You're white. You haven't experienced racism

[PatricksRum]

I'm so sick of repeating myself today.
AIBU or is ignorance just bliss?

Ask a mixed raced person how they feel.

@RickOShay I didn’t say it was the same. But it is still racism. As I said at the end of my post, it isn’t the same as the racism that black people in the west experience at all. But that is why generalised statements are so easy to disagree with and therefore would unhelpful.

I like pp’s distinguishing between individual and systematic racism. Stating that “you’re white, you haven’t experienced systematic racism” is probably true.

Op

I haven’t read the thread

What do you think she you see white people changing their status to black on social media. I haven’t as seems so patronising but will do if you think it’s a positive.

Do you and family change yours or thinks it is meaningless?

I'm bowing out of this thread. It's turned into a circle jerk of whatabouttary which is embarrassing and exhausting.

Why do we even use terms such as Black person or White person? Are we simply not... People?

People recognise race, and pretending that racial prejudice doesn't exist won't end racism.

You can't tackle inequality with whataboutism.

Apparently you can dismiss any nuance or appreciation of context as ‘whataboutism’ though. Clearly that’ll help in addressing inequality.

I'd be interested to know the dynamics of the team of 4 policemen that killed George. Were they even a team, if there were 4 of them? Did a team of 2 call for backup and the other 2 arrive? With one being mixed race, and one Chinese, if they were the backup that arrived late to the party so to speak, what input did they have? Did they ask their colleague to stop? Did they think he was being racist? I'd just like to know more, but I suspect we wont get the details in the UK.

Also, why the need for 4 of them to hold him down? Had he been difficult to manage? Why didnt the mixed race policeman question the need for 9 minutes?

I feel like this should say:

"You're white, you haven't experienced systemic racism"

Because people are getting confused between one off incidents/insults and something so ingrained into society today that its almost unnoticeable

It's like when you talk about feminism to a man who says "yeah but we get stereotyped too" or you talk about Me Too and that one guy pipes up about his friend who got falsely accused of rape

DRAINING

we've moved on so much from that as a society, surely this can't be used as an argument about how racist all white people are right now

I can assure you that many people who held racist attitudes in the 60s are alive and well, have not changed their opinions and currently hold positions of power.

TabbyMumz

I can't answer all of your questions but two of the cops were recruits and the one kneeling on the neck and the Asian officer both have form for brutality.

It's really, really fucking instructive that so many threads on MN about racism morph into a series of accounts of times when black people have been mean to white posters ('I used to work with a black woman, she was rude', 'in 1997 a black man sucked his teeth at my aunty' ,etc).

Really very revealing.

I hear your frustration OP, but talking about it on MN is a bit like fighting against windmills. You will always get comments pointing out that middle class, white British people are victims of racism too, and trying to minimize the appalling treatment of black minorities. You get the same when you point out that women tend to be victims of sexism more than men.

For the record, my husband is Asian but he recognizes how pervasive racism is today especially towards black people, and doesn't feel the need to point out that Indians suffered at the end of the Brits for so many centuries so they shouldn't complain.

I'm bowing out of this thread. It's turned into a circle jerk of whatabouttary which is embarrassing and exhausting.

I agree. And I think it very eloquently proves the OP's point. I'm bowing out too.

OP - this is doubtless the kind of response POC receive every time they try to make their voices heard. They are shouted down, told that their experiences are not valid, or are deafened with a chorus of 'what about me?' This isn't the nature of all responses on this thread, but a good many.

I see why you are exhausted.

[quote Porcupineinwaiting]@rosiejaune that's really interesting. So were most Jews in Germany not Ashkenazi Jews then? In Germany there was quite a lot of inter marriage pre WW2 hence all the mischling (my grandmother was a mischling hence her survival ).[/quote]
No, most Jews all over Europe are of Ashkenazi origin (except in Spain and Portugal where they are more likely to be Sefardi), but intermarriage is a more recent phenomenon, e.g. in the last century or so. Being half-Jewish might have saved some German Jews, but not because the Nazis didn't consider them Jewish enough to bother with; more because they might be less identifiable as Jews in appearance, or where they lived etc.

