Having been rather unfairly tarnished as a racist coward by Paisley's own living cartoon character, I must admit I took it all a bit personally. Stupid really when I'm an anonymous blogger amongst the millions of much smarter wordsmiths with more to say. Some might say that the resentment I'm feeling might be an inner feeling of guilt and acknowledgement of my underlying racist attitudes. That would require an advanced Catholic guilt complex I imagine, and as I've pretty well abandoned the church on every other issue, I'd hope that I could shake of the guilty for maybe not even thinking about something thing.
I'm pretty certain that what annoys me more than anything is the cheap use of the race card, unwarranted and unnecessary. Overplaying it is only likely to cause racial division in my opinion. Imagine I fell out with someone and they claimed that I thought they were being a tit purely on race grounds, they've pretty much brushed off any criticism of themselves. They fail to learn what it is I'm objecting to and I have failed to make my point, it being drowned out in the accusation of racism. Net result, we've fallen out, but not for the reason we should have. Little chance of reconciliation, because we've not even fallen out over the same thing. Do I then become wary of ever criticising someone with a different race? does it then make me wary of different races? Does the unfounded accusation become a self-fulfilling prophecy? You'd hope not, but it's not an amazing stretch of the imagination is it?
Anyway, I'm a white fella with a number of Black and Asian friends. In the steel-trap mind of our hero, this was proof beyond all doubt that I'm a racist. Quite how having such friends immediately casts me as a racist is beyond me, but it did give me the opportunity to ask them a bit more about the racism they've faced growing up in Scotland. After all Bashir Maan recently had many positive things to speak of his experiences in coming to Scotland, admittedly with a book to sell, and as the girls I was planning to ask fall into that jaw-droppingly good looking category, I felt sure I would get some decent ammunition to pour further scorn on my nemesis.
Alas, it wasn't to be. Both of the girls, emminently capable and having reached boardroom levels in their respective careers were particularly scathing about their high-school experiences. Now, they did acknowledge, as I was arguing that everyone at high school does indeed struggle with some form or another of abuse. Gangs of malcontent young men did run around bullying and terrorising one another, but they had certainly been singled out for racist abuse.
This being a high-school in Paisley, apparently bearing frightening resemblance to the nightmarish picture painted by Christopher Bookmyre in "A tale etched in Blood and Hard Black pencil". And Damn his eyes, I realised that when I had previously pulled Terry up for using Flashman as his refence point for the British Military, I should have countered his claim that George MacDonald Fraser knew plenty about the Military with Brookmyre's knowledge of Scottish Local politics, indeed I wonder whether Terry and his Mate Williamson have actually featured in one of Brookmyre's novels, though their antics may be considered too far fetched even for such satire.
Anyway, I was horrified to hear that the overwhelming racism they encountered came from a specific group of kids, predominantly those from the Ferguslie Park area of Paisley.
As sad as it was to hear how these cracking girls had had their youth ruined by the unrivalled ignorance of the Paisley ned, we wondered how such attitudes could ever be changed. I still feel that those ne'er do wells spraying the racist abuse about would be as likely to be use any sort of vitriol they could muster and it's more a question of ignorance and nurture rather than nature.
With the girls proclaiming that the boys were likely to be in jail and the girls single-mothers, we indulged in our own little bit of class prejudice, when it struck me. How to keep the streets clear of these nasty bits of work and their horrible racist outlooks? Prison's no good! I abhor the unnecessary jailing of our citizens as much as the good councillor does. Something to teach them the error of their ways, or if not, at least to keep them off the streets.
Suddenly it was as clear as a bell. The Digital Inclusion Project! Free PC's and all the internet porn you can shake a stick at. No wonder Terry couldn't or wouldn't explain it's merit's to me. Sheer genius!
I do hope the SNP will reconsider their draconian cut to this important service as councillor Terry Kelly , Visionary for our times, advocates.
Too long as ever, IP!
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3 comments:
I think it might be partly my fault he accused you of being racist. I could and should have phrased my question to you better and for that I'm sorry. I only recently discovered Terry's blog and I'm afraid I over estimated his level of debate.
To clarify I suppose I am bitter because of the racism I faced growing up (btw it's much better now), now I just get hassled about Islam even though I'm the atheist offspring of a catholic mother and a sikh father.
Growing up nearly every weekend we'd get abusive phone calls telling us to fuck off back home (I and my parents were born in Glasgow). When I was attacked in school the headmaster gave the culprits lines and explained to my parents that there had been no racism in the school until Asians started attending. When our back windows were smashed by the kids in the children's home we were told it was because they were poor. When a gang of white lads jumped me on my way home from an evening class threatening to 'rape my paki arse' the police did fuck all. When my brother got battered over the head with an iron bar for being a black bastard the police didn't exactly break a sweat. When my Auntie got her shop trashed she was told to install better security. When my best friend got spray painted in the face. Sod all was done. Then there were all the times we've been abused, spat on, spat at and verbally abused. Not once did an editorial appear in the papers about the white gang problem in Pollokshields or the targeting of Asians by white gangs. To my certain knowledge my father contacted the papers many times about the problems in Pollokshields before giving up due to lack of interest. As someone at The Herald put it 'Individual racist attacks aren't news they're just daily life'.
But now because an Asian gang problem has sprung up people are interested.
Let me be clear crime is crime and when I'm being attacked I don't really care what race the attacker is, I just wish that more attention
had been paid to the white gang problem years ago. Not least because it gives their Asian counterparts the excuse of 'defending' the area (which they don't).
I think it might be partly my fault he accused you of being racist.
I think you can probably blame your catholic mother for that ;-)
I am bitter because of the racism I faced growing up
It certainly doesn't make for comfortable reading and without trying to excuse such deplorable behaviour in any way, I wonder if those responsible might have found different targets had there not been an Asian community.
On the other hand, I am coming around to the view point that perhaps the poisonous wee pr*cks, may just have felt that they could get away with targeting a minority community and might not have had the bottle to target 'their own'?
Then it does certainly become racism (as opposed to my original view that the perpetrators are simply ignorant scum who will use whatever they can to cause offence).
I'm not sure, but I do know that Glasgow has had a long history of gang related violence, easily pre-dating its Asian community, so I don't agree with you that suddenly because there are Asian gangs it's become a problem, particularly as far as I'm concerned, it's the Asian community who have expressed the most concern about the 'Asian gangs'.
In the ideal world of course, the police would have had the courage of their convictions to proceed against all the gangs in an even handed manner, and been certain that they would have received support from the entire community.
It was utterly gutless of them to come out after the fact and claim that they hadn't proceeded against the Asian gangs for fear of the race card. Perhaps I'm being naive, but having some senior police officers liase with the Asian community leaders before the operation, should have been enough.
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