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Although I think the police officers captured in this documentry did take their views a bit too far, I still believe that everyone has their own views, it's just how they present their opinions. Due to my own personal experiences, I have certain views on some ethnic grops, yet I am not a racist - it is the truth!!
How are the police ever going to be able to arrest or search an ethnic minority without being accused of racism?? Some of the comments the targeted officers correctly highlighted were that in many circumstances it is mostly ethnic minorities that carry out crimes - this should not reflect their whole ethnic peers and therefore it is not racism!!
Nowadays, I think that the word racism has definitely become a one way thing - I'd like to see more action taken about racism to white citizens.
hmmmm...i always find this sort of statement quite suspect. Yes, black and asian people can be racist towards white people, but due to the inherent power imbalance in society this never has the same big influence as it does the other way. Yes, it is about "institutional racism", as a white person, you are automatically priviliged in this society.
What a quaint view, I'd have thought the opposite, the Public Sector actively favours non-Whites in recruitment terms. Endless hand-wringing over the lack of ethnic minorities in the legal profession, well Black males leave school with the poorest quals. - not the fault odf Society, oh I forgot "institutional racism" at work again
"institutional racism" = moondust
Understatement of the fucking century, that is...
However anyone who holds such illegal, racist, hatred-filled beliefs has no place in the police, and some would say anywhere outside a jail cell.
Would you care to elaborate?
So would I, as I would like to see all crime eradicated. But these kind or remarks have little to do with the fight against racism against non-whites, which is still all too common.
i could write a well thought out reply, but i'm pissed.
Suffice to say - what a load of crap. Open your eyes. :rolleyes:
No, thats not what I said. Racism has a compoment of power dynamics in society. To deny otherwise is silly.
expessing racist views can be illegal (incitement to racial hatred)
Such condesencion. What are you talking about?
The Asian PC in the prog. in question was being fast-tracked through his probationary period, this providing some of the animus against him
But it is what you said. You said, or at least implied, that whites being racist are worse because of the so-called "power dynamics"- why is it worse for whites to be racist, is it because theres more of us?
Incitement to racial hatred is simply telling everyone else why, lets say pakistanis, should be hurt.
Not liking Pakistanis, or thinking that they should all go home, is distasteful but nothing more.
Its interesting how racism has become *the* thought crime of modern times. Purely out of interest, why is it so bad? Without using emotive language, if poss.
the police don't have much cuase to be in rough areas if they can help it. that's why kids are getting away with torching cars in the streets of salford.
go to the posh areas and try walking or hanging around at a late hour ...you'll definately get a pull if your not wearing the right clothes or look the part for that area.
Correct me if I'm wrong but it wasn't just the beliefs here, it was the actions provoked by the beliefs ie stating the intention to pull someone over when driving because of the colour of their skin.
Why is racism bad? are you serious? If I called you a white 'so and so' or treated you in anyway with less respect because your skin happens to be white, could you consider it a good thing or even fair?
All racism is bad. If you haven't experienced it enough personally or seen its effects on others to undertsand this, consider yourself lucky.
But also correct me if Im wrong, but werent the policemen in question provoked and entrapped into saying such things?
And I also noticed how the rest of the coppers in the centre, the ones who *didnt* say such things, werent shown on the programme. Not good telly is it?
I happen to think that a lot of people see racism as bad without any reasoning behind it- that was what I was questioning after. I personally think it is distasteful- I find it uncomfortable to be racially abused by a group of the poor victimised ethnic population of Bradford- but nothing more, and certainly not worthy of the vitriol that comes along with it.
Though thats not to say that any discrimination that comes along with racist beliefs shouldnt be clamped down upon- as Ive said before, I wouldnt care if all 632 MPs were ethnic women, so long as they did their job right (and I think its more likely that having Blair as PM).
I don't think it counts as entrapment, the reporter did not say "I think all black people are scum, don't you agree?" That would be entrpment but he was far more subtle, they betrayed themselves.........
Seeing as it wqas an expose on racist police they weren't likely to show lots of people not being rascist. If a programme is billed as a comedy you don't get a lecture on the holocaust, a programme fulfills a purpose. Do you not think the purpose of this programme was worthwhile?
You are right that holding certain beliefs is not illegal as long as they are not expressed. However,
where the job position is one of power such as the police, every effort should be made to ensure racists are weeded out, simply because their beliefs are absolutely incompatible with such a job. Whether a racist might be able to keep his beliefs to himself is beneath the point.
