Member of Household resigns

[myrtleWilson]

Awful story just broken on twitter about horrendous racist questioning from Lady Hussey to Ngozi Fulani from Sister Space at yesterdays VAWG event.

Lady Hussey has resigned.

[Edited by MNHQ to correct typo at OP's request]

This is a very defensive question.

If it is genuine, then i kindly sggest that you start to read. Urgently.

If it is not - enjoy the huff.

My Dad is from Africa. He doesn't get asked where he's really from. Because he is a white South African. It is a racist question.

It was a horrific thing to have said, utterly stupid and yes, racist.
I'm glad the Palace are reaching out, and excellent that she will no longer be a part of the Royal Household.
That's it.
I fail to see the need to make this into more than it is.

She would never have asked a white person where they really came from.

I've only ever seen that asked of non whites even when they've said Britain in some form and clearly sound British.

In fact even being English in Wales we don't get asked where we are from - might get asked where we've traveled from at an event but that's not same as tacking all our ancestors back.

@BooksAreSaferThanPeople worrying but sadly not surprising. Unfortunately when it comes to racist exchanges there are always a group (usually not POC, funnily enough!) boldly stating 'it's not what they meant' 'it's just genuine curiosity' 'people can't say anything without offending someone these days' etc etc while completely disregarding the opinion of people who have to live this experience every day.

Are you being deliberately obtuse here?

If someone has told you that they're British, it's racist to insist that they're not based on the colour of their skin. Many white people have parents or grandparents from other countries too. If I told Lady Susan I'm from Yorkshire, do you think she'd keep pestering me until I told her my grandparents are Irish? It's much more likely she'd just accept that I, a white woman, am British. Do you think she'd be "denying me my heritage" if she didn't continue to push me until I told her?

@LookingAtYou I’m a white Australian with an English parent

never in my life have I responded to a question of where I’m from and said anything other than Australia. And I have never in my life been questioned about that

in other contexts indeed I might discuss my English heritage. But it has NEVER been suggested that this means that I am from England or that it qualifies my being Australian

this is purely and simply based on her view that someone black can’t be properly British

Same. "Where are you from?" "[Place]" "No.. where are you FROM." "...[same place."

Me too.

And I don't have a dog in this fight.

Oh that exchange is painful. My sympathies to Ms Fulani.

As a second generation British Asian woman, I am so sick of white people asking me where I’m from. And then disbelieving me when I say London.

Give it a rest!

Because she doesn't owe an explanation, for anything. You think non-white people should explain why they're not white (as that's the actual thing you are driving at)? But I suspect you know this and are just stirring.

And it seems to offend those people when I keep replying 'From London' to every question about my heritage, because my answers somehow deny them the right to assert their superiority.

Touching someone’s hair is deeply invasive if you don’t know them intimately.

Would they have moved long hair away from a White person to “ Read their badge?”
Or asked their heritage?

Horrible.

In Australia, you're telling me if I ask a white Australian, with an Australian accent, where he's from, he's gonna say, " I'm Australian but my grandparents are from the UK, Liverpool????"

NO. He will say I'm from fucking Perth or wherever.

If I said where do you originate from, he might say it. Most white Aussies, and Kiwi's see themselves as exactly that and wouldn't even fucking understand what you were getting at, if you kept asking, 'No, where are you REALLY from, what part of Europe?'

Lady H must be about 300. Her DH was the one the BBC slid the Diana Panorama con under when he was DG.

The lady at the charity was dead right to point it out. LH is so old and doddery no one could think any offence was intended, which unfortunately makes it worse if you’re on the receiving end. A lot more people could have been.

Hope LH is put out to grass pronto
and the charity CEO gets an MBE for her work.

I fail to see the need to make this into more than it is.

Well, a black woman married in to te family a few years back. Within a few years she had to run out of the place/palace because the pressure, and relentless public humiliation left barely able to function. Her husband decided to go with her.
It was headline news for a while. You may have missed it though.

My family member who is at London University and has a non-British surname was asked this exact question all the time by British white students who were passionately anti-racist. She was offended at first but soon established that none of these types wanted to be classed as white British. They would have DNA tests just to legitimately give themselves the right to emphasise the 0.00005% non British ancestry as being 'where they were really from'. I wonder if Lady S was using it as a lead in to a conversation to empahsise similar things.

This lady Susan shouldn't have asked where are you really from but I agree with the poster who suggests that reiterating I am british but my parents came from.............. shouldn't be that difficult.

Of course @LookingAtYou knows this....The shit stirring is so boring, its so obvious.

Not at all surprised that you've written this based on the vitriolic posts you make about H&M but Jesus Christ what a leap.

It is diffiuclt when you're asked it every fucking 5 minutes by cunts who haven't got the balls to simply say, you don't look British , so where do you originate from.

Infact, growing up with a non British surname, it was perfectly normal to be asked (and to ask) this question without anybody taking offence. Perhaps she could have rephrased it a little in terms of ancestry rather than belonging.

Many people are interested in anthropology and our different heritages are what makes us interesting to one another. There is nothing wrong in being interested in other people's ancestry in order to gain such an understanding.

I don't think it was the question itself so much as the pressuring from SH.

You are elevating the conversation.

There was no anthropology.

Shame on you.

Just sit this one out.

Exactly! All she had to say was, "British born and bred and my heritage is..." - job done without all the trauma! Isn't she proud of where her family came from?

I think people need to remember as well - this is an elderly lady, 83, brought up in a very different culture. Doesn't make her racist?? When you've lived most of your life in an era where your every word wasn't dissected for perceived slights, these PC times must be a challenge. I feel sorry for Lady Susan - I mean, headline news, elderly lady opens her mouth and puts her foot right in it. She must be traumatised too, by the attention this has brought to her and the embarrassment to the RF, as the hysterical go, "oh this just proves they are racist, doesn't it?"