Laurence Fox on Question Time

[SuckingDieselFella]

It isn't ok to try and shut anyone up with remarks about their skin colour. It doesn't matter if that skin colour is white, black or green with purple spots.

His fellow actors have been told to "denounce" him. It looks like he can wave goodbye to his career. What lovely tolerant people the ultra woke are.
www.thestage.co.uk/news/2020/laurence-fox-labelled-a-disgrace-to-industry-following-question-time-race-row/

Why should "the left" make attempts to put racism in a global or historical context when we are discussing it in this country now? Constantly telling people that its better than in other places is shutting down their point and massive whataboutism.

Which policies are being purused to the detriment of the native population?

You can't on the one hand use ethnic preference as some kind of evolutionary justification and at the same time scream about wanting the "natives" (whatever that means, it certainly doesn't mean Anglo Saxons) to be protected.

People who use the word natives really know fuck all about the history of this country, immigration and DNA.

I said previously that people react to the term 'white privilege' because they don't feel as privileged as wealthy Asian people. Those who live in deprived seaside areas will hardly ever see a BAME person, so the picture they get is what they get from the media. (I come from such a place. I'm an exception as I grew up with African people in my home, and with BAME people coming to study English at my parents' language school, and I heard about the way immigration treated them at times.)

That's why people from those regions feel insulted at the term 'white privilege'. Saying that they have misunderstood the meaning doesn't work because they don't believe you. That's why it might be time to change your language, if you want to win them over to your side. Otherwise you won't win back the votes from those who abandoned Labour and voted in the Tory party. Which is surely what you really want. It's certainly what I would like to see happen.

I agree with you BTW about the amount of racism BAME people have to go through. And also about male privilege. But you're not convincing deprived white people in deprived areas who voted Boris Johnson in. It's very sad but it's a fact.

As for LF, I think it may be true that he's simply an idiot and not a racist. But it sounds from what posters on here have said on his Twitter feeds that he's also a prat. (I don't have any desire to read it so I don't know. To me he's just an actor who I watch regularly on ITV3.)

I'd listened to him on podcasts prior to Question time and think he's great. I agreed with everything he said.

I’d listened to other podcasts of his too, and I also think he’s great. There is nothing racist or sexist about anything he says, if you’re not in the grip of an ideology that sees racism and sexism absolutely everywhere.

I’m really hoping the revolting divisive white privilege nonsense dies soon. Luckily the fact that it always comes accompanied by a bunch of hectoring, authoritarian, pessimistic Corbynistas is usually enough to put most sensible people right off.

people in seaside towns didn't vote Tory because of anything other than Brexit.

White privilege is the accurate term to use and yes, people are misunderstanding it if they equate it to economic privilege, and that needs to be explained.

Yes because of Brexit but also because of Jeremy Corbyn and his supporters. But quite apart of that, unfortunately you can go on explaining the meaning of 'white privilege' until you're blue in the face, but you can see from this thread that a lot of posters are simply sticking their fingers in their ears.

It's different with 'male privilege' because they do see and experience that.

But quite apart of that, unfortunately you can go on explaining the meaning of 'white privilege' until you're blue in the face, but you can see from this thread that a lot of posters are simply sticking their fingers in their ears.

Precisely. The groans from the QT audience when Rachel Boyle brought it up and the applause following LF’s comments should be seen as a warning sign that the language used is going down with the majority of British people like a cup of cold sick.

I said previously that people react to the term 'white privilege' because they don't feel as privileged as wealthy Asian people.
As others have pointed out, the problem with the term is that it’s misunderstood or willfully misinterpreted. Being white will not protect you from poverty or educational underachievement. Neither will being black or Asian, of course. However, being white will almost always protect you (or the vast majority) from ever experiencing racism in your home (the UK). Whereas that rich and successful black man, or that rich and successful Asian woman will most likely be the victim of racism on a weekly, or at least monthly basis, particularly outside of London or the other more racially mixed urban centers such as Manchester, Bradford etc . And if you dispute this observation then I can only assume that you are not very close to any nonwhite people. So that there is white privilege. You may not like the sound of the term but the meaning behind it is clear and correct. So what shall we make our priority? Fighting racism or arguing about the semantics of a phrase?
Whether or not any of this “wins elections” is of course another matter, and I agree generally speaking it’s not the way to go. So yes, perhaps the way for Labour to go would be to turn a blind eye to racism (and classism and sexism etc etc) because Joe Bloggs leant want to read about it. He wants to feel hard done by about living in a rich country with an excellent health system and schools and owning a three bedroom house. He wants to be promised the next government will make his life better, not talk about women, racism, people on minimum wage etc, . But they’re still there. They still exist.

Add climate change to those in the “let’s ignore it and it might go away category”. ^

@maylis Do you have a link to those stats on attainment by ethnicity? Am curious to see the full set of data.

I don't think the fact that Britain's had immigration without a genocide is proof we're not racist! There might be a bit of room for racism before you get to genocide...

Who are the 'natives'?

