To think people don't realise how much racism is directed towards Eastern Europeans ?

[rudolphrainbownose]

My boyfriend is Latvian, I am English. I've never really mixed much with the eastern european community until we started dating two years ago, so naively assumed racism wouldn't be so much of an issue.
However, my boyfriend works security at a railway station. He is often allocated to a very small station in town, and so is normally the only employee/ worker present. Due to this, his employer provides him and all staff with body worn cameras so there is audio/ visual proof of the following. Whenever people start behaving in an antisocial way at the station, ( e.g. kids trespassing on the tracks, smoking/ drinking alcohol, attempting to board trains without tickets etc), he will challenge this as part of his job. Obviously, as soon as he starts speaking/ engaging with these people, it is clear he has a strong eastern European accent. Without fail, they will normally retort, "well f back home/ back to Poland", ( he is not Polish, has never even been to Poland, but it is always "go back to Poland," ), that is the insult. Yesterday evening he tried to stop a man from stealing a passenger's bike, ( they have bike lock/ sheds there) . The man became enraged and started yelling , "just here for our benefits, go back to Poland!" ( despite the fact my boyfriend was in work uniform and obviously working). When my DP pointed out he was working and so not a benefit claimant anyway, the guy became very aggressive, shouted , "just f off back home and pushed my partner over." I'm genuinely shocked. Whilst physical violence like last night is rare, the "go back to Poland!" comments seem to happen at least once a month or so, just for doing his job and asking people not to steal/ smoke / drink/ tresspass etc at the station.

It's got to the stage that he insisted our daughter , ( two months old), had my surname when we registered her, as he didn't want her to receive abuse for having an eastern european name. AIBU to feel we don't actually recognise this group receive a lot of abuse ? To be perfectly honest, I was not aware of the extent of it until I met my partner.

On the other hand, it may just be that working security , ( and therefore "annoying," people by asking them to stop antisocial behaviour so they retaliate), means he is unfortunately much more prone to abuse than someone working in a shop/ factory / office etc

Firstly I am so sorry to hear of your other half’s experience of racism and ignorance. You pointed out he was allocated to a “very small station “ which I presume is somewhere semi rural or a small town. This may explain some of the strange intrenched weird racism.

however I feel YABU a bit for positing that this is somehow an experience that is universal across the UK and “people don’t know how much racism is directed” just from your experience.

I live in London and that view would be shouted down wherever I go. But that’s just my experience, just as yours is yours. Neither of us can speak for the entire UK

Or maybe people just aren't that interested?

We can only be angry at so many things on behalf of other people at any one time. None is my preferred number.

Where on earth did I say black people were talking too much about racism !? For the avoideance of doubt, I think racism full stop to anyone , ( obviously to black people), is utterly vile. I don't get where you got from my post I thought black people had spoken about racism too much ?

I don't know if other people realise that there is a lot racism against eastern Europeans but I always suspected there was. We had Brexit after all, which was mostly (!!!) due to racism against eastern Europeans, partially die to racism by some ignorant people who thought that Brexit will keep out brown people like me and there might have been about 50 people who had non bigoted reasons to vote for Brexit.

What's worse is I think that Brexit seems to have given racists a voice. Racism and xenophobia seems seems to be accepted now. I blame our politicians who made it a talking point for the sake of winning votes.

I'm sorry that your boyfriend is receiving so much of racist abuse. He shouldn't have to experience that. It's heart breaking that he thinks your daughter will be subjected to racism if anyone knows about her eastern European heritage. Heartbreaking but maybe sensible. I worry for my children too.

It's both reasons. He gets mild verbal racism here and there but his job is a grim one...dealing with criminally minded people. He can change jobs.

Your boyfriend is experiencing Xenophobia which is dreadful. But it is not racism (unless he is non white).

He is white. I assume you mean racism is directed at people based on skin colour and xenophobia is directed at people based on nationality, is that right ?

Last time I checked Slav was a race.

Also, just stop with your this isn't racism or that isn't racism. It all comes from the same place. The semantics are just distracting from the real issue and usually people say that to shut up people complaining about racism (or xenophobia, regionalism, anti semitism, islamophobia, etc. Racism is a good enough term for all of these).

The job pays pretty well, but yes, I do take your point and he himself has acknowledged in other jobs prior to this one, ( he used to work in hospitality), he very rarely experienced the go home abuse to the extent he is doing now, ( presumably because he wasn't challenging/ upsetting people when working in catering).

A lot of people are very xenophobic, and my children (half Eastern European) have been told to go home, told that people from their culture smell, crap like that. Had to go up to primary school to deal with it. Constant banging on about Romania and Bulgaria joining the EU was behind it about a decade ago, media portraying everyone as poor and having donkeys when they have a well-educated middle class like in the UK, now it's Albanians. Not the same as racism but a hatred of difference nonetheless. Roma people are persecuted across Europe.

Eastern european countries also have a big racism problem of their own. Everyone is racist against everyone else. It's all wrong.

The xenophobic behaviour your boyfriend is experiencing is horrible so no excusing that but my fiancée works in security (he is as English as you can get in accents) and he gets called all sorts of things everyday, unfortunately its a job that means dealing with the utter scum of society, drunk people, people who are high, obnoxious twats etc and getting called names and being verbally and physically assaulted comes with the territory.

Rubbish. It’s racism

Because there have been countless threads these last few days of white people denying racism exists and now you’ve decided to complain about “racism” against your partner, and how “no one talks about that” which is a common complaint from people who pretend racism against black people is an exaggeration? I am doubtful that the timing is a coincidence.

Also, as people on here always say about how you can’t be sexist against men, you can’t be racist against white people. Many will come along to tell me that all men have privilege but #notallwhitepeople, though.

@Lndnmummy ffs does it matter? What are you gaining by making that distinction? Slav is a race.

But if he was fat say, they would of been calling him a fat fuck. Yes it's racism, but it's the context in which it's given in these situations, you said yourself, they're individuals who are drinking, taking drugs and acting anti socially, therefore these are naturally going to be aggressive and abusive individuals once challenged, they just target the most obvious thing to cause maximum harm... attack is the first line of defence and all that! Which in your husbands case is his "foreign" accent. For this reason YABU as its not generalisable to the vast majority of the public. Its more to do with his line of work.

No one said anything about black people at all except you. Here you are though belittling ops experience of racism. Pretty sick stuff

Where did you get this from?

Just to be clear, I don't think racism against black people is exaggerated at all. I think it is underplayed if anything. This thread was prompted by my boyfriend being assaulted by a (white), man whilst telling him to go home. I do not think and have never said that racism against black people doesn't happen or shouldn't be dealt with.

If it is relevant, there are few minorities of any kind in our town, ( few black , asian, eastern europeans etc), which may explain the behaviour.

I refer you to the post above by buteverythingisfine

Hear that OP, if he doesn't like vile bigotry, he can give up his living.

What's worse is I think that Brexit seems to have given racists a voice

This isn’t unique to the U.K. My SIL in Denmark is married to a man born in Denmark to Polish parents. He is blond & blue eyed, speaks perfect Danish, but has repeatedly experienced prejudice and racism because of his Polish surname. When they married, he took SILs Danish surname because he didn’t want their DC to experience the same prejudice.

It amazes me how many people cry Brexit etc and imagine the U.K. is the most xenophobic country in Europe - in reality, other places are even worse.

Of course you can be sexist towards either sex and racist towards anyone. If your response to someone’s experience of racism is to be angry because you think one group has a monopoly on racism then you’re a pretty unpleasant individual imo.