On a recent visit to New York, I bought The New York Times Guide to New York City. I read the following in its prefatory "brief history of New York": "Then in the early 1990s, for reasons still not fully understood, urban America, led by New York City, made a stunning comeback. The city's notorious crime rate dropped by 70 percent, while tourism, job creation and construction hit record highs." Modest agnosticism indeed, from a source not known for it. The Times guide refused to advance even tentative reasons for the comeback.
Might the guide's authors have been reluctant to recognize the reasons for New York's renaissance precisely because those reasons offered a powerful refutation of all the social ideas that the Times has peddled for three decades? Certainly, the decline in New York's crime rate owes nothing to the Times's own attitude toward crime: a mixture of lordly indifference, pusillanimity, and hostility toward the police, whom it depicts as neo-Nazis scarcely preferable to the criminals themselves, the latter having at least the excuse of being poor, downtrodden, and racially oppressed.
While in New York, therefore, I was surprised at the sensible way in which the Times's London correspondent reported the brutal murder there of a ten-year-old child, a killing that provoked national soul-searching: for London is fast descending into the same vortex from which New York has triumphantly emerged. Crimes of violence are rising as fast as the NASDAQ has fallen—and the Times is realistic about the causes, because the problem is 3,000 miles away.
A little boy called Damilola Taylor, who had arrived in London from Nigeria with his mother a month before, was stabbed in the femoral artery on his way home from computer lessons and left to bleed to death in the street by several passersby.
Damilola, by all accounts, was a quiet, studious, and well-behaved boy, who was for that reason mercilessly bullied by his peers. The most likely suspects—to the chagrin of the liberal press—were some youths of West Indian origin, rather than white racists. The case revealed to the wider public for the first time what students of such matters have long known: that relations between West Indians and West Africans in England are not altogether amicable. Ethnic minorities are not one big, happy, family united in the struggle against their overlords.
Astonishingly, the Times correspondent quoted a local leader of the West Africans in Peckham, where the murder took place. "Nigerian people are not popular in this area," she said, "because they try to fit in and do well. The West Indian community likes to pretend there is racism everywhere and black people are being held back. Anyone who doesn't subscribe to that point of view suddenly becomes a target."
Such a statement, of course, casts doubt on the entire liberal worldview of oppressed and oppressors, the former requiring a vast bureaucratic apparatus of restitution to rescue them from the latter. It suggests that, on the contrary, it is this very world picture that prevents progress and entraps people in a culture of impotent resentment.
Not long before the murder, a young man of Nigerian origin who became the first black actor to play Hamlet at the National Theatre related how at school his classmates of West Indian origin called him a "coconut" (black on the outside but white on the inside), simply because he tried his best to reach a high academic standard. His classmates regarded his successful efforts as betrayal or treachery rather than as a source of pride or self-respect.
The Times correspondent added that Peckham, where the Damilola murder took place, is one of London's most violent areas, and that it is short of police. This suggests that there might be some connection between a lack of proper policing and urban violence, a novel and disturbing thought for those who affect to believe that the poor need protection from the police more than they need the protection of the police.
Perhaps the Damilola case might give the authors of the next New York Times Guide to New York City a valuable clue as to why their city's fortunes improved, as well as warn them how that improvement could evaporate: for, as they say in Nigeria, no condition is permanent. What has been done can be undone.
After 50 years of racist attacks on immigrants, conflict between West Indians, Asians and Africans is increasing
Darcus Howe
Saturday August 7, 2004
Guardian
Anti-immigrant racism has, for close to 50 years, offered perks to those at the top of the racial hierarchy here in Britain. Jobs, promotion once at work, access to careers which are almost exclusively open to those with white skins are but some of them.
It is inevitable that among immigrants and their offspring, copycat divisions would appear. We have supped from the cup. And just as that wider conflict expresses itself in violent racial attacks, so will the phenomenon repeat itself among Asians and West Indians. This antisocial activity has raised its ugly head in jets of violence, if hardly on the scale of white racism. It is certainly not as deep rooted; nevertheless, it exists, and if allowed to continue can transform areas of the inner city into very nasty places.
I celebrate my 21st anniversary in broadcasting with a documentary titled, Who You Callin' a Nigger. It reports on violent confrontations between West Indians and Somalis in South London and between West Indian and Pakistani youths in the Midlands. There are comments from Asian men and women which are wholly disparaging of their fellow migrants from the Caribbean, and equally vitriolic language from West Indians about Somalis.
It was very difficult listening to all this throughout the filming and in the editing studio. There have been frail deposits of this phenomenon as far back as I can remember, but it never went beyond banter between West Indians and Africans, totally devoid of any rationale that attempted to justify it. It was merely a dissonance that occurs when strangers meet without prior introduction. It is only in recent times that these deposits have matured into full blown violence, as has happened between West Indian and Somali youths in Plumstead and Woolwich.
My activism in the black community over the last 40 years included fierce and unrelenting campaigns on issues of the final liberation of Africans from colonialism. Mrs Howe actually held the platform with Amilcar Cabral at a hot meeting organised in support of Africans against Portuguese colonialism. Then there was the anti-apartheid movement and the birth of Zimbabwe. Then, an entire generation of West Indians in the UK could be relied on to stand tall.
Not, it seems, now. I journeyed through Woolwich and Plumstead, where thousands of Somali refugees are settling. The Caribbean community is mostly unwelcoming. Some visit on Somalis the same kind of racial abuse we suffered in the period of early migration. Dissenters to this reactionary view are few and far between. "They are taking our houses. They are getting social benefits which are denied to us. Their children are overcrowding our schools." And more.
One middle-aged West Indian woman capped her experiences at the hand of a group of young Somalis with uninhibited outburst: "I hate Somalis. They should go back to where they came from." She did not bat an eyelid.
Parts of Woolwich and Plumstead can only be described as the pits. The surrounding docklands offer no economic activity. Some housing stock depresses even optimists among social activists. Both communities of dark skin forage for a handful of employment opportunities. White Greenwich, a spit away, thrives, while citizens of Plumstead and parts of Woolwich can only feel teased and taunted by their neighbours' success.
The Somalis are a captive community in the grip of self-appointed community leaders. One of them slapped around the documentary director because we did not ask his permission to film his subjects.
And off to Walsall, just outside Birmingham. I had not visited there for close to 25 years when waves of West Indians and Asians (in particular Pakistanis) converged at first shift to set in motion the engineering factories which served the motor industry. The wages from this mass industrial activity supported whole communities. It's all gone now, leaving a wasteland, and new generations of Pakistanis and West Indian youths at each other throats with little social activity to mediate the conflict.
The virus which produces this conflict has also infected small Asian businessmen and the clerical lower middle classes who inhabit nearby Handsworth. The small Asian entrepreneur is slowly losing its captive clientele to large supermarkets and department stores. And there is a mad scramble for clerical jobs in the civil service, local councils and banks.
I spent some time with a Punjabi small businessman. He sells Indian sweets and a young generation of Punjabis ignores his wares for Mars bars, jelly babies, Bounty bars and the rest. He sees enemies everywhere. His primary target is the West Indian community, then the Russians and east Europeans. He belches forth the most lurid abuse he can muster.
My difficulties did not end with the filming and editing. I anticipate a return of hurdles I have long transcended in my earlier work at Channel 4. The first is positive images. My detractors will charge that such a documentary will strengthen the cause of the BNP. As I see it, our Asian businessman is already classic BNP material and I reply to those who make the charge only that the programme represents the truth. Dirty linen needs airing. We have to be mercilessly realistic to make any assessment of who and where we are.
