To think MN has a race problem and it’s getting worse

[MovingOutofZone2]

Posters say incredibly offensive, often outright racist things and MN lets them stand as it’s a ‘difference of opinion’ and that’s fine. Other posters complain about this and MN deletes said complaints as they are ‘personal attacks’ and that isn’t fine.

Then we have mods wandering in and going ‘let’s have peace and love’, as though ‘both sides’ need to calm down. No, we need to stop placating racists.

I’m not going to give examples as this will get taken down as a TAAT, but I cannot be the only person to be fed up with all this. MN needs to do something about the racism, race baiting and general cultural ignorance. Unless the site is ONLY meant to cater to white people and, even then, I firmly believe that most posters of any race don’t want to see all that ugliness.

It’s getting to the stage where, as a Black person, I’m steeling myself before I log on. And knowing that half the time I report a comment, I won’t even get a token acknowledgement. This isn’t right. It wasn’t always like this.

Stop trying to get round it, it's a fact.

@WondrousWinger It’s an analysis based on your “even if” statement. Yes, it only covers secondary. You can do similar for primary if you like.

I hope you recognise however that - in contradiction to what you actually wrote - that if Black teachers were not evenly distributed, but were concentrated in areas with higher numbers of Black students, that would actually make it more likely for Black students to get a Black teacher, not less.

You are correct that most of a child’s teachers would match the majority ethnicity if ethnicities were evenly distributed. You are not correct to imply that it would be an unlikely event for a child to get a teacher that matches their ethnicity (whether ethnicities are evenly distributed or not).

You can stand by your original statement if you like, but the numbers don’t support it. It’s as simple as realising that when you’ve got 60 people and 4% of them have some characteristic, that means 2.4 of those people have that characteristic. If you take 60 people from the UK population, it shouldn’t be surprising if 2 or 3 of them are Black. We’re not talking about 1 in a million or 1 in a thousand.

In general when parents & pupils talk about teacher representation, they’re not talking about every single teacher that comes in contact with their kids. They’re often talking about situations where 10% of the pupils are non-white, yet every teacher is white.

@BacklogBritain

I’ve just broken down your question there. I hope helpful.

Am I right in thinking you yourself have name changed after accusing thoughtful women of being transphobic?
No. I have changed my name when constantly attacked or targeted by persons for reasoning or calling out homo/transphobic comments, not thoughtful women. Thoughtful women are wonderful and make the world go round.

If so, then be careful what you wish for. Mumsnet can already identify who people are. I don’t think they can ID the individual. As far as I know they can only ID via email and IP address (Please do correct me if I’m wrong here), both of which are easily overcome by a recurring troll, reporter or someone wanting to stir mischief.

The only difference with a blue tick is inflammatory people will still keep posting, but you still won't know who they are.
I think that’s where the benefit might lie. Folks may feel less inclined to say hateful things in the first place, attack in the first place and post derogatory posts if linked to their actual ID.

There is a good reason not to have the name change option at all, but of course it's important for women experiencing domestic violence etc.
V much agree, there. There would be a lot to consider for those circumstances.

Perhaps there should be a name change allowed only for certain topics that require people to hide. With a request button to do so. On those threads only. And back to your usual name afterwards. Would that work for you?
I haven’t yet had to come here in deep desperation like I have seen some women have. In all of this, there is more goodness here than not. I’ve seen some beautiful shows of support and kindness from posters. It’s important people have a place to go. So, I’m not looking for an option that would work for me. I don’t have all the answers, but I think IDing people would be a step towards improving existing hateful talk.

This is an actual exchange currently happening with MN in real time. I had to report multiple times before I got even an acknowledgment and more before I got the response below. Possibly so they could invest some time in finding articles to shore up racist statements.

1. I submitted a report. Reason: Hate speech

User Note: 'We absolutely do not tolerate racism or any form of hate speech on Mumsnet and will always delete such posts when they're reported to us - so please do.' From one of you on the thread about MN's issue with racism.

