As I keep saying, the UK government continues to deal with British extremism by doing everything wrong. But with the new sort-of-well-intentioned-but-actually-racist-when-you-think-about-it proposal that female Muslims (screw males) will be given English lessons, I noticed a recurring pattern.
David Cameron has already shown that he has absolutely no idea what he's doing when it comes to Islam. He previously stated that England is a 'Christian' country, despite only less than 64% of us being baptised. (Though, still more than the number of people who voted for him.) He pressed on to suggest that Muslims need to do more about extremism. Because it's not like David Cameron is in charge of anything. As the Prime Minister of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, there is absolutely nothing he can do. It's all up to you: random person!
Whilst the government seriously debates whether Donald Trump should be allowed into the UK (he's a billionaire! Of course he's going to be let in!) they continue to show that Cameron and Trump are made for each-other. The government argues that Trump's proposal to deport and ban Muslims from entry to the US is racist. Meanwhile, the UK refuses to take in it's fair share of refugees, and what refugees that are allowed in have to face constant discrimination from locals and the government itself. Thousands are shoved into detention centres, many of them are spied on even after they're granted domicile, they're given measly funds to re-build their lives on, and all of them must constantly fear deportation. There are countless horrible stories of how LGBT asylum seekers are denied for "not being gay enough" and how children are separated from their parents, raised in England, then sent back once they're 16. Trump would be proud.
Meanwhile, there are whispers of banning women's headdresses, Muslim preachers are silenced, Muslims in general are encouraged to be less visible, local councils refuse to house refugees, when they do they do nothing to protect them from racism, and nothing at all has been done about preventing either anti-Islam or anti-migrant hatred. Instead of schools being taught about Islam and how it's an inherently non-violent religion, Muslim's are instead being taught about Christianity and our noble history of slavery in a laughable attempt to whitewash them.
The government is, in short, blaming Muslims for being victimised by the government.
This is just the issue of rape re-dressed. People continue to instruct women on how not to get raped (don't wear revealing clothing, don't talk to boys, avoid sex until your 34) rather than instructing men to not rape. I've already discussed how shambolic our sex-education is, but the issue of consent is never raised. At no point are boys given a frank talk about what qualifies as harassment. Instead, girls are taught how not to attract attention. This practise is, in effect, blaming women for being potential victims of sexual harassment/abuse. I'm glad that victims are starting to be treated respectfully, but it's too late by that point.
And it's exactly the same thing here. Hate-crime is being taken seriously, but the attitudes that lead to it are ignored. It's like how people only do something about depression when the sufferer attempts/commits suicide. Too late! Prevention is equally important because whilst you'll never be able to fully eradicate rape/hate-crime/suicide; surely the less cases, the better?
Obviously the government will deny racism. They'll say it's perfectly justified for people we're bombing to only be allowed in if they work twice as hard as everyone else for half the money. It's not racist at all to assume that someone not born in this country is clearly trying to steal our wealth. It's not racist to condemn immigrants for 'coming over here taking our money' whilst claiming to live in Switzerland to evade tax or emigrating abroad ourselves. It's not racist for the home office to completely ignore it's own findings that actually immigration has no impact on the economy. It's also not racist to assume that people fleeing countries torn apart by a lethal cocktail of dictatorships and terrorism would themselves become terrorists. It's not racist to think that migrants are security threats, and to detain asylum seekers in environments worse than prison. It's not racist to see Muslims as terrorists in the making, and spy on them just in case.
Nope. It's only racist if you murder foreign people...which the government is doing overseas (and has done since it's very inception). The Iraq War. The Afghanistan War. The Syrian War. There's also our accidental yet possible direct funding of The Crimea Annexation, The Ukraine Destabilization, and The Yemen War. We've also provided arms to China, who continue to oppress Taiwan and are close allies of North Korea. The government claims to take all this seriously, yet continues to shut down any inquiries. I doubt we'll ever see Tony Blair or David Cameron in court for playing a part in war crimes even though all these activities deserve investigation.
Obviously this is all sarcasm. Whilst our bombings and arms-dealings are just evil, the rest of the above are clearly racist. They all negatively affect people of a different race for no reason other than because of downright false assumptions fuelled by xenophobia.
And things are only getting more racist. There's a cruel footnote to Cameron's English Lessons, and that's that any migrants who fail English tests will be deported. The Home Office also intend to pass a law that'll mean any migrants who earn less than £35,000 a year will be deported
For the record: I don't earn that much. No-one in my job earns that much. My mother has never earned that much. It took my father two decades to earn that much. Once again: this is racism. The government already sets an unfairly high standard for migrants to follow - expecting refugees to be able to survive on £30 a week. The proposal is a new low for an already openly racist government, and I hope that just like the tax credits cut (remember when George Osborne tried to steal minimum-wage earners money?) this fascist proposal gets immediately shut down by the opposition...unless the Conservatives try to weasel it through without debate like the plan to cut student grants.
The double-standards on display show how racist we truly are. We expect Muslims to strip their clothes, speak fluent English, be better acquainted with our history then we are, have a successful job, never openly speak about their religion, and be anti-extremist activists who hold 100,000+ attended rallies against ISIS. We, in short, expect them to be white.
No. We expect them to be better than white. They must be the whitest possible citizens. They must be the kind of person you see in adverts for kitchens. We expect people who suffer from so much oppression to somehow overturn this to become a member of a society that hates them - like the worlds worst public school initiation. Read the Patrick Melrose novels to see how this "go through hell to enter heaven" approach never works.
And David Cameron has the nerve to suggest that the fault lies with Muslims for "not fitting in." Because whenever he goes to Saudi Arabia to make another arms deal and ignore all those human rights violations, he fits right in. He wears the robes, speaks the language, beheads protesters, bombs civilians, blows raspberries at Iran. It's amazing!
How about we sent all the Tories to Syria and see just how well they blend in there?
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