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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Laurence Fox on Question Time

999 replies

SuckingDieselFella · 17/01/2020 20:00

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/

OP posts:
Trewser · 17/01/2020 22:05

I must have watched a different QT, I thought he came across well and was supported by members of the audience?

Me too.

KatyCarrCan · 17/01/2020 22:07

Autumn I agree with you. Both about MM and about the 'blacks, dogs, Irish.'

There's an issue about trying to close down debates with identity politics. Calling someone 'privileged' so you can ignore them is perilously close to the Brexiteers calling people 'experts' so they can ignore them. Coming from completely opposite ends of the political spectrum but all about shutting down and reducing debate.

There's also a real shift (especially on social media) to view racism through an American prism. The UK has a completely different history of racism and it's reductive and unhelpful to pretend that the 'black and Irish' signs didn't exist or that other minorities aren't also institutionally discriminated against (eg travellers).

user1471510720 · 17/01/2020 22:07

He was spot on, usual scumbags on QT who are ultra Woke and are the most hypocritical and nasty people like Shami.

derxa · 17/01/2020 22:08

One journalist posted a picture of a chimp and said it was her newborn baby FFS. Danny Baker a journalist? He's a disgusting man.

leckford · 17/01/2020 22:08

The left is eating itself the awful RLB if she takes over the Labour Party will continue its slow death

Pukkatea · 17/01/2020 22:13

@ChipsyChopsy has it right. Saying someone is privileged is not calling them racist. It means you benefit from societal structures and biases that intrinsically are.

People crying about the term seem more concerned with a non-existent slight against them than trying to understand and dismantle the situations that lead to the term being used.

There is a great saying that when you are used to privilege, equality feels like oppression. That's where all this outrage at 'wokeness' comes from. It's the same as men complaining that you can't make innocent sexist jokes about grabbing their coworkers these days because someone will accuse them of having male privilege and obviously that's ridiculous because men had to fight in WW2 and women didn't.

PotteryLottery · 17/01/2020 22:13

How dare LF tell a PoC that talking about racism is getting boring. He doesn't experience it and is telling victims we cant talk about it.

Shameful. But his Twitter following went up hugely so there's a lot of similarly superior minded people about.

1st gen immigrants of colour didn't speak out but 2nd gen are. Get used to it.

TheRealMcKenna · 17/01/2020 22:14

It’s just unwoke opinions so people have given it a sinister label.

Part of the problem is how ‘unwoke’ opinions have been dealt with - for example, Brett Weinstein at Evergreen University.

It’s not just a case of ‘my opinion is a bit unwoke so I’m a member of the Intellectual Dark Web’. It’s more a case of ‘my opinion is unwoke so I’m fcked career-wise so where the fck do I go from here?’

Cam77 · 17/01/2020 22:15

I don’t like people blaming racism for every single thing wrong with their lives or the country, or dismissing as “privilege” every good thing that happens to somebody who happens to be white and/or male. Having said that, I dislike even more the current trend of fingers in ears “racism doesn’t exist, this is the most tolerant country in the world” spiel. Racism and other forms of prejudice are still many times the blight on society and threat to future peace as some politician or public sector worker occasionally going a bit overly PC.

Original poster
SuckingDieselFella · 17/01/2020 22:16

"1st gen immigrants of colour didn't speak out but 2nd gen are. Get used to it."

I won't be getting used to insults based on skin colour, thanks all the same.

Judging by the poll most people agree with me.

OP posts:
Cam77 · 17/01/2020 22:22

We’re in real danger of oversteering away from the one extreme of being too PC and positive discrimination etc, toward the other extreme of “racism doesn’t exist here” (despite mass evidence to the contrary). “if you don’t like it here “go home”.
There’s a few on the loony left (to use the cliche) who need reigning in a bit. But I’m far more worried about the mob on the right who have unfortunately found their voice post Brexit and are very much in the business of “reclaiming” Britain as the exclusive home of people like them (white, Christian etc) - with foreigners of other cultures “tolerated” to the extent that the economy requires their professional skills but never welcomed or accepted as “one of us”.

