4 ms·

One thing I've noticed is the whole sale importation of the BLM movement to the UK. I'm not overly aware of the issue facing ethnic minorities in the UK (I live

by ck425 6y ago

One thing I've noticed is the whole sale importation of the BLM movement to the UK. I'm not overly aware of the issue facing ethnic minorities in the UK (I live in Scotland where it's almost entirely white with some small asian communities, which isn't to say there isn't racism just few people to discuss it with personally) but from reading around racism in the UK is very different to the US. Despite this we've adopted BLM views wholesale, including call to defund the police. I fully support discussing racism in the UK and what we can do to counter it but I don't get why we're discussing it as if it's the exact same situation over here with the same solutions. This might to a symptom of London centric-ness where there is far more ethnic diversity and therefore racism.

notriskfree 6y ago
I agree the UK is not the US and we have different issues in the UK that we are dealing with. Living and working near London I always assumed the increased ethnic diversity and global outlook in the capital led to less racism. I assumed it was the rural homogenous countryside that had more endemic racism. I guess we all misunderstand each other all the time.
- cmdshiftf4 6y ago
  >Living and working near London I always assumed the increased ethnic diversity and global outlook in the capital led to less racism. From https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9477.2007.00176.x https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9477.... >In the short run, however, immigration and ethnic diversity tend to reduce social solidarity and social capital. New evidence from the US suggests that in ethnically diverse neighbourhoods residents of all races tend to ‘hunker down’. Trust (even of one's own race) is lower, altruism and community cooperation rarer, friends fewer. There's plenty of secondary sources reporting on this study if you want to have a look for the varying opinions on it but I thought I'd link the source of it itself. Whether less trust, less cohesion etc. == more racism is something I'm not in a position to draw a conclusion over, but it's interesting nonetheless.
  - dTal 6y ago
    If trust of one's own race is lower also, this seems unlikely to be a consequence of ethnic diversity per se. Rather, I would speculate that, due to the tendency of people to group with their own race, more diverse neighborhoods simply tend to be more transient neighborhoods - places where people are "just passing through" and not really there by choice. There is no point attempting to build community bonds in an area with high churn, and that you yourself plan to move out of at the soonest opportunity.
throwaway936482 6y ago
Unfortunately the BLM rhetoric I the UK is largely pushed by a bunch of (usually white) middle class students with a hard on for Kimberlie Crenshaw and an utter ignorance of the work done over the last seventy years by black and ethnic minority British anti racists to tackle the racism in British society that arises from our history as a colonising nation. Ironically by privileging black American narratives over those of BAME Britons BLM campaigners in the UK engage in a form of cultural colonialism that silences the voices of the very people they claim "matter." Arseholes.
- RichardCA 6y ago
  The average American doesn't even know who Kimberle Crenshaw is. For most of us BLM just means waiting for the next police shooting to show up in the news and on social media (because someone captured a video recording) and hoping our own nearby community isn't involved. Law enforcement in America is a web of federal, state, and local (city or county) laws and no one knows how any individual police officer is trained or what kind of accountability process is in place. The fact that it's different every single time is a huge part of the problem and a source of most of the frustration.
  - dkdk8283 6y ago
    In my opinion American BLM is racist in of itself. There needs to be changes but popularizing the polarities of the topic only serves the ad driven model of media which supports it.
    - eyelidlessness 6y ago
      Your opinion is wrong. Full stop. Stating that Black lives matter, and orienting a movement around that statement as an organizing principle, is not polarizing: it’s a recognition and rejection of extant polarization. Polarization which claims lives, specifically Black lives, disproportionately and institutionally. There is nothing racist about naming the phenomenon and challenging it directly. But demanding that the people who have so identified and challenged it find mask the underlying racism in the name of more inclusive language is essentially an argument to recognize and protect racism itself as part of the culture. No thank you.
pjc50 6y ago
> might to a symptom of London centric-ness where there is far more ethnic diversity and therefore racism More flareups, perhaps, especially riots against the Metropolitan police, but more diversity tends to make people less racist as they actually meet people of other ethnicities rather than just repeat what they've heard about people they've never met or seen. Was the Bristol statue teardown an import? The tactic of just dumping it in the sea was, and the "triggering event" of solidarity protests was, but the underlying question of why Bristol has a statue of a man who committed crimes against humanity had been rumbling on for years and the council had voted down even a recontextualisation plaque. Scotland has some similar "historical benefits of slavery" questions to look at; Edinburgh's own pro-slavery politician statue (Henry Dundas) is somewhat protected by being at the top of a 150-foot column.
motogpjimbo 6y ago
It has been profoundly odd watching UK BLM protesters (almost all of them white and middle class, of course) chanting "hands up, don't shoot"-type slogans recently. British police officers don't routinely carry guns and therefore couldn't possibly shoot you even if they wanted to. In fact, there is an almost zero probability of anyone in the UK getting shot by the police unless they happen to be committing an act of terrorism or murder at the time.
- pjc50 6y ago
  Incidents are rare .. but on the other hand, police shootings have sparked riots: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot / https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Mark_Duggan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Mark_Duggan And of course https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Jean_Charles_de_Menezes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Jean_Charles_de_Me...
  - thu2111 6y ago
    Duggan was nearly a decade ago though, and he pulled a gun on police when they tried to arrest him. Involved in gangland activities. It shows how messed up some of these sorts of riots are: they invariably seem to be about people who were in the process of attacking the police when they were shot. de Menezes of course is a terrible exception.
    - pjc50 6y ago
      > he pulled a gun on police when they tried to arrest him This is the disputed evidence at the center of the question; the gun was found several meters away from the scene, on the other side of a fence, "wrapped in a sock". There is a protracted argument about how plausible it is that he threw it there after being shot in the arm. > they invariably seem to be about people who were in the process of attacking the police when they were shot. If the police shoot someone, then of course all the official reports will say that they were attacking the police. There have been a number of mass casualty incidents in the UK (Hillsborough, Bloody Sunday) where the police or army reports turned out to be lies.

