#blacklivesmatter racism is a human problem

Project creep?

I'm not on twitter, but if it is to do with drawing wider attention to an urgent situation for an already oppressed people, what's strange about it?
What you already know about, a lot of people who follow UK BLM might not - they are using their position to highlight and increase awareness. Which is the same thing others with bigger platforms did for them. It doesn't seem so strange?

There's a long tradition for broadly leftwing campaigns to show solidarity with campaigns they perceive as 'sister' campaigns, so it could be that.

I think @hoefla and @dandruff (left in for typo comedy) @danstuff are both right.

Of course it's the right thing to do to use your platform to spread awareness of a major issue. I cant argue with that.

But, is that at the cost of diluting other messages while your audience is engaging with them? I guess I'm just overthinking it. Have been doing a lot of comms strategy stuff recently and maybe it has crept into the back of my mind.

I think it might be related to Angela Davis referencing the Palestinian struggle to an ethnic group finding hope while being continually oppressed .I think it was taken in that context but what Angela Davis says it resonates with Black people globally .I think black people can relate to a very similar struggle if that makes sense .

@dandruff

Sadly I no longer have enough hair to make that an issue, except maybe in my ears.

I can see there's a temptation when you represent a movement with considerable momentum (with a small 'm') to try and bring in within the umbrella of that movement other causes you consider worthy and analogous to the cause you're fighting for. The trouble is that I fear it dilutes the message and ultimately leads to arguments about scope which distract from the cause.

I appreciate that what BLM stands for will vary from place to place. The 'defund the police' argument may have less validity in the UK than the US, as the funding, militarization and ethos may be different. But that doesn't IMVHO mean that the core message shouldn't be the same.

this has been circulating amongst friends on fb - literally took me 5 minutes to go through all of the petitions:

The UK government (Rees Mogg) has said they will not consider any petitions unless it goes through their official petition website.
Link here: https://www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/rees-mogg-tells-campaigner-we-wont-debate-petitions-unless-theyre-hosted-on-government-site/14/05/

This means all the change.org sites that have gained alot of signatures over the past few weeks will not be considered for debate by the government. Their is no denying this is their way of wriggling out of discussions about black lives matter, racism and trans human rights issues in the UK and world wide.

I have collected as many petitions as I can from the website to do with the above issues and made a list below. Simply click, fill in and share this post. We need 10,000 for a response and 100,000 to be considered for debate. If anyone knows who created certain Change.org petitions that are of relevance to BLM or trans human rights please ask them to create a new one at https://petition.parliament.uk/

PETITIONS:

Teach Britain's colonial past as part of the UK's compulsory curriculum
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/324092

Add education on diversity and racism to all school curriculums
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/323808

Improve Maternal Mortality Rates and Health Care for Black Women in the U.K.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/301079

Make LGBT conversion therapy illegal in the UK
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/300976

Introduce Mandatory Ethnicity Pay Gap Reporting
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/300105

Making the UK education curriculum more inclusive of BAME history
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/323961

Create an independent investigatory commission to help protect ethnic minorities
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/323867

Require British Sign Language Interpreters for emergency announcements on TV.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/301461

Suspend future sales of tear gas and other crowd control equipment to the USA
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/324208

Add ethics to the national curriculum for primary schools
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/324194

Add gender identity to the characteristics protected under the Equality Act 2010
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/301138

Haven't been on lfgss for years (yo!) - in the last week I have been back researching for a new build and saw this pinned BLM conversation, which I have been slowly reading through, so apologies if any of the links/resources Im posting below have already been posted. It has been really interesting to read through the posts and discussions. Here are a set of resources and some videos I have seen in the past weeks that I have found useful and informative, hopefully they will be of interest here too.

Anti-Racism Resources:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BRlF2_zhNe86SGgHa6-VlBO-QgirITwCTugSfKie5Fs/preview?fbclid=IwAR2_yOfox-DdJJV-2S3HcAQ0n03VdGKToo9mYkWwpsUNzNWmRPxUd0a5Rn8&pru=AAABcyZgtHw*LZDT0dCZtpg-3FhQ4iH3yw

Gary Younge on the question of violence:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGFwxcjAbnM&t=120s

from 2015 - may seem obvious to some of us, but well worth understanding. Akala:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uIbN5C6z-v8

A statement from the FA/Premier League separating support for black lives matter from Black Lives Matter. I suspect we may see more of this type of thing.