It is impossible for a section of the immigrant community to avoid gravitating to racial categorisation when the practice is so rewarding for the indigenous population. This challenges us all: we face it, we die or we run away.
• Darcus Howe is a writer and broadcaster. His documentary, Who You Callin' a Nigger, will be shown
"Nigerian people are not popular in this area," she said, "because they try to fit in and do well. The West Indian community likes to pretend there is racism everywhere and black people are being held back. Anyone who doesn't subscribe to that point of view suddenly becomes a target."
Kind of sounds like what happens to multiracials/multi-ethnics.
Posted: Fri 01 Jul 2005 21:20 Post subject: "Blacks" versus Africans
It is obvious that "blacks" in the colonial diaspora (North America and the Caribbean) have, to a great extent, internalized the idea that "black" means a dumb thug and that they should take "pride" in that.
The "black" elites mostly refuse to deal with this issue and proclaim that the poor academic performance and high crime rates of blacks in general will not end until all whites love them. They spend far more time fighting to gain more white and other nonblack genes for their "race" via support of the "one drop" myth than they ever spend on the real problems of their supposed "race."
It is obvious that "blacks" in the colonial diaspora (North America and the Caribbean) have, to a great extent, internalized the idea that "black" means a dumb thug and that they should take "pride" in that.
The "black" elites mostly refuse to deal with this issue and proclaim that the poor academic performance and high crime rates of blacks in general will not end until all whites love them. They spend far more time fighting to gain more white and other nonblack genes for their "race" via support of the "one drop" myth than they ever spend on the real problems of their supposed "race."
As Frank Sweet would say, what's the source of this? Do you have any statistics from the UK? What books have you read to back this up? Considering the success rates of Caribbean immigrants to the U.S. how does this jibe with your thesis? Enquiring minds would like to know.
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I spent some time with a Punjabi small businessman. He sells Indian sweets and a young generation of Punjabis ignores his wares for Mars bars, jelly babies, Bounty bars and the rest. He sees enemies everywhere. His primary target is the West Indian community, then the Russians and east Europeans. He belches forth the most lurid abuse he can muster.
Oh look, a Punjabi businessman is expressing the same feelings. Instead of thing being about race, could it be about a bad economy and ethnic tensions of those fighting for scraps?
Of course, it wasn't so long ago that Irish immigrants complained about how "blacks" were stealing their jobs in early 20th century America.
Nowadays, there are a many
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conservatives
warning of the brown peril, the waves of illegal immigrants from Latin America who will steal American jobs.
Oh, and have we forgotten about "yellow peril"? How those dastardly Asians would steal jobs and white women from Americans?
It is obvious that "blacks" in the colonial diaspora (North America and the Caribbean) have, to a great extent, internalized the idea that "black" means a dumb thug and that they should take "pride" in that. The "black" elites mostly refuse to deal with this issue and proclaim that the poor academic performance and high crime rates of blacks in general will not end until all whites love them. They spend far more time fighting to gain more white and other nonblack genes for their "race" via support of the "one drop" myth than they ever spend on the real problems of their supposed "race."
As Frank Sweet would say, what's the source of this?
FWIW, the characters in BBC TV comedy show "No Problem" (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/n/noproblem_1299002339.shtml) depict such stereotyped behavior. One character (a Jamaican as I recall) plays the "race" card by constantly whining about "racism" at the most trivial events. Leave it to the Brits to make a comedy out of it.
I do not have any studies suggesting whether West Indians in the UK really are less industrious than those in the US, or if this perception difference is just a difference in stereotypes.
Nevertheless, on a more serious note, researchers have conclusively shown that West Indians in the UK out-marry with Whites at the same high rates as Irish-Americans or Hispanics in the US. See Suzanne Model and Gene Fisher, “Unions Between Blacks and Whites: England and the U.S. Compared,” in Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25 (no. 5, September 2002), 728-54. This means that, whatever the problems of immigrant groups in the UK (either problems of acculturation or of conflict between groups), those problems will inevitably vanish in two generations--guaranteed. One cannot have serious or intractable hatred based solely upon "ethnic differences" between people within the very same family.
In this regard (maintenance/enforcement of endogamy), the U.S. is unique.
Posted: Sat 02 Jul 2005 15:37 Post subject: Race Card, BNP, and Friends
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FWIW, the characters in BBC TV comedy show "No Problem" (see http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/guide/articles/n/noproblem_1299002339.shtml) depict such stereotyped behavior. One character (a Jamaican as I recall) plays the "race" card by constantly whining about "racism" at the most trivial events. Leave it to the Brits to make a comedy out of it.
A TV shows poke fun at something and that's social anthropology? Having watched Woody Allen movies (mostly set in NYC) or the television program "Friends" (also set in NYC) one would conclude that there are no Latinos in NYC, one Chinese woman, and maybe 2 "black" women (whoops, forgot to mention that the first black woman in a Woody Allen movie was a prostitute. Not racist stereotype there. Not at all.) So, how does a TV show serve as proof that Britain didn't have a serious problem of racism? (Might want to research Queen Elizabeth II's face speach against racism in the UK after the nastiness of the 1980s. Also might want to research the epithet "Paki.")
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...Plays the "race" card...Whining about "racism"...
Good grief, when did the phrase "plays the race card" originate and by whom? The OJ Simpson trial as far as I can remember saw the birth of this vile saying. Why must anytime someone complains about an event of racism it's "playing the race card"? The samething about "whining about racism."
Britain, like Germany, has had a traditional problem of accepting immigrants. Unlike Germany, Britain has made a concerted effort of late to integrate immigrants into its society (especially after several major racially based murders and race riots (might want to look into problems of South Asian integration in the former industrial towns of northern England. Also suggest looking into the BNP, the British Nationalist Party, and its efforts to foment racist struggle.). However, Britain's success is the result of tackling racism head on and not pretending that it doesn't exist.
As for "whining" about racism, again, a TV program's stereotypical character? How much of a characters "whining" might be a way of subtly taking a jab at racism and over-reaction without offending the masses?
Speaking of the racist British National Party, here are few bon mots from its website (you'll note the similarity to historical racist rants in the US, of course, if you search their website, you'll find davidduke.com as big content contributor. As we all know, David Duke would never, ever play the race card.):
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Manifesto of the BNP
Rebuilding British Democracy
British National Party General Election Manifesto 2005
The present regime is engaged in a profound cultural war against the British people, motivated by the desire to create a new ethnic power base to replace the working class which they have abandoned in pursuit of their enthusiasm for globalisation, justified by a quasi-Marxist ideology of the equality of all cultures. We intend to rebuild the basis of democracy in Britain, which is the right of all free-born Britons to debate in public the facts as they see them by restoring true freedom of speech to Britain.
Furthermore, when we speak of ‘British democracy' we do so in an ethnic as well as a civic sense. We do not accept the absurd superstition – propagated for different though sometimes overlapping reasons by capitalists, liberals, Marxists and theologians - of human equality. Whether the now totally discredited feminist argument that men and women are innately the same, to the partly refuted egalitarian claim that everyone within a given population is born as a blank slate with the same innate potential, or to the still dominant Politically Correct denial of the existence of differences on average between members of different races – we reject all these irrational myths.
