Hard to understand how diversity influences sport. Apparently a massively disproportionate number of premier league footballers from these islands are of mixed race. But no one quite knows why that is.

Some may ponder genetic influence, but as Michael Johnson has pointed out – Jamaica is not genetically very different to lots of other nations in that part of the world. It just has a stronger culture of sprinting than other countries and so generates and advances more talent then them.

An Icon from a religion or race can change hearts and minds though. John Barnes and other black footballers became heroes to fans affiliated to the teams they played for. Mo Farah, as a muslim, has just become a hero to the country as a whole.

We may not understand how the diversity drives success, or if it even does – but that may not matter so much as the influence of that success on our perceptions of diversity.

Isn’t it a bit early to be asking this question? The Games have only been over for a matter of hours!

Using the simple past tense like this, as opposed to even just using the perfect tense (“have the Olympics had a lasting impact?) makes it sound as though you’re setting a history essay question decades from now.

I think you mean “Will the Olympics have a lasting impact?”

Under 24 hours since it finished is a tad early to say anything meaningful about lasting impact. Plus, it would be rash to extrapolate too much from the acceptance of stars to the everyday experience. By their very nature Olympic athletes are the exception, and so are received differently.
Oh, and “a nation gaining confidence after a period of relative decline”. After? I wasn’t aware the recession was over, and believed quite the contrary that things are looking as gloomy as ever.

Oh, and “These sorts of questions will be much easier to answer during the paralympics, where everyone competing will have suffered a disability or an accident which will have had an acute effect on the course of their lives”
Er, no. Some athletes, able-bodied or paralympian, don’t define themselves by any one characteristic,no matter how important that characteristic is to a particular commentator.
Is a wheelchair athlete’s will to win, dedication to training etc framed only by the fact of their using a wheelchair? No. Similarly, it’s facile to frame Ennis’ or Farah’s attainments chiefly in light of their racial make-up or belief system. Yet that is the assumption. What if they are tremendous athletes who happen to be mixed-race or Muslim, but that didn’t play much of a part, if any? You need to consider that possibility.

Did the Olympics have a lasting impact?

They ended less than 24 hours ago!

At least ask will they have a lasting impact.

At its best, celebrating multiculturalism is not just about identifying difference. It is about showing how those different traits, faiths, and cultural practices, all contribute to ‘make the man’ (or woman).

And that’s the problem with thinking in ‘multi-cultural’ terms: you are looking at individusls as representatives of their ‘community’ rather than as people who are, by definition, extraordinary individuals: outliers in no way representative of people who just happen to share a similar background.

You are likely to find more in common between white and black sportsman and women than you are to find between a sportsman or woman and a couch potato who shares their background.

margin4error:

Some may ponder genetic influence, but as Michael Johnson has pointed out – Jamaica is not genetically very different to lots of other nations in that part of the world.

Try telling that to Allan Wells, who dug himself a hole about being the last white guy to win the men’s 100m, and just kept on digging…

alisdair

I suspect that the writer meant our relative decline from global-empire superpower nation – rather than relative decline in the last five years because bankers are rubbish at the jobs they get paid a fortune to do.

Sharp:

Instead, this is merely a cultural moment, like the emergence of a pop group which captures the Zeitgeist

…but of course that ‘Zeitgeist’ has to be there in order for a pop group to exploit it. Perhaps London (and the UK) needed the 2012 Games as a means of signalling how the country has already changed since the days of Empire/1948/whenever. It’s not a catalyst for a ‘legacy’; it’s a staging post (or, to be sporting about it, a ‘split’ time in a much longer race).

@7, margin4error. Okay, but even if he meant “our relative decline from global-empire superpower nation”, can it really be said that that decline has been arrested?

It is not enough to simply point out that Farah is a Muslim; one has to ask whether his faith has contributed to his astonishing success.

No one doesn’t. Because it is a complete red herring.

It would be pertinent to ask whether his genetic background, based on his ancestry, contributed to his success given that all of the most successful modern distance runners come from East Africa. His genetic make up, allied to a sophisticated Western training regime and a lot of individual talent and hard work were responsible for his gold medals.

Moreover Michael Johnson’s assertion that Jamaican athletes are not naturally pre-disposed to run quickly conforms to the progressive orthodoxy but flies in the face of reason. Because to accept that racial characteristics can be a factor in success at sport opens up a can of worms that most would prefer sealed forever.

Witness M4E who states, with apparent innocence,

Apparently a massively disproportionate number of premier league footballers from these islands are of mixed race. But no one quite knows why that is.

Please note this rather amusingly subverts the furore over racism in football. Surely the real insult, to a footballer, would be having his inferior Caucasian genetics highlighted!!!!

Finally, am I the only one who found the jingoistic nature of the media orgasm over the last few weeks somewhat nauseating? Or is everyone else still exhilarated?

The national celebration of minorities succeeding in sports is, of course, a precursor to social accord. That’s why since Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan and so on the US has been an idyll of racial harmony.

In the true spirit of our multicultural society and for those who, through some unfortunate misadventure, missed seeing the early rendition of Always look on the bright side of life, at the ending of the Monty Python film: The Life of Brian:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WoaktW-Lu38

Try this illuminating report in the Telegraph 11 October 2011: The Life of Brian facts and figures – quote:

- Thirty-nine local authorities in the UK imposed restrictions on the film when it was released, with an outright ban in Ireland and Norway. Not to be deterred, the Pythons used such notoriety in their marketing campaign, with slogans including: “So funny it was banned in Norway”.

- Religious institutions took the ban even further, with the Catholic Film Monitoring Office deeming it a “sin” to see the film.

- Life of Brian was a huge box office success, grossing fourth-highest in the UK and becoming the most popular British film in the United States in 1979. It has since been named the “greatest comedy film of all time” by several magazines and television shows.

@ 10 pagar

“No one doesn’t. Because it is a complete red herring.”

I don’t see why. Religion feeds into culture and culture affects things like work ethic, what kinds of outcomes you consider success, that sort of thing.

“Finally, am I the only one who found the jingoistic nature of the media orgasm over the last few weeks somewhat nauseating?”

Don’t worry, I was cringing with you from the very get-go. Although it was refreshing to have every commercial break filled with ads that were very definitely not aimed at me.

Even my Tesco muffins acquired a Union Jack theme, FFS.

Pagar

On racial disposition…

There is next to no racial difference between Jamaican and a lot of countries nearby, or indeed between Jamaican and large swathes of America’s African American population. Indeed the muscleake up that seems universally to be found in elite sprinters is about as prevalent among west Europeans as west Africans. As such something non-physiological seems to be at work.

Also, would it not make as much since to insult footballers, if that is one’s desire, by mocking their inferior black lineage as their inferior white lineage? After all, numerically it is mixed lineage that seems to have the edge – not black or white lineage.

”Deep down, I think we know that this two week gala cannot haul the entire country into a new cosmopolitan era, where racial tensions and religious discrimination are a thing of the past. That is not how things work.”

Of course not. Though it sounds like you just wish it was so simple.
I’ve been abroad during the games and so have missed out on this national ”happening”.
Tottenham is still down in the dumps after last summer’s riots I presume. Unemployment is still really high amongst young people living on Hackney housing estates … and even in the Olympic boroughs themselves I’d say.

I’m in Belgrade and can’t get over how UNLIKE any big British city it is.
It’s calm and peaceful and … it seems like you can walk the streets late at night without any bother. No drunk people shouting and raving after closing time, and even not any hint of anti-social people who would perhaps rob you given half the chance. And you always are aware that there are people like that about in London. It’s also very homogeneous compared to what this article was pointing at.
With the only minorities being ones that were always in Serbia or Yugoslavia anyway.

I’m not making any big point about that. Just that I’m reading this article in a city that is so totally different to what was being described in the OP.
And for now anyway, and for the next few days, I’d rather be here.
People live in shabby high rise blocks here, that if they were in Britain, would be the WORST estates to live in. But they don’t turn them into Broadwater Farm or The Gorbals. They don’t trash the children’s playground and the common areas beside the flats.
Why not? Was it their ”socialist” upbringing or something? Or just that it’s more the norm in former communist countries?
I do wonder how it would change if they had large scale immigration from Africa and west Asia though.

Alistair
Surely only really scummy pepple want our relative decline arrested? Who wants India to stay poor and Mexico to stay unstable? As the world advances our relative wealth and power declines. And rightly so.

What the article said,was that this last couple of weeks seems to have seen a nation at ease with that relative decline and confident about itself in the modern world.

And I think it has.

But I offer this warning. It was the London Olympics. It was not the UK Olympics. London is very confident in its place in the world and its people are international and at ease with themselves in a globalised world. Claiming the same about the rest of Britain is quite a leap.

