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.

YABU.

@LoisLane66 Megan is mixed race race so it's 50/50. The truth is sometimes as ANY mixed race person the black community will say to you as mixed race or you are not black enough.

Regarding the white community mixed race people are NOT part of the white community. People claim they thought she was white.... I mean really? You can clearly see she is mixed race and uses hair straightens along with a good hairdresser.

Race is complex even white women can have kids with a black man and STILL be racist.

But that's another tail........

‘Your’ - if you’re going to be a twat at least make sure you can spell 🙄

Absolutely agree OP, blatant racism, antisemitism and xenophobia on this site recently is absolutely vile. It never fails to amaze me how many people can’t tell the difference between free speech and just being a cunt.

No. You can't equate these two things. Mumsnet is a haven for what the majority of the population believe to be true - that trans rights activism has gone too far, and is actually ruining the good work that LGB activism has done, both for gay rights and women's rights.

Exactly. Not comparable at all. Wanting to protect womens rights is not Transphobia

Whenever someone doesn't like MM, it must be because of racism in some posters eyes. It's just ridiculous

I thought that was so black women would have a space to discuss issues that affect them in a specific way because of their race. A place where they don’t have to accept a white person’s view point on something that will never affect them in the same way.
Similar to mumsnet really. It’s a space for women to discuss issues that affect them in a specific way because of their sex without having to accept a male perspective on that issue.

I agree op and if it continues I will be coming off. which is a shame as I first joined for the parenting advice and it still is very helpful for that but MN have to realise that these days other forums are available. It does make you realise that these posters are part of every day society, the work place, school gates , the gym etc, These are the real views they have but don't say it face to face.

I think their workforce must be a factor -maybe like many companies the minorities are at the lower end of the hierarchy which makes the figures look acceptable but nothing else.

But yes I too brace myself for many threads more recently I am getting familiar with the usernames and skip the usual suspects.

I am Asian and I disagree with you. Yes there can be racism, and when I have seen it i have always also seen it removed here. Sometimes there can be differences of opinions and cultural insensitivity, but that doesn't mean mumsnet is racist. My aim is also to just rise above the petty crap. The bigger stuff needs dealing with, but I'm not wasting my life on older white people not quite getting it right. They'll get it eventually.

It's a UK website..of course it will have racist comments towards other minorities

But surely ever country is the same. My husband works all over the world the most racist country he has come across against him was Angola.

I think it doesn't matter where you are in this world..humans are inherently racist against anything that isn't the same as them.

I don't think it's right, but unfortunately humans in general aren't particularly nice.

Scroll on and ignore any idiots.

Sadly MN is indicative of wider society. Brexit, Boris etc has made racists feel emboldened in recent years.
I saw a man screaming at an elderly Muslim woman for queuing the “wrong way” in covid times. Outright racism in the middle of the street and he actually said it! “We can say how we feel about you lot again” both here and in the US far right politics has done a very clever number in creeping into the mainstream

The only specific example given here is about only white kid in all black school.
That may have been A) fantasy poster B) hyperbole. However... there have been a lot of "Don't want my kid to be only PoC at white school" threads, too. Yes there's a difference in situation/reality but fundamentally it's same anxiety, so I don't feel racist to raise that anxiety either way.

Obsession with interpretting everything as sexism, every male as selfish predator &/or paranoia about trans-rights-extremism is pretty rife on MN. I'm tired of those tedious obsessions on MN.

A lot of "ageism" accusations on MN are about statements i can agree with & don't find offensive (am speaking as 'older adult').

Aww @Ivyblu, let LoisLane66 tell mixed race people how to feel.

I mean she is an expert, what with her quarter Irish and quarter Spanish roots.

i need to know more about the "fail safe card" and " race armour"......

This thread is doing a really good job of proving OP’s point.

YANBU

You’re right.

I’m not sure if MN have changed the way they moderate but it seems to me that comments and threads are left to stand that, in the past, would have been deleted.

I reported this as homophobic and it was left to stand.

’I had heard there was a problem and accusations in the 1990s of gay women harassing younger straight women in sport which put many potential sportswomen off pursuing a career.’