With our support, the Premier League has today issued the following statement:
"The Premier League stands alongside players, clubs, The FA, EFL, PFA, LMA, PGMOL and all those who have come together in recent weeks to reject racism and to show support for the message that Black lives matter.
"These three words have become an expression of unity for people from all communities who believe it is unacceptable to treat Black people differently to anyone else.
"In an unprecedented move, Premier League players from all 20 clubs united in solidarity with this message and the Premier League supported their request to replace their names on the back of playing shirts with ‘Black Lives Matter’.
"The Premier League offered this backing as we wholly agree with the players’ single objective of eradicating racial prejudice wherever it exists.
"And we are unequivocal in the belief that there is no room for racism in our competition, football as a whole, or the wider community.
"Together, all professional football bodies and the players and managers recognise the importance of the message that Black lives matter. However, we do not endorse any political organisation or movement, nor support any group that calls for violence or condones illegal activity.
"We are aware of the risk posed by groups that seek to hijack popular causes and campaigns to promote their own political views.
"These actions are entirely unwelcome and are rejected by the Premier League and all other professional football bodies, and they underline the importance of our sport coming together to declare a very clear position against prejudice. We want our message to be a positive one that recognises football has the power to bring people together.
"As the players have made clear, we will all continue to work to promote equality of opportunity - regardless of colour or creed - and celebrate the advantages of diversity wherever we can.
"The Premier League believes there is no room for racism or any form of discrimination, anywhere."

There's been the occasional story in the Hackney Gazette about black girls being told by their schools to change their hairstyle over the years, but I didn't realise there was actually discriminatory legislation in the US about African hair:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jul/01/virginia-crown-act-black-hair-law-bill

In Louisiana in the 1700s, Tignon Laws even forced Black women to wear head wraps. Their natural hairstyles were considered a threat to the beauty of White women.

Afros are great. All power to natural hair.

In this same article, the Grauniad manages three different spellings of Bimi Fairyqueen's/Mimi Fairyqueen's/Mimi Fairqueen's name.

the Grauniad manages three different spellings

Strength through diversity.

These Karens continue to rage war on black people. How can you educate people like this ?
https://youtu.be/3Ux0wT3oDlc

It's my birthday coming up shortly, and I thought that I'd ask friends and family to make a contribution towards charities working to promote racial equality rather than getting me more stuff I don't need. I've done some research, and I know there's CORE (the Coalition of Race Equality Organisations) and Equally Ours (formerly the Equality and Diversity Forum), but if anyone has any suggestions for charities I can suggest to my nearest and dearest then fire away. It's only a tiny gesture I know, but I'm aware that the most effective charities are often the smaller charities, which in this area I'm unlikely to be aware of, so ideas welcome.

Karen's?

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2020/may/13/karen-meme-what-does-it-mean?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

Thanks - must have missed that one.

If we're going to educate people about racism (with a view to changing their behavior), is using another collective term for a group of people roughly based on their skin tone a good way to do this?

I think there have been many useful take away's from this thread and the wider discussion, one of which for me has been to be more specific about what we're talking about when discussing racism.
So wouldn't posting the video and saying "Look here's another racist white person discriminating against her black neighbors" work better?

This thread has been great for open & honest discussion, I'm just trying to continue that.

That would make sense the meme Karen implies many things .How dangerous and complicit in their white privilege this older white women are.At one point these same women would get black men killed so for me it still warfare .

If I’m reading it right... This particular Karen is responding to her largely unjustified fear of black men by weaponising the largely justified fear of police (and perpetuating a racial stereotype).

There is the possibility that the lawyer family is very much overplaying the racial context. People do horrible, petty things in spats with neighbours.

{edit} had to do a double take on the stats in that vid - absurd and depressing disparity {edit}

https://www.stephenlawrence.org.uk/ ?

Is racism really a human problem or is it a white European problem?

#endwhitesupremacy

Thanks, good suggestion. I'll add them to the list.

I'm no anthropologist, but I suspect it has an inherent human element. Humans are tribal creatures, and I think there's an inate tendency to see those in the tribe as good and to fear those from outside the tribe. The difference is that in white European cultures it tends to have become institutionalised, and European countries have historically used their greater levels of technology after the Industrial Revolution to give full rein to their views on racial superiority.

Another option might be to make a purchase or two from one/some of the many black owned businesses. There were some good lists published for black pound day.

My partner and I shop as infrequently as possible so had quite a list of stuff we needed built up. It wasn't hard to find a lot of the things we wanted through black owned retailers and my understanding is it's a good way to give direct support.

Definitely a human problem. You can find racism everywhere. One area I have a little personal knowledge is the level of racism between tribes in Nigeria and Ghana. I really do believe that you will find racism everywhere. I think @hats has given us some examples from China also.

Fair enough, that example with the woman & the bird watcher man in Central Park is one where it could have ended very badly in that way.