I completely agree that it’s important to hold our noses and read tripe like the Daily Mail. While I mistrust much of the press (and the BBC, who have their own agenda too) it is vital to read it to see what those with whom I disagree are thinking and why they think that.
Many people - no-one here, of course - seem to want to live in some sort of echo chamber where all they hear is their own views. Zuckerberg, Murdoch and the rest encourage this mentality. It’s dangerous and anti-democratic.
I disagree with the editorial policy and much of the content of the Daily Mail, but I do see it as an essential reference point for a very ‘mainstream’ and significant slice of popular opinion in Britain.
Moreover it is very well written, and indubitably “good journalism”.
For many years it was my wife’s favourite newspaper while mine was the Guardian, the Observer (every year since 1956*) and then the Independent. We often had heated arguments.
Some commentators, like our own down-to-earth guru @Geof_Cox (amongst constellar others) has the blessing of a balanced, critical intelligence, and the ability to hold opposing viewpoints in a creative tension, with “what if?” provisionality at its heart.
We should all aspire to that, IMO. After all, crap is the stuff that encourages the growth of green shoots of new insight. At a time when insight is in short supply.
*Who remembers Roy Brooke’s property ads for squalid two rm pad with ktchn and midget b/r almost in Sth Knsgtn for £2,500 freehold?
I think the original poster has been frightened off. I didn’t like what the MP said as it reminded me of the Nazis’ remarks about the Jews being diseased. I know this is a bit alarmist, but if this virus continues its grip on the world then we may find “strong” leaders wanting to take mesures to provide the population with security. We know where that goes.
Sadly, I think it’s quite possible to be racist without being of the n-word shouting variety just because of our societal norms / environment. In the 70s I lived in Brazil and found the societal mixture quite wonderful, drawing as they do on a range of immigrants: so friends there were part Japanese, part Amazon Indian, part Portuguese, part negro, part Celt, part German and most people (helped by the sunshine as well) ranged in colour from light coffee to very dark coffee. So there was far less sensitivity to “white” versus “black” and after 5 years there coming back to the UK I was very shocked by just how “white” my family’s small world was in a not untypical commuter town. Despite the complex ethnicity in Brazil that day to day tended to make for greater tolerance, there still was a sense that “white” Brazilians, ie those descended from the original Portuguese immigrants were somehow superior. And a very dark Trinidadian friend on more than one occasion was asked by the porter at the entrance to a block of flats to use the staff lift.
I would consider my racism to be based on noticing difference (however much I might like not to) - and certainly when I returned to Europe in the 70s “consciousness of difference” was very hard to avoid as it was a major time for Rastafarianism (I’d seen nothing like that in Brazil). There’s an interesting video on the BBC right now, 3 African-Americans who have gone to Africa to live better lives. Although they may not use these words, it seems to me that what they are seeking is the safety of sameness / blending in /not standing out to be a target.
So, I recognise I am racist to some degree due to my birth environment and I hope to keep it under control as much as possible and as sensitively as possible.
What I am prepared to admit -and proudly - is that I am “culturalist”. I am appalled how in the 21st century there are still some cultures / societies where women are treated outrageously and I see nothing of merit in the condoning / nay encouraging of ways of life that keep women as third-class citizens and practice acts such as FGM.
You are, I am afraid; BAME is the official UK government term for Black, Asian and Minority Ethnicities. These BAME are British people who are not pink and/or round eyed, basically.
Interesting points being made.
Those who ‘hate’ the DM need to stop and think; the DM has circulation figures far, far higher than the Guardian; the DM caters for the main stream british public - hate the DM and you are, effectively, ‘hating’ the views of a large proportion of the british people.
Secondly, the article contained within the DM - was NOT written by a DM journalist, but by a member of a particular ethnic group criticising his own group. My point was that anyone else making similar points, on the grounds of trying to protect those more vulnerable to this virus, whether the critics came from science, medicine, or government - if they were white they would be accused of ‘rascism’.
