Is Pakistani Impact in British Society Undervalued?

[SpiritOf1903]

The black community has long been maligned from the racism of 60s to the Windrush generation being deported. Indians have generally been accepted and have a generally passive and intellectual quality which lets them get on with it. But Pakistanis have always been the other; 'P***' was used not only as a slur but also a show of unity for India, from which the illegitimate state of Pakistan was spawned.

It's generally accepted Asians contributed vastly to the Empire in general but when it comes to the war, only statues erected in Britain are of sikh soldiers and the Sikh community generally is more vocal and more loved. It forgets Muslims also contributed vastly to the war effort and Jallianwal bagh wasn't just a sikh massacre but that's now the narrative.

Have Pakistanis allowed themselves to be cowed down and should their continued contribution not be a source of celebration?.

There is a shame to be Pakistani and a strong dislike of the people in Britain. Is the criminal underworld a factor or simply a byproduct of their standing in British society?.

It’s not just cricket. Racism against Yorkshire’s south Asian Muslims has a long history
Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan

Azeem Rafiq’s account and its reception point to the struggles of a community shaped by colonialism and exploitation

Yorkshire sits in the national imagination and how Yorkshire’s south Asian Muslims have been historically positioned as outsiders.

When Rafiq spoke about being physically pinned down and having red wine poured down his throat at age 15, I thought about the ways that action replicated the logic of a whole range of top-down policies and processes that have violently been imposed on people of colour.

For instance, in response to the arrival of Commonwealth migrants after the second world war, 11 local councils adopted a policy of “bussing” immigrant children to attend schools elsewhere in order that they made up no more than 30% of the classroom. Three of the 11 councils that adopted this policy – Bradford, Huddersfield and Halifax – were in Yorkshire. Paraded as an “integration” project, the buses were soon termed “**** buses” by local people, and children were taught in segregated sections of buildings. This exemplifies the paradoxical message that haunts us to this day: while we order you to integrate, we will continue to label you and punish you as outsiders.

At the time, the “problem” was immigrants not speaking English. Later, in 1988, the problem would be rearticulated as one of cultural backwardness linked specifically to Islam, in light of images of Asian Yorkshiremen burning Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses. By 2001, news media would invoke such images again when they spoke of riots in Bradford. The government review would explain the unrest as the result of “parallel lives” – suggesting that south Asians lived “apart from” the “rest of society”, rather than considering police brutality and fascist violence, or decades of deindustrialisation and unemployment, or racist labour and housing markets.

After 7/7, in 2005, the narrative about Yorkshire’s Asian Muslim population (both terms conflated since the war on terror began) would be solidified when three of the bombers were found to be from my hometown, Leeds. After so many decades of positioning Yorkshire’s Asians as a menace to the nation, the locale would be deemed explanation enough for their violence. Multiculturalism was declared a failure, and south Asian Muslims were seen to require surveillance at every level – now blatant through the Prevent strategy and counter-extremism, which criminalise our identities in every public institution. Entire Yorkshire towns would go on to be castigated through Islamophobic and racist stereotypes. Think of Rotherham and you think of “grooming gangs”; think of Bradford and you think of documentaries like Make Bradford British.

To fully understand this racism, we need to look deeper into the social and economic forces that shaped Yorkshire’s Asian population. British colonialism, working-class exploitation and racist border legislation can all shed light on the distinct manifestation of racism that Rafiq, and all of us, well know.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/21/cricket-racism-yorkshire-south-asian-muslims-azeem-rafiq

 

[SpiritOf1903]

I fail to recognise the Bengali community who also contributed to Empire! However, in Britain, they didn't come over like Indians and Pakistanis tie work in mills but arrived as economic migrants, reshaping the social housing sector in London where most industrial buildings became squalid living quarters to home the many Bangladeshi immigrants in East London.

Also they've been very successful and restaureteurs and become faitjy ingrained in the British fabric, so being Muslim isn't necessarily the biggest factor here.

 

[Mamoon]

Please, no more threads on racism.

No it is not undervalued - British Pakistanis are doing great but they like to play victim.

If they were struggling, they would be looking for a way out; they wouldn’t be making excuses when you ask them to return to Pakistan when they pretend act patriotic towards Pakistan.

They should focus on how minorities are treated in Pakistan. British Pakistanis live like kings compared to minorities in the country they pretend to love.

 

[Kroll]

Its important to note that **** is/was used against all immigrants and their descendants of brown colour.

In other words, there is racism against all ethnic minority communities from the sub continent.

 

[Robert]

Sadly, the contributions by many British Pakistanis are obscured by the bad things done by a few - the terrorists, the hundreds of convicted paedophiles in the North.

Pakistanis seemed to get Othered quicker than most BAME groups - they have an image of being resistant to integration, whereas Indians seem to slot into British society seamlessly, and Brit-Afro-Caribbeans have hugely contributed to music, and Brit-Africans such as Michaela Cole are winning BAFTAs.

Counter-narratives can be woven - the valiant Muslim soldiers in WW1 and WW2, the many fine doctors, the decent politicians like Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the acting success of Riz Ahmed.

Now I will get flamed in 5, 4, 3….

 

[Babeikh]

Sadly, the contributions by many British Pakistanis are obscured by the bad things done by a few - the terrorists, the hundreds of convicted paedophiles in the North.