Yet, this person's comments are still up, I had to report them thrice before you even sent me an acknowledgment and you're clearly not going to do anything.

(username redacted) - (2022-12-03 03:38:27):
And - the fear of being called racist is what silenced many scandals such as in Rotherham, Rochdale, Halifax , Facts are facts . Certain crimes are more prevalent in certain demographics than others

2. Response from MN

Hi there,

Thanks for reporting. We considered this post following your report and decided it didn't break our guidelines and is referencing something that has been widely covered in national media, including the BBC (www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-south-yorkshire-28951612). We'd suggest that you challenge the poster if you think they're not considering all issues here.

Best wishes,

Becky

MNHQ

3. Response to ‘Becky’.

Did you actually read that article you sent me? Nothing in that supports the statement ‘Certain crimes are more prevalent in certain demographics than others’. In fact, direct quote:

‘Prof Jay was keen to stress in her report that "there is no simple link between race and child sexual exploitation, and across the UK the greatest numbers of perpetrators of CSE [child sexual exploitation] are white men".’

But, as opposed to doing something about clear racism, you’re ignoring it (I had to report this multiple times to even get a response), defending it, finding articles to support it (although they don’t really) and yet also claiming that you do not tolerate racism on MN. It’s on me to ‘challenge the poster’. You’ve crossed over to actively supporting racism.

@YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet Is this an example of you not tolerating hate speech or racism if any kind? Or is that not on the cards today?

@torquewench
So who was it that made a famous speech
People are still dreaming of that day. People are still judged by the colour of their skin. So ‘not seeing colour’ or ‘not making everything about race’ are not a helpful suggestions and, as I said earlier, phrases that are weaponised by some white people as a way of gaslighting black people who dare suggest that they experience racial prejudice.

That’s shocking. Given white male gangs are the demographic most likely to groom young girls, that post is not accurate and is inflammatory, and should have been deleted

www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/dec/15/child-sexual-abuse-gangs-white-men-home-office-report

Exactly.

• It’s a demonstrably untrue and racist statement.
• I had to report it multiple times to get ANY response.
• When they finally responded, they did nothing but urged me to ‘challenge the poster’, so they are apparently actively encouraging bun fights.
• Someone on the mod team took the time to find an article to shore up the racist comment.
• They didn’t even bother to read said article, as it actually refutes said comment.

This is a common occurrence and exactly the sort of thing I mean. But, these are the mods who we are required to trust to safeguard the interests of minority posters.

Shocking. Thanks for pursuing @MovingOutofZone2 , even if it feels futile.

FFS Mumsnet. Get your bloody act together and mod the racism and other bigotry out.

Just to be clear on my previous post, I do support name changing as it's useful in many situations on mumsnet - just that it would be good to have an option to be able to get myself verified as Jane Smith behind the scenes, and then whatever name I post under (and I'm still able to change my username as many times as I want) shows a 'blue tick' (or whatever), so others know I am a real person - I'm not a bot, troll etc.

Non-verified posters should also be allowed to post, name change etc, they just wouldn't show a 'verified' tick.

Then users could make their own decisions about whether to engage fully with an unverified poster.

It should also mean mn admin could link the name changes to the verified person - so even if someone was verified, if their posts were constantly being reported, they could be chucked off the site and wouldn't be able to be verified again.

Thanks for reinstating the thread MN, it's a discussion that needs to be held.

That's shocking @MovingOutofZone2 . Except, well, this week maybe not as much as it might have been last week. As I said in the thread on site stuff, I have been very surprised at the sheer scale of the racism and apologists for racists that has been posted on here this week.

Great post by @Energypanic .

@MovingOutofZone2

We did consider your report and decided the post didn't break guidelines. The poster added at the end of their post (not included above) that the majority of the people they have arrested are white British.

Other posts you reported, did break guidelines, and were removed.

