Is the UK a racist country

[bubblebabble]

Hi there, just wanted to get your views on this. I've been following the Tory hustings and am very shocked that people prefer Truss to Sunak when clearly, he's more intelligent and capable.
It makes me wonder if racism is at play and people can't handle a non-white PM in this country?

Are you all serious?? The plight of poor white girls discriminated against when it comes to sleepovers. Typical "Karens".
Honestly, being a minority and at that a minority female is hard.
If it's any consolation these Asians girls will have a harder time in the world and be discriminated in ways that your white daughters won't be. That'll show them for not being friends with your daughters.
Do you really not see what you're doing by hijacking a thread on South Asian Mumsnet to play the victim?!
Also, Rishi Sunak is very well educated (Fulbright scholar etc), so it is fair to say he's smart.
We have never had a POC as PM but we have had female PMs, so again the whole sexism thing doesn't have much weight.

I do think people might prefer Truss' policies, and fair enough but honestly if you've been following the hustings she isn't as sharp as he is, and I hope people don't vote on policies and not because of race.

@CanDo92 "Measuring the racial tolerance of a country is difficult to do accurately"

And yet whichever way it is done it tends to be the same countries that always come out near the top and the bottom, so clearly it’s possible to do it reasonably well.

It’s also notable that many people seem happy to claim, despite it being hard to tell, that the UK is far more racist than the better data suggests.

We can, and should do better, but it’s ignorant to claim that the UK is not one of the countries who do the very best in tolerance and acceptance of racial, religious and sexual differences.

@kittyloverly
i’m new to this board and all I can see is lots of white (i’m assuming) people coming along say no you’re wrong you’re more racist than us and then their I’ll informed analysis of Asian families alleged racist behaviours. We are talking about what’s going on in the U.K. and what affects us as a minority living here ffs.
I know they have the same problem on black mumsnetters too.
Can’t get away from it even on here.

@CanDo92 Depends on the make up of the countries too. If it's primarily and historically racially homogeneous, their threshold of tolerance towards other races will be lower.
If it's more multicultural (such as the Uk, because you know, former empire and all) then the threshold will be higher.
Either way, trust me, it doesn't make being a minority race any easier. I've faced a lot of racism since moving out of London. Not something I expected as I always championed the UK as a country that wasn't racist but of course, this was me being naive as London is very different from the rest of the UK.
Knowing that it's worse out there in other countries does not give me solace.

Agree. It's awfully unkind.

Well they tend to worship you the whiter you are in many of those places and if you’re actually white then you’ll be put on a pedestal, so sucks to be you.

The worst countries include China, India and the Middle East. You can’t ask “is the UK a racist country” and then get upset when people answer by looking at how the data suggest that it fares relative to other countries.

I think it's the non dom tax dodging and the fact he had a us green card whilst a mp that sits uncomfortably with many. I'm not doubting that some of the Tory faithful are racist but they are not representative of the rest of the country. I don't know anyone who is a Tory party member. I have friends of many nationalities and ethnic origins, my children were in the minority at school being white Christian (40% Hindu, 10% Sikh, 20% Muslim plus a handful of Buddhists and Jain.) It was very diverse but there was frustration because parents refused to let their kids mix out of school even at sixth form - I really couldn't understand it (my friends are mostly in mixed marriages I should add, a couple are married to other Asian origin person but via Uganda)

I'm sorry, that's absolute shit. My mixed race family have faced plenty of racism in the uk.

My Indian husband has been abused at work, on public transport, and that's just for starters.

Our children have had racist abuse in school.

We've face it as a family on uk holidays. These are just the bigger incidents, it doesn't account for the random every day racism that people think doesn't exist.

OP I think if you look at most elections logically, pretty much every candidate shouldn't be there because there are better ones who never made it that far. People vote for wierd reasons. You only have to talk to a few people before you find one of the weird ones and realise why democracy doesn't work (no I don't have a better idea)

Truss is offering the whole candy store while Sunak is trying to be all sensible. Never a good move with right wing populists. Particularly if there are many who wanted to keep Boris (there were rumblings of having Boris on the ballot because the party members weren't happy he'd gone 🙄) as Sunak is seen as the straw that broke the camels back. He's the new Gove after that whole shambles with Boris's run for party leader when May was elected leader.