I think the pro-multiculturalists have started to intentionally pretend they don’t know the difference between multiculturalism and multiracialism. There has always been a significant difference.

Tory: “I think the pro-multiculturalists have started to intentionally pretend they don’t know the difference between multiculturalism and multiracialism. There has always been a significant difference.”

Personally, I try to follow the guidance of Thomas Hobbes on such distinctions:

“For words are wise men’s counters; they do but reckon by them: but they are the money of fools, that value them by the authority of an Aristotle, a Cicero, or a Thomas, or any other doctor whatsoever” [Leviathan Bk.1 Chp.4]
http://etext.library.adelaide.edu.au/h/hobbes/thomas/h68l/chapter4.html

Thanks to all who have commented so far.

A couple of responses:

@Alasdair: Yes, I did mean, as Marin4Error suggested, the wider decline, end of Empire, “what are we for?” etcetera. Not the current recession.

On the semantics of did vs will… I didn’t write the headline, Sunny did – so blame him! I was merely trying to begin the conversation about legacy, and “will” is obviously more appropriate.

@redpesto: Spot on.

I will try to write another comment tomorrow about the racial and cultural aspects.

This is a ridiculous question.

I enjoyed a lot of the Olympics.

“It is too soon to say”

(Often, though disputedly, thought to refer to the significance of the French Revolution of 1789, it has been argued that he was actually indicating the French protests of 1968, in “Zhou’s cryptic caution lost in translation” by Richard McGregor in Financial Times (10 June 2011))

Though I hope so.

Jessica Ennis is a role model for women and Mo Farrah is a role model for men.

Seems straightforward.

M4E

Indeed the muscleake up that seems universally to be found in elite sprinters is about as prevalent among west Europeans as west Africans.

Then how do you explain the relative failure of white sprinters? Although the UK is predominantly Caucasian, most of our successful sprinters are black.

Though not our swimmers……………

Pagar

What do you mean how do I explain it? Culture obviously. Hence I posted that and you commented on it.

How else do you explain it? Y’know, given that geneticists who look deeper than the coler of one’s skin, can find no alignment between the genetics of afro-carribean sprinters that is not common across other races that don’t tend to take up sprinting.

Weird thing is – I assume that despite you knowing nothing about it – you’ll probably keep on believing the genetic explanation that those who know about have found no evidence for at all.

strange how what we see with our eyes colours how our minds think.

“Did the Olympics have a lasting impact?”

Yes.

2 weeks ago the rest of the world thought we were shit at sport and good at music.

tory

I suspect that it is more that the lefties on here have stopped pretending that right wingers who whinge about multi-culturalism are not actually quite often just racists complaining about too many black and brown faces.

M4E

What do you mean how do I explain it? Culture obviously.

You mean the original argument that Mo Farah is a good runner because he attends a Mosque?

geneticists who look deeper than the coler of one’s skin, can find no alignment between the genetics of afro-carribean sprinters that is not common across other races that don’t tend to take up sprinting.

I’m going to need a link for that. Here’s mine.

“Generally, people of West African origin have more fast twitch muscles which allow intense bursts of power. This is why running backs, defensive linemen, and receivers are almost all black. We don’t need any expensive test. All you have to do is look at the physique. Blacks in basketball are lean and musularly [sic] hard. Whites have softer muscles, which is why white basketball players have to rely more on skill than blacks who have the advantage of skill + great speed/strength.”

http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/human_nature/2008/12/white_men_cant_jump.html

strange how what we see with our eyes colours how our minds think.

Indeed.

Even stranger how we can close our eyes to observable facts that are inconvenient to our cherished beliefs.

@ 17 tory

“I think the pro-multiculturalists have started to intentionally pretend they don’t know the difference between multiculturalism and multiracialism”

Perhaps because the people who are always whinging about multiculturalism tend to use them interchangeably? Actually, worse: they equivocate, insisting that they’re *only* talking about culture, and then pointing at black people on the telly and screaming “multiculturalism!” (c.f. Aidan Burley).

If the right want a sensible conversation using words like “multiculturalism”, “socialism” and “Marxism”, they need to start actually using those words in a way that has a reliable meaning, not redefining them every which way from sundown in the name of cheap point-scoring.

Ball’s not in the left’s court on this one.

@ 25 pagar

“You mean the original argument that Mo Farah is a good runner because he attends a Mosque?”

You made that up. I just checked and you’re the first person on this thread to mention Mosques.

I suspect the statement you’re so enthusiastically twisting out of all recognition is “It is not enough to simply point out that Farah is a Muslim; one has to ask whether his faith has contributed to his astonishing success.”

As you can see, that’s a query rather than a claim as far as the relevant point goes, and “does religion affect your sporting chances?” is a very different question to “does Mosque attendance make you run fast?”

Stop arguing with people who aren’t there.

@ Chaise

As you can see, that’s a query rather than a claim as far as the relevant point goes, and “does religion affect your sporting chances?” is a very different question to “does Mosque attendance make you run fast?”

So what other aspect of the Islamic faith are you arguing improves his sporting prowess?

His mode of dress? Something to do with his prayer mat?

Is Hashim Amla a better batsman because of his beard?

@ pagar

I already answered this @13.

Pagar

Rest assured that unlike Chaise – I don’t think you are using the mosque example because you are twisting things deliberately. I just think you are quite stupid and don’t understand.

Of course I tend to think this because you are arguing that racial alignment in sport is down to genetics – and yet have linked to an article that says it isn’t. (genuinely, I do wonder how many people don’t read links and thus never see how stupid the person posting them is).

the link article says “Race is a less, not more, reliable gauge of physical characteristics than genes are. In fact, that’s one of the chief consolations of nontherapeutic genetic testing: No matter how inaccurate genes are as a predictor of this or that ability, they’re more accurate than predictions based on race. And the sooner we get past judging by race, the better.”

The reason for this – as stated – is of course because the genes that do appear to align with different athletic advantages don’t align with race. They are prevalent across races.

Now, you asked me to provide a link – which suggests that you consider this the basis of arriving at conclusions. That being the case, are you deeply stupid? Or are you at least not so stupid that having provided my link for me, you can acknowledge that maybe you are wrong?

On religion

It is well worth noting the extraordinary career of Jonathan Edwards.

Throughout his athletics career he spoke repeatedly about how his faith had given him the talent and he felt his sporting success was a tribute to god. So it is clear that one’s religion can play quite a motivating factor.

Importantly in his case – he lost his religion almost the day after he quit sport. He realised very quickly that something he’d felt a long time ago had long since gone and the habit of faith had become nothing more than a crutch to get him through the pressure of competing.

Of course what is fascinating about that is that the faith was in the first instance an inspiration to him – and later a coping mechanism – neither of which were any less vital to his sporting success.

Maybe Mo feels a special sense that the support of his mosque and the service of his god by embracing the talent god gave him – makes him the athlete he is.

MFE says

The reason for this – as stated – is of course because the genes that do appear to align with different athletic advantages don’t align with race. They are prevalent across races.

No, They’re not.

Just about every sport seems to be racially dominated to a certain extent. Lets look at genetics role in athletic performance in specific sports…

Long distance running is by far dominated by those of East African descent. Kenyans are particularly dominant in long distance races and hold many of the world records. Not only that, it’s generally Kenyans from the Rift valley, the Kalenjins.

Middle distance races are a little more spread out in terms of records held, however it seems that most consistently races are won by those of Northern African descent. We do quite often see here though that people of Kenyan, Ethiopian and Arabic nations do well in middle distance races.

Sprinting is dominated almost exclusively by West Africans who can trace their lineage back to countries like Senegal, Cameroon or other countries in that general vicinity.

Weight lifting, throwing sports, power-lifting and most other strength and power oriented sports are dominated almost exclusively by Caucasians, particularly those of Scandinavian descent.

Those are just a few examples, there are many more but this provides a bit of insight to start with. Genetics role in athletic performance seems to take shape when we look at possible reasons for the dominance of certain sports.

Lets start with long distance running. Kenyans have been shown to have a higher predominance of slow-twitch or type I muscle fibres. These are the fibres responsible for endurance due to oxidative characteristics and their production and utilisation of aerobic enzymes. They also have a much higher lung capacity.

Another aspect contributing to Kenyan dominance in long distance running is biomechanics. Genetics role in athletic performance, in my opinion, seems to pertain a lot to the efficiency with which certain body types perform certain tasks. Since body type is largely genetically determined it can safely be stated that this racial aspect must play a role in the inherent potential ability for Kenyans to run efficiently over long distances.

Contrast the body type of Kenyans with that of Scandinavians. Kenyans are slim, they have narrow hips, small upper bodies, high calves, narrow waists, long legs etc. This combination is perfect for economical biomechanics suited to running. Now look at Scandinavians. Generally they are thick-set, have shorter legs, wider hips, higher body fat levels, larger upper bodies etc. This is of course a perfect combination for strength sports.

