I don’t think asking mn if something you did / said was racist should be allowed

[Gardensparrows]

They may or may not be genuine but the comments they prompt are awful.

The thread has been taken down but in 2022 I have reported three people for laughing at the word ‘chink’ and it is completely unacceptable.

@StillWeRise I live in such a place as you describe. Predominantly white, Home Counties, little village on the edge of a not huge town. My child's (primary) school is minuscule (under 100 children) and there are zero black children. Not one. There are a handful of other ethnicities but I would hazard a guess at maybe five children in the whole school. Despite appearances the school, and the community, is welcoming to everyone.

So yes I'd like to educate myself and in turn my children about racism. It is much trickier when you don't live in an area where you see or hear the issues first hand. To me growing up here, racism was, as you say, as simple as treating a person of colour in an unfavourable or unpleasant way because of their origins. Obviously I know now it's way way more complex than that but I bet if I were to ask my village neighbours if they'd ever heard or experienced any unpleasantness based on a persons race around here they'd say no. Because likely they haven't!

I know it's hard to credit if you live in the middle of London or any other major city,

Sometimes London is held up as the magnet of racial diversity, when in actual fact, if you are white, when you are not at work or at the school gate you may never have any regular and meaningful interaction with a black person, so it's not going to be easy to genuinely educate or understand racism. A PP said they wanted to understand so they can teach their children. Outside of school do your children have any meaningful friendships or interaction with black children? I suspect not many do. The structure of the school day Films and books are all well and good but if it's just left to the school what's the point. Many of these children will still grow up to think they are inherently superior based on the colour of their skin.

@PAFMO
...and if, say a Sudanese family came to live in your village, don't you think they might be met with curiosity? and that curiosity might be expressed in ways that would rightly be described as racist but which actually had no bad intent?
Well done you if you think you understand what racism is but don't expect everyone to have such amazing insight - most people are just living their lives and don't think beyond their immediate horizons until they have to.

I'm not sure what your objection is.

If it means people would weren't aware something is racist, then it least they'll know in future.

The poor lady that posted earlier clearly had a caee of foot in mouth which got worst when she tried to apologise but it was clear as day she didn't mean to offend anyone intentionally.

A while back another poster used the term 'Irish twin" - she had no idea it was considered offensive to some and again it was clear she didn't intend offense.

Surely, if it educates people then that is a positive and will prevent a reoccurance.

In fairness to the OP of that thread - as lots of people won't have seen it - she absolutely didn't use the word as a racial slur... I can't remember the exact phrasing but it was along the lines of 'is there a chink of light/of hope that I haven't done something foolish'... but I agree it was an unfortunate choice of words given the rest of the post.

I didn't see that thread so can't comment specifically. I find threads like that show just how many people on MN are racist. It's a scary amount.

It's not relevant to anything if a white person would be offended by a racist slur, yet so many posters are busy reassuring each other that something wasn't racist. They claim the right to an opinion because their husbands third cousin who they met once at a wedding is 'ethnic'

On the antisemitism thread 13% have voted YABU to the suggestion that antisemitism is on the rise. I'm shocked at that number I must say; it's easy to forget how many actual out-and-proud racists there really are out there, when you only associate with like-minded people for the most part.

[quote StillWeRise]@PAFMO
...and if, say a Sudanese family came to live in your village, don't you think they might be met with curiosity? and that curiosity might be expressed in ways that would rightly be described as racist but which actually had no bad intent?
Well done you if you think you understand what racism is but don't expect everyone to have such amazing insight - most people are just living their lives and don't think beyond their immediate horizons until they have to.[/quote]
Nobody truly understands 'what' racism is.
You have people (like on MN) who see nothing wrong with using racial slurs as a descriptive term.
Then you have career offended people who make a living out of providing 'diversity' training, coaching and speeches.
Then you have people like me, whose lived experience resembles none of these things.

IME the most 'PC' people, the ones v v careful about offending people and 'microaggressions' are the worst offenders. They congratulate themselves on being inclusive. But they won't give anybody not like them a chance. Or make an effort to contextualise conversation where it's say something like British school dinners.
They'll be perfectly polite, but there's an invisible barrier, they don't want to make friends with me.

