The Irony Thread

ballysmate

Just become aware that on the same programme, Fox got brought to task by (the bought and paid for) Baroness Chakrabarti for not opting for one of the woman candidates when asked who he thought would make the best leader of the Labour party. He should not apparently taken account of the ability of the respective candidates, merely their gender.

Labelled a sexist and racist in one appearance!

Well done that man!

surrey_commuter

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

I think the race card does get played when not appropriate. But if you hang out with non-white people you realise that they experience a lot of low level, casual, racism. By the same token a lot of people from privileged backgrounds do not appreciate the advantages they have had in life.

shortfall

My rule of thumb for QT these days is that it a guest is being booed by the audience then there's a high probability that they're actually talking sense.

rick_chasey

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

In this instance there a huge amount of evidence.

Your whole “if it’s presented without any evidence” premise is a bit disingenuous.

What’s so awful in the current climate is that the basic ground on which people try to debate is so hotly contested you can’t have the actual debate.

It’s plainly clear the coverage of Meghan is racist and this article (https://www.vox.com/first-person/2020/1/17/21070351/meghan-markle-prince-harry-leaving-royal-family-uk-racism) lists a whole load of evidence.

You’re probably right it’s not necessarily a helpful label to put on Larry as it’s not enormously easy to refute but he courts that kind of attention with his “racism doesn’t exist” chat - which nowadays is common code for “I am” as the evidence is so overwhelming that it does.

rjsterry

ballysmate said:

No

Based on what? The lady in the audience spends her working life dealing with racism and has grown up with it. No idea about yourself, but I would guess Fox's upbringing and working life don't bring him into as much contact with racism as her. At the very least she's more qualified to comment. Fox's opinion seemed to based on nothing at all.

rjsterry

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

You could just say, "I don't know; I don't feel qualified to comment." Must people carry around notebooks to document each and every incident just so that they can prove to you that it happens?

ballysmate

rjsterry said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

You could just say, "I don't know; I don't feel qualified to comment." Must people carry around notebooks to document each and every incident just so that they can prove to you that it happens?

So even with evidence to the contrary you would answer "I don't know" in order to avoid be branded racist or privileged?
Kinda makes my point dontcha think?

ballysmate

rjsterry said:

ballysmate said:

No

Edited because I managed to mangle 2 replies into 1

rick_chasey said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

In this instance there a huge amount of evidence.

Your whole “if it’s presented without any evidence” premise is a bit disingenuous.

What’s so awful in the current climate is that the basic ground on which people try to debate is so hotly contested you can’t have the actual debate.

It’s plainly clear the coverage of Meghan is racist and this article (https://www.vox.com/first-person/2020/1/17/21070351/meghan-markle-prince-harry-leaving-royal-family-uk-racism) lists a whole load of evidence.

You’re probably right it’s not necessarily a helpful label to put on Larry as it’s not enormously easy to refute but he courts that kind of attention with his “racism doesn’t exist” chat - which nowadays is common code for “I am” as the evidence is so overwhelming that it does.

Lots of stuff there with all the links. The Danny Baker thing was beyond belief, yes.
Story about the district where her mother lives? Plenty of stories on Ma Middleton, snootily referred to as the former air hostess. Her mother is from wherever she is from.
Stories citing that the public blame her for the decision to leave. I agree irrational as people don't know but perhaps explained by the fact that they see her as the newcomer and attribute the perceived change in Harry to her arrival.
Stormzy saying that there is no rational reason for not liking her. But public attitudes are fickle, they can like or loath you for no reason. I have an irrational dislike of David Beckham and Robin Williams, but have never met them.
Stories comparing her unfavourably to Kate? If only there was another example of two princely brothers getting married and the respective coverage of their spouses.
I wonder if Fergie is a member of the forum and she could tell us how the press and public took her to their hearts as much as they did the saintly Diana.
The public can take people to their hearts or shun them for no rational reason. Not necessarily colour of their skin.

ballysmate

rick_chasey said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

In this instance there a huge amount of evidence.

