I still don’t really understand how people who’d lived in integrated and multicultural communities for 20+ years could hold such actively negative views towards people of different race or religion, because they weren’t ignorant, isolated or living in monocultures.
Because it's not really about race. That's why we end up with the 'not you, you're alright, it's those other brown people' thing. It's about the being a dick towards out-groups. So if your colleagues are disposed towards being dicks, they'll just pick any group they like. And racial groups are visible.
Until the last few years I would have said we were making great strides, but all these new divisive terms like Gammon, Karen, etc.. are doing more harm than good. If you are not fluent in social media lexicon, you are forever branded a racist.
As a child of the 90s we grew up watching sitcoms with all black casts (sister, sister, fresh prince, cosby show, hanging with mr cooper etc) and never thought anything about race, now a lot of American shows define their characters by their ethnicity, making endless jokes about differences.
As a child of the 90s we grew up watching sitcoms with all black casts (sister, sister, fresh prince, cosby show, hanging with mr cooper etc) and never thought anything about race, now a lot of American shows define their characters by their ethnicity
Why do you think those all-black shows existed? It wasn't a coincidence that all the actors were black. Don't you think that's defining characters by their ethnicity? As a Brit you probably didn't think about race in the same way that Americans do.
Don’t you think that’s defining characters by their ethnicity?
None of the shows were about ethnicity really, at least I did not pick up on this at the time. They just happened to be all blacks casts, but it felt very universal. Fresh prince for example is all about class.
We have our own little Megan & Harry style drama in my family. My sister married a tanzanian, we flew out there for 3 weeks, my Dad paid for everything and walked her down the aisle, making a real effort with all the extended family (we stayed with them, without running water or electricity the whole time). He cashed in his pension early so the husband could come over to the UK and try and find work. He also lived with my Dad for a while. Despite this another of my sisters starting telling people my Dad was a racist. This is purely because he does speak the language of my sisters social media feeds. How about we judge people by their actions and not assume the worst all the time
