Census I don't belong.

[Devlesko]

I'm equally sadened and angered.
Every other ethnicity covered as far as I know, all other travelling groups rightly so. Roma who are here from Eastern Europe.

We have been told by campaigners to stand up and be counted so that we can access healthcare and schools.
Now we are white other, not a mention.

It's not just semantics we are all different ethnicities with separate cultures, the only similarity is we travel, or try to. Our DNA is distinctive to our ethnicity Irish and Romany are completely different.

What is a gypsy? What ethnicity? It doesn't exist. But more recently those who are interested and thank you, know that Romany originate from India, around 1,500 years ago and have been in the UK for 500 years.
During which time we have been enslaved, tortured, murdered, transported, hated by society and persecuted by Kings and Governments.

I'm sick of the back door laws to erode if not annilate our culture. It just isn't fair. Society tars us all with the same brush, but you can ask any health visitor who has ever visited how family orientated we are and spotlessley clean.

Gypsy is a slur for American Romany and Europeans. But it's that bad in the UK where we face racism daily that it's hardly worth fighting the use of the word "gypsy"

I'm writing this because I know whilst theres a few on here with Romany links, Mumsnet is a new audience and apart from me very few would venture. That is nothing personal, just a different culture.

So when you see us being refused service in a pub, restaurant, wedding reception venue, don't spit at us, laugh, call us names, we are human.

@Gwenhwyfar

"As an experiment, Google Romany hygiene laws...there is next to nothing on this complex part of gypsy life"

In Eldra Jarman's book on the Welsh Gypsies some of the hygiene laws were said to derive from misogyny if I remember correctly e.g. men and women's clothes shouldn't be washed together because women were dirty because they had periods. I don't have it to hand so I'm going on memory.

A very mysoginistic culture compared with gadja or gorger as we say here, society. Means non romany, my dh is one
What you would probably term 1950's, and earlier. Does have it's good points though.

@SnackSizeRaisin Agree with your posts.

@cocomarine Agree about the free text box/options.

I think the trouble with typing is spelling and even the order you write it, and also the muppets who write something like Martian.

But there is definitely a case for widening the options which they think they coming from white, black, Asian or other. It’s not enough and as I said before, I don’t think race gives you much of a picture about society.

I am still confused about difference between roma and romany😳
It sounds like basically the passport is the difference? So British are Romany and non british Roma?

Also because the language seems to be the same as I recognise gadjo even without the "fucking" (in native language) before it👀

@develesko I have traced my family tree on my Romany side back to the early 1600's and I am descended from well documented Romany families. My DNA shows small percent Northern Indian origin and I identify more Romany than I do Scottish, which is my predominant DNA at 34%. I'd love to swap ancestry tales with you :-)

@AnaisNun

Haven't finished reading but Black African and Black Caribbean are quite different. From culture, to music, to food to language. And whilst they may share some genetics there's dna in a lot of Carribbean people that most African people won't have.

@MiddleClassProblem

I think the trouble with typing is spelling and even the order you write it, and also the muppets who write something like Martian.

But there is definitely a case for widening the options which they think they coming from white, black, Asian or other. It’s not enough and as I said before, I don’t think race gives you much of a picture about society.

Thanks for the detail on the mixed drop downs.

I don’t think that typing / spelling is that big an issue. I expect the computer algorithms for basically fuzzy matching are pretty good, and will vastly reduce the number that would have to be manually considered.

How many ethnicities are in the UK? I can't really find a number. I know there is reportedly over 150 languages spoken in Manchester so I imagine there is hella lot of ethnicities?

My ethnicity wasn't listed either so I just ticked other, typed it in and got on with my day.

@Devlesko

So by your definition we should just suck it up and not have our needs met

What specific needs are you talking about? I'm not clear what exactly you mean.

I did post that upthread and I still don't know what you mean and what the census really has to do with it? Sorry if I'm being thick but can you please expand?

I'd have thought there'd be a sub category and am surprised there isn't. I've worked with Roma families and tended to think of them as a very marginalised group from E. Europe. The ones I've worked with live in houses and are settled.

I thought English travellers/ Romany were totally different and am surprised they're lumped together on the census.