Your whole “if it’s presented without any evidence” premise is a bit disingenuous.

What’s so awful in the current climate is that the basic ground on which people try to debate is so hotly contested you can’t have the actual debate.

It’s plainly clear the coverage of Meghan is racist and this article (https://www.vox.com/first-person/2020/1/17/21070351/meghan-markle-prince-harry-leaving-royal-family-uk-racism) lists a whole load of evidence.

You’re probably right it’s not necessarily a helpful label to put on Larry as it’s not enormously easy to refute but he courts that kind of attention with his “racism doesn’t exist” chat - which nowadays is common code for “I am” as the evidence is so overwhelming that it does.

Was talking in general terms and not about this specific issue of Meghan.

surrey_commuter

ballysmate said:

rjsterry said:

ballysmate said:

No

Based on what? The lady in the audience spends her working life dealing with racism and has grown up with it. No idea about yourself, but I would guess Fox's upbringing and working life don't bring him into as much contact with racism as her. At the very least she's more qualified to comment. Fox's opinion seemed to based on nothing at all.

So you are prepared to take her word

rick_chasey said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

In this instance there a huge amount of evidence.

Your whole “if it’s presented without any evidence” premise is a bit disingenuous.

What’s so awful in the current climate is that the basic ground on which people try to debate is so hotly contested you can’t have the actual debate.

It’s plainly clear the coverage of Meghan is racist and this article (https://www.vox.com/first-person/2020/1/17/21070351/meghan-markle-prince-harry-leaving-royal-family-uk-racism) lists a whole load of evidence.

You’re probably right it’s not necessarily a helpful label to put on Larry as it’s not enormously easy to refute but he courts that kind of attention with his “racism doesn’t exist” chat - which nowadays is common code for “I am” as the evidence is so overwhelming that it does.

Lots of stuff there with all the links. The Danny Baker thing was beyond belief, yes.
Story about the district where her mother lives? Plenty of stories on Ma Middleton, snootily referred to as the former air hostess. Her mother is from wherever she is from.
Stories citing that the public blame her for the decision to leave. I agree irrational as people don't know but perhaps explained by the fact that they see her as the newcomer and attribute the perceived change in Harry to her arrival.
Stormzy saying that there is no rational reason for not liking her. But public attitudes are fickle, they can like or loath you for no reason. I have an irrational dislike of David Beckham and Robin Williams, but have never met them.
Stories comparing her unfavourably to Kate? If only there was another example of two princely brothers getting married and the respective coverage of their spouses.
I wonder if Fergie is a member of the forum and she could tell us how the press and public took her to their hearts as much as they did the saintly Diana.
The public can take people to their hearts or shun them for no rational reason. Not necessarily colour of their skin.

I imagine people dislike her for different reasons, such as being female, black, American, actress, humble background, foreigner

ballysmate

Rick

"What’s so awful in the current climate is that the basic ground on which people try to debate is so hotly contested you can’t have the actual debate."

See RJS response above to show the state of things.
Don't always agree with him but I regard him as being sensible and intelligent. But such as he would rather duck the issue than call out a blatantly false allegation.

rick_chasey

You keep saying things like “blatantly” false when it isn’t in this instance.

Stevo_666

rjsterry said:

On QT, Fox said something along the lines of 'always bringing up racism was boring'. A mixed race member of the audience pointed out that as a very comfortable white middle-aged man, he might not be best placed to comment on whether racism was boring. He then accused her of being racist for accurately pointing out that he was white and male. This from the guy who dumped his girlfriend for liking an advertising campaign.

To be fair, his accuser was a chip on shoulder type who deservedly got put down very publically

Stevo_666

ballysmate said:

Just become aware that on the same programme, Fox got brought to task by (the bought and paid for) Baroness Chakrabarti for not opting for one of the woman candidates when asked who he thought would make the best leader of the Labour party. He should not apparently taken account of the ability of the respective candidates, merely their gender.