Re Rotherham:

The new report outlines in grim, “uncomfortable to read” detail the repeated police failings in their handling of allegations in Rotherham. It found that time and again police officers were not fully aware of, or able to deal with child sexual abuse and exploitation offences. Officers repeatedly lacked empathy, with some seeing children as “consenting” to their exploitation.

One parent concerned about a missing daughter said they were told by an officer “it was a ‘fashion accessory’ for girls in Rotherham to have an ‘older Asian boyfriend’ and that she would grow out of it”.

Another parent was told by an officer investigating the rape of his 15-year-old daughter in a Rotherham park that the incident would teach the child a “lesson"

^www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/22/costly-report-into-rotherham-police-failings-lets-down-grooming-survivors^

So where exactly does the "fear of being called racist" come into play here?

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/jun/22/costly-report-into-rotherham-police-failings-lets-down-grooming-survivors

Please explain how untrue assertions about ‘certain demographics’ don’t break guidelines with regards to racism and hate speech.

At time of posting my last comment, not a single one of that poster’s comments on that thread (which I had reported multiple times, starting roughly 12 hours ago) had been removed. Not one. You have now deleted said thread, within the last 15 minutes, which is interesting timing.

I have more examples of MN refusing to delete racist comments and the email conversations that followed, if you’d like me to share them here. This isn’t even the worst one, it was just the most recent.

@MovingOutofZone2 I’ve just realised that I don’t always report all racist posts because I’m unconsciously self-censoring myself based on what I think MNHQ, as a predominantly white company, will choose to delete or not.

I do think MNHQ take the path of least resistance because black and Asian people are less likely to complain than white people, because we don’t think we will believed or taken seriously.

The phenomenon of black and Asian people not complaining as much happens in many situations - in the workplace, with medical care, with police, in schools. It stands to reason that it happens on MN too. And the beneficiaries of this reticence are white people.

Many, many professionals have come forward to discuss the pressure that was placed on them not to speak out about this systemic abuse because of who the perpetrators were/ are (it’s still happening).

Yes. To every word of this.

Honestly, I know this thread will likely achieve nothing. The good Becky is unlikely to come back and admit that the mod team has a race problem and needs to examine that. Judging by the manner in which they ignore reports and emails, she’s unlikely to deign to come back at all.

However, if the conversations get a few posters thinking about the subject, I think it was worthwhile.

Such bollocks. They were caught having fucked up massively and this was their excuse. In actual fact police and council services were aware of what was going on, and reports were circulated, but the misogyny around these “bad girls” who had “brought it on themselves” were too ingrained to do anything about it.

The police aren’t worried about being accused of racism when they stop and search a disproportionate number of black and Asian men are they? Or when yet another black man dies in police custody after too forceful “restraint”.

Police might not be but social workers are. Teachers are. Care workers are. Council workers are.
I don’t want to say too much about my own personal link with this but it was absolutely an environment of fear and the heavy implication you would/ could lose your job if you voiced any concerns.

It’s not just the mods team though this kind of issue is top down.

Iirc a poster on the Black MNers forum was in contact with Justine on the matter but she was not receptive and nothing has changed.

Justine needs to acknowledge the problem and engage all MN staff in racial awareness training including herself. MN needs to specify in the Ts&Cs that racism will not be tolerated which includes microaggressions (and threads that pretend to be about sex offences but are really just an excuse to air racism). Right now - they don’t get it at all.

A little balance here to the claim that it is most likely the white men demographic who groom young girls

www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-home-office-s-grooming-report-is-an-exercise-in-obfuscation/

To be honest, I don’t really care who does it most (it’s males regardless of race or any other factor). It does concern me that we are still not able to discuss the specific cases of Rotherham and Rochdale, where thousands of young girls were allowed to be systematically raped, because of who the perpetrators were because other perpetrators also commit similar crimes. It worries me that posters would speak over the experiences of the professionals who finally spoke out against it and deem themselves more knowledgeable.

It worries me that this is STILL happening and we are still more concerned with what colour skin the men have who are perpetrating this abuse and whether it’s polite to discuss it.