Middle distance runners of Northern African descent seem to dominate based on a lot of the same genetically determined characteristics. The only difference here, and the reason for dominance in a different distance, is their predominance of Type IIa and also type IIb muscle fibres, which are both considered fast twitch. This predominance generally supports short distance power output like sprinting, jumping or lifting. However it has been discovered that the fast twitch muscle fibres they possess lean towards oxidative characteristics.

North Africans also have a higher anaerobic threshold due possibly to faster buffering, lower lactate levels during maximal performance and more efficient utilisation of anaerobic enzymes.

Sprinters of championship calibre seem to always be West African. This includes American, Jamaican and British sprinters. It should be considered no coincidence that they are also naturally (genetically) more mesomorphic in body type with narrow hips, thick and powerful thighs, high calves, predominance of type IIb muscle fibres and their extremely efficient use of energy substrates pertaining to speed and power.

As for weight lifting and other strength/power sports, we have already looked at the great white dominance in terms of biomechanics, but what about other aspects? If whites contained a higher predominance of type IIb muscle fibres then that would mean they should also dominate sprinting and jumping like the West Africans. Does that make sense? Logically it does, however the biomechanics issue comes into play and it all changes. It is this reason that West Africans don’t dominate lifting sports.

Tell me the above is wrong.

Or if you prefer you can close your eyes and shout la la la, I don’t want to hear this……

http://www.endlesshumanpotential.com/genetics-role-in-athletic-performance.html

Pagar

Your argument seems to ammount to the fact that because racial groups tend to dominate particular sports, it must be racial genetics that causes this.

So why did you post a link to an article that explained quite clearly why this isn’t true?

Is it because you are quite stupid?

Also – given the evidence you yourself presented in that link, why is it you are not reconsidering your opinion as perhaps wrong?

Is that also because you are quite stupid?

Your examples…

Kenyans – I would love any explanation as to why racially homogenous Kenyans born and raised at low altitude have won no medals at long distance running? Could it be, maybe, the altitude that impacts more than the genetics? Also, what is it the racial link between kenyans born and raised at high altitudes and koreans born at high altitides who show strong performance in long distance running?

I also love, given your debate with Chaise, pointing out that fasting might lead to physiological consequences that benefit middle distance runners.

So – altitude and culture – not race.

Fancy demonstrating your stupidity further by saying in 500 words roughly “well it must be race – just look at them”

Don’t fret though – genetics, culture a environment at complex things compared to stuff you can see – like race. So stupid people tend to cling to the latter. You are not alone.

pagar @25:

“Generally, people of West African origin have more fast twitch muscles which allow intense bursts of power. This is why running backs, defensive linemen, and receivers are almost all black.”

I remember Eldridge Cleaver giving this argument a kicking (I think in Soul on Ice). What this boiled down to was an argument best summarised as: ‘Blacks are big, strong and run fast – well, that’s why we justified making them slaves – but they just don’t have the brains, y’know, so they don’t get to be quarterback.’

That argument died when players like Warren Moon started in that role, and Doug Williams became the first black quarterback to win the Superbowl. Frankly, it’s amazing that any white guys even bother turning up to play American Football or basketball if it’s all (or largely) down to genetics or having ‘soft’ muscles.

Sometimes I just get the feeling this is less about actual scientific research and more about counting bumps on the head to determine a predisposition to criminal behaviour as a means of supporting a whole bunch of assertions that people just won’t abandon.

Also – brillianhtly – having read through the site you have cut and pasted from Pagar – it seems you have demonstrated your stupidity further.

The article itself actually goes on to recognise the complexity of training methods, culture, environment and genettics that makes it impossible to say “well look – most sprinters are black so it must play a part”.

It even notes that kenyans have a very different training regime for long distance running to the rest of the world.

brilliant.

I’m starting to think you are a satirist…

Who was the last caucasian sprinter to win a gold medal for the 100 metres in the Olympics and when?

There is nothing peculiar – or racist – about noting that different races or social groups are better at some activities on average than other races or groups. Large chunks of the social sciences are based on making such comparisons.

A well-documented medical phenomenon is that Afro-Caribbeans are more vulnerable to sickle cell anemia than other races. Most of the research on IQ that I’ve seen concludes that the Chinese on average have a higher IQ than other races. The GCSE results are based on large numbers:

“Government figures show only 15% of white working class boys in England got five good GCSEs including maths and English last year. . . Poorer pupils from Indian and Chinese backgrounds fared much better – with 36% and 52% making that grade respectively.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7220683.stm

” So it is clear that one’s religion can play quite a motivating factor. ”

I think its more the case that if you have the self -discipline to pray 5 times a day, fast for a month every year and generally observe the religious customs and rituals of whichever religion you are part of, then you are also likely to be able to have the self-discipline to be able to train, avoid eating cream cakes and sacrifice everything in pursuit of winning.

@ 36 Planeshift

“I think its more the case that if you have the self -discipline to pray 5 times a day, fast for a month every year and generally observe the religious customs and rituals of whichever religion you are part of, then you are also likely to be able to have the self-discipline to be able to train, avoid eating cream cakes and sacrifice everything in pursuit of winning.”

Almost certainly. I think it could be a cause and an effect, because belief in some higher power that wants you to win (because apparently God is into protagonist-centred morality) might give you confidence and drive you to succeed. Although there’s probably a thousand factors I’m not considering.

Bob b

Nothing peculiar or racist about the idea that some people are genetically more suited to some things than others.

But the fact that it is neither of those things does not in turn make it true.

you see, I’m not arguing that Pagar is some how offensive for holding the opinion Pagar holds. I’m arguing Pagar is stupid for holding an opinion for which Pagar has presented evidence disproving.

There is, for example, no notable genetic difference between the British white working class and the British white middle class. Yet their academic achievement is very different and they tend to get rather different average IQ scores. As such, it seems genetics are a poor indicator of intelligence or academic potential. And as such we need to examine cultural factors and environmental ones. (Maybe a greater expectation of academic success among middle class parents, or a better standard of facilities at fee paying schools make the difference).

What Pagar is doing wrong is ignoring a wealth of evidence (ironically linked to by Pagar) that it isn’t the race that defines athletic performance, it is the genetics of athletes, the environment and the culture.

hence the line in the article he linked to – that genetics, though a very inaccurate basis for determining likely athletic aptitude, is far more accurate than race.

Hence, as Michael Johnson pointed out, the 100m sprint is won by a nation that has made sprinting its national sport, while nearby countries with the same racial make-up get no where near the finals.

Planeshift

pinning down exactly how religion impacts on different individuals can be hard – but yes, those aspects may indeed play a big part in making Mo an astounding athlete.

@26

Perhaps because the people who are always whinging about multiculturalism tend to use them interchangeably?
—-

That is just a stupid strawman, and you know it. Even if it was true, are not pieces like this not somewhat responsible for the confusion, as they quite intentionally seek to blur the distinction? Race is not culture, and it shouldn’t be assumed to always be.

We did not see multicutluralism. We saw multiracialism under the Union flag. Two completely different things. I suspect the only remaining supporters of genuine state multiculturalism are middle-class whites working in the public sector.

@Bob B #36:

There is nothing peculiar – or racist – about noting that different races or social groups are better at some activities on average than other races or groups. Large chunks of the social sciences are based on making such comparisons.

A well-documented medical phenomenon is that Afro-Caribbeans are more vulnerable to sickle cell anemia than other races.

Sub-Saharan Africans, actually. And why do you think this might be? Are you aware of the interaction between sickle-cell and malaria? And the prevalence of malaria in sub-Saharan Africa?

Race is not the issue; genetics is.

M4E

Frankly, I’m getting bored trying to have any kind of intelligent debate with someone who seems to think calling his adversary stupid six times in two posts helps him win the argument. Particularly when the argument is to deny that that thing he can see on the end of his face is his nose.

You have admitted that genetics are partly responsible for good athletic performance and you cannot deny that good performances in different types of athletic pursuits are grounded in the ethnicity of the participants (see my post @32).

If, as I suspect, it is just the big R word that is compelling you to try to deny the facts, I’m happy to waive it. It’s really not a malignant tumour.

It’s your NOSE!!!!!

“It is about showing how those different traits, faiths, and cultural practices, all contribute to ‘make the man’ (or woman).”

No that is not multiculturalism. That is a person’s background.

“Ennis is mixed race. Rutherford is ginger. Farah is black.”

But they are of one single culture. British.