Some Romany live in houses, and people say they are "settled" but you don't stop being a traveller, it's in your blood.You still follow the same culture, and your house rather than you trailor or van is spotless

But that's nonsense, isn't it? If you're settled, and your parents were settled, and you grandparents were settled, you're not a traveller. You don't travel. You don't have a nomadic way of life and you have the same basic culture as everyone else.

Keeping your girls home from school to clean all day is not a culture.

@FullofCurryandparatha that is what I would like to know, if you are settled what is your culture?

Are there not other cultural things other than nomadic life?

If you’re great grand parents we Italian on all sides, but all settled in the U.K., then your grandparents all married into Italian families settled here, and you parents are both from parents born in the U.K. but all their grandparents are born in Italy, are you not likely to be very culturally and genetically Italian?

"Can I please ask the distinction be made between having ancestral DNA to a group, and having ancestral DNA to a group that you belong to now.
Theres a big difference.

That's your opinion. My ethnicity is incredibly varied. It is not based on the "ancestral DNA to a group I belong to now". People view ethnicity as different things. They're not wrong simply because they think differently to you."

I think OP's point makes sense. There's quite a bid difference between being a Native American, say, living in a separate 'nation' and being someone who has found out that they Native American DNA.

"I've worked with Roma families and tended to think of them as a very marginalised group from E. Europe. The ones I've worked with live in houses and are settled.

I thought English travellers/ Romany were totally different and am surprised they're lumped together on the census."

Travellers and Romany are not lumped together. Romany and Roma are together, which is what OP's complaining about. (Or that Romany isn't listed at all and she's expected to tick Roma).

Internally, people we have traditionally called Gypsies are often known as Roma. Outside the UK, it doesn't just mean eastern European 'gypsies'.

I live on the continent (western and not eastern European) and got told off for saying the word 'gypsy' and told I should use Roma, but official documents in the UK refer to gypsies as do Romanies themselves...

"If you’re great grand parents we Italian on all sides, but all settled in the U.K., then your grandparents all married into Italian families settled here, and you parents are both from parents born in the U.K. but all their grandparents are born in Italy, are you not likely to be very culturally and genetically Italian?"

Culturally, it would depend on the degree of integration into the mainstream culture wouldn't it? Some migrants assimilate completely within a generation or two, others don't. Your example of nobody marrying out is probably not that likely within three generations of Italians, I would have thought.

[quote ineedaholidaynow]@FullofCurryandparatha that is what I would like to know, if you are settled what is your culture?[/quote]
I imagine there is more to Romany culture than just travelling.

@Gwenhwyfar

"I've worked with Roma families and tended to think of them as a very marginalised group from E. Europe. The ones I've worked with live in houses and are settled.

I thought English travellers/ Romany were totally different and am surprised they're lumped together on the census."

Travellers and Romany are not lumped together. Romany and Roma are together, which is what OP's complaining about. (Or that Romany isn't listed at all and she's expected to tick Roma).

Internally, people we have traditionally called Gypsies are often known as Roma. Outside the UK, it doesn't just mean eastern European 'gypsies'.

I live on the continent (western and not eastern European) and got told off for saying the word 'gypsy' and told I should use Roma, but official documents in the UK refer to gypsies as do Romanies themselves...

Is the problem that there isn't a consensus across the group on what is offensive?

I'm aware of what the issue is, but I am referring to those who travel in England and have been around for centuries, not the Irish Travellers. I'm using travellers as an adjective rather than a proper noun.

[quote JinglePies]@anaisNun
New powers to seize gypsy and traveller vehicles, criminalisation of trespass, 3 months in prison or 2.5k fine if arrested .... this comes after years of reducing the number of legal sites available to travellers. So now they have almost nowhere to stop legally, and when they do stop, their homes can be taken and they face legal action.

It’s grim.

And to the OP who has encountered “awful racists” when travellers/Roma/Romany camp...

Every time travellers (of any background) arrive in our small town, and I really do mean EVERY time, there is horrendous antisocial behaviour. If the police will have new powers then I’m thrilled.

