Taking the knee

Quoted from TheRonRaffertyFanClub

If this was the sole aim of BLM then I doubt very much if there would be very much opposition. We all like to think of having equality in society. BLM in the U.K. has gone to great lengths to distance itself from BLM USA, which is a very good thing. The problem is that BLM UK still stands for so much more than simple anti-racism. It has admitted links with extremist and undemocratic groups and its website contains statements about being born white automatically making you a racist. By all means let’s demonstrate against racism but let’s not be so naive as to think this is all that BLM is about.

Hold on a minute. Just suppose all that is true about some organisation called ‘BLM’, what has that got to do with footballers announcing their opposition to racism by ‘taking the knee’.

Does this mean they are all part of SPECTRE or SMERSH or whatever global evildoers collective, and are committed to the overthrow of Queen and Country, and Paddington Bear and all else that is good and wholesome?

I must have missed the smallprint about this! Am I now a Bond villain’s minion and bound to die in a grey boiler suit in some hollowed out volcano?

Joking aside, are you seriously saying that you would be anti-racist if it wasn’t for the fact that some anti-racists hold other views that you don’t agree with?

I’ve just discovered that some extreme left wingers (Marxist-Leninists I believe they’re called) are in favour of free healthcare and education for everyone!

Better disband the NHS and close down state schools. The evil bas.tards!! We don’t want to be supporting any of that nonsense do we!

I self identify as a black homosexual and I think this is all balderdash.

Quoted from KingstonMariner

I’ve just discovered that some extreme left wingers (Marxist-Leninists I believe they’re called) are in favour of free healthcare and education for everyone!

Better disband the NHS and close down state schools. The evil bas.tards!! We don’t want to be supporting any of that nonsense do we!

Best extreme left winger ever was Dave Gilbert

Quoted from ska face

Ah right. So that’s isn’t politicising sport but this is. Wars famous for being apolitical events...

Some whopper you are...  Remembrance day is not about remembering wars but those ordinary people that died in it.

Quoted from TheRonRaffertyFanClub

If this was the sole aim of BLM then I doubt very much if there would be very much opposition. We all like to think of having equality in society. BLM in the U.K. has gone to great lengths to distance itself from BLM USA, which is a very good thing. The problem is that BLM UK still stands for so much more than simple anti-racism. It has admitted links with extremist and undemocratic groups and its website contains statements about being born white automatically making you a racist. By all means let’s demonstrate against racism but let’s not be so naive as to think this is all that BLM is about.

I understand what you’re saying but do you honestly think, when footballers take the knee — which is what this thread was originally about — that they’re doing it for anything other than equality and freedom?

I find many people will look for ways to distract or even discredit a campaign if they don’t agree with it, which I think is what is happening here.

All I’m saying is let’s acknowledge there is institutional racism, let’s acknowledge there’s racism in football and let’s respect someone’s right to protest. Taking the knee has raised the profile of this campaign. Whether it’s run its course or not is a fair debate.

This entire thread feels like a discussion between white people.

If any of you get the chance, sit down with a black person and talk about their everyday experiences in the UK. Very few will have been violently and verbally abused because of their race but they will have been discriminated against many times every day - the way white people look at them, the subtle shifts in body language when a white person meets a black person, the subtle change of tone and words in a conversation. Many institutions that we use every day are designed by and for white people.

A black mother was interviewed on the TV recently and she said she feared for her pre-teen son because he was very close to the point where British society stopped seeing him as cute and started seeing him as a threat.

Walk a mile in a black person's shoes.

Quoted from BobbyCummingsTackle

This entire thread feels like a discussion between white people.

If any of you get the chance, sit down with a black person and talk about their everyday experiences in the UK. Very few will have been violently and verbally abused because of their race but they will have been discriminated against many times every day - the way white people look at them, the subtle shifts in body language when a white person meets a black person, the subtle change of tone and words in a conversation. Many institutions that we use every day are designed by and for white people.

A black mother was interviewed on the TV recently and she said she feared for her pre-teen son because he was very close to the point where British society stopped seeing him as cute and started seeing him as a threat.

Walk a mile in a black person's shoes.

Yes good points. Theres still a way  to go in overcoming racial discrimination/stereotyping etc. Not just with black people but also disabled people and other groups as well. Hence Ive had friends for one who are wheelchair bound and they have faced untold mockery and discrimination throughout their lives.

The issue is with black lives matter  is your not going  to change people by forcing someone to support the black lives matter movement  eg the media. Change has to come from within.  

After this movement has run its cause there will always be some other form of injustice that needs battling. Hence its human nature sadly. People have a choice and often doing the right thing is often the hardest. Human perfection doesn't exist  .All we can all do is try.

Its a never ending battle .

Quoted from KingstonMariner

Joking aside, are you seriously saying that you would be anti-racist if it wasn’t for the fact that some anti-racists hold other views that you don’t agree with?

No Kingston I don’t think I said that at all. I am simply pointing out that there is a difference between believing and demonstrating that racism is wrong and supporting an organisations whose aims go way beyond promoting anti-racism. What players are thinking about when kneeling is not the same as what the leaders of that organisation think.

Not directed at you KM.

When people make trite comments about walking in a black person’s shoes and about white people being institutionally racist for being born white, it shows a level of bias and hatred of humanity on a par with any and every other racist attitude. But it is asking too much of the BLM supporters to see the illogicality of their levelling down philosophy against the levelling up of a true anti-racist. Much easier to call names and make gestures.

Quoted from TheRonRaffertyFanClub

No Kingston I don’t think I said that at all. I am simply pointing out that there is a difference between believing and demonstrating that racism is wrong and supporting an organisations whose aims go way beyond promoting anti-racism. What players are thinking about when kneeling is not the same as what the leaders of that organisation think.

Not directed at you KM.

When people make trite comments about walking in a black person’s shoes and about white people being institutionally racist for being born white, it shows a level of bias and hatred of humanity on a par with any and every other racist attitude. But it is asking too much of the BLM supporters to see the illogicality of their levelling down philosophy against the levelling up of a true anti-racist. Much easier to call names and make gestures.

I have never read such a pile of cr*p that my comment about walking in a black person's shoes makes me biased and a hater of humanity (I can live with being accused of being trite). You are either being inflammatory or you are an unmitigated idiot.