Multiculturalism is about making minority cultures more important than they really should be. Positive discrimination in effect. And that is just as bad as negative discrimination.

tory

Strawman, really? We actually might need to bring in a new rule that when people start screaming “strawman” it is effectively like using nazis as an example. ie they have somewhat lost (as though winning and losing is even the point).

I say this because it is a bit idiotic of you to claim that what we saw was only multi-race under the British flag, when in fact there were clearly people there from very different backgrounds, different faiths (or lack of), different sexuality and so on.

With a team of over 500 athletes it would be pretty difficult to make it mono-cultural. And as for hosting it in Newham in London, maybe the most multi-cultural borough in arguably the most multicultural city in the world, the team of thousands of volunteers were no less multi-cultural.

Or are you either not very good at maths, or not intelligent enough to understand what the word culture means?

Of course – I should stress – I see this with a very London-centric outlook. The London Games were a very good reflection of London’s confidence and ease with its place in the world and its diversity within. The same should not be projected out to whoever or whatever lives beyond zone 6.

@ 41 Tory

“That is just a stupid strawman, and you know it.”

Not at all. Because if you (and I don’t mean *you*, but your side) are going to use a word in two different ways, and then exploit that to hide racism behind a bushel of cultural conservatism or whatever, you can hardly complain when the other side refuses to “admit” that it only has one meaning, because it doesn’t.

“Even if it was true, are not pieces like this not somewhat responsible for the confusion, as they quite intentionally seek to blur the distinction? Race is not culture, and it shouldn’t be assumed to always be. ”

You mean the article that calls the focus on race “shallow” and goes on to say: “At its best, celebrating multiculturalism is not just about identifying difference. It is about showing how those different traits, faiths, and cultural practices, all contribute to ‘make the man’ (or woman)”?

It seems to me that the OP is broadly on your side here. Indeed, I assume that’s why your first comment was broad complaint about a shadowy group instead of an attempt to address anything in the OP. You seem to have responded to the dog-whistle in the title.

“We did not see multicutluralism. We saw multiracialism under the Union flag. Two completely different things.”

Who are you arguing with here?

“I suspect the only remaining supporters of genuine state multiculturalism are middle-class whites working in the public sector.”

I suspect that you are a blueberry muffin. I don’t suppose you’d explain what “geniune state multiculturalism” means, would you? Because it sounds to me like you’re preparing to do some No True Scotsmanning.

@ 45 m4e

“We actually might need to bring in a new rule that when people start screaming “strawman” it is effectively like using nazis as an example. ie they have somewhat lost ”

I have to disagree there. The word is overused, but that’s hardly surprising as straw men and ad homs seem to make up about 80% of internet arguments. Don’t believe in a flat tax rate? Why do you think communism would be preferable, you Marxist!?!

As long as someone can explain *why* it’s a straw man, that’s cool. Tory being an example of someone who didn’t do so, presumably in the hope that we wouldn’t notice.

Chaise

Fair enough – though in this instance it was clearly a fatuous use of the term.

Pagar

If I call you stupid it is because I call a spade a spade.

you see, I don’t admit that genetics play a big part in athletic potential. I don’t admit it because it is in fact what I’m arguing. Genetics plays a significant part in athletic potential and this transends race.

This is of course exactly what the evidence you posted said. The first link made exactly that point and explained why it is. Yet some how, having seen and posted that article, you have been incapable of grasping that genetics and race are not, in terms of athletic potential, the same thing. They are, in fact, so far as geneticists have been able to determine, simply not aligned. Hence the article that YOU posted.

And of course when your rather simple-minded “but look, the sprinters are all black” mentality is confronted by the notion that perhaps that’s about culture and environment and so on – as the second link that YOU posted suggested – you again seem incapable of grasping this.

So yes, when confronted by such a sad inability to grasp relatively simple concepts, to follow one’s own evidence, and to recognise the idiocy of one’s own weak argument – I call a spade and spade and I call you stupid.

I’m sorry – but I’m sure you are good at running or something.

sadbutmadlad

Multi-culturalism isn’t a policy. It isn’t a particular agenda. It is just the word used to describe a situation in which people of different cultures live alongside eachother in a reasonably tolerant and respectful way.

A lot of people who don’t like this, because they are racists or biggots of other sorts, or because they have a firm belief that their notion of the right way to live should be widely enforced. (I hope you are neither type and have just been tricked into believing a lie).

Those people pretend multi-culturalism is some sort of terrible impossition form above and pretend it is somehow unfair.

But it really isn’t. It is just liberty. That said – if you could offer an example of the state making one religion or another, one some other cultural group higher than others – let me know.

Aside from anglicans obviously. Their drugs of choice are legal (unlike Rastas), their religious days are made national holidays (unlike Jews, Hindus or Muslims), and their leaders are given a say on all legislation in the country (unlike, well, anybody really).

But I suspect they are not the minority you suspect are being unfairly elevated.

@46

“Perhaps because the people who are always whinging about multiculturalism tend to use them interchangeably?”

You know exactly what your strawman was here. You implied that opponents of multiculturalism also object to mulitracialism (ie -racists). I think you must of done this so many times over the years you don’t even notice doing it anymore. You didn’t say how many opponents of multiculturalism are also racist, or what kind of opponents, you just left those bit hanging….quite intentionally.

By the way, the BNP support massive re-nationalisation, just like you. We can all play this game of links but it doesn’t mean much.

Anyway, with the exception margin4error, most folk here think we saw multiracialism under the Union flag – not ‘multiculturalism’. That begs the quesiton of why lefty blogs like this still so keen to promote the outdated and useless model for bringing a country together. What is it you lefties call it, solidarity?

I am sorry to say to say the game is up. The games showed on a very large scale just how cool ethinc-minorities are with being loyal British citizens. The Left need to hang onto the divide and rule of multiculturalism because they are in danger of losing their client base. If more of us realise how similar our shared values and interests are, despite different skin colours, this spells the end game for the lefty politics of cultural identity. ‘Brown people vote Labour this way’ etc. Is this what is threatening margin so..?

Has anyone else noticed that people from countries where it snows a lot do quite well in the winter Olympics?

In Kenya there are thousands of people trying to become the latest running superstar. It’s a way out of poverty. There was an item on it on the TV recently. A poor village where all the children run everywhere – all day. Run to school, run at school, run home, run after school. It’s not surprising that several of them become world class.

margin4error @24 ”I suspect that it is more that the lefties on here have stopped pretending that right wingers who whinge about multi-culturalism are not actually quite often just racists complaining about too many black and brown faces.

Is that how it works now? Anyone who might think that there was (perhaps) too much immigration from third world countries during the 1990s say, has to be considered a racist? That seems pretty harsh, given that it might just be a majority opinion within the country if the question was asked.

Although I do remember Simon Woolley of Operation Black Vote saying in the Guardian that he thought that ”most white people think non-white people are inferior”. I think they were more or less his exact words. And that while people may cheer on Mo Farah at the Olympics, they still may have been very dubious about the way so many asylum seekers came to the country in the first place.

There was this (rather sensationalist) documentary that Rageh Omaar did for Channel 4 a couple of years back, which commisioned a YouGov poll on the issue of immigration.
http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/dispatches/immigration+the+inconvenient+truth/1933847.html

So you can spin things which ever way suits your view.
Britain doesn’t have a problem with individual black people or even communities.
But there are particular problems in particular areas.
The unemployment levels of black inner city youth being just one … which was some of the causes of last summer’s rioting, and was something that probably got even worse and was never really ”fixed” since the more serious rioting in the early 80s.
A whole swathe of non-white people feel that they are the victims of racism it seems. Even if their family just came to this country as grateful refugees a short time ago. Racism in the jobs market. Racism at school (according to Diane Abbott, because she said Hackney schools would fail her son), racism from the police and the courts. Racism from the town hall and social services even maybe.
Most whites think non-white people are inferior he said.

Damon

See, it’s associations like the ones you make that tend to illuminate the racial focus of those who complain about multi-culturalism.

I tend to ask a simple question in conversations like these. A question that must be easy to answer for those who hate the multi-cultural “thing” that sees minorities treated better than everyone else. That question is “give me an example” – just one example. An example of the state policy that does this. And they rarely ever do.

The reason they never do is because it’s obviously nonsense. It’s not true. And yet, confronted by that evidence, unable to offer an example, they stick by it. That suggests something at work other than an empirical concern about multiculturalism. And that something is, as demonstrated by Aiden Burley, often just racism and biggotry.

And your post sums that up brilliantly.

A discussion of multi-culturalism – and you jump straight to asylum seekers – you jump straight to “too many” – you jump straight to the third world (so black and brown people) and you seem also to claim to speak as part of a majority of the majority. (“might just be a majority opinion…”)

So why?