Every time there has been threatening and aggressive behaviour from the men when people walk past. Every time there has been human waste left for the council to clear up. Every time there has been dog waste to clear up. Every time there has been a spate of petty thefts. Every time the swimming pool has had to close because the travellers go to use the showers and leave it in a disgusting mess, threaten staff and steal whatever isn’t nailed down. Every time, local residents are threatened and blocked from using the playing fields (where the drive their vehicles onto and churn up the turf).

It’s not ok. I am very much pro official sites but even liberal lefty old me just can’t be ok with the lack of respect, vandalism and crime that the travellers bring. Every time.

Of course not all are like that. But EVERY TIME I walk through the playing fields after they’ve gone and see and smell the mess I feel so frustrated that this is allowed.[/quote]
Unfortunately this is my experience too. Trespass and criminal damage of private property (cutting of bolts and chains on gates or fencing to access private land, fields or car parks), threats or blackmail of landowners (we’ll leave if you pay us X amount, often in the thousands), police telling those property owners that it’s a ‘civil matter’ and they can’t get involved, increased rates of theft like shed break-ins and bike thefts, intimidation of the general public and other antisocial behaviour and then the expensive, time consuming and risky clean up of household and biological waste following the removal or departure of the trespassers.

I have sympathy for the plight of the travelling community but there is a lot of tension between it and the settled community for good reason.

[quote JackieTheFart]@Devlesko

So by your definition we should just suck it up and not have our needs met

What specific needs are you talking about? I'm not clear what exactly you mean.

I did post that upthread and I still don't know what you mean and what the census really has to do with it? Sorry if I'm being thick but can you please expand?[/quote]
We need sites, there are thousands homeless atm.
Pritti Patel has made our way of life impossible, I fear for our future.
If we travel we have our vehicles/ homes confiscated or imprisoned.
We no longer have the right to roam as we aren't allowed to stop.
There's nowhere to go.
Many are being forced to move into council houses because there's nowhere else.

Roma live in houses and their needs could include help with policies and systems in the UK, help with translation, and perhaps liason with Police and other agencies.

We don't need that type of help, we need outreach for schools and healthcare, you can't register if you don't have an address, for example.

Yes, some Romany live in houses, I'm in one atm, as due to covid couldn't travel. I understand this, nobodies fault.
But, usually it's because it's made impossible for us not to.
My dc are grown up now but they can't offer their children the same as they had. We used to pull up in a beautiful see the area and move on. Always contributing to the local economy.

The problem is Roma, Irish travellers will be considered in policy making, but not Romany, because we aren't named.
I don't think there's ever been more than a ball park guess at how many Romany are in the UK, nobody has any idea.
I know for certain that the provision of more sites would see most of those living in houses move to the camps, freeing up houses for the rest of society.

@cansu

How would having another category box for you to tick change your life? How would it help plan services which is supposedly the point of the census? Is it even possible to list every different ethnicity on this form? I think you need to stop focusing on the census.

Well, it woild tell them that more sites are needed for a start.

@Gwenhwyfar

"If you’re great grand parents we Italian on all sides, but all settled in the U.K., then your grandparents all married into Italian families settled here, and you parents are both from parents born in the U.K. but all their grandparents are born in Italy, are you not likely to be very culturally and genetically Italian?"

Culturally, it would depend on the degree of integration into the mainstream culture wouldn't it? Some migrants assimilate completely within a generation or two, others don't. Your example of nobody marrying out is probably not that likely within three generations of Italians, I would have thought.

Yes but if you have a culture that is tight then it is likely, also I think it’s more likely than you think as people often look for partners with similar values and plenty want someone from the same culture. Replace Italian with something like Ghanaian and you might look at it differently.

I come from an Anglo Indian family, so similar to people in Madagascar and the Philippines for example, multiple generations of mixed raced people. So starting with the original mix of say English and Indian, then creating a sub culture of just the mixed race offspring having relationships with people who are mixed and so on. It’s very complicated!

"Yes but if you have a culture that is tight then it is likely"

Yes, I was afraid to say which cultures I thought would be less likely to marry out in case of being criticised for stereotyping or something.
I know Italians living in another country in Europe where there is a sizeable Italian community and the Italians who have just arrived do not see the existing Italian community as being fully Italian like them, if you see what I mean.