You know you're back home when... (casual racism)

Isnt the above pic of dancing blokes in blackface related to a pagan festival and completely unrelated to race ?

May well be but in 2024 it may need to be a bit more considered than it was in 1450.

Possibly - the origins of it seem unclear - but nevertheless a number of groups have recognised the likelihood of it causing offence and abandoned the practice.

In my small, Central Scottish hometown we not only have casual racism to describe local businesses but also casual sectarianism!

Are you from Larkhall or Croy?

As for racism, casual or otherwise, don't see it much where i am, it is something that's slowly dying off generation by generation, and having a young daughter in primary school does drive home the fact it's taught or copied rather than inherent.

As a resident of the shandy drinking South Coast I do find myself deeply shocked by some of the Language I hear when travelling to certain areas. Tbh, it's probably more associated with poverty, education and opportunity than geography but it does make me sad.

(It's obviously not universal etc etc but it's noticeable)

Tbh, it’s probably more associated with poverty, education and opportunity than geography but it does make me sad.

Anecdotal but. I do know of examples of elderly people who are comfortably retired and in no way experiencing poverty of lack of access to information, who are also quite convinced the UKs "native white" population is heading for replacement by "them" and are actually taking some limited comfort in that they'll be gone before it happens, although they do obviously worry a great deal about their children/grandchildren.

Now, you can think what you like about that viewpoint. But they do actually believe it themselves. And are living with that belief as a perceived reality.

Fair, I'd written off the old and racist as they'll be dead soon, plenty of them about .

Working with staff of 7 different nationalities to British I have to say their casual racism to each other and well everyone is shockingly worse than I’ve heard against them.

Is it racism or is it nationalistic type stereotyping and (not sure of the word but let's go with) bantz?

This is still a difficult distinction for me (ie I still can't give a good answer). To treat any group differently because of a different heritage would be wrong but different nationalities, even within a race*, do have different characteristics and habits and commenting or making humour over it is not automatically racist.

Henning Wehn makes a lot of both his german habits, poking fun at himself - but also at what 'you brits' are like - but I wouldn't actually assume all germans are like his OTT stereotyping, and just start ascribing them to a random german that I just met, nor am I offended by his stereotyping of me.

* noting there is not a 1-1 mapping of race and nationality - eg: perfectly possible to be british and asian, etc.

People are tribal and like to highlight differences.
See also the anti-cycling nonesense. Also see the anti-EV nonesense - almost any EV ad you see has people commenting about “milk floats” etc and declaring that they would never have one.

If that level of knuckle dragging* hatred exists for a relatively small change to how a car is powered we have no chance with anything else.

* - I just did the same thing! I’m no better than anyone else. Human nature (sigh).

Is it racism or is it nationalistic type stereotyping and (not sure of the word but let’s go with) bantz?

I'd suggest that's a distinction to be made at the discretion of the target.  It's only "bantz" if the recipient is laughing along, otherwise it's not banter, it's bullying.

Wait a minute, I thought "Jesus was an architect previous to his career as a prophet"

Carpenter's apprentice I thought.

He also had a stint as a goalkeeper for Bethlehem United, but dropped a cross in the biggest fixture of the year and never played again.

Regarding the black face above, no I don't think the origins are racist, no one actually knows but it was probably coal mining related. However the the people who now support them really are quite racist and love to aggressively tell you it's not racist, it's tradition and how dare they be made to stop blacking up.

depends where home is really..

https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/most-racist-countries

UK seems to have a good score. Let's check the details...

% Prefer No Foreign Neighbours: 0%

% Witnessed Racism: 0%

Forgive me if I take that map with a pinch of salt (the same pinch of salt I spilled on the floor and put in the bin about half an hour ago)

It says 0% for many countries, presumably where no survey data was present.

Only yesterday someone of south east asian origin called you a stupid white man?

What this shows is that when angry people will shout out any old crap, and visual differences are simply handy. In school I got called 'four eyes' - how is wearing glasses the basis for an insult? It's meaningless.

Racial discrimination and the fact that different skin tones, origins, languages and cultural practices cause unease in some people are the real problems, not what they do after they feel uneasy.

how is wearing glasses the basis for an insult? It’s meaningless.

It's "othering."  It's easier to justify being unpleasant to someone if they're a bit different.  The kid with glasses, the fat kid, the ****stani, the ginger, the 'poofter,' the nerd, etc etc and indeed etc.  You're not like us therefore you're inferior.

Kids are bastards for it, unfortunately some never grew up.

Christmas – birth.

Easter – death and resurrection.

Maybe. It still staggers me that if the resurrection thing did happen that no one thought to write down what day it was. Christmas is fixed as it is allegedly the birth of Christ. So how come someone knew the date of the birth of a random baby but not the day of the clever bit. And yes I am well aware that Jesus almost certainly wasn't born in December, but hey, the church has never been one for letting facts get in the way.

Christmas is fixed as it is allegedly the birth of Christ.

It isn't. No one claims to know the date. 25th December is as good as any other day in the year, and it conveniently fits in nicely with European pagan festival time.