I mean, sexism and racism is everywhere. We live in a patriarchal society where women still do not have equality. Being ignorant to it doesn’t mean it’s not there. For some people, Male and female, patriarchy serves them and so they don’t want to disrupt it. But it is everywhere as is racism.
I echo what a previous poster said - the book “why I’m not longer talking to white people about race” is a very good read and I urge people to have an open mind and read it.

I’m shocked how some posters are saying things like “ revolting divisive white privilege nonsense dies soon” ... how is White privilege revolting but racism and sexism isn’t????

I’m a white woman. I have more societal privilege than a black woman and in some circumstances I have more privilege than a black male but always less than a White Male. I didn’t personally create that privilege it’s just inherent based on unconscious bias. It’s not about my salary or where I live. It’s based on how society views me and as I am white society, In general, will view me in a certain way which will then influence how i get treated and my experiences. Intersectional feminism explains it well.

Its easily found as it government published, i just have the documents not a link, can't post a PDF.

It does show some interesting stuff, like PP black Caribbean boys perform lower than PP white British (by 0.1 of a point) at progress 8.

Although other migrant groups do outperform white British boys at this level they arent the lowest, that would be Roma and Irish travellers.

@Cam77 I really don't know, I wish I did. Maybe by dropping the phrase and telling real stories from BAME people of racism that they experience on a regular basis. The terms 'white privilege' and 'male privilege' are sociological terms which are meaningless to most people.

Hearing sociological terms bandied about by middle class metropolitan liberal 'white privileged' people won't win them over. Hearing real life stories of experiences of racism has a much better chance of being successful. These deprived white people don't witness racism, which is why they've swallowed the myth that it doesn't exist. (Whereas they DO witness misogyny.)

Then we end up right back at Laurence Fox and lots of the posters on here. Denying that there is racism in the UK because they don't experience it and shouting racist at the people who critique it.

Also saying that you need to use simpler terms for certain people is very patronising.

I honestly don’t understand why people vote for the modern Conservative Party. And I don’t mean that I disagree with the fundamental political ideology of conservatism (or at least not all of it)
I’m talking about the modern incarnation of the British Conservative Party: It doesn’t want to seriously address climate change. Their policies on this are absolutely useless and ineffective. They don’t want to discuss racism or sexism in society. They don’t want to discuss how the bulk of the UKs populace can make any meaningful improvements to their standard of living/quality of life, either financially, physically or mentally. All they care about is fkong Brexit.
Vote Labour? Not suggesting you do that necessarily, though at least they’re not effectively advocating ecological genocide. But why place your crossnext to the Tories? They should change their name to the “Dont give a shit about anything” Party. I don’t even hate it, it’s just a big fat nothing. Anyway, roll on 2025 and sign me up for one more vote for the “Let’s all keep rolling along in a state of apathy until the next big fuckoff financial crisis/bank bail out hits & Or ecological disaster takes us first”. (How do you say that in Latin?)

Quick thank you to Malylis. You've made some really interesting points and stayed calm and factual in the face of some posts that certainly weren't!

I doubt LF or anyone here thinks that racism doesn’t exist

@rockingchaircandle I totally agree. Thank you @malylis

Patronising? It might sound that way, but clearly talking about 'whites privilege' isn't working, is it? How long are you going to continue banging your head against a brick wall.

You could continue to use the term combining it with real life experiences of racism. I'm thinking mainly of the metropolitan liberal people of 'white privilege' really. I think it's more likely to be accepted from POC, as they have real and personal experience of racism.

Otherwise, it's kind of like men, particularly men of 'white privilege', telling us all about misogyny. Non feminist women would be likely to ask how would they know how it feels to be female?

It is patronising. What you are saying is that they can't understand these terms, of course they can.

Real experiences or racism are not accepted. Just look at LF who told a POC that we didn't have racism here.

However, being white will almost always protect you (or the vast majority) from ever experiencing racism in your home (the UK). Whereas that rich and successful black man, or that rich and successful Asian woman will most likely be the victim of racism on a weekly, or at least monthly basis, particularly outside of London or the other more racially mixed urban centers such as Manchester, Bradford etc

This is completely untrue. White Jews regularly experience huge amounts of racism, being rich or successful does not stop this. There is even institutionalised racism against them coming from the highest sections of the UK (Labour party) and I would also counter that being a minority white person in a predominately Muslim or black area, you would likely experience a lot of anti-white racism (often purposely ignored by institutions such as the police/courts as can be seen from the outrageous whitewashing of the mass grooming scandal as well as the numerous experiences of anti-white racism reported by people on this thread).

Black people, like every other human being on this planet, can and do behave very badly and need to be confronted and prosecuted like everyone else.

What is so very hard about this concept?

Racism on the other hand, which is condemning people (often unconsciously, in micro aggressive ways and attitudes) on the basis of their identity is despicable and must be confronted.

These two concepts ARE NOT one and the same. It is a huge mistake for wokes to mix them up. LF showed huge courage bringing it up and if you can't handle this? You, not he, is the knobber.