This must not be taken to mean or imply that we believe that any particular ethnic group or race is ‘superior' or ‘inferior'; we simply recognise that – as any biologist would be able to predict, and the new medical science of pharmacogenetics is now confirming – human populations which have undergone micro-evolutionary changes while being separated for many thousands of years have developed differences in many fields of endeavour, susceptibility to health problems, behavioural tendencies and such like.
To deny such differences on the grounds of egalitarian dogma has always been wrong, but to continue to do so in the light of the latest medical evidence is to condemn people to unnecessary suffering on account of racially specific health problems. We therefore believe that the myth that “we are all the same under the skin” will soon be as discredited as its feminist equivalent, and that all political parties will have to drastically amend their thinking to reflect the new reality in the not too distant future.
Taking these facts into account, we believe that it is far more likely than not that the historically established tendency (and we do not claim that it is any more than that) of the peoples of Western Europe in general - and of these islands in particular - to create and sustain social and political structures in which individual freedom, equality before the law, private property and popular participation in decision-making, is to some extent at least genetically pre-determined. Such tendencies would, naturally, both shape our culture around such institutions, and in turn tend to be reinforced by that culture.
If this is the case, then the idea that it is possible to allow large numbers of people from very different ethnic groups and cultures to settle here, on the assumption that it is just something about our bracing sea air that tends to make us natural born democrats, is fatally flawed. Just as is the idea that we can export our enthusiasm for representative government to other peoples, either by example or by carpet-bombing their countries into giving up their penchant for strong government or theocracy.
Hence, in order to guarantee the continued existence of our British democracy, we also intend to take long-term steps to guarantee the continued existence, as the clearly dominant ethnic, cultural and political group, of the native peoples of these islands – the English, Scots, Irish and Welsh – together with the limited numbers of peoples of European descent, who arrived as refugees or economic immigrants centuries or decades ago, and who have fully integrated into our society.
Multi-racialism – a recipe for disaster
We are further encouraged to see this as essential by two other factors. The first is the truly gruesome record of multi-ethnic societies breaking down into hatred and mass murder. From Bosnia to Rwanda, Indonesia to Northern Ireland, one only has to scratch most of the conflicts in the world – ranging from low-level loathing to outright genocide – to find that at the root of the problem is the juxtaposition by past migration or strategic decision by a ruling class of two or more different peoples in the same piece of territory.
Again, this is no surprise. Scientists studying various primates have now discovered that murderous ‘wars' against different groups of the same species are as frequent among our non-human relatives as they are among us. The tendency to conceive of our relationships with other human populations in terms of ‘in-groups' and ‘out-groups', is older than humanity itself. ‘Racism', in other words, is not a consequence of ‘false consciousness', economics, imperialism or the work of evil agitators, it is part of human nature.
The last idealistic egalitarian attempt to ignore and override human nature, Marxist economic determinism, led to disaster and human misery on an almost unimaginable scale. The lessons of history, and the growing tensions in the multi-ethnic society that the left-liberal elite have imposed on us in recent decades, all point to the likelihood that the closely-related egalitarian ‘multi-racial experiment' will end in the same way. Our determination to avoid such a human tragedy is what drives us to risk imprisonment and persecution, and it is what allows us to say with confidence and sincerity that we are not ‘racists', but realists.
Multi-culturalism – the enemy of human diversity
Even if, against most prior historical experience, it proved to be possible to assimilate and integrate huge numbers of immigrants from other ethnic and cultural groups into Western societies without mayhem and bloodshed, we would still oppose it. This is because we believe that the principle that bio-diversity is an innate good – accepted by liberals for every form of life on this planet except Man – also applies to human cultures and populations.
There is clearly a deeply ingrained human need to ‘belong' and to identify with people with whom one shares special things in common; we all have a need to feel ‘at home'. While this is generally met at one level by membership of a family, this is clearly not enough. But the idea that this need can be fulfilled by identification with the entire human race is an intellectual fantasy.
The human need to belong is best met at a ‘tribal' level, and the best way to avoid such tribalism leading in turn to clashes with other tribes is to encourage its realization at the level of a genuine nation-state, particularly one whose dominant political elite regard their primary duty as being to mind their own nation's business and looking after their own people. This half-way house between the expansionist Empire and the nihilistic football gang is the best hope for peace.
This is not something we desire only for ourselves, we recognise the right of all people to belong to a specific culture and to preserve the local particularisms which make us truly and fully human.
For most of human history, the existence of such ethnic and cultural diversity among humanity was so obvious and apparently unchallengeably natural that the political theorists and philosophers of past generations simply took it for granted. Only in the last few decades has this been changed forever by the advent of mass passenger travel, the insatiable desire of the globalised capitalist economy for cheap labour, and the worldwide reach of US consumerist culture through film and television.
As a result the entire world – or at least every nation of predominantly European descent – is now in the grip of a set of assumptions and prejudices about race, culture and integration that, however well-meaning in theory, are increasingly anti-human and even genocidal in practice.
While the often subtle differences between similar cultures make it hard for an outsider to tell where one ends and another starts, it is generally easier to distinguish between languages. Hence these are a very good indicator for the health or otherwise of human cultural and biological diversity.
So it should be deeply worrying to anyone who values traditional cultures and the rich patchwork of human variety to read what Prof. Bill Sutherland, Population Biologist at the University of East Anglia, has discovered about the status of the 6,800 languages of the world: Over the last five hundred years, they have been disappearing faster than species - 4.5% of total number have been lost over the last 500 years, compared with 1.3% of bird species and 1.9% of mammals.
None of which sounds too drastic. The real problem, however, is from here onwards. According to Prof. Sutherland at least half of mankind's 6,800 living languages will be dead by 2050, and 90% of them will be extinct by 2100. Every one of those extinctions will mean another group of people who are cut off from their roots and their ancestors by an unbridgeable chasm. Every single one diminishes the variety which makes our world such an interesting and wonderful place.
Among those at gravest risk are Welsh, Scots Gaelic and Irish Gaelic. And although English is one of the 10% of ‘safe' languages, the fact remains that all the vanishing tongues should alert us, like so many miners' canaries, to the existence of an invisible but deadly poison which threatens every culture and distinct ethnic group in the world.
traditional welsh folk dancing by school children
That poison is in large measure the blind economic force of global capitalism, with its insistence on the unrestricted flow of goods, capital and labour to wherever in the world they will make the maximum short-term profit. This, rather than a misty-eyed post-Christian fantasy about ‘equality', post-Marxist fixation on turning refugees and immigrants into a surrogate proletariat, or post-Holocaust suspicion of European consciousness, is the real driving force behind multi-culturalism. It is not about ‘love' and ‘tolerance', it is about profit.
There is no conspiracy of wicked plutocrats or sinister Elders of Zion at work here, the unique cultural and ethnic groups that are being destroyed are not so much specifically targeted for elimination, they are just in the way of a conscience-free global money-making machine.
If this juggernaut is to be resisted, and the diversity which does so much to make us fully human preserved, then politicians of all hues have to rethink their attitudes to culture and identity. The natural resistance of all native peoples to the arrival of huge numbers of outsiders in their territory – whether loggers in the Amazon jungle or Third World settlers in Europe – must cease to be demonized as ‘racism' and understood as a natural and laudable survival mechanism.
We must learn to avoid the temptation to allow arguments about short-term economic expediency to prevail over the rights of indigenous cultures and peoples to preserve their territorial and cultural integrity.