Meanwhile, people who may be inadvertently racist while being curious (as you said) mean well, are open minded and so can be corrected. They strive to find common points of connection. Like my former boss, who grew up in the rural NE. He may have said the wrong thing sometimes, but it was out of ignorance (I corrected him of course!). That man believed in me, gave me chances, I wouldn't be where I am today without him.

Frankly that's all I want. I want to be friends, to feel like I belong, to have fair chances based on my ability. I don't need people to 'educate' themselves on the history of oppression blah2 I just need them to see me as a fellow human being. I welcome them being curious and wanting to learn. It's the same attitude for people of ANY group; race, class, wanting to know more about your fellow human beings and understanding that you have a lot to learn and that you might make missteps.

This spirit doesn't come out at all. It's all 'just don't do or say X Y and Z ever or you're a racist and there'll be a huge witch hunt'.

Sorry - just trying to work though this - was the deleted thread the one with the cafe owners who were Turkish?

Don't know what thread this is referring to, but I'm a bit torn.
As in, somebody could genuinely be asking as they aren't sure.
However, it soon becomes apparent if they are or not by future responses.
People are sometimes genuinely well meaning but ignorant.
I've learnt a lot being on MN over the years, but I'm absolutely aware it's nobody's place to educate me too.
Racist posts and posters should never be allowed to stand though

Seek out a resource from someone willing to go on record with their real name and face alongside their opinion. As PP have pointed out, there is an abundance of information including articles, interviews, studies etc. as well as spaces to discuss them specifically if you’re still confused.
A random person on MN is not someone you should be trusting for an education about anything really
Very true.
I follow quite a few people on Twitter for example, verified blue ticks and real people to see their opinions.
As you say, you don't know if someone is automatically genuine on here

I find threads like that show just how many people on MN are racist. It's a scary amount
Agree
I've been here years and I've noticed it definitely getting worse the past few years.
I think people feel more emboldened to air their racist shit, and it is genuinely scary.

Lots of us have been on MN long enough to know that most hidden in plain sight wide-eyed faux innocent posts about racist language from posters have nothing but racist goading at their core.

Definitely - and disablist terms as well. All the faux:

'What's wrong with saying mng out of the couch?'
'But I've always said spzzing about'

And STILL insist they're fine to use those terms.

Ugh, sorry for bold fails on quotes there!

MN is not the right forum to pose questions about racism, because most of the posters on here are White without a clue of what is and what is not racism. It simply is not their lived experience, therefore, they are likely to be blind to it unless they are well read and have empathy (not ignorant/racist).

Most people starting those type of threads/posing those questions are racist and are goading others.

The only times I've ever been referred to as a "chink" have been from strangers in the street, either quietly saying it to me as we pass each other or shouted at me (in case I'm deaf and need their voices raised?)

I bet no one who has used that term towards me have thought "I'll pay that girl a nice compliment by calling her a chink". It's always aggressive. It's always racism.

And no, threads about racism on MN do not ever end well, because the inherent racism in the West cannot be understood much less accepted by the white majority. Including this forum's users.

Please acknowledge that I started that deleted thread by admitting I'd shown a racist attitude to someone and I knew it was wrong. I've read that racism can be unconscious in people who believe they're not racist. My behaviour in the cafe was, from my point of view, an instance of that, and I had hoped to discuss it to get more awareness of myself and my potential to be unwittingly rude and hurt people's feelings. I later used a very unfortunate turn of phrase and it was picked up and used abusively, and I deeply regret providing that opportunity for others. To me, the unconscious is aspects of ourselves we don't see, or prefer not to see. It derailed that thread, hence some people's disgust at a word I used which, given the context, was poorly chosen. But it wasn't used in the way it has been taken, and the realization of the hurt it has caused has made me feel very shaky.

