4 Unhelpful and inappropriate responses to racism

Racial prejudice affects black-skinned people even more than brown-skinned or other races. As a second-generation Indian immigrant to the UK, I can see that. Black people are arrested more often for not doing anything wrong, and employed less often when they have the same qualifications. But what bothers me equally are the inept responses to racism we’re seeing around us. We must take racism very seriously, but token and misguided responses. don’t help Here are some examples and why they don’t work:

1. Defacing and destroying national monuments

Although these actions are not those of the majority of anti-racist demonstrators this has become a major topic in the news, so let’s deal with it. My guess is that if you examine the statues of famous men and women in almost any country you will find aspects of all of their lives, or comments they made, which are now judged unacceptable, but in their own time were not. We can’t pull then all down. Moreover, tearing down monuments seems to come from a desire to impose a single narrative on this country – racial oppression – when in fact that narrative is just one of many narratives.

2. Jumping onto a “WETOO” bandwagon

There has been a spate of brands rushing to prove that they care about racial injustice. This is best depicted in a satirical tweet I saw recently (note “elide” here means to ignore).

And who can blame them? Edelman, the public relations consultancy, conducted a poll in the last few days. This showed that 60% of Americans will now buy from or boycott a brand based on the brand’s response to the George Floyd killing. (Among black consumers that figure rises to 80%). Add to that the economic downturn, and some brands are falling over each other to show support for anti-racist demonstrations, any old way they can.

60% of Americans will now buy from or boycott a brand based on the brand’s response to the George Floyd killing

3. Organising politically correct but badly thought out training

There is now great anxiety of offending minorities, and ordinary white folks genuinely fear saying the wrong thing and being branded racist. Unfortunately, that has led to some absurd over corrections, (not least the recent attempt by the BBC to ban the “don’t mention the war” episode of Fawlty Towers).

One example from many: At a racial awareness training event for ministers, we were given a list of common English phrases including: black-sheep, black-look, black as thunder, Black Friday … etc and asked to discuss racist connotations. My comment to the course-leader was that there were no racist connotations until we came onto this course. They WERE just English phrases. These phrases are not offensive, but if you insist they are, by repeatedly proposing the idea (to people afraid of saying the wrong thing), eventually you will succeed, and they will become unacceptable. Then of course the extreme far right (yes, racists!) become fuelled because the language they know is being censored.

4. Refusing to see the racism in myself (whichever race I am from)

It’s easy to be a determined anti-racist when you live in a white bubble where everybody looks like you. These days I too live in a middle-class white town, but it’s different from the town I grew up in, Blackburn. Blackburn is a working town in Lancashire which in the seventies and eighties was largely white. Today, however, the town is approx. one-third Asian Muslim, and some areas have become exclusively Muslim. Unsurprisingly the shops have changed to adapt to Muslim consumers, many local pubs have closed from lack of business, and my old High School is now an Islamic College for girls. Many of the white friends I went to school with have moved out to areas outside the town. Does that make them racist? Or do they simply want to live with shops, pubs, and schools as they knew them?

Shops and Mosques in Whalley Range, Blackburn

If the face of your town were transformed like Blackburn’s, how would you feel?  Sometimes it’s easier to get angry about incidents to do with the police in America than holding ourselves to account.

It’s easy to be anti-racist when you live in a white bubble where everybody looks like you

How then should we respond?

Racial prejudice is part of the history of many western nations. They competed to dominate populations around the world, and somehow that mindset can linger on. But let’s start not by fixing the world but by examining ourselves, and dealing with undiscovered racism within us – ask yourself the Blackburn question above.

Secondly, it’s right to own up to this country’s colonial past. We should express regret for the fact that most of us live in western towns and cities that benefitted (and may still benefit) from exploitation and enslaving of other nations. More importantly, it’s right to try to repair damage done. That means finding peaceful ways to voice our opinions and ensuring that as far as we can, as nations and as individuals, we deliberately buy fairly-traded goods and clothes from developing nations. (Wouldn’t it be something if 60% of us would buy from or boycott a brand based  on the brand’s treatment of workers and farmers in developing countries?) It will surprise some to learn that there are more people in slavery and being trafficked today in 2020 than in any past century. Few seem to be demonstrating or pulling down statues for present-day victims of slavery. Their lives must matter too.

And lastly, we need to see that there are other forms of discrimination besides race. Some years ago a young lad in our church youth-club called me an effing p***i (Pakistani descent – although I am ethnically Indian). I shrugged it off as his ignorant attempt to wind me up, but leaders in the church were outraged and kicked him out of our club forever. Now, what he said was unacceptable and needed to be dealt with, but it was no worse than if he had based his insult on, say, body weight, sexuality, or disability. If he had made one of those insults I doubt he would have been kicked out. I should have said so at the time but I regret I failed to. There seems to be an assumption that racist insults are worse than other insults based on identity, In fact, they are all unacceptable.

If you enjoyed this try listening to This Lesson In Understanding Racism Would Not Be Allowed Today

This article was also published by Premier Christianity