In your defence, you are clearly strawmanning. Obviously you don’t think that the comments I made ammount to “anyone who has concerns about the level of immigration is racist”. You can’t possibly be that stupid. (I hope).

But the fact that while strawmanning you associate multi-culturalism with third world asylum seekers (a relatively small aspect to it) does indeed hint at your personal biggotries over race.

For what it’s worth, most people I’ve spoken to on the doorstep are, when it comes to immigration, generally more concerned about housing and school places for their kids. As such they don’t really care about where they immigrants come from (your proxy for having brown or black skin) but do care how to secure their own interests.

Indeed in London, I’d say most quite like the diversity of lives we all lead. But as I’ve said previously, we should not project from London’s ease with itself and its internationalism onto the rest of the country. The rest of the country is a more biggoted and homogenous and insular place. http://www.economist.com/node/21557754

A more useful link about my comments that the rest of Britain is a bit backwards compared to London (and yes, I do consider anti-internationalism backwards – but then I would. I’m a londoner.

http://www.economist.com/node/21557523

“You know exactly what your strawman was here. You implied that opponents of multiculturalism also object to mulitracialism (ie -racists).”

Oh. Well, that’s not actually a straw man. It’s a generalisation. But you’re right that it doesn’t apply to all opponents of multiculturalism. So I accept that I should have made that clearer.

However, as you’re taking implications from my lack of clarity, rather than responding to something I actually said, it would have been helpful for you to SAY what you objected to instead of just shouting “straw man!” without explaining what you meant.

“I think you must of done this so many times over the years you don’t even notice doing it anymore. You didn’t say how many opponents of multiculturalism are also racist, or what kind of opponents, you just left those bit hanging….quite intentionally.”

Um, are you saying it was intentional or not? You can’t have it both ways. I can clarify anyway. I was using shorthand: should have said *some* opponents of multiculturalism use it as an excuse for racism.

“By the way, the BNP support massive re-nationalisation, just like you. We can all play this game of links but it doesn’t mean much. ”

Grow up. I SPECIFICALLY said that I wasn’t talking about you personally. So I’m not saying “some opponents of multiculturalism are racist, you oppose multiculturalism, therefore you are racist”. I’m not making links. Do you know what the term is for what you just did? It’s called a “straw man”. Ironic I know.

Instead, I was responding to your claim that: “pro-multiculturalists have started to intentionally pretend they don’t know the difference between multiculturalism and multiracialism”. As I’ve pointed out, the reason for this is that racists frequently use multiculturalism as a stalking horse, to the point that one effective definition of “multiculturalism” is “different-looking people”. Do you want to stop dodging the issue and address that?

“Anyway, with the exception margin4error, most folk here think we saw multiracialism under the Union flag – not ‘multiculturalism’. That begs the quesiton of why lefty blogs like this still so keen to promote the outdated and useless model for bringing a country together. What is it you lefties call it, solidarity? ”

Begging the question indeed!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

Whether or not Danny Boyle decided to celebrate multiculturalism in the ceremony has sod-all to do with whether or not multiculturalism is “outdated and useless”.

“I am sorry to say to say the game is up.”

Dun-dun-duuuun!

“The games showed on a very large scale just how cool ethinc-minorities are with being loyal British citizens. The Left need to hang onto the divide and rule of multiculturalism because they are in danger of losing their client base.”

Psychobabble based on your personal prejudices. Rather paranoid too.

“If more of us realise how similar our shared values and interests are, despite different skin colours, this spells the end game for the lefty politics of cultural identity. ‘Brown people vote Labour this way’ etc. Is this what is threatening margin so..?”

Cultural identity is a lefty game, is it? So we’ll hear no word on the subject from the right, yes? Certainly no right-wingers will try to tell us what is the “true” British culture or anything like that?

Cultural differences were not made up by modern politicians, although they may be exploited by them. Multiculturalism is simply one way of dealing with cultural differences: others, which I’d reject, include bending over backwards to change British law to make all cultural quirks legal (e.g. legalising pot for Rastafarians), forcing people to fall in line with whatever we declare is “true” British culture (e.g. banning Mosques), and just preventing anyone perceived to be different from entering Britain in the first place (and, I dunno, exiling home-grown outliers?). Do you support one of those, and if not, what position do you hold?

M4E

Indeed in London, I’d say most quite like the diversity of lives we all lead. But as I’ve said previously, we should not project from London’s ease with itself and its internationalism onto the rest of the country. The rest of the country is a more biggoted and homogenous and insular place.

Somewhat patronising, no?

“We are enlightened and civilised down here. We are all cool with the big melting pot idea and respect the diverse cultures of others but in the rest of the country, innocent immigrants are subjected to unspeakable racism from knuckle dragging white trash. That’s probably why they felt compelled to come down here and bomb our tubes.

If only we had more diversity officers in the provinces, we could educate the ignorant scum to understand what the future could be like. We just need to enforce anti-bigotry more venomously”

That about it?

Oh, and remind me. Why were they called the London riots?

pagar

Patronising indeed. But true. I know you like links as evidence – even though you apparently don’t read the ones you post – so maybe you could read the links I posted in #54 and #53 to understand where the sentiment comes from and why I’m quite patronising on this issue about the rest of our country.

There was a great study by Readers Diget a few years ago too (not sure why the did it particularly) about biggotry across the regions – and found it was more prevelent in rural parts of the country – and least prevelent in London specifically. (google search doesn’t seem to find it – sorry)

Indeed the 16 page report on London from which those articles above come – included an article on london rioting – and among the causes it notes that rioting is just something London has always done. http://www.economist.com/node/21557526

As for the two paragraphs you made up – some one else above extrapolated wildly and I pointed out that it was presumably just pointless straw-manning since that poster probably wasn’t stupid enough to believe what he/she was saying. In your case, all the evidence of this thread suggests to me that you actually are stupid enough to believe it.

But needless to say – no – those two paragraphs are clearly just stupid whether you are too stupid to know it or not.

m4e

If you are going to accuse others of bigotry at least learn to spell it correctly.

Also – probably wise not to use the phrase “call a spade a spade” when you are discussing racism.

M4E

It has more foreigners, wealth, poverty, diversity, disruption and excitement than the rest of Britain or the European mainland. It is an adventurous, outward-looking place, tugging at its moorings between an inward-looking country and a troubled continent.

Actually, I did read your links and found them to be spouting the same brand of bewildering tosh as you.

Funny that.

rioting is just something London has always done.

Oh well. that’s all right then.

And as for your biggotry across the regions

We may be a bunch of stupid bigots, but we can use a spell checker…….

Suburban Tory

Thanks – I suspect no one confused my meaning despite my poor spelling – or indeed despite my use of an old colloquial term.

but just to set the record straight – such people as I’ve described as biggots are in fact bigots. Likewise those tendancies I’ve described as biggotries or biggotry are in fact bigotries and bigotry.

m4e

Do you also read your links?

Nor do rich people feel properly appreciated. “I don’t meet anybody today who genuinely believes that this country values wealth-creation,” says Apurv Bagri, the Indian-born president and CEO of Metdist, a metals-trading company, as well as deputy chairman of the London Business School and chairman of the Royal Parks. “The rhetoric in the UK is a bit like the India I left in the 1980s,” says V. Shankar of Standard Chartered bank. “You’ve forgotten Margaret Thatcher, and you’re taking a leaf out of Indira Gandhi’s book.”

More of him. Less of you. Win. Win,

@ 58 Suburban Tory

“Also – probably wise not to use the phrase “call a spade a spade” when you are discussing racism.”

I used to make that assumption too, but turns out it’s an innocent coincidence. “Spade” in that phrase apparently means “digging tool”: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_call_a_spade_a_spade

So saying the phrase is racist is like saying it’s sexist to use the words “manual” and “history”.

Suburban Tory

Are you saying the country doesn’t want wealth creators like me? The company I’m starting up in my spare time while working a full time job is less appropriate than this chap’s company? My first contract was not something to be celebrated in regards to the narrowly defined criteria of “wealth creation” that Tories like you use?

Or are you a bigot who assumes lefties can’t be wealth creators?

If it’s the second – fair enough – you are wrong. If it’s the first, fancy explaining why?

Chaise

Surely you mean ““herstory”.

Fight the Patriarchy!

M4E

Likewise those tendancies I’ve described as biggotries

I know you think I’m stupid but this link could transform your life……..

http://support.google.com/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=95604

@ 64 Suburban Tory

Ah yes, “herstory”. Candidate for the Most Annoying Word Ever Award, along with “womb-an”. And “sexpert”, but that’s in another category altogether.

oh – and yes – I do read the links i post. Usually a long time before I ever post them. I don’t do that silly “google for something that backs my bias” rubbish. I just read the economist and remembered those articles a couple of months later.

m4e

Forgive me. Didn’t mean to sound so mean. Hope all goes well.