Pakistanis seemed to get Othered quicker than most BAME groups - they have an image of being resistant to integration, whereas Indians seem to slot into British society seamlessly, and Brit-Afro-Caribbeans have hugely contributed to music, and Brit-Africans such as Michaela Cole are winning BAFTAs.

Counter-narratives can be woven - the valiant Muslim soldiers in WW1 and WW2, the many fine doctors, the decent politicians like Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the acting success of Riz Ahmed.

Now I will get flamed in 5, 4, 3….

Agree with this.

A lot of it can ultimately be put down to the origins of the migration. Many Pakistanis migrated to the UK to work in the textile industries in the north and the midlands so their work was not work which made integration easy, similarly they lived in ghettoised localities.

Of course there are still many many British Pakistanis across all spheres of life who have made wonderful contributions to British society. I think the media plays an important role here in framing narratives etc.

 

[SpiritOf1903]

Sadly, the contributions by many British Pakistanis are obscured by the bad things done by a few - the terrorists, the hundreds of convicted paedophiles in the North.

Pakistanis seemed to get Othered quicker than most BAME groups - they have an image of being resistant to integration, whereas Indians seem to slot into British society seamlessly, and Brit-Afro-Caribbeans have hugely contributed to music, and Brit-Africans such as Michaela Cole are winning BAFTAs.

Counter-narratives can be woven - the valiant Muslim soldiers in WW1 and WW2, the many fine doctors, the decent politicians like Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the acting success of Riz Ahmed.

Now I will get flamed in 5, 4, 3….

If ever there was a backhanded compliment.

 

[Giannis]

Yes, also as a Pakistani-American I hate it when Pakistani-Americans and other Diaspora Pakistanis clown British Pakistanis and push the negative stereotypes that are perpetuated by the media. British Pakistanis paved the way for other Pakistanis in the west and they had to do so in a country that had no history of multiculturalism at the time they had migrated.

 

[Cpt. Rishwat]

Sadly, the contributions by many British Pakistanis are obscured by the bad things done by a few - the terrorists, the hundreds of convicted paedophiles in the North.

Pakistanis seemed to get Othered quicker than most BAME groups - they have an image of being resistant to integration, whereas Indians seem to slot into British society seamlessly, and Brit-Afro-Caribbeans have hugely contributed to music, and Brit-Africans such as Michaela Cole are winning BAFTAs.

Counter-narratives can be woven - the valiant Muslim soldiers in WW1 and WW2, the many fine doctors, the decent politicians like Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the acting success of Riz Ahmed.

Now I will get flamed in 5, 4, 3….

Pakistanis have gotten this reputation of being resistant to integrating, but I think this will change gradually. They are usually only resistant to stuff that goes against their faith, so for example, they aren't resistant to shopping, or watching football matches. I think once Brits start to accept not everyone has to be the same in a multicultural nation, we will see less friction.

 

[ElRaja]

this is a long and very complex topic but i will try to boil it down to main points ive felt as a brit pak that may make us more likely to be seen as "others".

brit paks are aware of being othered, especially given the history and weight carried with the P word, so i think you'll find more brit paks who identify actively with being pakistani than say bengalis (the younger generations especially who may be once or twice removed from anyone who grew up in bangladesh) and sikhs (who identify with sikhi, but rarely with india as an identity). most indians in the uk identify with there ethnic groups, i.e. gujratis, punjabis, southern indians normally stick to their own groups.

brit paks have a far stronger connection to back home owing to much larger proportion of imported spouses. this compounds the first issue.

finally some britpaks have done really well for themselves, and when u have guys who have a certain level of fame, sportsmen, politicians, entertainers, etc, they act as lightning rods, and everything good they do will get put into the brit drawer, and everything bad in the pak drawer, its just the way it is.

[MENTION=7774]Robert[/MENTION] you can mention terrorists, honour killings, paedophiles, etc, but pa*i bashing is a lot older than all these phenomena, and the media used these phenomena to stoke the divisory sentiment which was already present and keep it alive, it wasnt the source of that otherness tho.

it wasnt legally possible N-bash in mainstream media but implying britpaks were hiding large groups of terrorists, paedos and honour killers was, so all that pent up racial hatred got openly focused on britpaks, whereas im pretty sure the same people hating on us hated on indians, and black people too.

even riz ahmed gets hate because hes very political, and this is a theme with britpaks, maybe as a result of the history or whatever, that they tend to be more politically opinionated than other asian ethnic groups, in my experience.

but its important that britpaks dont dwell on it, because the minority that think that way is shrinking in my experience.

 

[NishanKonar]

Sadly, the contributions by many British Pakistanis are obscured by the bad things done by a few - the terrorists, the hundreds of convicted paedophiles in the North.

Pakistanis seemed to get Othered quicker than most BAME groups - they have an image of being resistant to integration, whereas Indians seem to slot into British society seamlessly, and Brit-Afro-Caribbeans have hugely contributed to music, and Brit-Africans such as Michaela Cole are winning BAFTAs.

Counter-narratives can be woven - the valiant Muslim soldiers in WW1 and WW2, the many fine doctors, the decent politicians like Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, the acting success of Riz Ahmed.

Now I will get flamed in 5, 4, 3….

Far more Muslims and Hindus served British army in the world wars. Example in WW1 , there were 100k Sikhs , 500k Muslims and 800k Hindus

Only difference is while Sikhs love glorifying their role in the world wars , Hindus and Muslims tend to be quiet about their role as serving the British is not seen as something to be proud of . So India and Pakistan have largely glossed over that fact and moved on