by baldricks_cunning_plan » Thu Aug 13, 2009 1:10 am
On racism though I'll try and give my view.
For the 18 years I've been alive, I've lived in Toxteth. Now for anybody unaware of what Toxteth is, it's an inner city area of Liverpool and has the highest Black and I think Muslim community in Liverpool. So I've grown up around a lot of black people which have influenced my life massively because of the area I've grown up I've learnt to appriciate reggae music and Carribean food a lot more especially from the elder folk who are actually from the West Indian islands. And while I'm very proud to be white, I am also very proud to admit the influence I've had by black people.
Now when I went to secondy school (St Margaret's on Aigburth Rd) the number of whites to black was about 50 white to each black lad. Now a few lads I went to Windsor St School with applied to join Margy's and were just as intellegent as me so I find it baffling as to why the ratio was so high. But the racism aimed at the few black lads was shocking. I always argued back with anybody who used the racist terms because of my roots in Toxteth and the number of black mates I had and still have got. This isolated me a lot from some of the whites.
As for white lads "trying" to be black well most of the time that will just be down to the group of mates they have. As I've said because of the black mates I had, I fell in love with reggae and Ska music something I probably wouldn't have done if I'd been in an middle class white area. So if white lads are listening to hip hop, rap, RnB or whatever the latest name for it is, then where's the problem? By seeing a problem with it, you are being racist yourself. (you being nobody in particular, just generally) The same with the language thing. Scousers grow up saying la, Geordies grow up saying pet because it's the environment they are in, if a person is surrounded by people saying "ting" then they'll pick it up. I don't class it as trying to be black because there'll be many black people who don't say "ting" so it's not trying to be black, it's trying to fit in with the environment they're living in.
The gang thing, again I can safely say by growing up in Toxteth I've seen more than one gang or "firm" as some wanted to be called because they didn't like the term gang. Apparently a gang is a coward's version of a firm. In other words they've been watching Green Street and took the word firm from there. But this is not a race thing, as both whites and blacks have gangs which includes both races.
The real problem lies with people trying to glorify it. Films such as "This Is England" or "Made In England" do not help the racist issue. In "This Is England" (which I acutally like, mainly because of the soundtrack) the lead character, Shaun, and is portraying a 10 year old (I think that's the age) yet is being asked to go into the corner shop saying words like "paki" (appologies for the use of the word, but it's to make the point.) Then you have the skinhead leader, Combo, using words such as "wog" or "nigger" and kicking the s**t out of Milky because he is black. While the film is trying to show the truth to the origional skinhead trend, it also glorifies the problems of it, which will brainwash kids that it's right just as much as the good parts of it will do.
There's no need to glorify these sort of things. It's like Green Street, The Firm, Footy Factory and any other football hooligan film, it glorifies things that don't need to be. Then there's the telly shows like Rising Damp and The Fresh Prince where so many of the jokes are based on the ignorance people have towards racism but again kids watching them may well be brainwashed and think it's alright to have that attiude. Again there's computer games like GTA San Andreas where every other word is "nigger" while shagging a tart and carrying a gun. Then there's the common theme that every new rap song must include "I'm f*****g hoes with my niggaz".
The media are to blame as much as anybody for the modern day racism because they want it to continue which is why any slight disagreement between a white and black person (or any other race) there's up roar in the press.
Then of course we have the political correctness nonsense. We can no longer have blackboards, they have to be chalkboards but it's alright to have whiteboards. We can't have ba ba black sheep but we can have mary had a little lamb, it's fleece was as white as snow. This again is racist in it's own way by trying to make out they're not being racist. Nobody with a brain cell saw a problem with a blackboard but then again politicians don't have brain cells and by trying to look like the do gooders they end up making the situation worse.
Continuing along similar lines. In America there is "Miss Black America" for black american women but for "Miss America" anybody can enter. The same with Black Awareness Week but no White Awareness. There's Black Colleges and Universities, there's Black History that is taught in schools. So from that I can understand why white people would feel annoyed. That's not equality, it's racist but because it racism on the part of black people nobody sees it as racism as apparently only white people can be racism.
It's the same with derogatry terms. A straight lad says the word "queer" or "puff" or "shirt lifter" or any other term of that sort and he's homophobic but when a gay lad says it, all is ok. It's still using the same derogatry term. And the same with sexism, women can be as sexist as they want but when a bloke does it he's the world's worst.
The truth is, only whites can be racist, only straight people can be homophobic and only men can be sexist. And yes this rant is from a white, straight lad. And one who f*****g proud to be. That's not to say I am racist, homophobic or sexist because I don't think I am, it's just the way I see this so called politically correct world.
) I could see race in general as something that disapears from the picture with more and more interracial couples. In America, we don't really think of Russians, Italians, and Scottish as different races. they are just white people (if your a 3rd or 4th generation "Euro Mutt" like myself.
anyway what I am going to say is that I completely agree with what Dawson has said so far
off.' 