ChazsBrilliantAttitude · 17/01/2020 22:25

OP
Are you saying you regard the term white privilege as an insult?

longwayoff · 17/01/2020 22:25

What's he doing on QT anyway? Isnt it supposed to have a panel of knowledgeable guests rather than ill-informed luvvies?

jaminthemiddle · 17/01/2020 22:25

@Cam77

Where is the like button!

SanAntonio · 17/01/2020 22:26

How dare LF tell a PoC that talking about racism is getting boring. He doesn't experience it

How do you know he doesn't experience it?

I am white and I have experienced 1 major and 1 minor incident of racist abuse in the last 6 months. 1 included being physically touched and having my car vandalised whilst being racially abused. The other was minor verbal abuse.

goldfinchfan · 17/01/2020 22:28

It is not so simple...there were not lots of signs about black and white back in the fifties and sixties......
Jimi Hendix was The guitar hero of the sixties....the Notting Hill Carnival was started to ease racial tensions....that was a positive step
There are always bigots yes , but nothing here has ever been as bad as the USA......
and it does get a bit crap to be told you are a racist just because you are white!

We might actually be the most tolerant country.....who else has absorbed so many different peoples than the UK? Why can't we talk about this and find out ?

So many mixed race people here because their parents are different. Isn't this a good thing?
It is not good to shut down discussions. I have heard the worst racism coming from people of a certain ethnicity....but I can't say which.
It's not white though. nor black.

So lets keep stopping racism but not shut down discussions.

TheRealMcKenna · 17/01/2020 22:28

People crying about the term seem more concerned with a non-existent slight against them than trying to understand and dismantle the situations that lead to the term being used.

Actually, I’m more concerned about the backlash that ‘s already evident against the term being used. Please tell me what part of the use of the term ‘white privilege’ is being used to create a more cohesive society?

LonginesPrime · 17/01/2020 22:31

How do you know he doesn't experience it?

If LF experienced racism, why would he suggest that he doesn't think racism is an issue in this country?

Chocpear · 17/01/2020 22:36

I think he showed ignorance by confidently asserting UK has little to no racism and mocking the idea of white privilege.

I don’t think criticism of MM in sections of the the press is solely due to racism - the hypocritical behaviour and cakeisim of both her and H is a big factor - but I equally would not imply as Lawrence Fox did that there was no racism in the press coverage of her.

BorneoBabe · 17/01/2020 22:37

Just as women don't need men to explain sexism, people of colour don't need whites to explain racism.

percheron67 · 17/01/2020 22:38

I think he was absolutely right and like him even more. Racism is nasty whatever your colour or position in life. I am sure he has faced discrimination because he is white, perceived (probably is) wealthy and has a beautifully modulated voice. On another forum he was criticised because he went to Harrow! Sheer Harrowism!!

Rhea1981 · 17/01/2020 22:43

I only saw the short clip but thought he was absolutely right and so glad he had the balls to stand up to her bs. The woman accusing people of being racist towards meghan without any substance but then completely dismissing the man's opinion purely because he is white. That is racism and the double standards infuriate me.

WhatsTheLatest · 17/01/2020 22:43

I fell in love a little bit with him when I saw it. He reacted genuinely. He is obviously fed up with feeling whatever his opinion is will be shot down because he is white and privileged. Everyone's opinion should be equal is what I got from him

Piggywaspushed · 17/01/2020 22:45

To the PP who said he ought to read 'Why I Will No Longer Talk To White People About Race' , he said he would 'rather eat a lightbulb'.

Rastamousehat · 17/01/2020 22:49

I remember Kate Middleton getting criticised being waity katie, never having had a "proper job", setting out to catch a prince, her parents were commoners etc etc (and same for insults levelled at fergie and Diana in the previous generations) and a lot of the criticisms I have seen against MM have been about her (perceived ) behaviour , but that doesn't exclude the possibility that there have been racist comments as well. I understood the comments against LF that he is perhaps not the best person to judge the level of racism in this country, but he is entitled to an opinion and indeed must have been invited to have an opinion - QT would be pretty boring if people either didnt have an opinion on the topic,or all agreed.