Labelled a sexist and racist in one appearance!

Well done that man!

I remember Jeremy Clarkson's rather amusimg response to being labelled homophobic:
https://radiotimes.com/news/on-demand/2019-02-02/jeremy-clarkson-will-young-grand-tour-response/

“I will apologise to Will for causing him some upset and reassure him that I know I’m not homophobic as I very much enjoy watching lesbians on the internet.”

Pross

rick_chasey said:

You don’t think Meghan gets a tougher ride because of her ethnicity?

I saw something the other day where someone had analysed all the press articles about Meghan from when her involvement with Harry became public. It concluded that the vast majority of articles were positive at first but changed when she started to complain about the press. There seemed to be nothing to suggest she was treated unfairly on racial or any other grounds until she made enemies of the press.

rjsterry

ballysmate said:

rjsterry said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

Ahahaha ok that explains a lot.

I do generally think it’s odd when people who are from the dominant side of the prejudices lecture the other side on what is and isn’t prejudice.

If you really think the “I don’t see colour” argument holds water, you really understand what’s at hand here.

If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

You could just say, "I don't know; I don't feel qualified to comment." Must people carry around notebooks to document each and every incident just so that they can prove to you that it happens?

So even with evidence to the contrary you would answer "I don't know" in order to avoid be branded racist or privileged?
Kinda makes my point dontcha think?

Missed the second line - I meant if the situation is unclear - the first part of your scenario. Obviously if you can explain why a specific accusation of racism is unwarranted then fair enough, although life isn't usually as clear cut as that.

Soweto Kinch made the point on the Peston show the other night that it is exhausting being expected to endlessly prove that each and every incident does in fact qualify as racism when those incidents are often relatively minor in themselves but form a pattern over time.

But that's not quite what we are talking about with Fox and Markle. Given the sheer volume of comment relating to Markle in articles and social media, it would be a bit odd if none of it exhibited any racist attitudes at all. So we're really just questioning how much. Somehow I think Fox wasn't interested either way and just wanted to make his reactionary point.

ballysmate

rick_chasey said:

You keep saying things like “blatantly” false when it isn’t in this instance.

Rick
I said blatantly in relation to this post




If someone in this day and age cites racism without any evidence or even evidence to the contrary, what is the accepted response?


1. Refute the allegation and get called a racist or privileged because you can't see it?
2. Agree with the complainant that it is racism because you don't want to be called a racist?

Either way, the allegation will stand.

In a further post in reply to you, I said that it was a general point and not specific to Meghan. SC seemed to realise it was a general question.
So aside from RJS' "I don't know, no comment", what do you think is the appropriate response?

rjsterry

The point is that it isn't always clear cut - probably more often than not. How do you distinguish between a deliberate act of discrimination and one that is not deliberate but nevertheless born out of assumptions or stereotypes that are to some extent racist? Individual incidents can be explained away as just a misunderstanding or carelessness but these same incidents form a pattern over time.

rick_chasey

It entirely depends on the context in which it occurs.

ballysmate

rick_chasey said:

It entirely depends on the context in which it occurs.

Context? The context is that the allegation has no evidence to support it or there is evidence to disprove it.

Longshot

I have no personal view as to whether the backlash against MM is racist - I haven't read enough of it to know.

However, what I have noticed, is that a lot of women were anti-MM from the start, mainly down to gold-digging, dishonest accusations.

ballysmate

rjsterry said:

The point is that it isn't always clear cut - probably more often than not. How do you distinguish between a deliberate act of discrimination and one that is not deliberate but nevertheless born out of assumptions or stereotypes that are to some extent racist? Individual incidents can be explained away as just a misunderstanding or carelessness but these same incidents form a pattern over time.

