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Original poster

Institutional Racism in our policing - Dawn Butler MP

525 replies

AuntyPasta · 09/08/2020 18:48

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/aug/09/labour-mp-dawn-butler-stopped-by-police-in-london

The police stopped the car being driven by her friend (she was a passenger.) Unlike the elite athletes stopped with their 3 month old baby in the car www.theguardian.com/law/2020/jul/06/why-did-police-stop-and-search-bianca-williams-and-ricardo-dos-santos she’s had an apology.

AIBU to think that if she wasn’t an MP the police would be sticking by their ‘reasonable suspicion’? Is that what it takes to be dealt with fairly by the police?

OP posts:
Smileyaxolotl1 · 09/08/2020 23:33

userd
100% agree

Smileyaxolotl1 · 09/08/2020 23:34

userd and to add, black men in expensive cars do seem to get stopped disproportionately.

AtiaoftheJulii · 09/08/2020 23:42

There's been no comment/excuse given for why the police were checking the registration in the first place, so that could well have been (probably imo) racist.

But stopping them for being from Yorkshire? That could be because of the current covid restrictions - people of some parts of West Yorkshire are not supposed to be travelling out of the region. So that may have been legit. Although it seems highly unlikely that they're actually checking every car they see on a shift just in case they come from a restricted region!

DdraigGoch · 09/08/2020 23:47

@AuntyPasta

Bet Butler thought all her Christmases had come at once

I’m sure she was glad that for once there would be consequences for the police.

The car wasn’t registered outside London. The officer had entered the registration number wrongly. Why exactly they entered the registration number ...

It's standard practice to run a check on the registration. Usually it happens automatically though, and ANPR camera will read numberplates as you go along, cross-reference them with the PNC and squeaks if any passing car is uninsured/stolen etc.

Given Dawn Butler's history and the current focus on "hate crimes" though, I wouldn't be surprised if he pulled her over in connection with offending homosexual giraffes or something. Or he could have been checking that she wasn't claiming dodgy expenses again.

Flaxmeadow · 09/08/2020 23:47

userd and to add, black men in expensive cars do seem to get stopped disproportionately

White people do as well. My ex was a car mechanic who drove some very nice cars and we used to get stopped all the time.

I expect there were a few reasons
We were young
Working class
He had tattoos
We lived in a high crime area.
We would drive around and around the same area just for something to do

He also used to dangle his arm out of the window and steer with one hand, the way young men sometimes do, he smoked roll ups

His cars were always legal and I think he got a kick out of that when he was stopped tbh

JamieLeeCurtains · 09/08/2020 23:49

Well we'll see, won't we. I'm no political fan of Dawn Butler or Diane Abbot, but they've experienced the most appalling racism over their lives including in parliament, which is bloody shameful.

JuniperFather · 10/08/2020 00:11

Why are people spending so much time trying to disprove that the driver was black?

That disturbs me as much as anything in that video.

Smileyaxolotl1 · 10/08/2020 00:17

juniper
Because if he isn’t black (or more likely) does not look black then an MP is deliberately gaslighting people in order to accuse the MET police of racism in order to sow discord/back up her statements about institutional racism.
Do you not think that is a very serious matter?

JuniperFather · 10/08/2020 00:22

@Smileyaxolotl1

juniper Because if he isn’t black (or more likely) does not look black then an MP is deliberately gaslighting people in order to accuse the MET police of racism in order to sow discord/back up her statements about institutional racism. Do you not think that is a very serious matter?
Yeah it's a serious matter, in the way that George Bush directly ordering the destruction of the Twin Towers to justify a war would be a serious matter. Both are possible but both are ridiculously improbable. Sometimes the truth, however horrifying, is the more mundane and explainable thing, not the fantastical conspiracy.

Anyways forget all that for a minute - what is 'not looking black', can you explain this?!

I am mixed race, but perhaps some police would categorise me as IC3 if I was down to be stopped by them in a snap decision.

Peering at the neck of some chap next to Dawn Butler in order to substantiate him as "white" and then start some conspiracy theory about an MP trying to accuse the MET of racism....

Wow.

ArriettyJones · 10/08/2020 00:24

and subsequently released an edited reverse image video which at first glance appears to support her assertion that she was the driver.

Oh that’s why I’m confused!

Why do people reverse images? Aesthetics?

Smileyaxolotl1 · 10/08/2020 00:28

Juniperfather
You really can’t think why an MP who on Saturday accused the police of institutional racism wouldn’t try to promote the idea that her car being stopped on Sunday was racism? Really?