There is a very nasty element of McCarthyism starting to sweep around freedom of speech. It’s being seen in America where very respected, very well educated journalists, broadcasters, professors are now losing their jobs or being heavily censored because a ‘certain group’ are not allowing freedom of speech.
It is worrying; I’d suggest some on here should look at the American press - and be worried.
I very much like SJ’s comments about ‘culturalist’ - appreciating all races - but feeling the right to still criticise some aspects of some race/religion because a particular practice is wrong/immoral - whatever. But maybe that excellent viewpoint is too nuanced and subtle for those who wish to see rascism where it does not exist.
VL - thank you correctly defining my original use of ‘bame’ - I thought everyone was aware of the definition.
Here’s another thought; why do some americans describe themselves as ‘Afro-Americans’ or ‘Afro-caribbean’.
If there is such a thing as integration shouldn’t they refer to themselves as either ‘American-Afro’ or simply American - because they are American ?
Is this really a serious question? Because of slavery, the Jim Crow laws, the civil rights movement: the melting pot doesn’t melt everyone into a homogeneous mass by any means and while there were signs saying ‘no Jews no Irish’ for example on eg golf clubs in the early 20th century, having a difference which can be SEEN 500 yards off does make a considerable difference. (The only reason golf clubs didn’t have signs saying no Black people was because it wasn’t even imaginable they would be there except to clean, cook etc.)
Unfortunately the term ‘American’ which by rights ought to apply to eg the Navajo, Sioux, Comanche etc has been hijacked by white immigrants of European origin so the original inhabitants are ‘Native Americans’ or in Canada ‘First Nations’.
Thus anyone other than white Americans of European origin has to qualify his or her American-ness.
RF - I obviously misunderstood; I had assumed that he was actually praising the Jewish people for being clever and enterprising; he also went on to compliment the Germans as ‘clever engineers’ - didn’t see anything wrong with that, at all.
And no - I’ve not been frightened off by the responses - quite enjoy a good debate. It is when it becomes a personal slanging match, with - very wrong - assumptions made about me that I find it becomes offensive, abusive, and bullying. Not you, though.
Side-bar - you mention the virus and ‘strong leaders’. Doesn’t the eu always think that it can ‘take advantage of a crisis’ and then use it to ratchet up their federalist aims !!
As I understand it the term “America”, up to the early 1800s, refered only to South America.
Various other names, including Columbia, were touted by white settlers, to describe the occupied entity that comprised the northern continent.
At the time of the Civil War, in the 1870s, only the eastern states were regarded as America, the mid-west was the (ever-expanding) Frontier territory.
In that sense, and perhaps not only in that Trumpian sense, the “Native Americans” were never ever Americans. Thay are inherently and on their own terms aboriginal Navajos, Iroqoui, etc.
The terms America and American are thus a European settler conceit and an imposition of recent historic origin. To many white Americans non-Whites are thus Americans only in a qualified, subordinate and removable sense; and should be grateful for the concession and careful lest they lose it, or their lives under the knee of their betters.
The same conditional status operates in the minds of many white British people when they consider their grudgingly compatriot fellows of ‘duskier hues’.
SJ - oh lucky you - time in South America. Quite understand your comment about the dissonance when you returned to dreary, grey UK. Be honest - if you had ended up in Denmark, Finland, Norway, Germany, Belgium, France - wouldn’t you have felt the same about the non-colour of the people you were with ?
Similar to returning home from foreign holiday; come back from America and everything’s so small and squeezed in. Return from any foreign holiday and the UK feels grey, dismal and over-crowded.
I think I am lucky having been in the position of lecturing/teaching international marketing to a large array of different audiences. I was going through the list and although black people do not ‘feature’ as an ethnic group in my memory neither do any others. My public seminars differed slightly in that they were ‘country oriented’ for delivery (see Russia, Vietnam as examples) Others were Business or University based where attendees were indeed very mixed- notably at MBA levels (25-5O year old age range). Looking back at one class I noted that there were three English , 2 Arab - Tunisian, Algerian) 2 Belgian, I Israeli, I German, I Russian, and 2 Japanese.