Cheers ST.

Margin4error @53. ”See, it’s associations like the ones you make that tend to illuminate the racial focus of those who complain about multi-culturalism.”

Racial focus. It’s a tough one really. People who are living in Mali right now have a pretty different culture to people living in England. Particularly if they’ve never left their country before, or even been to a town or city. If they move to England tommorow they will not just be another black person living in England. They have little in common other black English people who have grown up here and are English and British. How many is ”too many” (new arrivals from Africa)?
Is there such a ting as too many? In one town or city or part of a city?
It’s not something that the left is usually comfortable about discussing.

Camberwell and Tottenham, even Croydon have seen a growth in their African populations to the point where they start to outnumber the previous generations of people of Caribbean origin. And does it matter? The riots of the early 80s showed that there were somethings seriously wrong with the way that some people were either being treated or feeling about how they were being treated.
And for many black people who speak about race publicly, things have never been right they say …. but the numbers of people facing these issues have grown quite dramaticly, because so many new BME people came to the country in the mean time.

Btw, you’ve made a number of wrong asumptions about what I wrote.
First what’s this thing about some people being treated better than others?
I never mentioned such an idea. I raised the issue of asylum seekers, as that’s the route through which a lot of ”new Brits” have come in the last decade and more. Somalians got their initial entry into the UK and Europe mainly through the asylum route I think. And then it has continued through family reunification and Somalis living in Sweden and the Netherlands moving in large numbers over to England. To Leicester in particular. It must be true of people of Congolese origin too. As Congo has never had any links to the UK.

A full third of the 27 teenagers who were killed by knife and gun crime in London in 2007 were of Congolese origin btw. Not a lot of people know that …. but I heard a BBC London discussion programme with Dotun Adebayo where he had the Congolese mother of one of the victims in the studio …. and that figure came up. Nine out of the 27 that year.

Did you look at that YouGov poll I was talking about?
You shouldn’t shoot the messenger.
http://www.channel4.com/news/media/immigration/immigration_survey.pdf

”Which of the following statements comes closer to your view?
Immigration into Britain over the years has led to the development of a rich
and varied culture ……. 25%

Immigration into Britain over the years has led to culture iin Britain being
damaged and diluted …… 58%

Neither of these / not sure ……. 17%”

If you have a problem with the YouGov poll you should take it up with them, or at least say what it is.

As for London’s ease with itself, is this true or a bit of an urban myth? Or a bit of both? I’m from Croydon and I wouldn’t say that Croydon ”was at ease with itself”. It’s quite a divided borough with a rich south and a poorer ….. much more racially diverse north. And they meet in the town centre in a kind of unease I find.
You only have to walk up to West Croydon railway station to see that many white people don’t go that far, even though it’s at the top of the pedestrianised high street. People of BME origin out-number whites greatly there and along London Road …. where last summer’s rioting started.

Croydon College is also a very different place today to how it was when I went there in the early 80s. Then it was lots of apprentices going there one day a week and it was a bit ”football geezerish” in it’s culture. And now to (old) me, it looks like an Ali G convention. They even put ”knife arches” in onetime becuse there had been some trouble with knife violence inside the college.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/articles/2008/02/04/croydon_college_stabbing_feature.shtml

There’s a lot of other places in London that I don’t find too ”at ease” either.
Have you not been to Woolwich? It’s a dump of a place.
Or Tottenham, Deptford or Camberwell?
I don’t find them to be very happy places. They’re poor and somewhat disjointed I find. People are not all swaying together like to some Bob Marley record (”One Love, one heart. Let’s get together and feel all right”).
It’s the opposite of that really. They are grim places with persistant annoying crime. Particularly street crime against the person. People get their stuff taken off them and don’t even report it to the police I think. As for some, mostly young people, it’s a daily part of life.
My neice has just spent five years going to a Lambeth school walking past these stupid police signs every day.
http://www.urban75.org/brixton/photos/images/feb-07-39.jpg

I raised these issues because of the spin that was going on about what the Olympics has done for racial harmony etc. I’m out of the country so have missed most of it, but I can just imagine who Radio Five Live must have been bashing on about it.

I can understand why the owner of this website wants less of this and more videos and light hearted stuff to be honest.

Damon

The thing about minority groups being treated better was my illustration that people who whinge about multi-culturalism as a policy – tend not to be able to find a policy illustrating their case. I posted that because of your silly “so anyone who thinks… is racist” comment – which is obviously not what either I nor Chaise had said and only a stupid person would think it was. It was just that in a lot of cases (Aiden Burley being a great example) complaining about multi-culturalism is just a proxy for their racism.

So why wouldn’t the left, or indeed the right (most of which is not racist), not recognise that and call a spade a spade?

For reference to London being at ease with itself, and in particular more so than the rest of the UK as a whole – click through the links to the Economist’s articles I posted previously. That’s where that comes from. You may simply not be typical – or at least less reflective of how London differs in this regard to the wider UK. I’m perfectly at ease about such things. But I don’t claim everyone is. That’s just silly.

I should also point out in regards to a college in croydon – as a bit of an old football “geezer” – maybe occasional knife spotters would have been useful in the 80s. There certainly wasn’t a lack of brutal violence back then among any races in this country.

And yep – I spend quite a bit of time in three of those four places you list. Not Camberwell. But the three others. I tend to feel perfectly at ease in all of them. And yes, they are pretty poor places with a lot of problems. But I’m not sure one could argue that the reason London, or indeed the UK, isn’t utopia is that we are a diverse nation. London and the UK have always had desperately poor communities and centres of vice and criminality. This isn’t an immigration issue, an asylum issue or an issue of multi-culturalism. It is about segregation of rich and poor. Ken Livingstone put through some good rules which if they were maintained might change that over a very very long time (over generations). The rules on incorporating social housing into private property developments might better integrate those with and without certain levels of wealth – and undo the culture of effectively forming ghettos in some corners of our major cities.

What those corners demonstrate though, is nothing about multi-culturalism. They existed long before the UK became as diverse as it is now.

Also – I should highlight a bit of a statistical anomaly in something you posted. While “a lot” is entirely non-specific and so can’t be “wrong” in a technical sense – defining 4% (the 2010 figure) of immigration as “a lot” when talking about the level made up by asylum seekers (and that 4% is not all from the third world) is at best a little simplistic and probably a bit misleading. Indeed since 2004 it has scarcely ever reached 10% in a given year. So you seem to have carried an historic perception of asylum skyrocketing (in the 90s in particular) well beyond its relevence. But that’s a slight side issue. Absolute numbers mean relatively little. The phenomenon still exists.

And I do get that your example of a Mali family arriving in the UK (perhaps to escape slavery, which is not uncommon there) throws up some real issues with regards to how they then go about living a life in a very different world to the one they are used to.

It is just that we have been handling that problem for hundreds of years. People from all over the world, speaking all sorts of different languages, have come to the UK and become part of it. The fact that it is difficult for those people when they start demonstrates the remarkable character of those who try. But it isn’t the race of those people that matters. It is their culture and their experiences. Racism is widely recognised as wrong – and this is why those who have something of a racist outlook will instead focus on proxies like immigration, asylum, multi-culturalism and so on. Those Malis who gain asylum should be helped to get by. They should be supported to house their family and develop the skills they need to earn a crust. But that’s back to where we started. Concerns about the fact that this is not easy, doesn’t mean the UK does relatively well at managing that – nor does it mean people in London don’t feel some degree of benefit to our diversity.

And it certainly doesn’t mean that pointing out where complaints about multi-culturalism are really just racism by proxy means all concerns about how we get by in a multi-cultural world result from racism.

ps – here’s some data on asylum as a proportion of immigration.

You’ll note spikes around the time of the kosovo conflict in the 90s and later during the effective collapse of Somalia and the withdrawal of foreign troops from the DRC.

http://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/briefings/migration-uk-asylum

margin4error, I think the same situation can be different to different people.
Some people will like the new extreme diversity, where white people become a minority in areas, as new people move in and older established people move out.
I remember when Old Kent Road was linked intrinsically with the image of south London’s version of Cockneys. And now it’s more the centre of the multi-cultural ”fish stew” (not quite melting pot). The famous old pubs have either closed down and become something else, or are a shadow of their former selves. A lot of those people from those areas of south London now live twenty miles further out into Kent.
If I am to believe the people on the Millwall fans website I sometimes read, many of them left because they didn’t want their children to be going to an inner city school where they would be the ethnic minority.
And so moved to Maidstone and places like Dartford.
Racists in other words.
But they seem to cherish their south London cockney-like culture, and feel it can be better passed on to their children if they don’t go to a school where the dominant culture is the one that reveres black origin culture.
The Hip Hop/R&B music culture and the modern ”street/urban” way of speaking.

