodgy foreigner.

Yeah.
It's one of those scenarios where we think, is it because of my colour..? Because we don't know a person's intention as to why they've done it in the first place.

One thing is though, we know for sure that when white people encounter problems of any kind, it is not going to be because of their skin colour. White people will be victims of bad neighbourly relations, poverty, toxic work colleagues, redundancy and similar, but it's extremely rare, so very very rare that any of those things happened because of their white ethnicity.
We will encounter the exact same issues as above, but what puts the extra element to the problems we run into is we don't know or can't always tell if the motivation behind these problems is prejudice and racism towards us.
That's why we always question it, "I wonder if it's because I'm black...?"

I was in Tesco the other evening and the black security guard seemed to be keeping a very close eye on me compared to other people and I'm also black. They probably get briefed to pay close attention to particular types and races. Imagine what they would they're like if they had a group of Roma people in the store.

I was in Tesco the other evening and the black security guard seemed to be keeping a very close eye on me compared to other people and I'm also black.

Being white I obviously only have that set of experiences to draw on but of course people of colour can also be racist - just like you get women who make sexist assumptions about women. We all grow up in and live in the same society so it's inevitable that we're going to take on some of its values and attitudes to some degree.

Or maybe it was something else, who knows, but whichever way you look at it it seems clear that our society is horribly biased against certain groups.

Any threads about racism are so predictable.

Dear MN - can we have a sub section for black women please? Honestly the wilful ignorance of white women on here is extremely tiring

Gbin
yep! I said it! One stupid bitch called me King Kong in an argument. I punched her in the face and broke her nose and I’m proud

You're a violent person.

Fck off @Juells* -like racism isn't much worse violence. Can you see your white supremacy? White supremacy is violence too.

Ah, a tag team.

Violence is violence - you're not doing the cause any good, just confirming the stereotypes with comments like that.

Racism doesn't excuse violence.

She was a cunt but breaking her nose makes you even worse than she is.

White supremacy is violence too.

I don't think you understand what the word "violence" means.

This happens to me a lot. I’m not black, I have 4 children and I think that is the reason. It’s very annoying and I always loudly comment on it to let them know that I know they are following me.

Tanselle - that is so identifiable.