Random Is there an issue of race in Ireland/UK?

[cowardescent]

Particularly Ireland. I'm African and have been living here for 11 years and not the one to call everything racist, it's definitely better than when I lived in the US. There isn't a "deep rooted" covert racial mentality that pervades societies mindset.

The thing is though, even if there's little racism here, I still find that in terms of fitting in, it seems that if you're African this is next to impossible. It seemed to me that a lot of black people in two schools I went to didn't really feel comfortable. Mostly everyone was polite (just like in wider society) but It seemed to me that they never were invited everywhere or made friends. There was a "popular clique" in my school and I found that perhaps unintentionally they excluded africans.

If I look at my family life, I see that my parents themselves are friendless and my mother admits that people here are polite but don't want to be friends with Africans.

Would you say that this is the case or not

 

[CFC]

I don't know about Ireland, but in the UK I don't think that's generally true. I mean, I'm sure there's covert and overt racism, and it's probably harder for Africans (and other 'outsiders') to be accepted initially. But beyond that, all the Africans I know seem to have way more friends and belong to generally larger social groups than British natives.

 

[Ganjcat]

Particularly Ireland. I'm African and have been living here for 11 years and not the one to call everything racist, it's definitely better than when I lived in the US. There isn't a "deep rooted" covert racial mentality that pervades societies mindset.

The thing is though, even if there's little racism here, I still find that in terms of fitting in, it seems that if you're African this is next to impossible. It seemed to me that a lot of black people in two schools I went to didn't really feel comfortable. Mostly everyone was polite (just like in wider society) but It seemed to me that they never were invited everywhere or made friends. There was a "popular clique" in my school and I found that perhaps unintentionally they excluded africans.

If I look at my family life, I see that my parents themselves are friendless and my mother admits that people here are polite but don't want to be friends with Africans.

Would you say that this is the case or not

My mum was always on the hunt for a sign of racism (shes black) let me tell you i have seen first hand what all these racists stories do to vunruble black peoples mentality, the ones who havent converted to ala anyway now before you call me racist let me finish, the racist and racism definetely happened, slavery the holocous definetely happened but hundred years later its still effecting you i guarantee you 90% of black people in the uk have never experienced proper racism in their life

 

[Xorkoth]

I'm not sure exactly what "proper" racism is... I would imagine you mean racism as bad as it was right after slavery or something, when people were being lynched and there were separate entrances? Well I'll just say that it doesn't have to be that bad for it to be racism and for it to hurt and be destructive to peoples' lives. I also get the impression it's better in the UK than it is in the USA so I'm just speaking from the perspective of how it is here. A lot of people are denying racism is still happening in America, too, but that's nonsense. It's way better, absolutely, and I think it will eventually mostly disappear (except I don't doubt some people will always be racist no matter what - of any color, by the way, there are plenty of racist people in any ethnicity), but it's not gone yet.

 

[Phobos]

I have been living in London since 2015, in this city it seems that racism is basically absent, at least if you look at apparent wealth of the people you meet.
I would like to give my personal definition of "proper racism" vs "annoying shit that's not really racism but more like bad behaviour"
What I mean is, you can see many, many people with African genetics but also SEAsians and Arabs working good jobs (bank managers, accounting, shop managers etc), or going around wearing expensive clothes, driving a nice car...
The vast majority of homeless people I see are white Caucasians, never seen any African begging for money.

Proper racism: to think that one certain negative quality (or more than one) is/are common to a whole race, making said race somehow inferior. This behaviour is completely illegal in UK and USA, although sometimes it might be hard to prove discrimination in a court of law.
And ofcourse even if one knows he's protected by the law, being a victim of racism is a horrible experience anyway.

Annoying shit: somebody that doesn't fancy you because your culture is completely different from his, so he has a hard time trusting you. People mostly trust people that they can easily relate to because of some sort of similar background.
Everybody experiences that in life, regardless of race, I think it is wrong to scream KKK if somebody likes somebody else better than you, in case your skin is dark.
In instance, not getting a job position for reasons other than skills and qualifications happens to everybody, regardless of race. While in an ideal world it wouldn't happen, our world is far from perfect.