To say that London has always been changing and been evolving, and always had poverty etc, won’t necessarly cut much ice with those who don’t like the new Old Kent Road and Camberwell. Where the toughest guys are now exclusively from within the black communities and whites have to defer – or leave the area.
There can’t be tough guy white blokes wandering about Camberwell anymore like there was thirty years ago. It could easily turn racial and nasty if they clashed with black street gangs like the Peckham Boys and the like.

This was the story of one teenager who came from Congo as a small child and moved into an east Londdon estate.
http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/dispatches/i4i+aj+nakasila+biography/1394447.html

He and his friends made some of those short films that come on after Channel 4 News. The very boys who have got involved with the gang culture that causes so many problems for the police and even ”race relations”, As some people in the black community say the police are racists for picjing on their children all the timem and even urged black people not to join the police because it was a racist institution. That was the Black Police Association saying that just recently.

So while you might feel comfortable in all parts of London, not everyone feels the same way.

This is too big a subject for LC btw. The owner of the site doesn’t want this kind of talking on it and doesn’t encourage it. Which is fair enough.
But I rally don’t believe you can just spin your way all the time and say that everything is fine. To some people (it seems) England is still ”Babylon”.
Racism everywhere. Racist schools delivering a racist curriculum. Racist police and on and on.
Lee Jasper thinks so, and he was Ken Livingstone’s advisor on race issues and policing.

Maybe it’s just the ”Stewart Lee” type audience who really thinks London is just fine and at ease with itself. Liberal white urban professonals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stewart_Lee

Again Damon

I didn’t say everyone in London feels comfortable with everything. And you are presumably quite stupid to believe I did. Indeed going to all the effort of offering examples to show some people not feeling that way somewhat compounds your stupidity.

London being more comfortable with all of this than the wider country, and me being perfectly comfortable (as a bit of a hard and white east-londoner – if that’s even a thing to be) with it, living as I do, in a part of London where white Brits are not a majority – doesn’t mean everyone is perfectly comfortable. Just as your example of racists leaving for Maidstone isn’t evidence that no one is comfortable. (Though I’m inclined to celebrate that example as London’s gain. Fewer racists and fewer Millwall fans in London is a good thing to my mind.)

Like I say – you are obviously not very bright to think I’ve said everything is fine. That’s fair enough. There is room for stupid people in London too. But you could try educating yourself. Or you could try acknowledging that all of this was triggered by you railing that a perfectly sensible recogntition that some people who whinge about multi-culturalism or immigration do so as a proxy for race.

And that’s all that discussions about race and multiculturalism can be margin4error. You reaching for the ”stupid” calling people racists angle.
As I said, LC is not the right forum for such a discussion. It is too ideologically driven by it’s owner and main writers …. and commentators such as yourself.
Owen Jones has written posts on here before I remember. Before he became a little media darling and voice of that section of left/liberal society that will always spin things mercilessly to get their fundamental point across. Even though I agree with some of the things he says. The way of doing it is wrong (for me).

Yes London is better at being at ease with being diverse than say Middlesbrough, Oldham … or even Luton not so far away. So I agree.
But then pick a place in London – any place, and when you look into it in detail you see that actually all is not so well.

You could pick anywhere. The places I have already mentioned. Croydon ”suffers” greatly from a cultural and racial disconnect IMO. It’s where I’m from and where I know best. In the last thirty years ….. since I was at school there, ”black London” has moved out of what might be called ghetto areas such as Brixton back in the early 80s, and the children of those Caribbean immigrants have moved south and spread out into places like the northern half of Croydon and all points in between … like Streatham.
You cannot say that they are really harmonious places. Some of the problems that faced black people in Brixton, now affect their children in Croydon.
Just Listen to Lee Jasper talking about race.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W4EFSfYv3uI

Tower Hamlets is another place you could look at. You think it’s great if the ”white racists” move out of such places …. home of the Kray twins and that kind of east London Cockney type community. The kind of people who might resent that the Bangladeshi community in TH have brought Bangladesh type communalism to their borough. It’s still 57.1% white according to wikipedia, with ”Asian or Asian British” making just 30.6% of the population, But by solid communty single mindedness were able to win the mayorship of their borough for an independent candidate of their choice. A borough with a budget of a BILLION pounds a year. That’s some feat and is just what they do in Bangladesh where it’s vital to have ”your man” or your party in power – and when they aren’t it’s a disaster. The election passed most non-Bangladeshis by it seems and so a minority was able to punch way above their weight.
Is that racism on their part that they are so into themselves as a community?
In a way that if whites are you would rather they left the city?

So most Londoners say ”so what?” and aren’t too bothered. Good for them.
The only people who do get hacked off about it, and places like the East London Mosque continually having biggoted fundamentalist Saudis and the like speaking at their places … are the EDL (and they’ve been marginalised mostly) and websites like Harry’s Place. Most other people say ”so what”?
If you don’t like it you are invited to bugger of out of London.

No wonder some of those fans on the Millwall-Online site are somewhat backward in their views. They ”moan” when a festival like the Southark Park festival gets closed down becuse some gang banging ”ghetto boys” turned up and people got stabbed. You could just say that that bit of south London was always rough and had gangs of toughs I suppose. But they moan about it because the the gangs are race based – and not white. They are racist black gangs in effect. And they dominate socially and culturally, on the streets and on the buses and trains locally.
Millwall fans show up for a few hours every couple of weeks on a saturday, but are then long gone by 7pm.

Anyway, I’d be interested to know of some places where there really is an easy going multi-racialism where everyone mixes freely. It happens of course. In many schools and colleges. But their is also the seperatness too, where black people still socialise and are interested on going to black only spaces.

Or like I would see driving about in south London from Crystal Palace down into Dulwich and on through Camberwell to the City or West End …… a not so subtle race and class division betrween what schools children went to. One school mostly or predominantly BME … and then walking or driving through them (around Dulwich) – the posh white parents taking their children to private school. They want to live in the ”nice” parts of Dulwich, and even Peckham, but like Diane Abbott, don’t want their kids to go to the big comprehensive where the culture is decidely black and ”urban/street”.

Btw margin4error, race often defines culture. It certainly does with African Americans who even have a different way of talking most often, and it does too in London. If you are black British and going to school in south London, you are most likely not going to be into white guitar bands or want to go camping at Glastonbury. That’s a white thing. You don’t go on holiday to Spain and Greece and other ”white” places like that. And you are far more likely to not have a father figure in your life.

So while people might be comfortable and at ease to a degree, it’s only really because there is no other choice. But in the USA we can see that it really does make a difference whether you are living in Seattle or Washington DC.
In Portland (Oregon or Maine) or New Orleans.
Of course it’s capitalism that is to blame for many of these problems of poverty and disconnection, but capitalism is the system we live under.

Anyway, wrong forum, wrong conversation.

Damon

I didn’t call them racist. You did.

“If I am to believe the people on the Millwall fans website I sometimes read, many of them left because they didn’t want their children to be going to an inner city school where they would be the ethnic minority.
And so moved to Maidstone and places like Dartford.
Racists in other words.”

I’m happy to acknolwedge very strong differences between culture and race. The Bengali community in tower hamlets is a good example of a cultural issue not a racial one. They are racially fairly diverse. You shouldn’t forget that the “community” as it were is in fact not exclusively bangladeshi at all, but also Pakistani and Indian too. And not surprisingly, given the geographical range of that collection of people, they are as racially diverse as Swedish people are to Spanish people. But what they have is a strong community connection (Islam most visibly, but also a number of traditions associated with rural communities right across that region of the world).

In terms of festivals being closed down – again – I’m inclined to point out that this is hardly a new phenomenon linked to racial diversity. The Greenwich Festival was closed down under Queen Victoria because it tended to get so violent. And the London Mosque always makes me happy because my favourite pub is directly across Whitechapel Road from it. You litterally stand outside opposite the mosque drinking 10% beer at 2am. One of my happy places in life.

I would suggest for probably the least ambiguous mutli-cultural ease in London, you might want to try Stratford ironically. The area, like most poor parts of London, and indeed places with relatively little diversity, has crime and unemployment. But the “gangs” who hang around roller skating in the old shopping mall at 3am (who I tend to come across, ironically, only on my way back from my favourite pub) are a racially diverse bunch. Tend to leave me well alone too. The shops and pubs are always filled with people of all ages, races, religions and nationalities. There are even christian evangelists and Muslim preachers doing their bit in the main public areas without any animosity (though plenty of disregard as most people don’t go to the shops to find god).

But in fairness – I’m quite impressed at your willingness to talk about multi-racialism rather than multi-culturalism. It is a different thing (despite the US tendancy to define communities through race historically).