by ck425 6y ago

notriskfree 6y ago

I agree the UK is not the US and we have different issues in the UK that we are dealing with. Living and working near London I always assumed the increased ethnic diversity and global outlook in the capital led to less racism. I assumed it was the rural homogenous countryside that had more endemic racism. I guess we all misunderstand each other all the time.

cmdshiftf4 6y ago
>Living and working near London I always assumed the increased ethnic diversity and global outlook in the capital led to less racism. From https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9477.2007.00176.x https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-9477.... >In the short run, however, immigration and ethnic diversity tend to reduce social solidarity and social capital. New evidence from the US suggests that in ethnically diverse neighbourhoods residents of all races tend to ‘hunker down’. Trust (even of one's own race) is lower, altruism and community cooperation rarer, friends fewer. There's plenty of secondary sources reporting on this study if you want to have a look for the varying opinions on it but I thought I'd link the source of it itself. Whether less trust, less cohesion etc. == more racism is something I'm not in a position to draw a conclusion over, but it's interesting nonetheless.
- dTal 6y ago
  If trust of one's own race is lower also, this seems unlikely to be a consequence of ethnic diversity per se. Rather, I would speculate that, due to the tendency of people to group with their own race, more diverse neighborhoods simply tend to be more transient neighborhoods - places where people are "just passing through" and not really there by choice. There is no point attempting to build community bonds in an area with high churn, and that you yourself plan to move out of at the soonest opportunity.

throwaway936482 6y ago

Unfortunately the BLM rhetoric I the UK is largely pushed by a bunch of (usually white) middle class students with a hard on for Kimberlie Crenshaw and an utter ignorance of the work done over the last seventy years by black and ethnic minority British anti racists to tackle the racism in British society that arises from our history as a colonising nation. Ironically by privileging black American narratives over those of BAME Britons BLM campaigners in the UK engage in a form of cultural colonialism that silences the voices of the very people they claim "matter." Arseholes.

RichardCA 6y ago
The average American doesn't even know who Kimberle Crenshaw is. For most of us BLM just means waiting for the next police shooting to show up in the news and on social media (because someone captured a video recording) and hoping our own nearby community isn't involved. Law enforcement in America is a web of federal, state, and local (city or county) laws and no one knows how any individual police officer is trained or what kind of accountability process is in place. The fact that it's different every single time is a huge part of the problem and a source of most of the frustration.
- dkdk8283 6y ago
  In my opinion American BLM is racist in of itself. There needs to be changes but popularizing the polarities of the topic only serves the ad driven model of media which supports it.
  - eyelidlessness 6y ago
    Your opinion is wrong. Full stop. Stating that Black lives matter, and orienting a movement around that statement as an organizing principle, is not polarizing: it’s a recognition and rejection of extant polarization. Polarization which claims lives, specifically Black lives, disproportionately and institutionally. There is nothing racist about naming the phenomenon and challenging it directly. But demanding that the people who have so identified and challenged it find mask the underlying racism in the name of more inclusive language is essentially an argument to recognize and protect racism itself as part of the culture. No thank you.

pjc50 6y ago

> might to a symptom of London centric-ness where there is far more ethnic diversity and therefore racism More flareups, perhaps, especially riots against the Metropolitan police, but more diversity tends to make people less racist as they actually meet people of other ethnicities rather than just repeat what they've heard about people they've never met or seen. Was the Bristol statue teardown an import? The tactic of just dumping it in the sea was, and the "triggering event" of solidarity protests was, but the underlying question of why Bristol has a statue of a man who committed crimes against humanity had been rumbling on for years and the council had voted down even a recontextualisation plaque. Scotland has some similar "historical benefits of slavery" questions to look at; Edinburgh's own pro-slavery politician statue (Henry Dundas) is somewhat protected by being at the top of a 150-foot column.

motogpjimbo 6y ago

It has been profoundly odd watching UK BLM protesters (almost all of them white and middle class, of course) chanting "hands up, don't shoot"-type slogans recently. British police officers don't routinely carry guns and therefore couldn't possibly shoot you even if they wanted to. In fact, there is an almost zero probability of anyone in the UK getting shot by the police unless they happen to be committing an act of terrorism or murder at the time.

pjc50 6y ago
Incidents are rare .. but on the other hand, police shootings have sparked riots: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadwater_Farm_riot / https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Mark_Duggan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Mark_Duggan And of course https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Jean_Charles_de_Menezes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shooting_of_Jean_Charles_de_Me...
- thu2111 6y ago
  Duggan was nearly a decade ago though, and he pulled a gun on police when they tried to arrest him. Involved in gangland activities. It shows how messed up some of these sorts of riots are: they invariably seem to be about people who were in the process of attacking the police when they were shot. de Menezes of course is a terrible exception.
  - pjc50 6y ago
    > he pulled a gun on police when they tried to arrest him This is the disputed evidence at the center of the question; the gun was found several meters away from the scene, on the other side of a fence, "wrapped in a sock". There is a protracted argument about how plausible it is that he threw it there after being shot in the arm. > they invariably seem to be about people who were in the process of attacking the police when they were shot. If the police shoot someone, then of course all the official reports will say that they were attacking the police. There have been a number of mass casualty incidents in the UK (Hillsborough, Bloody Sunday) where the police or army reports turned out to be lies.