I remember going into a Pub in Balham in the mid 70s with a black friend of mine. It probably didn't occur to him that I'd be the only white face in there. He decided we'd better leave.....quickly. Works both ways of course..
I'm just not convinced about this sudden outbreak of xenophobia.
I have lived and worked as a teacher in S W London (as an Art Teacher and on general supply for other subjects such as English etc), for a fair number of years.....There are some very nice 'enclaves', Dulwich being one, cheek by jowl with some very bad areas to live.....The policy of creating vast council estates (horrible architecture), in the late 50's early 60's was a bad one....Decent people who had no choice but to be rehoused there, were lumped in (in people's minds) with criminals & the lowest of the low...really 'ghettoising' them (I used to think that the celebrated architects of such places should be compelled to live in them, that way we might have got a 'rethink')...During the latter part of my teaching career, I was sent by an agency for a few weeks to a type of school that tries to deal with 'difficult' pupils and get them through GCSE's etc, despite somewhat pronounced anti-social tendencies. I have great respect for the staff working in such (potentially dangerous) places...Despite quite a few years working with special needs pupils, some of whom could be 'difficult and challenging', I felt very much the 'learner' and took things slowly, assisting other staff more experienced in dealing with working in this situation and made some attempt to 'get to know' some of the pupils in order to be 'allowed' by them to help them...(impossible otherwise).....The vast majority of these disaffected pupils were black, from council estates where a very strong gang culture exists....The sort of culture where if you ventured 'out of your area', using your oyster card to another part of London, you took the risk that you would be spotted as fair game by a rival gang......after I left, I read in the newspapers that one of the kids that I had worked with, had been persued by rival gang members coming out of school at lunchtime and he was knifed to death in a local shop, in broad daylight....We have imported this, it is'nt being dealt with in a strong enough fashion......It is unsurprising to me that an ex-colleague of mine and his mixed race wife and their mixed race son, now rent out their house in Peckham and live in a couple of acres in the Loire....where the son is doing well in school and is away from the potential threat of gang culture....Certainly, if I was of the age to be pregnant and was living on an estate in a city in the Uk, I would do everything possible to relocate and get out of that environment.
I agree with everything you write Hilary except "We have imported this". These are second and third generation kids. This is a homegrown problem in my opinion. There are similar problems in France of course.
The kids are 2nd and 3rd generation if you are talking about Afro-carribeans, but not the Somalian kids, who are [art of a recent influx.....The problem is we really haven't been careful enough re immigration (re who exactly, are we letting in )....this gang warfare stems from the 'Yardie' culture...gangs in places like Jamaica...If we had more thorough screening, then these people and the likes of Abdul Hamza and his 40 wives, would not have been allowed in, in the first place.
Of course, as I said previously, that isn't helped by concentrating the more deprived people together and I hope that lesson has been learned.....I would insist that every new housing development, whether gated or not, has at least 15%of the houses allocated to people on the housing list, even if those houses or flats were finished to a more basic standard. Places of work in the cities should also be encouraged through tax incentives etc, to construct apartments for rent on or near there premises....Silly to have got rid of the nurses homes, in retrospect...
I agree with John but I am put in mind of a Mr E Powell who made a speech in 1968 - pre EU - who had a lot of criticism for saying something similar to Hilary.
“For reasons which they could not comprehend, and in pursuance of a decision by default, on which they were never consulted, they found themselves made strangers in their own country. They found their wives unable to obtain hospital beds in childbirth, their children unable to obtain school places, their homes and neighbourhoods changed beyond recognition, their plans and prospects for the future defeated; at work they found that employers hesitated to apply to the immigrant worker the standards of discipline and competence required of the native-born worker; they began to hear, as time went by, more and more voices which told them that they were now the unwanted. On top of this, they now learn that a one-way privilege is to be established by Act of Parliament; a law which cannot, and is not intended to, operate to protect them or redress their grievances, is to be enacted to give the stranger, the disgruntled and the agent provocateur the power to pillory them for their private actions."
Now fast forward to the brexit vote.
Hilary I find your logic hard to follow. Firstly, is there any proof that kids recently arrived from Somalia are causing more issues than second or third generation "Afro-Caribbean" kids. Secondly, how will Brexit change the immigration from Somalia?
