Posters have been critising white racist history from slave trading to civil rights, AND questioning whether racism is ingrained in white communities following Lloyds death. On PP. Read the thread. Are the posters criticising racists?
How can you fix a problem unless you address it? That's why we haven't come far. It's time to stop thinking like the left.
For the last few days I've been in my general poster mode, where I read or post with some levity, call it my "off duty" mode. Chilling. People want to chat, blah blah, no biggie.
However, as this draws out longer and longer, it scares me the amount of casual discriminatory, xenophobic and racist remarks that are being made. I feel I have to challenge certain posts. It pains me that we are brothers in many ways, whether its through faith, or community, or just through similar life experiences. We have suffered immensely in the last 20 years. We have been abused and mocked, attacked and labelled and all we have is anger to show for it. Is it so hard to sympathise and build solidarity with our societal neighbours? Is our community so perfect that we have never done anything wrong?
Firstly, in my opinion, I suspect people are very lazy in their use of language and sometimes what they mean to say is not coming across well. I admit, I can be equally guilty of this in "off duty" mode. However, when serious issues like this are being discussed, communication is important.
Secondly, as I've stated in my previous post, I'm a practicing Muslim. Do you really think I'm a lefty cultist? Do my beliefs and submission to my God and faith allow me to have a positive view towards certain topics important to the left?
However, the situation in the UK and the way it governs, leaves me a choice to vote for this country to stay on a certain path in line with what is best for me as a Muslim.
Abortion laws do not affect me. Gay marriage laws do not affect me. All parties are unfairly pro-Israel, so that really doesn't become an issue. These things don't factor into my day to day life. I can only exert control over my own sphere of influence. Therefore, I will side towards the left because its current iteration is more favourable to me than most iterations of right wing philosophies in the West.
What does affect me? Racial inequality. Religious inequality. Employment inequality. Healthcare inequality.
I recommended to you that you read the Equality Act. You haven't answered if you would forego all access to that protection, just so you can "criticise" black people for being criminals, or whoever you want to generally criticise.
Do you really need me to explain why criticising, for example Muslims, by calling them terrorists, women and child abusers, racists, rapists has absolutely no value at all? You can replace "Muslims" from my example, with any "race" you wished to "criticise". There is a way of having the discussion, it's not by hammering a community or demographic with criticisms regarding their race, which is a misdirected attack anyway as discussed in my previous post.
Here, I will tie in my earlier point about language and the point you make about criticising white people. I will concede, that it is incredibly lazy to generalise things under the banner of "white people".
However, there is also a difference between the use of privilege linked to the topic of race, and directly attacking a demographic for their race.
I would hope that people criticising the actions of "white people" are not criticising the race as a whole. I would hope they are referring to the particular action of using one's race as a means to oppress those of another race.
Oppression and discrimination can be implemented by anyone, anywhere on Earth. Therefore, the BLM conversation is happening within a particular societal sphere and context. The movement has legs and relevance in areas where there are shared characteristics of that societal sphere.
In Pakistan, for example, the same discrimination that happens in America occurs in Pakistan too, under pretty much all grounds of discrimination. However, there are no white people perpetuating this, it's South Asians.
My point is that you have to take into account the context the discussion is taking place in. It's not a pure criticism of race itself, it is the institutions and systems which have a bearing on how certain communities function within the system, even if it appears that everything is on an equal footing. The conversation can be had about not just the issues in white majority countries, but also in Africa, South America and Asia. The actors in the discussion would then change to the majority of that area v the minority.
Nobody has said, or should be saying, that white people are all racist across the board. If it comes across that way, then you're right, it can be strongly argued that it is racism.
I'm still intrigued about what you want to say though. What is it you want to say? I'm always curious about "PC gone mad" types, because I usually find what they do want to say turns out to be quite offensive.
You need to remember that whatever you want to say about someone else, may be thrown back at you ten fold.
Also, Pakistani's are not a race. I even find the definition of Sikh's being a race perplexing considering the difference between most Punjabi's is their faith and nothing else. Alas, who am I to challenge the machine?
)
