Weekend musing - don’t hate me, I’m talking race

The simmering racist nature of small minded U.K. white people disgusts me. It’s beyond crazy.

As a child, I remember when Enoch Powell’s Rivers of Blood speech made the media headlines. At the time, my mum, a native Scot and Glaswegian, talked with gentle humour about the first time she saw an Indian bus conductor who spoke in a Glaswegian accent. That was in the 1930s. If you know anything about British history you also know we’ve been a country that has a horrible colonial history but which has also warmly welcomed immigrants of all stripes for hundreds of years. Until recently.

In my region, Asians poured in to service the wool processing industry during the 1960/70’s. And only a few decades before that industry fell apart. Guess what? Those same Asians found new ways to earn a living, creating British Indian Food for which l, along with many others, are more than grateful some 50 years later.

The NHS and London Underground would not function without the Windrush generation and who can forget the influx of Ugandan Asians at the time of Idi Amin’s regime. They brought business acumen while having near zero resource. And, for that matter, how is it that ‘curry’ is top of the take outs in popularity, surpassing fish and chips?

In my region, less than three percentage of taxi drivers are white British. Some years back, it was hard to check into a hotel without meeting an east European on the reception desk. Today, you’re lucky to find anyone other than a surly, snot nosed trainee who doesn’t want to be there. Want a builder? Check out the Polish folk who work hard at decent prices while delivering good quality with a smile.

In short, the mark of the U.K. - at least until recently, was of a country that welcomed immigrants from pretty much anywhere. Why? Because we implicitly knew they would do the jobs white Brits can’t or won’t do plus they brought a desire to create the kind of wealth a modern functioning state needs.

So…what is it about our current government that they have fomented a form of racism that is underpinning so much of the turmoil we see today in this country?

There is perhaps a clue in this extract:

As part of a very proud multi-racial family with roots in India, Pakistan and the Caribbean I feel sick at how my second and third generation immigrant family are treated by white Brits. When they say ‘you don’t belong’ I wonder about their own heritage. For myself, my DNA says I’m part Neanderthal, Irish, English…and unknown. Ergo, I am a mongrel.

I love talking to Asian cabbies who have a never ending sense of hope and ambition. They’re willing to innovate - check running their cars around the clock with family members to maximise income - check those happy to run two jobs, and those who save using Sharia principles so that their communities have opportunities to progress. Check the Indian heritage people who know the value of a good education and actively encourage their children to learn the skills necessary for the future. Not for them the allure of PPE degrees at Oxford, rather the computer science degree promise of Cambridge.

Should we not also admire those East Europeans who are prepared to do the back breaking work that involve picking our fruit and vegetables?

If you listen to the fucktards in our government, the answer appears to be ‘no.’ In the meantime, we stock our supermarkets with produce from Peru, Spain and South Africa when there is no need to do so and at prices that reflect the cost of acquiring those goods. Hello inflation!

It’s time for a reset. It’s time for the U.K. to wake up, appreciate the value our immigrant population brings, build on that, learn and discover a fresh future. Anything else is a recipe for descending into a dystopian future where we are condemned to be riven by division.

Oh - and while I’m saying this, I’m looking forward to my appointment with my Egyptian dental surgeon and a session with my Pakistani ophthalmic consultant. It doesn’t cross my mind to question their credentials or societal worth. What about you?

End note: snotty comments will be deleted and the people banned from future comments. If you don’t have anything sensible to say then go fuck yourself. Because yes - I’m angry at the incipient racist society in which I live..