I find the lack of tolerance generally on MM has got much worse.

I've been in here for 20 years and I'm appalled at how some people just can't wait to put the boot in.

I'm seeing this reflected in society more since the pandemic, selfish, intolerant behaviour. People seem to have become very insular and me, me me.

I hear you op.

ableism and disablism is also rife and it's not being effectively dealt with.

See this is a perfect example. Plenty of Black people aren't visiting or recently moved here, they are British and Black. Being a Black Brit is not the same as being a tourist in another country, you can't just go back home after 2 weeks. You are home.
It isn't two ways, only one group holds institutional power and only one group was considered to be not human and enslaved.

As for your "fail safe card", what a very telling comment. You are a white woman who has no idea or experience what it is like to be Black or from a visible ethnic minority yet you feel you can confidently assume that people are falsely claiming to experience racism...why? Is it because you despite saying people shouldn't see colour (something white people seem very confident in saying but not in doing) you are actually quite prejudice to people who aren't white.

Also Dutch, Mexican, Brazilian, Austrian, Polish etc are nationalities not races or ethnic groups. You can be Black and any one of those. Brazilians are one of the most ethnically diverse populations on earth

You know MN deletes any transphobic posts that are reported don't you?

Standing up for single sex spaces prisons, sport, refuges, and safeguarding children is not transphobic. Pointing out the flaws in Mermaids operation is not transphobic. You do know Mermaids are now being investigated by the Charity Commission?

Furthermore then implying that women who want to protect women's single sex spaces are therefore racist without showing any evidence there is significant overlap in posters is overreach to say the least.

@LoisLane66 who are you referring to when you say ‘we’ and ‘our’ when you speak about the laws in Britain? And who is ‘their’ when you mention ‘their customs’?

That’s disgusting. I’m Asian as is my elderly, disabled mum. Two women were walking behind her in the high street and then one of them suddenly rammed her in then back of her legs with her push chair. When my mum, shocked and hurt, asked why they did that, they replied ‘You were walking too slow’.

I wish I had been there, I felt so helpless when she told me, that I couldn’t protect my own mum.

@LoisLane66 doing a very good job of proving the OP’s point

Ever hear of The Troubles?

Mumsnet has taught me a lot about racism. Not the overt sort... but the insidious minor comments that many people casually say. Even if its just a minority saying them, it all adds up.

I also think, as a nation, its still socially acceptable to use "American" as an insult. Most commonly on Halloween and Christmas threads.

I agree with you. I'm white bit grew up in a country where most of the population is black. Sadly in the UK I've witnessed far more extreme racism and xenophobia in the UK than I ever experienced in my own country, on paper the UK seems tolerant but in reality it isn't. I think unfortunately MN represents the general UK population. I wish people could appreciate cultural diversity rather than creating conflict as it really enriches society.

Oh look, a measured, considered post on Mumsnet's race problem.

And right on cue comes @LoisLane66, first, with a dog whistle, and then to deny the identity that Meghan has had her whole life as the child of a black mother and a white father and to reclassify her as "more than 50% white".

What gives you the right and freedom to think you can reclassify someone's race? Your long experience with the Race Classification Board of apartheid South Africa perhaps? Or was it your internship with Mengele?

Can't we get past all this

No we cannot.

For as long as your country and its white majority is unwilling to discuss the legacy of slavery and colonialism, this will not go away.

A whole continent, the largest continent at that, was governed by the British, the French and others on the basis of racial segregation, white superiority and black inferiority. Entire islands in the Caribbean are peopled today with the descendants of slaves, of black men and women who were shipped across the Atlantic as cargo to be bought and sold at auction, with black women raped by their white "masters" to produce slave children, who were considered black because they had just "one drop" of black blood in them.

Our societies were upended on the basis of race, our modern nations established on racial lines.

Black people live EVERY DAY with the legacy of slavery and colonialism, and in Britain, there are people like you who won't even have a conversation about it. worse, who, when told about racism, simply dismiss it.

So no, the race question is not going away. Do what America did. Take it on, look it in the eye, discuss it.

Listen, read and learn.

And do better.