They actually know when the crucifixion occurred, it occurred during Passover which is a movable feast dependant on the moon. Ramadan is also connected to the Passover which is also why it is movable and dependant on moon phases.

They claim to know the date of the crucifixion.   Conveniently it coincides with the pagan spring festival and uses pagan symbols.   Lambs.  Eggs.  Bunnies.

I didn't know that lambs, eggs, and bunnies, were pagan symbols. Do bunnies represent a pagan god that I don't know about?

Tomorrow evening I am attending a local community iftar to raise money for Medical Aid for Palestine, the link with a pagan festival is obvious but I doubt that it will be celebrated because of it.

The casual racism can be bad in the older generation. My wife works in an NHS respite place. A resident spouted “ We are friends so you won’t mind me calling you blacky”. Now I’m no spring chicken so remember that this wasn’t acceptable in the 70s never mind now.

"As said he’s a Muslim prophet and one of the five Buddhas in Manichaeism. Probably a few other jobs too."

Self appointed or did he impress them with his sleight of hand?

I prefer my racism to be in a suit and tie

Ernie.  Pagan fertility symbols for the spring festival .

No link to christianity at all.

Like holly and ivy at the midwinter festival.  Pre Christian symbols

No link to christianity at all.

Is that why you don't see bunnies,  lambs, and eggs, in churches?

I am surprised that you haven't mentioned the actual word "Easter",  which I think is only used in Germanic speaking countries and refers to a pagan goddess who previously had April named after her.

The reality is that Easter, the Passover, and Ramadan, are all vaguely connected and correspond to Luna phases at this time of year.

The Luna phases I believe also depend on whereabouts in the world you are which explains why Ramadan and the Passover are based on Luna phases in the Middle East and  Orthodox Eastern Christians celebrate Easter on different dates to Rome based Christians.

The idea that these feasts have been established because of  European pre-Christian religions smacks of European exceptionalism to me. I don't know if this is an example of casual racism though.

TBH wouldn’t you get more converts to your new fangled religion when you keep the old favourites and add extra benefits.

The spring fertility festival is fairly universal and predates christianity.   Not just European either nor did i say it was.

The casual racism can be bad in the older generation.

My dad (85) went on a shocking rant this afternoon about Muslims taking over the UK, BBC was all about Ramadan and had nothing about Easter but most of the presenters were "them" etc etc.

I think he may have been trying to wind up MCJnr who was refusing to bite - if the kids hadn't been there I'd have called him out, it was vile and tbf, most unlike him. I have a sneaking suspicion that he's found GB News on his telly.

Ernie.  Pagan fertility symbols for the spring festival .

No link to christianity at all

Is that why you don’t see bunnies,  lambs, and eggs, in churches

The lamb is quite common in Christian churches (may just be a left footer thing though), windows etc, Jesus being the lamb of god

Not just European either

Interesting . Do you think there were pre Christian spring festivals in the Middle East?

Where else outside Europe do you think there were pre Christian  spring festivals which the current Easter celebrations attached themselves to?

Jesus being the lamb of god

Because of the connection to a pre Christian spring festival, or because of animal husbandry practices in Levant a few thousand years ago?

And was lambs blood used in mark the houses of the Israelites in ancient Egypt during the Passover because it corresponded with a pagan spring festival in Europe?

Because of the connection to a pre Christian spring festival, or because of animal husbandry practices in Levant a few thousand years ago?

That would be an ecumenical matter.

Marking the passing of seasons with ceremonies seems fairly universal worldwide.  Canadian first nations do i believe.

South American indigenous peoples did as well again i think and like the stone circle builders in the uk build huge constructions to measure the passing of the seasons

Eggs are clearly a fertility symbol not a Christian one at all.  I have heard it said it symbolizes the stone rolled from the door but thats somewhat farfetched to me given the obvious link with spring and fertility

That would be an ecumenical matter.

DRINK!

The lamb in this instance comes from the Jewish faith and the sacrificial lamb the night before the exodus from Egypt - the feast of Passover is the remembrance of their deliverance from servitude. {EDIT: Ernie got there first] As Ernie rightly says the Feast of Passover is essentially the foundation of the Easter story - the Last Supper is the Passover meal and if you attend a service of vigil there is much overlap with Jewish traditions, readings from the Old Testament - which must include a reading from Exodus, singing of Psalms etc. Easter in the catholic churches does not always coincide with Passover because of the conversion to the Gregorian calendar, but it does in the Orthodox church.

WTF has happened to this thread? From causal racism to Easter in three pages.

Easter was actually mentioned in the first post of this thread, and whether "foreigners"  sell Easter eggs cheap after Easter Monday.

different nationalities, even within a race*, do have different characteristics and habits

Missed this earlier.

You cannot ascribe characteristics to people based on the country they are from. Different countries do have different collective behaviours, this is called culture. Because people do things that people around them do, you can make certain cultural generalisations and predictions, but only where it pertains to cultural behaviour, not innate personal characteristics. So for example, some Asian cultures encourage or even mandate strong deference to authority, but you can't then say that Asian people are cowards.