I did not start that thread to be goady. I tried to own my shit and I was very explicit about that. I feel as though that is being used by people who didn't even see the thread to impute intentions to me that weren't there. You don't have to believe me, of course, but if I don't reiterate this it seems to me I've managed to convince some people today that there's deliberate racism on MN from me. It was racism, but it was not deliberate.That was the whole point of the thread I started. I live near Eltham. Literally yesterday I walked past the glass plaque commemorating Stephen Lawrence's murder, set into the pavement on Well Hall Road. There were a few bunches of flowers and a potted plant (I think it was a geranium) that had been placed there very recently. I observed that as I passed and I felt some of the shame and deep disgust of being a white person living in this area, because of the misery that was caused to Stephen's family and the country by white men and their families. I have friends who are people of colour. Some of those friendships are long standing. If I didn't feel bad about what happened in the cafe this morning I wouldn't have posted. I admitted I was concerned about my behaviour and the underlying attitude it betrayed.

If that counts for nothing, or worse than nothing, with you, I sincerely apologise for troubling you.

@theidiotnextdoor

I didn't see that thread, but I know how you (general you) can say something and can come across badly through genuinely not knowing, you seem genuine.
Trouble is a lot of people aren't so too easy to lump all in together when it's not always the way.

@theidiotnextdoor Can you see why your reactions are perceived as extreme by some people?

Shame and disgust over what happened to Stephen Lawrence - a very understandable emotion.

Shame and disgust with yourself for being a white person living in the area - extreme and illogical.

@StillWeRise coloured people, seriously?

*You can't talk about racist words without using the racist words in context. And trying to understand the boundaries, why a chink in the armour is ok & a Chink in the street would be bad. Why a dark-skinned person can say the N-word but as a white person I can't even type it out without being criticised.

I'm leaning towards YABVU*

So using that ‘logic’ because I can use the word bitch to refer to a female dog, it would be perfectly fine to call all women bitches.

It isn't a crime to simply ask questions. Being asked a question by someone isn't "forcing them to educate you". People ask many questions about many topics. Of course we shouldn't introduce a blanket ban on questions like this. Otherwise how will people learn? My (not-white) DH said, when I read him this thread, that he's happy to answer people's questions if they're genuinely trying to avoid offending someone/trying to learn what is the acceptable word for something or what is non-offensive behaviour. So you shouldn't speak on behalf of everyone either.

@Sirzy

Part of educating yourself though is surely talking to people from those communities (if they are happy to do so). You can read multiple books and official resources but sometimes actually hearing from people at the forefront is as valuable if not more.

As someone who lives in an area with very little diversity I do find that reading things like threads on here can be an eye opener to things I would never normally consider - obviously I don’t include the word used in the example on this thread there - which is all part of developing.

I wasn't on this thread but I would agree with this. I've read a little bit around the "official" position on racism and racist language but I have probably learned more about why language can be aggressive or hurtful or excluding on MN than from some official forums.

As a white person, all of the really important stuff I have learned about racism has come from having conversations with non white people. It enables you to see through a lens you hadn't seen through before.

I accept that its not the "job" of non-white people to educate white people on how racism impacts them. But I also think learning directly from non white people has an immediacy and an impact that you won't get from books.

One side effect of this is that you will get a lot of ignorant - in the true sense of the word -- people piling on looking for validation of what are essentially racist positions. It's always going to be a trade off and I can totally understand non white people seeking not to engage. But, at least from a white person's perspective, I think ultimately discussions like this help increase understanding.

My (not-white) DH said, when I read him this thread, that he's happy to answer people's questions if they're genuinely trying to avoid offending someone/trying to learn what is the acceptable word for something or what is non-offensive behaviour
That's just it, isn't it, sometimes it is innocent.
The fact that so many times it isn't though and it's faux innocence most of the time is what gets people questioning or being hostile as they've seen it all before.

[quote watchtheglitterdustswirl]@sadpapercourtesan Oh I don't know about that.

My Dad, who is actually not of English heritage himself and would be horrified to be thought of as racist frequently uses the term 'let's go for a ch*nky' when he means let's go for a Chinese takeaway. It's just what he's always called it. I have him an absolute bollocking for saying it in front of my children a few weeks ago. Luckily they didn't hear or if they did they didn't notice.

He's 60. So not old, by any means. [/quote]
He is racist though. He uses language he knows is racist. He knows because you told him, and he still does it. He’s a racist.