Black vs. All Lives Matter

I saw this post being shared on Facebook and thought I needed to address it. There are many strong feelings in it that seem to be clouding the writer’s critical thinking. Hopefully I can help with that.

Before I start, I should note that the word “race” comes from a time when it was widely held that black people were a different (they would even say “lesser”) species. The difference between races are nowhere near enough to cause speciation, but it’s the word we’re using these days, so in the interests of a common language, it’s the one I’ll use here.

Read the screenshot of the post if you want, but I’ll be quoting its lines below.

I have been wondering about why whites are racists, and no other race is?

All races can be racist. Some of the minorities, I think the stereotype is black Americans in particular, feel it’s their right to get revenge on the whites for the centuries of oppression. These people have no experience of those extreme levels of oppression (there are inequalities to this day, but more on that later). The fact they weren’t the subject of it means that, in order to maintain the peace, they shouldn’t act because of it, but hate and blame passes down human generations easily (probably something to do with our tribal ancestry).

There are places, notably South Africa, where white people are in the minority and racism persists in the opposite way to racism in the West. Nelson Mandela himself taught that Africans shouldn’t do to whites, what whites did to them. Looking at the state of South Africa today, that message has fallen on deaf ears.

There are British Africans, British Chinese, British Asian, British Turks, etc, etc, etc.

And then there are just British. You know what I mean, plain ole English people that were born here. You can include the Welsh, the Scottish and the people who live off our shores of Great Britain.

What about those that are phenotypically and genotypically Asian, but were nevertheless born here and fully integrated into our society? What about those of us who descended from the Norman invaders, or the Anglo-Saxon invaders? We didn’t originate here. What does this part of the post even mean?! It appears to be an attempt to say that the only people who should be labelled as “British” are Caucasian, but every form I’ve ever filled in does not combine these two things, you tick “British” then in the next section you tick “White”. I feel like this part goes too far in trying to give groups of people one label.

You say that whites commit a lot of violence against you. So why are the ghettos the most dangerous places to live?

I promise you this has nothing to do with any genetic or cultural differences. The ghettos are dangerous places because it’s in the name…

“known for being more impoverished” – This is the reason. There is a link between ethnicity and crime, and that link is poverty. Discrimination against minorities leads to less than equal chances at getting a job or being promoted. This obviously results in collectively more poverty amongst minority groups. And seeing as groups of people who have lots in common tend to stick together, visual differences being the most easily identified, ghettos become a thing. They are more dangerous because it’s an area of increased poverty. (https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0233034)

You have Muslim only areas.

I’ve never seen these, so I can’t comment.

You have the Muslim Council of Great Britain.

This is a religious thing, not a race thing. You can be white and be a Muslim.

There are also similar bodies for Christians etc. The CofE is also represented in the House of Lords.

You have Black History Month.

This is raising awareness of the parts of history that are glossed over in the history books, because history is written by the victors. White history is usually just called History, rightly or wrongly. There are also many thing in our own history that have been glossed over or outright omitted, because the victors aren’t just white, they’re the ruling class!

You have swimming pools for Asian women.

There are times when I, as a man, can’t go to a normal swimming pool! Do you see me asking for a “men’s only” time as retaliation.

You have Islamic banks for Muslims only.

I’ve written award winning Islamic banking systems. You don’t want to use them, trust me.

There are even Muslims that steer clear of them.

You have year of the dragon day for Chinese people.

This is called Chinese New Year. It’s new years day on their calendar.

We have one too, it’s celebrated according to our customs, it’s called “New Year’s Day”(!)

If we had a White Pride Day, you would call us racists.

Pride days are for raising awareness of minority issues, like black people, LGBTQ+ people, etc. As the majority of the population, having a White Pride Day, would be pointless, the whole of our society is tailor made for white people, by white people. The day you can have a White Pride Day is the day whites aren’t a majority anymore.

If we had White History Month, we’d be racists.

Again, HISTORY  is white history. It’s bloody, it’s hateful, and it’s hard to swallow. Which is why, if we had a White History Month we wouldn’t focus on what went wrong and how we can improve, we’d just show the nice bits, like winning WWII, while glossing over colonial atrocities.

If we had any organization for only whites to ‘advance’ OUR lives, we’d be racists.