A racist who had two brain cells put together would at least keep quiet about his beliefs. Somone who is so willing to brag to others about what should be done to 'pakis' and n*ggers' should be kicked out straight away. I don't see anything wrong with 'entrapment' in these cases (even though I don't think it qualified as entrapment at all) because there is no fine line in racism. Either you are or you aren't, and those who are must be weeded out by all means necessary.
RACISM is endemic in the criminal justice system four years after Parliament placed a duty on the police and courts to avoid discrimination, according to a report today by the Penal Affairs Consortium which says British-born black men are nine times more likely than their white counterparts to go to prison.
The consortium, which represents 31 organisations including chief probation officers and prison governors, says official research shows that from street searches to prosecutions, bail and sentencing there is discrimination against ethnic minorities. Its report, Race and Criminal Justice, says that although black people are only 5.5 per cent of the population, they are 18 per cent of the jail population.
Ethnic minorities also account for 37 per cent of men stopped and searched by the Metropolitan police, while black defendants are 16 per cent more likely to be refused bail and black people entering prison have on average fewer previous convictions than white inmates. However, Home Office research shows similar rates of offending among young Afro-Caribbeans and young whites and concludes the differences can only be due to discrimination. - Alan Travis
Copyright 1996 Guardian Newspapers Limited
Around Britain, ethnic minorities complain of prejudice at the hands of the police. Throughout the country, blacks are more likely to be charged than whites, more likely to be jailed if convicted, more likely to be denied bail. Stop-and-search figures show that blacks are far more likely to be pulled over than whites - and this experience, too, holds true across much of the country.
In London, 37% of those stopped are black or Asian; in the West Midlands 31% and in Bedfordshire 19.8%.
The Lawrence inquiry reached this conclusion: "Institutional racism...exists both in the Metropolitan police service and in other police services and institutions countrywide."
THE institutional racism with which the police are charged is not an overt prejudice. It can be "unwitting", a pernicious attitude of mind. The report explains: "It can be seen as detected in processes, attitudes and behaviour which amount to discrimination through unwitting prejudice, ignorance, thoughtlessness and racist stereotyping which disadvantage minority ethnic people." It has aroused controversy. How can such a thing be detected? How can one man know what is in the mind of another?
I agree that maybe fast-tracking and positive discrimination is maybe not the best way to deal with institutional racism, but to deny that it exists is to deny the epxeriences of thousands of people in this country. Thats why you need to open your eyes, at least stop being so bloody arrogant.
Because our society is a white society. White people make the rules and hold the positions of power. Although there is an argument about class actually being more important and that argument has some merit to it. Of course racism is shitty whichever side it comes from - but as a white person, you are automatically in a stronger position in this society than being balck or asian or whatever, because the predominant culture is your culture.
Too right. My experience of the police is that they are a lot keener to attend a call out if you are middle class and a property owner than if you working class and living on a council estate.
Not so, neither will be satisfied by a police response, the mechanics of it are, you'll be kept hanging on a phone by an operator who'll assess the priority . I'm not being flippant but an ethnic-sounding name claiming racist abuse will likely produce the best response of all (short of murder...). i saw on a TV doc about hendon that such a call-out must be attended by a sergeant. Weird
I've plenty of experience with the good and bad of police so was not expecting to be shocked by what I saw. If, has been discussed here, the police were just talking about pulling over asians I would not have been surprised. What was shocking was the amount of discussion of violence and hatred, much more than I would have expected. This debate does seem to have lacked any discussion of those extreme and disturbing views, something that goes well beyond discrimination.
Secondly, and from the other side, the program I saw went to great lengths to highlight the fact that the majority of the officers present were not racist in their views. More than this a segment of the program went as far as to show long standing police officers dealing with harrasement in a way that was evenly balanced and showed no racism at all. Even during the training segment of the show we were regularly shown the group photograph of the intake class with a great majority of faces all blurred out. All of these officers were not considered racist in the experience of the journalist.
I just feel that the program itself was more even handed than it has been given credit for. Talking about pulling over a certain ethnic group just because of race should , in my view, be reprehensable and should see an officer either investigated and removed in due course, but when a police officer is talking about hoping to kill an asian then how can there be any debate that such a person should stand as societies representative of the law.