I feel like this should say

You're white, you haven't experienced systemic racism

Yes, I think that would have helped a lot.

I'm sorry for what you've experienced OP. It's sounds bloody hard to deal with and I'm not surprised that you're frustrated.

I will argue with your point that white people can't experience racism. I used to live in a corrupt country where life wasn't worth a whole lot, Some people in out town were murdered in their beds for their skin colour.

When I moved the the UK, some people assumed because I'm darker skinned with an accent and come from an African country that I must be mixed race. Not everyone is so stupid but the people who did treat me differently because of this really ground me down and even denied that I knew my own parentage. I know my experiences are nothing in comparison to yours but it does give me a small insight into what it feels like and I'm sorry.

If people stopped electing viscous, ignorant privileged arseholes who would sell their grandmother’s kidney to increase their share bonds then perhaps the leadership messages and principles would be a force for good. Do as we say not as we do. We are all soon fucked if we don’t reset ourselves.

IMO much of the systemic and dripped “acceptable white supremacy” phraseology on that slide ( as well as some of the top) is entirely attributable to our failure as electorates and socially culturally conscious people to realise and harness the power that lies in our hands. It thrives because the powers that be know the way to get what they want is to appease us as much as possible on an individual basis so as to ensure compliance and a blind eye.

So much of the failings are choice and self inflicted. The Ongoing polarisation promoted and espoused by victims or racism is entirely justified but counterproductive. Passion and enragement don’t stoke the fires of revolutions anymore they allow the establishment to encroach more and more upon on powers and rights regardless of skin colour.

We need to find a new way to work together as human beings and seek a consensus that will not allow the likes of Trump, Johnson et all to keep us as lab rats in their Petrie dishes.

I believe Trump is quite happy for civil unrest to evolve into civil war so as to establish a dictatorship by the not so back door. What is happening in America now is what he wants, I believe.

Vicious not viscous
But these in ideals are also thick so perhaps a Freudian slip

Tell that to the Irish in the UK when the signs " no blacks, no dogs and no Irish" were the norm. We might be white but suffered the same discrimination and note how we were listed after dogs. Add to that the famine and the 800 years of oppression. I don't hold it against the British people and have no bad feeling so not posting to start a row or have a go at anyone but just responding to your post that white people of different cultures, religions, countries can be discriminated against or oppressed as much as black people in some countries.

*Why do we even use terms such as Black person or White person? Are we simply not... People?

People recognise race, and pretending that racial prejudice doesn't exist won't end racism.*

^^
No. It’s like “can we stop seeing the difference between men and women, and just say we are all equal. Even though we’re not, and one group had lots of advantage and privilege, we’ll just stop talking about it”

I'm entirely happy with Boris and Trump being described as 'viscous'. It somehow suits them.

I find 'cunts' fits quite well too.

* Why do we even use terms such as Black person or White person? Are we simply not... People?*

We say “a tall person” “a short person” “fat person” “thin person”

To me it’s a descriptive physical feature. Nothing more nothing less.

I have just seen some posts regarding Zimbabwe and other african countries with some white people living in, and the apparent discrimination they faced. If my memory serves me correctly, the autochthonous black populations were forcibly removed in Zimbabwe to allow white colonists to have more farmland, at the same time enjoying rights that black people didn't have, including better jobs.

South Africa had apartheid, so enough said about it.

You're white. You haven't experienced racism

Utter tripe. You've clearly never been 'white' working in a predominently non-white school, racial insults had to be accepted, you're never been a 'white' woman walking through a predominently non-white area. This constant barrage of insults at the 'white' community doesn't help the cause it claims to support one iota. By the way 'white' is in inverted commas as it's a meaningless word applied to skin colour.