None of these things would be racist. But they would still be wrong. In this case, improving our lives would only mean widening the gap between us and the minorities, and that’s a bit of a dick move, don’t you think? I think we can all agree, that racial equality is the goal here, so why even suggest that? There are ways in which our lives can be improved, and there are ways in which the minorities have it better than us, but the groups that advocate for those issues don’t have the word “White” attached because they don’t need it. In some cases, it’s race agnostic, and in other cases “White” is just assumed, again, because we are a majority white country.

A white woman could not be in the Miss Black Britain or Miss Asia, but any colour can be in the Miss UK.

If we had a college fund that only gave white students scholarships, you know we’d be racists.

This part misunderstands the purpose of such things. They are needed to bring more representation to the systems they are a part of. Take the Miss X competitions. Miss Black Britain would be needed because of inherent bias (knowing or not) from the judges, the organisers, the talent agents, etc. This form of racism is hard to spot but it’s systemic. One day, our children will grow up in a world where this post is unnecessary, and then we can abolish these things. I’m sure if you look hard enough you can find parts of our society that used to be segregated but now aren’t.

There are over 200 openly proclaimed Muslim only schools in England. Yet if there were ‘White schools only’, that would be racist!

Yes, it would, because Muslim only schools, again aren’t selective on race (intentionally, again, inherent bias here) but on religion. For the record, all religious schools should be abolished and replaced with non-religious ones. Christian, Muslim, Pagan, Sikh, whatever the religion, it shouldn’t be in schools anywhere apart from RE (the reason why is not a topic for this post.).

In the Bradford riots and Toxteth riots, you believed that you were standing-up for your race and rights. If we stood-up for our race and rights, you would call us racists.

On the whole, white people have no racial discrimination in their day-to-day lives. They’re standing up for their whole race because there are so many issues they have to face in their lives, that all come down, eventually, to racial discrimination.

You are proud to be black, brown, yellow and orange, and you’re not afraid to announce it and that’s fine.But when we announce our white pride, you call us racists.

That’s more because of the other racist things going on at the same time. In a White Pride parade? Take a look at the other banners being held up, and the words people are saying. There’s certainly a correlation between people who feel like they need to display pride in their race and racists.

We fly our flag, we are racists. If we celebrate St George’s day we are racists.

No, it’s because of all the racist rhetoric that surrounds people that do that, especially at demonstrations. The flags are nothing to do with it.

You can fly your flag and it’s called diversity. You celebrate your cultures and it’s called multiculturalism.

I am proud…. but you’d call me a racist.

We live in our own culture. These people don’t, they live in ours. Sometimes they want the place to feel a little bit more like home. We can go out any day and have afternoon tea, or a drink at the pub. If you lived in the middle east, you’d probably have to set those things up yourself from scratch, and to do that you’d probably need the support of other ex-pats.

I’m also proud of our little isle, but it’s all around me, all the time. And I don’t need to shout it from the rooftops because everyone else is already here. They already know.

Why is it that only whites can be racists??

I’ve already established that everyone can be racist, but that a certain portion of minority groups think revenge is a good idea, and that they have the right to balance the scales. They are wrong, and so will you be if you, dear reader, choose to take actions fuelled by you hate of this situation or of the others. Instead direct that energy into making the world a better place. However small the cause is, they’d be glad for that energy.

There is nothing improper about this and I’m not declaring any hatred for any race, I’m just annoyed by the lack of equal representation and selected media coverage.

So is everyone at the Black Lives Matter protests. That’s why they are there. Because there’s not any equitable representation for minority groups. There are situations when to make the world a fairer place, minority groups need to be over-represented. (Exactly what those situations are I’ll leave up to you to work out.)

Let’s see which of you are proud enough to agree.

BEING PROUD TO BE WHITE! It’s not a crime, YET… but its getting very close.

From lower down in the post, but it fits here better.

Beware your pride, as they say, it comes before a fall.

I sadly don’t think many will. That’s why we have LOST most of OUR RIGHTS in this country. We won’t stand up for ourselves!

We have lost rights in the last few years, but it’s nothing to do with race, and neither was that “we”…

And mark my words, the government will love nothing more than to keep you distracted with this, so they can take away more of your rights!

Oh and ALL lives matter.

Yes, they do. That goes without saying. Which is why BLM supporters aren’t saying it, and it’s even the driving force behind the protests. White people seeing the injustices that black people face every day and trying to correct them, so that one day, all lives can matter, equally.

If you made it this far, then thank you. And if you emotionally identified with the post, I hope I’ve been able to add some thoughts to those feelings.

Make changing who you are, a part of your identity.

– Raingram