The fear of being labelled has seemingly got sensible people like yourself afraid to even express an opinion to the contrary when someone alleges racism.

"I don't know; I don't feel qualified to comment." was your suggestion as a viable position.

rjsterry

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

It entirely depends on the context in which it occurs.

Context? The context is that the allegation has no evidence to support it or there is evidence to disprove it.

Those are two different contexts.

A specific example: a white man (A) is sat in the priority seat on the train. A black, pregnant woman (B) gets on and as there are no free seats stands in aisle, clearly visible to A. Four stops later an elderly white woman with a walking stick gets on and A straight away offers his seat to her.

ballysmate

rjsterry said:

ballysmate said:

rick_chasey said:

It entirely depends on the context in which it occurs.

Context? The context is that the allegation has no evidence to support it or there is evidence to disprove it.

Those are two different contexts.

A specific example: a white man (A) is sat in the priority seat on the train. A black, pregnant woman (B) gets on and as there are no free seats stands in aisle, clearly visible to A. Four stops later an elderly white woman with a walking stick gets on and A straight away offers his seat to her.

So, the black woman complains to you.
Do you

1. Agree with her that is racism although you don't know the mindset of the seated man and that he may have felt the woman with the stick was more infirm than the pregnant woman.
2. Point out that you don't know the mindset of the seated white man, he may have felt that the woman with the stick was more infirm than the pregnant woman. The pregnant black woman then tells you to check your white privilege as that is the root of your racist views.

So now both the seated man (or now standing) and yourself are labelled racist.

ballysmate

Or based on your previous answer, don't reply to her and pretend to read the paper?

rick_chasey

The label seems to bother you more than the racism, Bally.

Why so hung up on it?

Look, the evidence is there that racism is rife. There's lot of work gone into why, and, broadly speaking, we all have biases so we are all likely to be racist.

I guess there is a difference between the conscious and the unconscious, and I guess people are sort of accepting of one but not the other.

In my world of recruitment I've had to do various bits of unconscious bias training and when it's laid out to you, even as someone who literally studied racism and how it even came into being, it's quite plain how biased we all are.

What's frustrating is people then refuse to say they have these biases and don't understand that there isn't a perfect way to correct for these.

Longshot

rick_chasey said:

The label seems to bother you more than the racism, Bally.

Why so hung up on it?

Look, the evidence is there that racism is rife. There's lot of work gone into why, and, broadly speaking, we all have biases so we are all likely to be racist.

I guess there is a difference between the conscious and the unconscious, and I guess people are sort of accepting of one but not the other.

In my world of recruitment I've had to do various bits of unconscious bias training and when it's laid out to you, even as someone who literally studied racism and how it even came into being, it's quite plain how biased we all are.

What's frustrating is people then refuse to say they have these biases and don't understand that there isn't a perfect way to correct for these.

It's "Us" and "Them". We all do it.

ballysmate

rick_chasey said:

The label seems to bother you more than the racism, Bally.

Why so hung up on it?

Look, the evidence is there that racism is rife. There's lot of work gone into why, and, broadly speaking, we all have biases so we are all likely to be racist.

I guess there is a difference between the conscious and the unconscious, and I guess people are sort of accepting of one but not the other.

In my world of recruitment I've had to do various bits of unconscious bias training and when it's laid out to you, even as someone who literally studied racism and how it even came into being, it's quite plain how biased we all are.

What's frustrating is people then refuse to say they have these biases and don't understand that there isn't a perfect way to correct for these.

I am not saying racism or bias doesn't exist, to say that would be stupid.

My point is that when someone alleges racism, regardless of the allegation's merit, there appears to be no defence.

rick_chasey

Sure, but let's face it, if there really is no evidence then the label won't really stick will it?

ballysmate

rick_chasey said:

Sure, but let's face it, if there really is no evidence then the label won't really stick will it?

Brings us neatly back to Fox talking about the charge of racism being bandied about too readily, no?