We've hardly imported it. That sort of thing happens in schools with all white pupils too. It happened in a comprehensive school I attended in the 70s. In my maths classroom there was a hole in the blackboard where a teacher had been pinned by a knife thrown by a pupil. That pupil was born and bred British - and white.
In my wayward student days I spent a summer as a bus conducter out of Brixton garage. Probably the most fun I ever had in a job. The 109 used to go through Thornton Heath.
If they are going to try and establish a points based system of some sort (and I hope they do - and that different industries in the various parts of the country will be able to put in bids for workers maybe on a bi-annual basis), then I expect they will review the rules on immigration and numbers, from wherever the source.....
The evidence that I go on as regards kids recently arrived from Somalia, is my own personal experience and that of my colleagues...
Thanks Mark,
I was quite young when Enoch Powell was in Parliament,..so I've only heard 'snippets' of his speeches -like the famous 'rivers of blood, ' speech.... I think I will have to do a bit of homework on him and his activities....I suspect that his concerns (about a feeling of a potential loss of identity, mainly) will resonate with alot of people in the UK and in recent years political correctness has been very strong and ordinary people were made to feel that these basic feeling were wrong.....Now there are parts of London where the percentage of original white British people is very low (see link below)and his sentiments that he was brave enough to express and that may have seemed extreme then, perhaps seem much less so now....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2950401/How-one-three-Londoners-born-abroad-areas-live-in.html
They could have brought in a points based system for non EU nationals without this Brexit rubbish. Don't be fooled by them Hilary.
Sounds fun John and all the way to Thornton Heath ?
How many clippies used to go all the way ?
The term "racism" is all to easily used to describe anyone whose view about any foreigner is less than positive. In America we hear about police shootings of black men & the protests that follow. I have little sympathy in most cases. The most recent police killing there concerned a black youth who stole a Jaguar & drove at speed through a police road block putting both officers & civilian lives at risk. Despite being shot at the youth continued until the car stopped then jumped out of the car & tried to run away. He had proved to the police (who we all know are armed) that he cared little for their safety, had already been shot at but chose not to surrender. Now the family are claiming that the boy meant no harm & that the police killed him because he was black. No! He was a violent criminal who could have killed! His colour made no difference. Many of the instances start with a police stop but continue with the suspect becoming aggressive & violent or running away to the point that the officers feel that they have to protect themselves.
I agree that "Black lives matter" so if you are stopped & questioned or arrested & are innocent, allow the police to do what they want then sue them when their actions have been proved groundless. To argue with a man who has a gun is not bright!
The "Black lives matter" protests have made it to the UK where they have been causing havoc for the population who would normally be sympathetic. Why there? What has happened there to warrant these protests which are probably losing public support more than generating it.
I agree with much of what you say, Mark...
A recent news report which was moving( and showed great presence of mind on behalf of the girlfriend of the guy who had been shot), depicting her filming on her phone the aftermath of the shooting (she was sitting next to her partner in the car), holding a conversation with the officer who had just fired a shot, asking him why, when her partner had said,' don't shoot' and was intending to be co-operative....The officer, in a shakey voice, said 'I don't know'....
We have do remember that the police, despite being armed feel vulnerable.....there is in some cases a bit of a kill or be killed mentality and some of these so called 'atrocities' are the result of fear rather than a rascist outlook......
All lives matter and at the moment stopping people from reaching airports or work as with Southern Trains is to be deplored.
I do think that we are unable to criticise nowadays without being labelled racist, homophobic or anti semitic etc.
It is as though people have forgotten that for every action there is a reaction and it is totally ok to go around expecting that you can affect the lives of others without them objecting.
However, Israel seems to carry on with its policy of building homes on Palestinian land and then says that people are anti-semitic when they object. I think that the Israeli government is responsible for much if this so-called anti-semitism because it totally ignores the opinions of others including the UN .
PRU units are the more extreme end of things and there are quite a few of them around...over 420 in the Uk according to Wikkipedia...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pupil_Referral_Unit
They weren't around when I was at school and this was in a normal comprehensive school in a village on the edge of an average town - not in the city. It was also in the 70s, so like I said, we haven't imported a problem but the problems have been there a long, long time.
Mark, situations whether right or wrong - not everyone can afford to sue the police, especially those who are poor! Anyway don't you think it's time they [police] used Tasars as they do in UK?
Ding,ding :-)
Knew I saŵ you on tv somewhere John it was "On the Buses"