These considerations, rather than intolerance and bigotry are what informs the British National Party's determination not simply to stop any further mass immigration into the British Isles , but also to reverse the tide which has transformed vast areas of our country out of all recognition over the last fifty years. We, as the sole political representatives of the Silent Majority of the English, Scots, Irish and Welsh who formed and were formed by our island home, have one overriding demand: We want our country back!
The proposals outlined below represent the only practical way to move towards that long-term goal. We recognise that a reversal of the tide of immigration can only be secured by negotiation and consent, and that it is probably now too late to anticipate a return to the status quo ante 1948.
On account of that, and also in the understanding that genocide through integration is a threat to all peoples across the world, we also intend to develop a model of ‘multi-culturalism' which combines peaceful co-existence with the maintenance of cultural and biological separation. In parts of the world where mass immigration is irreversible, the only thing that can prevent human diversity vanishing into an antheap of rootless coffee-coloured consumerism is the celebration of difference.
Amazon culture in Brazil under threat in same way as traditional British and European folk cultures
Simply put, relationships between different ethnic and cultural groups sharing the same places need to settle down on lines closer to those practiced for centuries in Persia or India, than to those preached in Hollywood and on MTV. Different groups can live side-by-side and at peace for generations. They can even enjoy each other's cultures, but they must stick to their own, or ‘diversity' will be but a short-lived stepping stone to nothingness.
Our proposals:
1. We would repeal the Race Relations Acts and all other restrictions on free speech in Britain .
2. We would abolish all targets and quotas for ethnic representation in all areas of employment, public and private.
3. We would abolish all politically-correct indoctrination of the police, teachers, and other public employees.
4. We would abolish all government-sponsored ethnicity-specific professional bodies, housing associations, and other organisations.
5. We would abolish all departments, agencies, or other units of government whose sole and specific purpose is to deal with ethnic issues, grievances, or crimes. Such organisations deliberately seek out the maximum quantity of "racism" in order to justify their own existence and expand their power and budgets. The law is the law and must be enforced equally upon all without being politicised over ethnic differences.
6. We would abolish all laws against racial discrimination in employment and the government bodies associated with enforcing them.
7. Except for purposes of teaching foreign languages to native speakers of English, the only languages permitted in official documents, government business, and schools will be English, Scots, and Welsh. The use of other languages by ethnic minorities in their own homes, school and institutions will also be encouraged.
8. A Clause 28-style proscription against the promotion of racial integration in schools and the media would be introduced.
9. In order to make it clear that the “celebration of diversity” is something in which the native peoples of our islands can share, each of our traditional Saints Days would be made Public Holidays in the nations in question, with Trafalgar Day being an additional Public Holiday throughout the entire UK.
10. A massively-funded and permanent programme, using and doubling Britain's current foreign aid budget, will aim to reduce, by voluntary resettlement to their lands of ethnic origin, the proportion of ethnic minorities living in Britain, for as long as the majority of the electorate are willing to fund such expenditure. Since the chief impact of such a programme would be the assistance it would render to Developing Countries in the Third World, this is described further in Section 16 – Britain and the World.
11. While accepting the right of law-abiding minorities, in our country because they or their ancestors came here legally, to remain here and to enjoy the full protection of the law against any form of harassment or hostility, we will also seek to emphasise the importance of the prior status of the aboriginal people. This would be a national extension of the ‘Sons and Daughters' policy in priority on housing and school places lists which BNP councils seek to implement at local level.
We will publish a list of these British nationals preference proposals before the next major election.
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Slovakian invasion of the British job market
17th June 2005
News article filed by BNP news team
UK bound? - Free flights to rid Slovakia of its gipsy population
The Slovakian government have recently decided that in a bid to cut Slovakian unemployment figures, they will ship thousand of jobless Slovaks to Britain and other neighbouring EU member states. As things stand at the moment, Slovakia’s unemployed are being given train tickets to Austria, Hungary and the Czech Republic. However, a spokesman for the Slovakian employment ministry recently stated “If it is a success, we will extend it to other countries further afield, such as the United Kingdom”.
EU subsidies
Bearing in mind that Slovakia has a population of 5.4 million- 17.5% of which are unemployed- this means that Britain is looking at having to take a huge share of the estimated 875,000 unemployed that are going to be looking at leaving Slovakia in search of an easy life at the expense of the hardworking British taxpayer.
Perhaps the most sickening part of this story, is the fact that their airfare will be paid for out of EU subsidies awarded to Slovakia to help create jobs for the unemployed- subsidies, which the British tax payer is helping to pay for.
Economic impact
There will, without a doubt be a huge economic impact from this. We live in a country which is exporting jobs to Third World sweat shops at every opportunity and now Slovakia - with the EU’s backing - are planning to unload their unemployed onto the already overstretched British job market. This will lead to even more undercutting of British workers’ wages by people who come from a country where the average pay is £136 a month.
And that is assuming that when they get here they actually want, and can find work. Some are quite likely to prefer to sign on and live at our expense that way.
Increase in crime
This however, is not the only impact that the British taxpayer will have to suffer. It has been reported in Austria that the migrating Slovakian Gipsies (who make up a massively disproportionate number of that country’s unemployed) are looting in their droves. As if Britain doesn’t have enough to worry about with yobbish chav “culture”, increased drug use and drink fuelled violence; without the added worry of thousands of unemployed, looting Gipsies to this “carry on film” that is modern Britain.
All in all, this is just another example of the way in which hard-working British people are being made to pay for other countries short comings. If the Slovakians have a problem with unemployment and looting gipsies, then ultimately it is their problem, not ours.
Now why do you suppose the BNP would post the following article about genetic evidence of race?!!
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Racial groupings match genetic profiles
The follwing is the press release from Stanford University showing the results of a major study in ethnicity and genetic mapping.
DNA - the helix of life DNA - the helix of life
STANFORD, Calif. (27th Jan 05) - Checking a box next to a racial/ethnic category gives several pieces of information about people - the continent where their ancestors were born, the possible color of their skin and perhaps something about their risk of different diseases. But a new study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine finds that the checked box also says something about a person's genetic background.
This work comes on the heels of several contradictory studies about the genetic basis of race. Some found that race is a social construct with no genetic basis while others suggested that clear genetic differences exist between people of different races.
Largest study to date
What makes the current study, published in the February issue of the American Journal of Human Genetics, more conclusive is its size. The study is by far the largest, consisting of 3,636 people who all identified themselves as either white, African-American, East Asian or Hispanic. Of these, only five individuals had DNA that matched an ethnic group different than the box they checked at the beginning of the study. That's an error rate of 0.14 percent.
According to Neil Risch, PhD, a UCSF professor who led the study while he was professor of genetics at Stanford, the findings are particularly surprising given that people in both African-American and Hispanic ethnic groups often have a mixed background. "We might expect these individuals to cross several different genetic clusters," Risch said. This is especially true for Hispanics who are often a mix of Native American, white and African-American ancestry. But that's not what the study found. Instead, each self-identified racial/ethnic group clumped into the same genetic cluster.
The people in this research were all part of a study on the genetics of hypertension, recruited at 15 locations within the United States and in Taiwan. This broad distribution is important because it means that the results are representative of racial/ethnic groups throughout the United States rather than a small region that might not reflect the population nationwide.
DNA clusters match ethnic groups
For each person in the study, the researchers examined 326 DNA regions that tend to vary between people. These regions are not necessarily within genes, but are simply genetic signposts on chromosomes that come in a variety of different forms at the same location.