Public Seminars reflected the populations - eg Ukrainians, Russians, Vietnamese etc. in my bBA courses I had several black students - including I was assured a Princess from Africa. Curiously I remember only female black students.
really didn’t have time to piss about with racism!
A crisis, to the wise, is always an opportunity for creative thought.
The European Union is a federalist and federalising entity that engages creatively, collectively, collaboratively, cooperatively and peacefully towards turning crisis into an opportunity for closer unity, and equitably shared prosperity.
Pity you can’t see that, and prefer solitude, the charms of a decaying and dissolute monarchy, and the obscenely obese House of Lords as a sovereign figment to console you.
Go your own prodigal way. You will always be welcome back. Fresh raiment will be laid out and the fatted calf will await your return 
You want to be purist - OK. British people of colour are not British in the racial/genetic sense. They are different. Their bodies are not adapted to living in the grey, dismal, northern european countries - which is why there are concerns about certain groups needing to take Vitamin D to protect themselves. We are all different racial groups on a genetic level - so yes there are differences. I personally feel that many non-whites are more attractive than the whites, some Indian women are stunners…remember Miss India who won Miss World ?
But I do NOT feel that the genetic difference makes anyone inferior (or superior) - just different. Which is what our wonderful world is supposed to be about. Differences between nations, culture, history, colour, dress, etc etc.
I used to love hanging around the arrivals area at Heathrow airport. Seeing some of the international people coming through, wearing their traditional/normal clothes I found amazing and wonderful to see. Then I thought, oh lordy - they are so wonderfully, colourfully dressed - they are going to get such a horrible shock with the greyness of the UK. In some ways I felt sorry for them.
As for adopting the british home life-style thing; come on PG. The homes in the UK are designed for the UK climate (well, sort of). So if you live in the UK you live in a UK house and all the fittings are UK.
But go to any supermarket in the UK and you will find shelves just packed with foodstuffs from right around the world. Which is amazing. So anyone living in the UK can have a choice of eating food from the whole world.
Go and live in different parts of the world, one would live in a different type of house and have a different form of heating, eating and transport. I think it’s called ‘adapting’ isn’t it ? And absolutely nothing to do with feelings of superiority or inferiority - just human instinct for survival.
As for ‘appropriating’ other cultures - I always took it as a compliment that some white women would want to dress their hair in corn-rows. I always regarded it as a compliment in that it was attractive, and more interesting than the way white women normally wore their hair. Now it seems that in the USA some white ‘c-lebs’ who did that are now feeling it necessary to apologise… for what ?
I’m naive - I always thought it was a compliment to another group to adopt some of what was being worn by them- I obviously need educating !!
PG - You’re doing it again - you’re making - WRONG - assumptions about me, and you’ve been warned not to do so.
I did not mention the monarchy (you don’t know my views on that); I did not mention the HoL (you do not know my views on that); you don’t have a clue -
So STOP making WRONG assumptions - you’re letting yourself down. Don’t.
Not British in “the racial/genetics sense”?
Anne you are at risk of publishing racial/genetic nonsense of the most unpleasant and potentially dangerous kind here.
In what sense do you propose there to be a racial/genetic sense of Britishness? Is there a test or a threshold to determine what racial or genetic test might be applied to determine the “right” level of genetic or racial determinants to qualify an individual to be legitimately qualified as fully British?
Perhaps you can make yourself clear? Are our mixed-race children sufficiently British, in your view, to be authentically racially or genetically British? Or, conversely, disqualified as provenly and fully British?
Be very careful how you answer, lest you reveal your own assumptions.
NB. I am not “bullying” you.
I always thought that the British were a mongrel race anyway
As distinct, perhaps, from pure-bred, Eddie?
Why not use the good old imperialist term “half-caste”, it seems to have gone out of fashion. Too “politically incorrect” maybe?
Yes it’s been invaded so many times the genetic make up of most of us is completely mixed up. Mine certainly iss
I do sincerely hope you don’t feel that your purity has somehow got contaminated by your buccaneering forebears, Eddie?
Used to be referred to as “a touch of the tar-brush”, but not so the servants could overhear, what d’you know?! 