They actually know when the crucifixion occurred, it occurred during Passover which is a movable feast dependant on the moon

it still happened on a specific date allegedly so why not celebrate the single most important point of Christianity on that specific date?   There is less flexibility shown on when we venerate Guy Fawkes trying to blow up parliament on when the monarchs fake birthday is. I don’t understand why the restriction isn’t vibrated in the date it haunted if it’s that important

You cannot ascribe characteristics to people based on the country they are from. Different countries do have different collective behaviours, this is called culture. Because people do things that people around them do, you can make certain cultural generalisations and predictions, but only where it pertains to cultural behaviour, not innate personal characteristics. So for example, some Asian cultures encourage or even mandate strong deference to authority, but you can’t then say that Asian people are cowards.

Characteristics was a poor choice of word, apologies.

What i mean is that even within a race (eg: white European) certain nationalities have different cultures - contrast Italians with Swedes for example. But both white European. So to the comment I was commenting on

Working with staff of 7 different nationalities to British I have to say their casual racism to each other and well everyone is shockingly worse than I’ve heard against them.

I'm still uncertain if that is really racism, and whether commenting on differences / ascribing cultural differences to each other when meant as humour (and indeed agree with another post that humour is more in the definition of the target than the creator) is a problem or not.

Like I said in my post - this confuses the hell out of me. I think I mainly get it right but I couldn't particularly explain why / what 'right' is.

 I have heard it said it symbolizes the stone rolled from the door but that's somewhat farfetched to me given the obvious link with spring and fertility

A valid interpretation according to my Re teacher wife!

They actually know when the crucifixion occurred

They don't "actually know" anything of the sort. (Whoever "they" are.)  They don't actually know whether Jesus even existed (it seems likely but far from definite).  They may well believe but that's not the same thing.

We don't really know a good many things from way more recent history. Robin Hood, for instance. That's a legend from, what, C15? And we don't know what if any of it is much more than folklore.  We've got buckleys of "knowing" what happened two millennia ago.

As well as overt racism, I have seen a lot of casual racism - when you have dual heritage, and some people believe you are white-European with a Mediterranean complexion.

They actually know when the crucifixion occurred

They don’t “actually know” anything of the sort.

I think they know their religion better than you do cougar. For Christians when the crucifixion occurred is not an unknown - it occurred the day following the Passover meal. Which is why Easter is celebrated when it is.

In contrast according to the bible when the birth of Christ occurred is an unknown (in terms of which time in the year) and has very likely been attached to a convenient existing mid winter festival.

Obviously you are free to reject it all as complete tosh and that none of it ever happened, but that is why Easter is celebrated when it is.

Obviously you are free to reject it all as complete tosh and that none of it ever happened, but that is why Easter is celebrated when it is.

The problem with any sort of ancient text, is theres no document control..  If there are multiple steps in the translation process, then it’s likely something gets lost in translation. If modern Bible translations are a translation of a translation of a translation of a...well, you get the point...

I mean just look at Henry VIII, I think it was... don't like the fact you can't divorce? No problem, just create a new type of Chistianity that suits you, and start persecuting the other ones, and that was technically the same language!

God knows what got lost in translation from the Hebrew Bible to its Greek translation, the Septuagint, in the Hellenistic period (c. 300 BCE–c. 300 CE)

Islam is no different.. how many different flavours of that are there, that fight tooth and claw with each other?... they can't all be right. They can all be wrong, though!

"As well as overt racism, I have seen a lot of casual racism"

You could never accuse these guys of casual racism, though.

Woppit to the forum, please.

I suppose if religion threads always get closed then divert a racism one.

I think they know their religion better than you do cougar. For Christians when the crucifixion occurred is not an unknown – it occurred the day following the Passover meal. Which is why Easter is celebrated when it is.

The issue is that nobody knows it. It’s based on conjecture, legends and ancient texts that have been translated time and again. Add in the bits that were inevitably cut out or altered and that leaves nobody in a position of any real authority on the subject.

I think they know their religion better than you do cougar.

I have no doubts that they believe they do. And that's absolutely fine.

They can know the teachings, they can know the narrative and the symbolism and so forth of course. But they cannot know events from two millennia ago as irrefutable historical fact, it's simply not possible. Contemporary records are vanishingly thin and it's a misconception that everyone was illiterate at the time.  Today we live in an unparalleled age of communication and it's hard to know with any real certainty what happened last week.

As I said, it seems likely from what records do exist that someone named Jesus (or regional variations thereof) lived at that time, made himself a bit of a pain in the arse for the Romans and got nailed to a cross for his troubles. Son of god, feeding the 5,000, curing the blind, not so much. But it's not difficult to see how word-of-mouth stories might get passed down through the years and centuries, embellished slightly at every retelling.

For Christians when the crucifixion occurred is not an unknown – it occurred the day following the Passover meal.

Why specify "Christians" here? It's either known or it isn't.

"But they cannot know events from two millennia ago as irrefutable historical fact, it’s simply not possible."

lolwut