Without knowing how the participants had identified themselves, Risch and his team ran the results through a computer program that grouped individuals according to patterns of the 326 signposts. This analysis could have resulted in any number of different clusters, but only four clear groups turned up. And in each case the individuals within those clusters all fell within the same self-identified racial group.
"This shows that people's self-identified race/ethnicity is a nearly perfect indicator of their genetic background," Risch said.
Two sub-groups within Asian category
When the team further analyzed each of the four clusters, they found two distinct sub-groups within the East Asian genetic cluster. These two groups correlated with people who identified themselves as Chinese and Japanese. None of the other genetic groups could be broken down into smaller sub-sections. This suggests that there isn't enough genetic difference to distinguish between people who have ancestry from northern Europe versus southern Europe, for example. Risch admitted that few people in this study were of recent mixed ancestry, who might not fall into such neat genetic categories.
This work could influence how medical research is carried out. Often researchers ask study participants to identify their race and ethnicity at the beginning of a clinical trial. The researchers can then follow people of different racial/ethnic groups to see which group is more likely to get a particular disease or respond well to a new treatment. This information can help future doctors know which patients may need additional disease screening or should receive one treatment over another.
But recently some researchers have moved to examining genetic differences between participants rather than relying on race and ethnicity. Their reasoning is that genetic differences may be a more precise tool for tracking groups of patients. Risch points out that this genetic analysis is costly. If people fall into the same groups using self-identified race as using genetics, then that could bring down the expanding cost of medical research.
Researchers
Other Stanford researchers who participated in this work include Hua Tang, a graduate student now at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, and Tom Quertermous, MD, the William G. Irwin Professor in Cardiovascular Medicine.
Stanford University Medical Center integrates research, medical education and patient care at its three institutions - Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford Hospital & Clinics and Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. For more information, please visit the Web site of the medical center's Office of Communication & Public Affairs at http://mednews.stanford.edu.
Thankfully, there are voices of sanity in Britain to combat BNP bigotry, like StoptheBNP.org.uk:
Quote:
News Desk
Date: 21 June 2005
Source: Searchlight
Councillors free to call BNP nazi
The local government watchdog, the Standards Board, has rejected a BNP councillor's complaint over another councillor who said, "We don't want nazis in our town".
Gavin Stollar, an Epping Forest district councillor and Liberal Democrat general election candidate in Brentwood and Ongar, made the comment after the BNP held a conference in Brentwood in January. The Loughton BNP councillor Patricia Richardson claimed the remark breached the councillors' Code of Conduct as it failed to treat the BNP with respect and was "extremely offensive and confrontational". She claimed it was especially offensive because she is Jewish, something she is keen to emphasise whenever she can capitalise on it.
Reporting on 16 June, the Standards Board ruled that Stollar "expressed his views on a rival political party within the normal and acceptable limits of political debate".
Welcoming the decision, Stollar told Searchlight, "I feel this landmark ruling by the Standards Board not only vindicates me but allows councillors across the country who have to share their chamber with BNP members to speak freely about this racist and antisemitic political party.
"The BNP play on people's fears and attempt to stir up hatred in the communities where they are active. Just as the three main parties will constantly call each other to account on different policy issues, it is incumbent on councillors and politicians of these very same parties to unite to show the BNP up for what they are – something that has now officially been recognised as 'standard political discourse'."
Quote:
The BNP unmasked
This recently filmed DVD reveals the true nature of the BNP - in their own words. It shows them behind closed doors when they think the public are not watching. It proves they are still Nazis.
The BNP website describes Scott McLean, the party's deputy chairman, as "a family man with three children … [a] native of Glasgow and a well-established and respected local businessman for the past ten years". In this DVD you see him giving a Nazi salute at a BNP "winter camp" where party members sing racist and pro-Nazi songs, glorify the Holocaust and call for blacks to be killed. All this takes place in front of children.
In the garden they set fire to a huge "tree of life" in a ceremony modelled on a Ku Klux Klan cross burning. The tree of life is a runic symbol used by Hitler's SS and several Nazi groups today.
The film runs for just over eight minutes and say more about the BNP than the whole of the 53 pages of the party's election manifesto.
You can obtain this DVD for just £4 (£5 outside UK), which covers our production cost and postage and packing. Watch it, show it to your friends, colleagues, neighbours and community groups. Let everyone see the BNP for what it really is.
Discounts available for bulk orders (more than four). Please email editors@searchlightmagazine.com or telephone 020 7681 8660 for details.
Date: 19 June 2005
Source: The Sunday Times
Stephen Fry listed as hate target on neo-Nazi website
Maurice Chittenden
STEPHEN FRY, the comedy actor, has put been on a hate list by a neo-Nazi group. The television presenter was told by researchers at Searchlight, the anti-fascist organisation, that his name had been posted on a far-right website.
Fry describes hearing of the threat in an interview in today's Sunday Times News Review. His name and details were posted on Redwatch, a website which is used by extreme right-wing groups to publicise details of their enemies.
Many of those whose names have been listed have subsequently been attacked. A teacher in West Yorkshire had his car firebombed allegedly the day after his name and address had appeared.
Fry's Jewish descent and left-leaning political views are thought to have marked him out for targeting by the right. Few people realised that he had Jewish blood until he talked of his family's history at a recent literary festival.
"They think we deserve to be taught a lesson. The Jews are regarded as clever and they don't like that," said Fry. "I was told I could get help with fitting panic buttons — Jews look after our own — but I decided against it.
"Yet the threats are real. Someone like Denis Norden (the television presenter) is for ever receiving threats. We are still witnessing the smouldering ashes of (the Holocaust)."
Fry also mentioned his ancestry in his autobiography, Moab is My Washpot, published in 1997. His mother's grandfather was a Hungarian Jew named Neumann who lived for a time in Vienna.
In the book Fry recalled that his "blood ran cold" when he read that a Hungarian Jew with the same surname had given Hitler a long black overcoat in Vienna in 1910.
Fry added that "one can't help wondering if it really might be true that one's great-grandfather might have befriended and kept warm a man who would decimate a large part of his family".
Fry, host of the BBC2 quiz show QI, visited his ancestor's grave in Slovakia last month only to find that it had been desecrated.
Gerry Gable, who runs Searchlight, said he believed that Fry's name had been put on the website in the hope that some harm would come to him. He blamed some members of the British National party and remnants of the outlawed Combat 18 terrorist group.
"They will go for anybody," said Gable. "They will put people's names on there hoping that a young person who wants to make a name for himself or an older pyscho will take action. At best it is going to be a phone call, at the worst your house will be burnt down."
Despite the threat, Fry is continuing to support opposition to the government's racial and religious hatred bill on the grounds that it attacks free speech.
Tomorrow Rowan Atkinson, his friend and fellow Blackadder star, will be joined by Ian McEwan, the novelist, Nicholas Hytner, director of the National Theatre, and MPs from all three main political parties to voice opposition to the bill in a meeting at Westminster.
Redwatch did not return e-mails asking for comment.
Like a certain party in the US, the BNP also talks about family values hypocritically so...
Quote:
HYPOCRITE
BNP councillor denounced by his own wife
A BNP councillor has been branded a hypocrite by his former wife. Robin Evans won a council by-election in the Mill Hill ward in Blackburn last November. He told voters that he was standing to give his family a future. Yet during his election campaign he was having a secret affair with a party worker.
Evans, 38, has since walked out on his wife and 10-year-old son and set up home with the 21-year-old party activist.