And you are either incredibly dim or deliberately disingenuous if you can’t work out what ‘doesn’t look black’ means. For it to be a racially motivated stop, the driver would have to have appeared to be non white through a moving car window. Since people looking at a video can’t agree on the mans race (not just on here but all over Twitter) it seems unlikely that a policeman would be able to clearly see it enough to then carry out a racially motivated stop.

Celebratealice · 10/08/2020 05:59

This reply has been deleted

Message deleted by MNHQ. Here's a link to our Talk Guidelines.

ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:23

@Flaxmeadow

West Yorkshire has the highest serious crime rates in the UK. Police will be on the look out for organised crime and serious crime all the time. It's what they do and yes they stop cars they believe are from certain high crime areas. Why not?
If this is true, why is it that none of the many, many West Yorkshire residents I know has ever mentioned to me that they've been stopped while driving elsewhere in the UK?

I work in Leeds, so most of my colleagues live in West Yorks. And when I lived in Leeds, I was never stopped driving in London.

ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:27

@AtiaoftheJulii

There's been no comment/excuse given for why the police were checking the registration in the first place, so that could well have been (probably imo) racist.

But stopping them for being from Yorkshire? That could be because of the current covid restrictions - people of some parts of West Yorkshire are not supposed to be travelling out of the region. So that may have been legit. Although it seems highly unlikely that they're actually checking every car they see on a shift just in case they come from a restricted region!

There are no restrictions preventing people from travelling out of West Yorks right now. The restriction is on meeting with other households, not travelling.
SimonJT · 10/08/2020 07:33

@ArriettyJones

and subsequently released an edited reverse image video which at first glance appears to support her assertion that she was the driver.

Oh that’s why I’m confused!

Why do people reverse images? Aesthetics?

Sigh, it isn’t reversed. All videos or images taken on selfie mode/the front camera are automatically mirrored by the phone.
AtiaoftheJulii · 10/08/2020 07:33

Can I travel outside of my area?
You should not travel outside of your area to meet people other than those in your support bubble, in their homes or gardens, or indoor public places.

You can still go on holiday outside of your area, but you can only do this with people you live with (or have formed a support bubble with).

It's not completely clear, I grant you, but there are travel restrictions. My son lives in Manchester - he can't come home, although I guess he could come and stay in holiday accommodation nearby.

ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:36

Its 100% clear - people in west Yorks can travel where they like and even go on holiday as long as they aren't mixing households.

ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:36

Your son can't come home as that would involve meeting another household.

SimonJT · 10/08/2020 07:37

@AtiaoftheJulii

Can I travel outside of my area? You should not travel outside of your area to meet people other than those in your support bubble, in their homes or gardens, or indoor public places.

You can still go on holiday outside of your area, but you can only do this with people you live with (or have formed a support bubble with).

It's not completely clear, I grant you, but there are travel restrictions. My son lives in Manchester - he can't come home, although I guess he could come and stay in holiday accommodation nearby.

Its completely clear, and if a police officers reading comprehension is so poor that they don’t completely understans those very simple paragraphs then they shouldn’t be working.
ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:37

Inventing COVID restrictions in order to justify police racism is a new one though!

ReceptacleForTheRespectable · 10/08/2020 07:41

Also, those talking about west Yorks being a high crime area... there are lots of high crime areas in the UK, with hundreds of thousands, if not millions of people living in those areas. Many MNers will live in high crime areas.

Do you really think it is normal for all those people to experience being stopped when driving a nice car outside their area? If so, what planet do you live on?

ItsAlwaysSunnyOnMN · 10/08/2020 07:51

Why are people spending so much time trying to disprove that the driver was black?

That disturbs me as much as anything in that video

I ageee

But you must know that MN being predominantly white knows how racism works better than a black woman. Of course they will have black friends that they have discussed this with who will back them up

What is as predictable as police profiling is the response in here (that will no doubt mirror the Daily Mail)

VillanellesOrangeCoat · 10/08/2020 07:55

@Celebratealice

*”All I saw in this video was a police officer politely doing their job. I have no idea what the complaint here could be.

Real racism is so much uglier than this.“*

So some forms of racism is just pretend?Please can you explain what “real” racism is?

PicsInRed · 10/08/2020 08:07

The driver's face is censored so you can't possibly tell if he "looks black" from that. He may be lighter than her and still be clearly black. I'm sure she knows the ethnicity of her own friend better than us. She says he's black, he's black. Now stop it.

She hasn't flipped the image, it's a selfie video, that's how they come out.

The clutching for straws by racism apologists is illustrative isn't it?