Sunak's considerable wealth is an issue. The UK is a country with a long history of wealthy people telling poor people it's their own fault they're poor and if they weren't so feckless they'd be better off. This resurfaces regularly in various ways, more recently with 'yes it is possible to feed a family of 5 on 7p per day you need to just stop wasting money ' etc. Yes the same can be said of others tories (and politicians in general) but they aren't all on the times rich list. Neither was the recent publicity stunt of trying to look like an everyman buying stuff at the petrol station and looking confused particularly helpful in this regard .

It just tells people he can't relate to them and therefore it doesn't matter how good at problem solving he is if he can't understand what the problem is.

I've no idea why Truss is soooo far ahead in the polls either though, racism will certainly play a part. Particularly since he did so well with the tory MPs.

I honestly think Sunak would be a better choice for the party and harder for Labour to beat than Truss.

Not that I'd vote for either of them 🤣

this ^

off topic slightly, I've met Sunak, the first time I didn't know who he was, (it's was not the sort of place you'd expect to see him slumming it with the ordinary folk) he was polite and easy, he didn't come across above, alloof or arrogant, Which I had come across surprisingly regularly in the industry.

I agree with all of this. I’m not going to try to pretend that I understand how the minds of Tory party members work, but I’m pretty sure that they don’t care about whether someone can relate to ordinary people or not. Liz Truss is doing Thatcher cosplay and talking non-stop about tax cuts. That’s all they want to hear.

I thought Kemi Badenoch was quite popular with tory grassroots. I think this has more to do with tax rises and the fact that he’s loaded tbh.

@CanDo92 does that make it ok that he's subject to racism?

When our eldest son was severely racially bullied at school, should we just tell him he should be glad it isn't worse?

Is that seriously the standard you think is ok? You seem really gleefully for what my family have experienced.

Yup just checked, Badenoch was the most popular candidate with members of conservative home.

I think it's more about his wealth and backstabbing, but some people see things as racist when they aren't. Take the new host of University Challenge - Asian man, with quite a lot of people objecting - not to do with race but the fact that he's a smug git. There are many countries with far worse racism than here.

There is something seriously wrong with your thinking @CanDo92.

It's absolutely disgusting that you feel entitled to minimise peoples lived experience of racism.

Why the hell does it matter how it compares to other countries? He's been here 20 years, our children have never lived anywhere else.

Please tell me what else you think of justifiable because it could be worse? It's not distorting the situation in the UK, it's a fact of life for mine and many other families.

I hope you are a kinder person in real life than you are on your keyboard.

You are very judgemental. About me, and about the UK. The UK is less racist than most other countries. Any examples of racism which do occur are wrong, and I wish that they did not happen, but you are being ignorant to suggest that we are not a genuinely good country in this respect when considered relative to nearly everywhere else.

Of course there is racism in the UK. But racism in the party that gave us the Windrush scandal or that dumps asylum seekers in Rwanda? That would be ridiculous!

That said, I couldn't give a tuppenny fart about the impact on a multi-millionaire's ambitions to ascend to the highest political office. Sunak will be just fine whatever happens. It's not like he's going to struggle to put food on the table if he doesn't get the job, unlike those at the other end of society who experience discrimination.

@CanDo92 you are excusing racism on the grounds that it could be worse.

That says a lot more about you than me.

Rishi’s biggest problem is everyone has an opinion on Boris. If you hate Boris then he was Boris’s Right Hand Man. If you like Boris then he was Evil Backstabber.

Either way - you are not going to vote for him.

Ffs I don’t hate the U.K. I like living here and pay my taxes but I’m not going to be a good little brown woman and take the racist abuse because ya know it’s soo much worse somewhere else. I mean, we know our history, you’re not doing us some favour here by almost tolerating us. We are on a minority board discussing our experiences and opinions on Sunak, away from the loud white voices that usually gaslight us so I like to think this is a safe-ish space away from that noise but some people can’t help themselves and are taking it personally which says a lot about them really.