Concerns about racism

[PandoraSocks]

Hi there Mumsnet HQ

Many of us are concerned about the uptick of hatred, xenophobia and racism on the site over the past couple of weeks. Most of the bigotry is focused on asylum seekers. MNHQ will of course delete racism etc. if reported, but this has gone way beyond a few hateful posts.

Links below to three examples of threads which have descended into real nastiness.

Cheers.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/in_the_news/5385273-civil-unrest-whats-really-going-on?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5385914-do-you-believe-there-will-be-a-civil-war?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/5386073-to-be-so-fed-up-amd-disheartened-with-all-the-xenophobia?utm_campaign=thread&utm_medium=share

No, it’s logic. If you are aware that women and children will suffer as a result of unvetted immigration from misogynistic regimes, but are happy to give it the green light regardless, then you consider that an acceptable price to pay to enact your vision of multiculturalism. I stand by that, and it isn’t racist. In the same way people cheering for transwomen to enter women’s prisons are happy to risk women to affirm their views on gender identity. It’s no different.

The thread title is Concerns about racism Not necessarily just Illegal Immigration. I was talking about the claims on various threads that all Muslim men are misogynist and women and girls are in danger. I think you actually know that though and are just acting dumb.

Fair enough but they didn’t quote where anyone has been racist purely based on skin colour so it seemed a strange kind of straw man.

We’d really prefer to encourage a culture of reporting concerns directly

Are they serious? Report and the reported post stays and the reporter gets deleted. That’s real encouragement.

Jeez Mumsnet. Has the heat blinded you to the light as well?

Perhaps MNHQ should reconsider their approach to deleting personal attacks if they want posters to continue to challenge posts on the thread rather than moderate themselves.

If a post is a strongly felt and accurate rebuttal of some reprehensible opinion which contains a single line which is arguably a personal attack, then perhaps they could edit the post to remove the personal attack rather than removing the entire post.

So interesting that the poster in question thinks we're talking about "illegal immigration". When that wasn't actually the focus of the thread. Very telling.

Excellent idea.

This is particularly disappointing as BeckyA/mnhq have not returned to this thread, despite further points being raised/questions being asked

I'm with you. I'm saying Inchworm's Comment about accepting the sacrifice of women and children as victims is disgusting. I'm an immigrant myself and I have been sexually abused by 2 Iranians immigrants, who drove me around and groped all over my body. If I hadn't cried in distress I would have been raped. It gave me trauma. So to say that kind incident is acceptable for the same of multiculturalism is absolutely disgusting.

Can I even say they are Iranians? People like OP will say I'm racist.

Yes and I repeat, where did I say racism shouldn’t be censored?

This is quite a disappointing response from MNHQ. I would really like to know if they perceive that their current approach to moderation is generating light rather than heat.

The message is pretty clear tbh. They're happy with the status quo, they're not interested in changing it and we can either suck it up or go elsewhere.

The culture of reporting is problematic though, as we have seen in the last couple of days

Good grief I’m very sorry you were put through that. I expect your comment will go ignored - but it’s been taken on board by me. Women and children first, always.

@MNHQThis thread was not aimed to be a critique, it was aimed at getting answers about genuine concerns about the site direction - in view of an increasing amount of threads full of posters spreading mis/disinformation and clearly pushing a racist agenda. The only answer we got is to keep reporting, which clearly raises even more concerns. I would really have appreciated a better clarification from MNHQ.

I’d say wanting to censor any questioning that mass immigration, illegal immigration and multiculturalism has been anything but a success would be far left and I consider that an extreme ideology.

The mainstream views come from
the mainstream,i.e, it’s not outside normal views that immigration of 9 million people per 10 years and not checking the background of immigrants is going to have negative effects. Immigration is cited as a major concern for 56% of people now.

I’d say wanting to censor any questioning that mass immigration, illegal immigration and multiculturalism has been anything but a success would be far left and I consider that an extreme ideology.

The mainstream views come from
the mainstream,i.e, it’s not outside normal views that immigration of 9 million people per 10 years and not checking the background of immigrants is going to have negative effects. Immigration is cited as a major concern for 56% of people now.

Power and wealth are not infinite and in order to grant more to people who have less, someone will have to lose something.

I can stand to lose. I would prefer the truly rich and powerful lose more, but I can’t wait around for them and the question of ‘truly’ is relative anyway. The only question is where to draw the line about what’s an appropriate amount, what that ‘losing’ looks like. I’m very happy to admit my line is pretty extreme, by MN standards, but it’s always under review.

There are of course intersectional questions and questions of specific situations that come into it, but I don’t think this thread is really the place for that, esp on page 37

You can discuss immigration of any kind without resorting to racist tropes or stereotyping.

I think the answer that we have got is that MNHQ is going to continue to make all the right noises about not tolerating hate speech, but they have no plans to take any further action to address the issue. They are happy with the status quo.

The onus will therefore continue to be placed on users of the site to "challenge on the thread". However, we must take care not to challenge too robustly, because this will get us deleted.

We do have the choice to walk away if necessary. I am currently contemplating that. If we choose to stay, I guess we have the option of trying to scroll past and ignore the hate (increasingly difficult as there is so much of it) or to challenge on thread as MNHQ suggest. If we are going to do the latter, we need to ensure that we know how to jump through the moderation hoops in the same way that many of the racist posters have learnt. So we can't say "you are despicable" but we can say that "racism is despicable". What I'm not yet very clear about is whether we are permitted to say "you are being racist and racism is despicable".

You can question immigration, but you have to do it honestly. So no referring to.small boat asylum seekers as illegal, because it is not illegal to arrive by small boat. Also no blaming immigrants for all the nation's woes, because they are multifactorial. Lastly, no sweeping generalisations about whole ethnic groups, because that absolutely is racist.

Argue your corner, but be nuanced and accurate about it. Asking for this isn't politically extreme.

Let's break it down.

1. The thread is about racism
2. You are saying that people should engage with racism and inflammatory views and not find strategies to censor them.

I'm very interested in the extreme political agenda you're talking about. Care to expand?

The above is the reply from MNHQ about setting up a new thread. My conclusion is that I don't think there is much point in a thread 2 on Site Stuff, because there is little to achieve from it

Yes, I think another one in site stuff is pointless, maybe one in AIBU? As it's an interesting discussion to have

I mean as a parent it’s really quite worrying to read this but at least you're honest, I wouldn’t want this deleted as I think it’s good for people to understand some of the authentic views behind supporting such large scale immigration.

However, I have taken this exact quote from Keir Starmer’s own Facebook page. So is the PM now racist too?

“Illegal migration is a business, run by organised criminal gangs leading hundreds of people to their death in the Channel.

My government is putting an end to this vile trade with a groundbreaking returns deal, smashing the business model and securing our borders”