"His election campaign was all about family values," Gwen Evans told Searchlight. "That was a load of rubbish."
Evans told voters that he wanted to "ensure a British future for his family in Blackburn."
But, according to his wife, the only future he was planning was to ditch her and her son.
Even when she found out about the affair the BNP attempted to silence her. "They told me that it was important that I kept my mouth shut and didn't tell anyone. They wanted me to stand beside him because it was important to show a united family."
In one confrontation, builder Evans warned his wife against going to the newspapers. "He said there would be repercussions if I did and the party would take steps to 'counter-act' such moves.
"It was a clear threat and I knew he meant it. But I don't care any more. As far as I am concerned, the BNP has wrecked my marriage and deprived our son of a good father."
Her suspicions about her husband's affair grew during the election campaign but he always denied it. Then she found some text messages from Julie Russell. One read: "I want your teddy bear on my pillow again."
Evans moved out soon after the election and is now living with Russell, the daughter of BNP press officer Stuart Russell. Gwen is angry and resentful towards the BNP.
"The BNP has changed him. He was a family man and a great dad but he is different now. Most of his previous business was with Asians but this has all dried up and he doesn't seem to care. He had some Asian friends before but now he wishes them dead."
Gwen first learnt about his decision to stand from her mother who had read it in the local paper. "I thought it was a joke," she remembers. "He had only been in the party for a few months."
Her mother was horrified and she lost several close friends. But she stuck by her husband and the BNP offered to look after her.
"They promised to get me protection. They talked about strengthened glass for my windows, a security and video system and a panic button linked to the local police station. The day after Robin won, a BNP member came round to my house and left a baseball bat for me!"
Their relationship has soured further since he walked out.
Gwen Evans has been left to rebuild her life but she remains angry.
"Robin has been brainwashed by these people. I don't know what goes on at their meetings but it must be pretty evil. The quiet man I knew has now turned into a strutting little Hitler. I suppose I should feel sorry for him, but what he and the BNP have done to me and my son are unforgivable."
Robin Evans was the only BNP councillor to attend the all-important budget meeting. Despite having promised to speak out for the people who voted for him, the only words he could muster were: "It's all mumbo jumbo. I don't understand".
Clueless Evans failed the people who voted for him.
Police have been called in to probe Robin Evans' business affairs after it has been alleged that he had illegally hired workers.
The issue came to light when several of these workers, some close family friends, were dropped after his business dried up following his election victory. When these workers attempted to claim benefit they were told that they were ineligible because there was no evidence that they had been working.
Evans failed to back up his friends and even denied he had ever employed them.
During his election campaign Evans attacked those who "can morally justify giving a single penny to people who had not contributed anything to our society."
This article appeared in the Searchlight Newspaper April 2003.
Posted: Sat 02 Jul 2005 16:24 Post subject: Re: Race Card, BNP, and Friends
triguy wrote:
A TV shows poke fun at something and that's social anthropology?
No. As I clearly said, it is a BBC comedy series. The "social anthropology" was the reference to the journal article.
The rest of triguy's post is another rant against "racists" and "racism," without making any attempt to define the terms. Judging his the choice of sources, triguy, like the Jamaican character in "No Problem," sincerely sees "racism" in every life's obstacle and in every human conflict.
For the last time, if triguy wants his opinions to carry weight, he would be wise to define his terms. I have become reluctantly convinced that he uses the terms as mere synonym for "bad." And so, translating his phrase, "Stephen Sailer is a racist," yields "Stephen Sailer is a bad man." This is a waste of bandwidth. The point is not that there is evil in the world. The point is that applying the terms "racism" and "racist" to every conflict cheapens the terms to meaninglessness and stifles serious attempts to examine phenotype-based oppression.
Triguy is begining to create the impression that he is interested neither in learning the facts of U.S. racialism nor in teaching the facts of U.S. racialism, but instead wants to use this discussion group to rail against those whom he dislikes by labeling them "racists."
Posted: Sun 03 Jul 2005 01:11 Post subject: Unions Between Blacks and Whites: England and the U.S.
I have serious questions about this study:
Suzanne Model and Gene Fisher, “Unions Between Blacks and Whites: England and the U.S. Compared,” in Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25 (no. 5, September 2002), 728-54
The assertion that whites and blacks in the U.S. are equally supportive of the "one drop rule" is, in my strong opinion, a myth perpetuated by constant reference to secondary sources.
There are plenty of surveys in which American whites have been asked what they think of blacks or of interracial marriage. Where is the survey that asks whites what they think of partial black ancestry in otherwise white-identified persons? The very fact that none of these studies which tell us that the "one drop rule" is gospel in the U.S. even take note of the all too obvious "Latino Escape Hatch" (or the Arab one) seems to be proof of their intellectual dishonesty.
Based on my own "white to white" conversations with people as well as reading years of correspodence on "Interracial Voice," and the lopsided black (as opposed to white) opposition to both the Multiracial Census Movement and any any freedom of choice for the "tarbrushed" who don't have the Hispanic/Arab shield, I have to conclude that the "one drop" myth survives almost totally on the moral auuthority of blacks and would disintegrate if blacks turned against it.
Those whites who support the ODR apparently do so because they have been told by blacks that this is the politically correct thing to believe, yet even they are careful to not "insult" Hispanics or Arabs by mentioning their African ancestry when the ODR is discussed. How can we claim that whites in general support the ODR for traditionally racist reasons when it is mainly the public arbiters of what is and is not racist (the intelligentsia and media elites) who say that the ODR, while racist in origin, should not be resisted by its intended victims and any resistence is proof of bad character in said victims?
Note also that the descendants of Eston Hemings Jeffferson are still white. The Melungeons and Redbones are still white.
I seriously doubt there are many scholars willing to formally test these theories.
I have serious questions about this study: Suzanne Model and Gene Fisher, “Unions Between Blacks and Whites: England and the U.S. Compared,” in Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25 (no. 5, September 2002), 728-54. The assertion that whites and blacks in the U.S. are equally supportive of the "one drop rule" is, in my strong opinion, a myth perpetuated by constant reference to secondary sources.
I agree with A.D.’s specific objection but point out that she is looking at just one paragraph out of a 27-page article.
The bulk of the article is hard to refute, since it is simply shows measured numbers from the census. It demonstrates that B/W exogamy in the UK is comparable to Hispanic or Jewish exogamy in the U.S. and much higher than B/W exogamy in the U.S. It also shows that the children and grandchildren of BWI immigrants in the U.S. out-marry at a higher rate than do ethnic African Americans. The study’s data are clear and convincing: BWI immigrants of strong African ancestry in the UK are being accepted into mainstream UK society. BWI immigrants of strong African ancestry in the U.S. are almost being accepted into mainstream U.S. society. But Ethnic African Americans in the U.S. are not even close to acceptance into mainstream U.S. society. This is important data.
The questionable fragment starts with
Quote:
To determine if intermarriage promotes the ultimate disappearance of salient group boundaries requires a consideration of the identities open to the offspring. If the offspring of mixed-race unions have a range of ethnic options; for instance, to take on the identity of either parent or to take on a separate biracial identity, then their parents’ union has facilitated the demise of ethnic boundaries. But if the offspring of mixed race partnerships have little say in the matter; if the dominant society automatically assigns them the heritage of the parent who belongs to the more stigmatized group, then mixed race unions do not facilitate the erosion of ethnic boundaries.