 

[Ganjcat]

I have witnessed my mum getting racially abused as a kid and when she was a kid everyone was racist and it really effected her like all black people from that time racism definetely still exists but not like it used to my mum told me in america the police would hunt down black african americans for sport like literaly shoot them like they are animals i am mixed raced but its hard to tell unless you know what to look for my dads white so i look white pretty get pretty pale in the winter to everyone is always telling me that

 

[Tranced]

I'd imagine it is largely dependent on how much you are acclimatised to the local customs/culture, and especially in Ireland, humour.

I live in Newcastle and love the Irish. I l also love the Scottish, and for exactly the same reasons; they are (generally) ridiculously sarcastic/ironic, and make me laugh.

I've met people from different countries who (unfortunately) didn't fit in very well at all; and this was mostly because they didn't have the right kind of approach to life/banter, with respect to the general population of the nation in which they resided. I've also met British people who suffered (unfortunately) the exact same fate. My best friend is Irish, and he fit perfectly into Newcastle, and now fits perfectly into Bristol. He's got that Irish charm, and he says exactly what he thinks. I know that if he met somebody from any race/culture/whatever, he'd make it ridiculously apparent they'd said something he wasn't keen on; exactly like he does with me (and I do with him)

 

[Ganjcat]

I got a lot of Irish in me, my grandad whoes dead now was irish, full irish he came here to england from ireland on a cruise to get away from the ira troubles, he got took by the police cus he was sleeping rough and he was irish he ended up joining the armed forces and yes he had some good stories to share

 

[Xorkoth]

my mum told me in america the police would hunt down black african americans for sport like literaly shoot them like they are animals

There are still quite a number of incidents where police shoot unarmed black people in traffic stops and such, even today. Though I'm sure it's better than it was a generation ago. These days police are being held accountable (sort of) because of cell phone cameras and police car cameras, and the Internet. Now you hear about these incidents and society for the most part rails against it. But it still happens.

I guess from my perspective racism is racism whether it's mild or harsh, whether it's intentional or unintentional. It certainly has gotten a lot better but it's not gone. The reason I want to make that distinction is because there are a lot of people, in America at least, who insist that racism is no longer a thing, and that there is "white genocide" happening, when really the playing field is being leveled and they're upset that they don't have as much power as they used to. There are a lot of people who I think truly do not believe that they're racist, yet their actions and attitudes suggest otherwise. Saying that racism isn't happening anymore is telling racists that their attitudes are okay. It exist under a new guise now. Whereas it used to be an open disdain and wanton aggression towards people of other races, now it's a sort of defensive posture, with people believing they have to fear being made into the minority. At least in America. I don't know how it is in Ireland.

 

[F.U.B.A.R.]

To the OP - do you mean you're black African? If so, who are the white couple depicted in your avatar as I naturally assumed it was a picture of you and your good lady.

But of course there is an issue of race over here. However, I think that these days it is more directed toward Asian muslims rather than Africans because of the association with terrorist extremist groups. I also think that black Africans have integrated into European culture very well which certainly helps to reduce racist attitudes.

On the whole, I would argue that malicious racism seems to be on the wane, but there does seem to be plenty of 'casual' racism still existing, especially amongst the older generation who remember a time 'before the darkies came' and is probably a legacy from our colonial days.

We've never experienced the extreme levels of racism that the USA has suffered though, probably because owning slaves was never really a thing over here - even though we were instrumental in the slave trade.

The vast majority of homeless people I see are white Caucasians, never seen any African begging for money.

That's a good point actually, you'd expect the supposed 'downtrodden' in society to be more represented amongst the homeless and the beggars - but this doesn't seem to be the case.

However, the last time I bought a Big Issue was from a young Muslim woman who was trading in a very affluent middle class white Cheshire village. She looked so out of place and everyone was ignoring her so I felt it was the right thing to do.

Chances are, she owned six corner shops and was just making a bit extra on the side...

 

[Soso78]

There’s an issue of race in every country uk and Ireland are no exception.

 

[Ganjcat]

It was a lot worse, in the uk, in the 70s-early 90s