Diane Abbott....racist comment or not?

[festi]

I think If you look and consider what she said in the context of the discussuion she was having. I believe she has a very valid point, she did make a generalised remark and by definition that was racist, but, it was in my opinion acceptable for her to generate discussion and break down the barriers that exist (the fear of counter accusations of racism) in discussuing the exposure openly.

Anyone else remember her "Finnish nurses" comment?

This is not the first time she has made bigoted comments about white people. If she did not want her remarks to be "taken out of context", perhaps she should have supplied some context in the first place.

Just another interesting thing I read about her. she went to Harrow Girls Grammar and Michael Portillo was in the boys school and he came into contact with her in the 6th form.

i think there is a programme on BBC4 tonight about Grammar schools but that is another thread

thanks Herbie Tea, I think the colonial comment was dreamt up after the event. I don't do twitter so the tag doesn't mean much to me.

I fail to see a problem with her being excited about getting her son christened in the House of Commons. Very, very few black women have ever been members of that exclusive and privileged club, and there's nothing wrong with her revelling in the fact that for once, someone with her genitals and ethnicity gets the trappings. I like it when I see black women strutting around in the corridors of power, so I don't see why someone who actually is a black woman shouldn't. It makes me happy to think of Michelle Obama and her girls having the run of the White House, too.

The Finnish nurses comment was rather reprehensible, as was the one about white women's personal hygiene.

Oh! there's more, and attacking an individual nurse?

The bit I remembered was her saying that blonde haired blue eyed nurses shouldn't be allowed to come to work in Hackney as they'd never have seen a black person before.

No, neither do I.Fabulous to have her son christened there but as I said, she loves to attack the very things she aspires to and wants to be part of.
You can't have it both ways and expect peopel to take you seriously.

If that was said by a white person there would be a big hooha about it. Racism works both ways!

but it doesn't seem to. I think that is why people get so fed up.

Dianne Abbott has a career built on her ethnic minority-ness. The last thing she wants is a society where race doesn't matter as then she would be seen for the non-entity she is.

Has she actually attacked MPs getting their children christened at Westminster? She was a hypocrite with regards to her son's education, but I'm not seeing it re baptism.

I think she needs to step down, can you Imagen if it were the other way round there would be hell to pay.

I think she has to go silly woman

no not attacked anyone Frangelina.
i think what Moondog is saying is that it is slightly hypocritical to spend a lot of time slagging off the "white society" the way she does and yet bend over backwards to fit into that exact world.

I think its already been swept under the carpet tbh, she aint going anywhere soon im afraid. Maybe if she went to a party with folk dressed as nazis

I have no idea why people are getting so worked up about this.

She was having a twitter conversation with a journalist, the journalist said she didn't like constant referrals to "the black community" and Diane Abbott argued that the idea of the "black community" was an important one. In doing so, she said something supposedly offensive to white people. Am I offended? Am I heck. Seriously, hand on heart, is any other white person here offended? Truly offended?

Yes, politicians need to be careful about what they say on Twitter. But it's sad when finger-wagging takes precedence over the actual issues being discussed.

If it was the other way around....whites need to stick together, don't be playing into those black divide and conquer tactics....it would be racist so that's why people are talking about this.

I didn't know about the blonde nurse thing and I find that insulting too! The history of black women in nursing in this country is interesting and I remember older workers both black and white telling me that black women got pushed into midwifery or care of the elderly rather than A&E or surgery as back in the 50's and 60's there was alot of racism in the NHS. But to say that white nurses can't work in Hackney is so insulting and shows how she sees people. She sees the colour of someone's skin before seeing the person rather than the person and she sees people in homogenous groups rather than a broad category of individuals with complex life stories.

yes.

I am very much offended by a great deal of what Abbott said during that conversation and various other statements she has made in the past.

Whilst i take your point that the articulation of a point should not take precedence over the actual issue being discussed, but the outright racist comments that this MP makes continually should not be tolerated.

If a woman on my bus said this I wouldn't care.
She is an MP. She wrote it. She is very short sighted if she thinks there would be no backlash.
When she sent her son to a private school I did think she was a hypocrite but didn't think it was the end of the world. What really, really pissed me off though and still rankles is the way she defended her decision. She wrote an article for the Guardian that said the decision to send her son to private school was a 'devastating' decision to have to make. The use of the word devastating in this context causes me massive anger!

White people as a group have oppressed, exploited, enslaved and murdered non-white people for generations. Dianne Abbot was bang on the money when she said these tactics were as old as colonialism. What she said is true, and I speak as a white person.

I'm not offended. Stephen Lawrence was murdered for the colour of his skin; a skin colour that meant the police didn't care and it has taken more years to catch the culprits than Lawrence was alive. The judge can't sentence the convicted as he would for a hate crime - because hate crime didn't exist as a concept when they committed their crime, less than twenty years ago. As a nation, we didn't officially give a shit about racist acts until comparatively recently.

But, y'know, a black woman - one of the few black women in parliament, a fact that in itself should raise eyebrows - tweeted something that has hurt white people's feelings. Get a bloody grip.

Bang on OldMumsy.
These people have a lot to gain from the perpetuation of a situation they purport to be striving to remedy.

Oh yes, and for all those who believe that if a white politician had said a similar thing they'd be fired instantaneously, I give you...Boris Johnson. Who has beeing saying undisputably racist things for years ('watermelon smiles', anyone?) and where is he now?

Oh yes, he's Mayor of London.

Have you read any of this thread victor?
Are you aware that she often brings race into things, where race has absolutely no part in it.

Finnish nurses, West Indian Mothers, White people..... how often can she make remarks which, in her view, suggests a very clear demarcation between the behaviour of "white" and "non-whites" before people accept there is a pattern of clearly disparaging white people.

Racism is just fucking wrong. I could cry over the behaviour of some of my ancestors as a white (half-Irish, half-English child who was abused for my Irish blood) but her remarks are out of line.

Don't bloody well try to defend them.

disparaging view of

ancestors as a white woman

It's not ideal.
She should be behaving to the standards she (rightly) demands of the rest of society.
But as things stand, overall my view is in line with Gollancz's

I am white. I am offended. In fact I am absolutely bloody outraged that an MP would lump people together according to the colour of their skin. This isnt about my feelings being hurt. It is about someone in a position of power expressing openly racist views. And this is NOT a one off. She has said worse before.

Of course I've read the thread.

Her remarks should be examined, of course they should. But in this case it is demonstrable fact that non-white people have been systematically exploited, enslaved and demonised by white people. The tactic of 'divide and rule' is accepted fact.

Calling attention to accepted fact in a badly worded way is not racism.

The colonialism reason was an excuse. Her tense and use of the English language clearly implied she was not speaking past-tense.

For fuck-sake, people defending her are doing more harm than good.

Even she (with her arm tied behind her back and her face smacked into a frozen grimace by Ed Milli) has apologised for it.