There is nothing controversial or doubtful about the above statement. It merely says that enforcement of a one-drop rule perpetuates the color line. No one who has studied the matter would disagree. But the next paragraph, which A.D. objects to, says
Quote:
With respect to the US, research reveals that Americans, black and white, still honour the one drop rule (Waters 1991). According to this convention, ‘. . . a black is any person with any known African black ancestry . . .’ (Davis 1991, p. 5 italics in the original), which means that, ‘For all persons of any known black lineage . . . assimilation is blocked and is not promoted by miscegenation’ (Davis 1991, p. 14). To be sure, in the post Civil Rights era, Americans with one white and one black parent increasingly identify as ‘mixed race’ or ‘biracial’ (Root 1996). But the more telling social fact is not how mixed race people view themselves but how the larger society views them. And as yet, there is simply no evidence that Americans, black or white, classify the offspring of one black parent and one white parent as anything but black (Byng 1999).
That last sentence is blatantly inaccurate. As of the 2000 census, more than half (56 percent) of interracial couples checked off both boxes for their kids. (See the section titled “The Future” in my essay Features of Today’s One-Drop Rule.) The rest of the paragraph quotes others’ unsubstantiated opinions that are also known to be inaccurate.
Two mitigating factors explain but cannot excuse such error. First, the article looked only at the 1990 census and did not look at 2000 census. At that time, few would have predicted the birth of the multiracial movement, much less that the feds would allow people to check off more than one box in 2000. In short, they guessed wrong. The second mitigating factor is that current academic dogma claims that the ODR has no exceptions and is enforced by White society. This may be inaccurate, but it is academic dogma nonetheless. I wager that the authors were told in no uncertain terms that they either inserted a paragraph paying lip service to the dogma or they would not get published. Simple as that. Believe me; I have been there, done that.
Powell wrote:
I seriously doubt there are many scholars willing to formally test these theories.
That is correct. This is because there are not many scholars willing to lose their right to teach and publish within the scholarly community. As Tenzer knows, that is what happens to those who defy current dogma. I do feel that this will change, however. I have seen a hundred students in a lecture hall roll their eyes with skepticism when a professor orates that millions of Americans are actually Black without even knowing it. Eventually, these skeptics will be in positions to hire and fire professors.
Joined: 28 Apr 2006 {Posts: 282 } Location: 51st State
Posted: Wed 12 Jul 2006 11:57 Post subject:
fwsweet wrote:
Nevertheless, on a more serious note, researchers have conclusively shown that West Indians in the UK out-marry with Whites at the same high rates as Irish-Americans or Hispanics in the US. See Suzanne Model and Gene Fisher, “Unions Between Blacks and Whites: England and the U.S. Compared,” in Ethnic and Racial Studies, 25 (no. 5, September 2002), 728-54. This means that, whatever the problems of immigrant groups in the UK (either problems of acculturation or of conflict between groups), those problems will inevitably vanish in two generations--guaranteed. One cannot have serious or intractable hatred based solely upon "ethnic differences" between people within the very same family.
In this regard (maintenance/enforcement of endogamy), the U.S. is unique.
But is the result in the U.S or the U.K, justice: meaning equality among people, and/or guarenteeing no person is mistreated and the person who needs the most help gets the most help?
I've always wondered what is the standard length of a generation, in this instance, at what date can the ethnicities in the UK expect the end of "racial" hatred and discrimination?
While agreeing that the institution of a USAmerican engodamos color line is unique, I cannot follow the logic, according the evidence that intermarriage, integration, and assimilation universally, or automatically cures inequality and racism.
‘Belonging in Britain: The second generation Chinese in Britain’
(DRAFT: please do not quote with permission)
Miri Song, University of Kent, England
Introduction
ABSTRACT: Questions about ‘belonging’ are now of central concern for the British born Chinese (BBCs) who constitute the ‘second generation’ in Britain. The Chinese have been regarded as being rather separate from both the White Britons and the ‘Black’ (African Caribbean and South Asian) minority populations. What does the emergence of the British born Chinese, then, presage for their ‘integration’ into Britain in the 21st century?
Quote:
The Chinese provide an interesting case study concerning ‘belonging’, because, as the third largest non-White minority group in Britain, they are a rather ‘invisible’ minority, especially in comparison with the more visible and publicly present second generation Britons of South Asian and African Caribbean heritage.1
1 Ching Lin Pang (2003) also observes that the Chinese are socially and politically ‘invisible’ as a minority group in Belgium.
Concerns about ‘integrating’ immigrants, asylum seekers, and more settled minority groups in Britain is prominent on the British national agenda, as illustrated by the Labour government’s concerns about ‘social inclusion’ and the current debate about the possibility of introducing identity cards and citizenship tests. In December 2001, the British Home Secretary, David Blunkett, made a major announcement, urging ethnic minorities in Britain to integrate and ‘to develop a greater sense of belonging in Britain’. It is suggested that with the rights of citizenship come the obligations to fit into the wider society. Another implication of this announcement is that minority peoples’ rights to difference are, in practice, limited by societal expectations of what kinds of behaviors and allegiances are normatively acceptable in mainstream Britain.
Britain now comprises a sizeable population of ‘second generation’ minority people in Britain, and there is ongoing debate about the viability and desirability of ‘integration’ by minority individuals and groups themselves. Assertions of ‘difference’ and distinctive ethnic identities are not straightforwardly in decline in multiethnic societies such as Britain (Song 2003). In the U.S., classical assimilation theorists, such as Gordon (1964), assumed that immigrants’ offspring would gradually assimilate into the dominant society and culture, with the inevitable loss of their parents’ and grandparents’ ethnicities and cultural practices. However, racialized immigrant groups and their children have not been able to assimilate as easily as White European immigrants of an earlier era. There appears to be growing evidence in both the U.S. and Britain that it is possible to retain both a minority ethnic identityand to be significantly acculturated into these societies. Furthermore, ethnic minority individuals and groups increasingly refuse to abide by the meanings, discourses, and stereotypes which are foisted upon them by the wider society (Cornell & Hartmann 1998).
Quote:
The mixed experiences of the Chinese in Britain
The Chinese presence in Britain today dates from the late 18th century, at a time when Britain’s imperial expansion included East Asia (Parker 1998b).2 Most of the foreign born Chinese came from the New Territories of Hong Kong, followed by smaller numbers from Malaysia, Singapore, China, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Of a total population of 58 million Britons (of which 54 million are White), 247,403 are of Chinese heritage (Office of National Statistics 2001). More than 53% of the Chinese live in Southeast England, but they are also the most widely dispersed minority group in Britain (Owen 1994). As the third largest minority, they are significantly smaller in number than African Caribbean and Black African Britons (1,148,738 – 2% of the population) and South Asian Britons (2,048,643 -- 4%) (Office of National Statistics 2001).
(Class and socioeconomic indicators)
According to various socioeconomic indicators, the Chinese are a relatively successful group, both in relation to the White majority and other non-White minorities such as African Caribbeans and Muslim South Asians. Generally speaking, British minority groups can be separated into two groups: African Caribbeans (especially male), Pakistanis, and Bangladeshis have lower than average qualification levels than White Britons, while Indian, African Asian, Chinese, and Black Africans possess higher qualifications (A-levels and above) than White Britons (Modood et al. 1997).
