Do you find this offensive?

[Meeting]

The Theatre Royal Stratford East is putting on a show and have blocked out 2 dates as "Blackout" nights where they encourage (but I don't think plan to enforce) that only black people may attend these performances.

I saw them discussing it on Piers Morgan and neither of the guests advocating for it were able to convince me that this type of segregation was at all beneficial.

Does anybody think this is a good idea? Personally I think segregation based on skin colour has no place in society, no matter who benefits from it. But I'm interested to hear from others who might away it differently?

I don't give a shiny shite. I think it's important to listen to black people on these issues, not white people moaning. I'm white by the way.

I'm white. I think it's a brilliant idea.

Incidentally, in case anyone on here is worried, it's fine to say Happy Christmas and celebrate St George's Day.

When you want to encourage children to come to an event, you put on things which children will enjoy and relax those 'rules' which are culturally adult.

If the audiences are predominantly white isn't that because what's on appeals to a more white audience? Or is it that theatre's a more white sort of experience generally regardless of what's going on onstage?

Meeting I'm no more or less an authority than you are, but I am politically engaged and it walks with me.

More importantly you are the person who dragged our culture in here as part of trying to object to other peoples trying to advance their culture, to give weight to your dislike of it. You chose to do that.
I tried to tell you nicely and failed. So I said it straight because intended or not, it's dog whistle stuff aligning us with those that hear it. You have the right to align yourself, and I have the right to shine a light on it.

I left the small bit of school I got without primary school reading level. Decades back I was at it teaching myself to read and write to fight what was happening to us. We now have the internet at our fingertips.
The 'large portion' who are ill educated do not live some sort of more authentic lifestyle than those who educate themselves. You play into others hands if you think we should be defined only by the least educated.

As to not living a 'gypsy lifestyle,' what do you know of how I and my family live and make our money? You don't, you really don't. But what do you think a 'gypsy lifestyle' is? Is it listening to Piers Morgan, and saying what other cultures should do or not?

Does it include meeting on Mumsnet disagreeing about who should get to be at a theater performance of all things? Do we stop having a 'gypsy lifestyle' through being here? 😂

They build a wall to keep you in,
It serves to keep them out.
So when they set their feet upon the wall
Be aware what you're about.

OK I have read both of those but it doesn't really explain my point . Is it because I am white I have not experienced racism during the 25 years I lived in predominantly black countries? That it is not relevant because it isn't of a certain level? Was I misreading what happened to me?

What you experienced might have been prejudiced but it wasn’t racism. White people globally are a privileged race whether they live in a majority black country or not.

One thing I have learned from this thread is that as a white person I am even more offensive as I possess " a white gaze". I had never even heard of this phrase until here. Do all white people have this or just some? It seems to me that this phrase lumps all white people into one blob of people who think all the same and have the same experience. What a load of nonsense. Is there a reverse? "A black gaze" - same conditions apply.

White people ARE a minority in that area I went to school nearby and was one of 2 white people in my form group and in majority of classes and that was in the 80s. Even less white people there now

I'm not trying to be obtuse. Why is it prejudice and not racist? Am I not of the race that colonised many black countries? Is it not mine and every white person's fault that there was slavery?

Now you just need to post ‘All lives matter’ and my bingo card will be complete.

The fact that you are posting fighting against something that could benefit black people shows just how privileged you are, OP.

Ok now apply that to phrases like the male gaze and how feminist talk of the problems caused by men as a class. Same principle. If you’re fine with that, why do you have a problem with this?

Imagine trying to absorb and discuss issues pertaining to your race and experience as a {insert minority ethnic group} person, and this person decides to enter the conversation with their own questions and making it about them.

Even white people who know better will roll their eyes.

@CandyLips

Have you never heard of the phrase 'the male gaze' either? If not, it's easy to Google.

Do you take issue with that phrase too?

Right, so here's a thought -

The fact that it didn't occur to me that this was a stupid thing to ask until after l'd asked it is why we need private sessions for minority groups, so they can get down to the bones of what they've experienced without having to field a whole chorus of "Yeah but why ... ?" flimflammery from the rest of us!

So it's a degeneration into "we were treated badly", "were treated badder" , "no we were treated badderer" and " we treated you badly but we can make it better".

Is there a hierarchy of racism is the worst, xenophobia second, bigotry next, chosen phobia after that and ogony bringing up the rear?

Why not call it all "hate" and get off our backsides to try to stop it, understand why people do it and try to get them to understand why it is wrong.

Hate is far too simplistic and is usually just used to make majority groups feel good. Hate is the more extreme end of what is involved in racism. Most of us can comfort ourselves by telling ourselves we have no complicity in structural racism because we don’t hate people of different races.

But structural racism is about far more than people being actively abused or attacked or openly discriminated against because of their race.

There is evidence that a CV submitted for a job bearing an English sounding name will be much more likely to get an interview than the exact same CV bearing a name of African origin. That’s not necessarily because recruiters hate people of African descent but more likely they have been conditioned to trust familiarity and make assumptions about people of colour that they may not even be aware of.

The security guard who follows a black customer but not a white customer might not hate black people, but somewhere along the way they have learned to assume that the black customer is a bigger risk.

This forum is filled with threads of white people who would all insist they don’t have black people. And in most cases they’re being honest - they probably don’t. But they nonetheless insist that their assessment of what is appropriate reaction to racism (or even what constitutes racism) is more valid, and demonstrating more concern about majority groups who might be accused of causing offence than minority groups who experience that offence.

Hate covers only one, extreme, end of structural racism. But it’s a comforting one because most of us don’t hate people of other races. But reducing it down to hate ignores the assumptions, prejudices, white centring, profiling and othering that all form part of racism.

Who has said that white gaze is offensive?

Don't be so touchy!

No-one is judging you as a terrible racist. They're just asking you to consider abstaining from a couple of performances of a theatre show. Who could take offence at that?

Meeting. You're reading too much into it.

As a non white woman, I would more likely go if I knew other non white women would be present. It's not a situation that ww would have to think about in this country.

There's no malice involved, unless you're specifically looking for it...

We have never had segregation in this country and I desperately hope we never do. These theatre productions are the thin end of the wedge.

The default in this country is white. So, as a ww, you can frequent most places, if not all, and see people who look like you.

As a non white person, that is not always guaranteed. So, if I decided to go to a production like this, there would be no Ill intention, it would be so I could be around people who looked like me (representation). I would not be sat there, plotting revenge, as some of you have alluded, I would be enjoying a production with people who looked like me and who were less likely to make me feel uncomfortable because I looked like me.

What is so hard about that to understand?

And please don't try and minimise or gaslight what I have said. Having lived both in this county and brought up in South Africa, I am very very aware of how things roll.

I don't hate anyone. But sometimes it is nice to be around familiarity. I can't go back to Zim so I am making the best of things here with my black family, and my white family.

@AAAAABBBBBCCCCC , it is not hard to understand, but it is old fashioned racism (from before critical race theory)

Yet another who hasn’t bothered to read or to address the very explicit and detailed posts explaining why events like this might be reasonable.

This of course is a perfect illustration of why a pp who tried to conflate racism and hate was misguided - racism exists in this form as a wilful refusal to even engage in the arguments put forward in support of this sort of event.

Well I don't consider all men to be the same. I think it is a very narrow way of looking at life.