And yes, race can inform one’s cultural preferences. We are all individually heavilly influenced by role models and there is a tendancy to associate with role models who appear to be a bit like us (geographically, racially, religiously, or – dare I say it – economically). I tend to assume few black people go to Glastonbry because it is a middle class hippy-fest rather than a music festival. But it is true that when Maiden play Brixton the crowd will tend to be rather more white than the wider population of London, let alone Brixton.

But that comes back to multi-culturalism – liberty offers us choice about our musical and other preferences. And we all rub along reasonably well with most of those choices. (Though I really do wish some one would legally dope already – dictatorial nonsense that prohibition is).

And don’t imagine there is no other choice. Those millwall fans made another choice. They have as much liberty to keep themselves to themselves as we all have to live however we want.

margin4errorr

> Genetics plays a significant part in athletic potential and this transends race.

> genetics and race are not, in terms of athletic potential, the same thing.

This is curious – what is race if not genetics ?

It’s also interesting in this thread – lots of talk of culture as an explanation of athletic performance.

Which contradicts the normal LC line, that there is no such thing as english culture. Or that culture is dog-whistle for race-(ism). Or that there’s no such thing as mainstream Islamic culture.

Strange how in this context the concept of culture is OK.

Is it because in the context of this thread – admitting racial diferrences would be less palatable than admitting cultural ones?

margin4error

I didn’t call them racist. You did.

I was doing so somewhat fecesioussly, because the term ”racist” has become almost entirely discreddited though overuse and misuse.
But anyone who moves out of the inner city because they don’t want to live in the extreme multi-culture and multi-racialism of parts of London HAS to be called a racist in some quarters. Again you have to remember what Diane Abbott did regarding her son. She didn’t want him as a black boy to go to a Hackney school where black pupils would be in an overall majority. Why not?

She talked of racism and schools failing black boys …. disengenously in my opinion. What I believe is that she didn’t want her sone to be going to school with AJ Nakasila and his friends Trebla and Troopa.
http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/dispatches/i4i+films+by+aj+nakasila/1390347.html

…..and picking up that street culture. Some of the Millwall fans on the website I read also didn’t want their kids going to such schools. You say ”good riddence” to them because of that and say that maybe all Millwall fans should move out of south east London. Do you say the same about West Ham fans in East London and Tottenham fans too? That they should move out to Hertfordshire and Essex if they insist one behaving like old time Cockneys?

You say Stratford is pretty OK. It may well be I don’t know it well.
The thing is though, that you can always look into furter and further detail about areas and find things that are right and not so right. It’s interesting though that you equate the modern ”post code” type gangs which plague London with similar gangs and street toughs going back to Victorian times.
It’s a good way of relativisng and trivialisng a quite serious problem …. which the police and wider society are really unable to deal with. When they target these groups of young men they get accused of being racists. And when the numbers of killings of black teenagers spikes in a particular period, they and wider society get accused of racism for not caring about young balck lives being lost.

When you look in more detail at some of the problems the police face, it does look like an intractable problem. What can you really do about social phenomina like the ”Woolwich Boys”?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qoqXhqemH2E

You can laugh and say that there have always been gangs in places like Woolwich I suppose. And Teddy Boys and all the rest. These people though seem to be pretty much a recent thing as the children of the newer immigrants from Africa.

The Woolwich Boys are the oldest street gang in Greenwich currently in existence having developed in 1998. They were initially almost entirely Somali youths who grouped together to protect themselves from racist attacks from other communities and gangs in neighbouring boroughs such as the Ghetto Boys from Lewisham and Catford. They felt as though they were being confined to the SE18 postal district where they reside and so began to group together in larger numbers for protection, however, from this they, like many other groups formed for the same reasons, realised the influence they could have in their numbers and began to use this strength for more negative endeavours.

https://sites.google.com/site/londonstreetgangs/gang-lists/south-london-gangs/woolwich-boys

These were obviously the guys who rioted in Woolwich last year and burnt down a Wetherspoons pub in the town. (Wetherspoons is often a bit of a white people’s pub). Was it a racial thing, or just wreckless oportunism?
I don’t know becuse I’ve never heard it talked about.

As for Tower Hamlets and Whitechapel. I only know it from being around in the day time. The market there is so Asian that the stall holders even call out their wares and prices in Asian languages. How many of those youngish men from India and Bangladesh came to be living in England I have no idea. Through marriage? The Blind Beggar pub looks rather forlorn in the day time. Like an outpost in a foreign city. I don’t know if it livens up at night.
One pub that is very lively in the evening is the Shakespear in Bethnal Green Road – down at the Bethnal Green end. It’s a ”proper” east end geezers pub, where they even have a picture of the Kray Twins on the wall. Whether that’s being a bit ironic or not I don’t know, but the last time I was there was when Tottenham were playing away and the game was on the TV and they were all Tottenham hooligan types in there.
I’m guessing that their interactions with the local Bangladeshi population are very limited indeed.

You could go on and on delving further into the detail of urban life …. in a way that the ”Stewart Lee” white liberal part of society usually never does … and this website never does, but some people have studdied in the USA.

There’s a book I have at home called ”Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City”. in which a black accademic looks particularly at Philadelphia’s neighbourhoods and how the culture changes as you travel from the most white, upper class leafy outer suburbs, down through more mixed working class areas and then down past Philadelphia’s worst ghetto.
http://www.amazon.com/Code-Street-Decency-Violence-Moral/dp/0393320782

They even teach part of it at Rutgers University in Philadelphia in some urban studies kind of course.
http://sociology.camden.rutgers.edu/curriculum/code_film.htm

Much of that actually applies to parts of London now …. but I’ve never seen a similar willingness to take on such ideas. It’s too sensitive and there would be accusations of racism and racial stereotyping made quite quickly.

I worked in Pizza Hot at Clapham Junction once for a short time. Delivering pizzas on a moped. Even though the Falcon Road estate was just behind the shop, no deliveries were to be made there at all. When people from there rang up and asked for a pizza we said sorry but we didn’t deliver to Falcon Road, but they could come in and order at the shop.
Falcon Road estate is a ”black ghetto” estate if there is such a thing.
Meaning that the young (black) people hang about on the estate, and a pizza delivery man would probably make a tempting target to rob of his pizza and nick the moped for a bit of joy riding. I’ve looked inside and seen the eyes suddenly all turn to look at the stranger coming in. Like on another similar estate in Battersea, it’s a bit of a disconcerting feeling.

I’m in Belgrade at the moment, and it’s strange discussing a subject like extreme diversity of population in a city that is largely mono-cultural. With a much smaller but very visible sub class of poverty stricken Roma peole who make their living sorting through rubbish. But they are mostly ignored and mostly it’s all the one culture – Serb people. I wonder how they would handle mass immigration here. Not very well I think.
On the other hand, I can’t believe how easy going and relaxed it is.
It feels completely safe and unthreatening … although I have been told there’s much goes on that you don’t see and a lot of guns around. But that would rarely affect a tourist.
Unlike in London say, where tourists wearing backpacks would be advised to be careful about where they walked about lost – looking at there maps like I do here.

@ JV

“This is curious – what is race if not genetics ?”

Race is part of genetics. That doesn’t make all genetics race. An apple is a fruit but not all fruit are apples.

“It’s also interesting in this thread – lots of talk of culture as an explanation of athletic performance.

Which contradicts the normal LC line, that there is no such thing as english culture. Or that culture is dog-whistle for race-(ism). Or that there’s no such thing as mainstream Islamic culture.”

Can you point me to an LC article arguing that culture doesn’t exist? It seems far more likely (and sensible) that the site has argued that there is not one, easily defined English culture, ditto Muslim and so on. Which doesn’t contradict the idea that someone’s athleticism might have been influenced by the culture they grew up in.

And that last is obviously true. Fred grew up in a village where everyone was football-mad and all the kids spent every dry night having a kickabout on the green. Bob grew up in a village where all the kids spend all night playing video games. All else being equal, who’s more likely to grow up athletic?

“Strange how in this context the concept of culture is OK.”

If someone talks about “culture” as a stalking horse for race because they’ve worked out that people get annoyed when they whinge about brown people, that’s not ok (for a given value of “ok”). If someone talks about “culture” and MEANS culture, that’s ok. Hardly a strange or inconsistent position.

I think the Olympics have had a significant effect on how other nations view modern Britain. I’ve often felt that the image Americans have of Britain as a conservative, class-conscious, bowler-wearing country made it harder for them to hear arguments about social democracy – it was always, ‘Don’t give us that BS, we know what your country is really like.’ The image of a multi-cultural, non-heterosexist country that loves its socialised healthcare system and accepts atheism provides powerful support for British attempts to support other nations in their fight for those things. Don’t underestimate it.