Quote:
The Chinese are not ‘Black’ in Britain Another important issue which shapes BBCs’ ‘place’ in British society concerns their relationship to and perceived similarities (and differences) with other second generation groups such as South Asians and African Caribbeans. Because the Chinese have been relatively successful in socioeconomic terms, and because it is widely believed that the Chinese are not a racially targeted group, they have not been seen as ‘Black’ -- a term applied primarily to African Caribbean and South Asian Britons, which connotes a disadvantaged but politicized status and identity.5
The term Black was widely used throughout the 1970s and 80s in reference to people of African, Caribbean, and South Asian origins in Britain, and its usage was intended to convey a sense of common interest and ethnic mobilization based upon the politics of anti-colonialsim and anti-racism.6 African Caribbean and Asian groups worked together in major campaigns against fascist violence, immigration controls, police harrassment, and racism in employment and trade unions (Solomos 1993; Brah 1996:106).
A further reason why the Chinese have not been included in the category ‘Black’ is that they have not been a significant oppositional minority presence in British society, as have South Asians and African Caribbeans. The Chinese have not entered into a significant dialogue with the wider British public, and have not presented themselves as an oppositional presence which is concerned with fighting racism, and achieving fuller participation in society on their own terms. So while there is growing evidence of an assertive ‘public’ ethnicity by many second generation Britons (Modood 1996), this assertiveness and public presence is by no means equal across groups.
In recent years there has been increased attention to the diversity of experiences of ethnicity and ‘race’ among minority groups in Britain. For one thing, the composition of both the African Caribbean and South Asian populations in Britain has changed considerably in the last few decades. There is now some evidence of diverse outcomes for ethnic minorities in higher education and in the British labor market, and some analysts argue that generalized arguments about the racial barriers in employment faced by all ethnic minorities are now untenable (see Iganski & Payne 1996).
5 In the Fourth National Survey of Ethnic Minorities, only 1 of the 118 Chinese people surveyed on this question said that they considered themselves to be Black (Modood et al. 1997:295).
6 This broad understanding of the category Black is in stark contrast with how Black is conceived of in the USA, where Black refers specifically to the experiences of people of African origin.
As such, there has been growing debate about the legitimacy of the collective term ‘Black’. Analysts such as Tariq Modood (1994; 1996) have argued that the term ‘Black’ can obscure the particular forms of racial oppression suffered by South Asian, and in particular, working class Muslim Asians, in Britain.7 The recognition of the diversification of minority experience has also helped to highlight the particular circumstances and experiences of the British born Chinese.
Conclusion
While British scholarship has begun to investigate White-Black interethnic friendships and alliances (see Hewitt 1986; Back 1995; Modood et al. 1997), relatively little is actually known about how BBCs interact with White or other second generation minority Britons. We still know very little about the extent to which BBCs form friendships in schools, date, or marry other Britons – all of which can be seen as indicators of ‘social inclusion’.
The high levels of White-Black (African Caribbean) partnering (and friendships) in Britain suggests that there is a deep ‘mix’ of White and Black people and cultures in Britain, and this ‘mixing’ has been understood as a form of inclusion in the wider, predominantly White society (see Modood et al. 1996). Interestingly, in the Fourth National Survey of Ethnic Minorities, Modood et al. (1997) found that 15% of children with Chinese heritage also had one White parent – in comparison with 39% of African Caribbean children, 3% of Indian/African Asian children, and only 1% of Pakistani/Bangladeshi children (p.31). Thus the findings of this survey suggest the very real possibility of growing rates of intermarriage for Chinese people with White Britons -- raising questions about inclusion and the distinctiveness of Chinese ethnic boundaries and ethnicity in the future.
Yet growing rates of intermarriage should be interpreted with caution, as this alone does not necessarily signal ‘social inclusion’ and fuller participation in British society. In the case of Black Britons, a ‘deep mix’ does not preclude racial abuse or the relatively high rates of unemployment they suffer. Similarly, increased intermarriage with White Britons would not necessarily mean that the Chinese would no longer encounter racial prejudice or that they would be able to enjoy full social acceptance. Thus we need to examine the specific ways in which minority groups such as African Caribbeans, Asians, and Chinese, can be both simultaneously ‘integrated’ and ‘socially excluded’ in particular ways, depending upon the specific dimension of experience (Song 2003).
Last edited by Altertude on Wed 12 Jul 2006 14:02; edited 1 time in total
Joined: 28 Apr 2006 {Posts: 282 } Location: 51st State
Posted: Wed 12 Jul 2006 12:22 Post subject:
fwsweet wrote:
The questionable fragment starts with
Quote:
To determine if intermarriage promotes the ultimate disappearance of salient group boundaries requires a consideration of the identities open to the offspring. If the offspring of mixed-race unions have a range of ethnic options; for instance, to take on the identity of either parent or to take on a separate biracial identity, then their parents’ union has facilitated the demise of ethnic boundaries. But if the offspring of mixed race partnerships have little say in the matter; if the dominant society automatically assigns them the heritage of the parent who belongs to the more stigmatized group, then mixed race unions do not facilitate the erosion of ethnic boundaries.
There is nothing controversial or doubtful about the above statement. It merely says that enforcement of a one-drop rule perpetuates the color line. No one who has studied the matter would disagree.
But what about overall in terms of your ODR thesis:
Quote:
Unfortunately, as Gordon (1964) pointed out, intermarriage is only one dimension of assimilation.
Quote:
But the next paragraph, which A.D. objects to, says
Quote:
With respect to the US, research reveals that Americans, black and white, still honour the one drop rule (Waters 1991). According to this convention, ‘. . . a black is any person with any known African black ancestry . . .’ (Davis 1991, p. 5 italics in the original), which means that, ‘For all persons of any known black lineage . . . assimilation is blocked and is not promoted by miscegenation’ (Davis 1991, p. 14). To be sure, in the post Civil Rights era, Americans with one white and one black parent increasingly identify as ‘mixed race’ or ‘biracial’ (Root 1996). But the more telling social fact is not how mixed race people view themselves but how the larger society views them. And as yet, there is simply no evidence that Americans, black or white, classify the offspring of one black parent and one white parent as anything but black (Byng 1999).
That last sentence is blatantly inaccurate. As of the 2000 census, more than half (56 percent) of interracial couples checked off both boxes for their kids. (See the section titled “The Future” in my essay Features of Today’s One-Drop Rule.) The rest of the paragraph quotes others’ unsubstantiated opinions that are also known to be inaccurate.
I tried searching for what (Byng 1999) studies but, the article is not available to me. Anyway, Model and Fischer in citing Byng, might be indicating society, the subject of the previous sentence. Because, they don't say what one black parent and one white parent do, but how Americans, black or white classify the offspring of such. Though, of course those parents are American too.
Posted: Sat 15 Jul 2006 00:35 Post subject: Re: Race Card, BNP, and Friends
Tryguy posted 2 Jul. 2005 the British National Party Manifesto.
triguy, quoting Manifesto of the BNP British National Party 2005 wrote:
The present [British] regime is ... motivated by the desire to create a new ethnic power base ... justified by a quasi-Marxist ideology of the equality of all cultures.
(My ellipses.) This BNP rant seemingly tags the progressive Leftism throughout the U.K., Europe, and in the U.S., too. But read on.
If "races" do not exist in the essential sense of named things that are "different," then is it not a bit screwy proclaiming that they are "equal"? "Equal races" actually is an oxymoron, because socially "races" name "different" groups. "Equal difference" is an oxymoron! If "races" can only be made equal by ceasing to be "different" (which abolishes "races," since the concept means "different group"), then wh
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