John Walker's Electronic House

The Daily Mail, And How An NHS Death Means… Racism Is Fine?

by on Jul.28, 2012, under The Rest

UPDATE UPDATE: The Mail has pulled the article entirely now. The link to it now just reaches an error page. But you can read the article in full via the links a few lines below, and via FreezePage here.

UPDATE: That was quick. About five minutes after I posted, the Mail’s story was ninja edited, without acknowledgement, to remove the most outrageously racist lines. Where once it read:

“This was supposed to be a representation of modern life in England but it is likely to be a challenge for the organisers to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family in such a set-up.

Almost, if not every, shot in the next sequence included an ethnic minority performer. The BBC presenter Hazel Irvine gushed about the importance of grime music (a form of awful electronic music popular among black youths) to east London. This multicultural equality agenda was so staged it was painful to watch.”

It now reads:

“This was supposed to be a representation of modern life in England but such set-ups are simply not the ‘norm’ in any part of the country. So why was it portrayed like this and given such prominence? If it was intended to be something that we can celebrate, that two people with different colour skin and different cultural heritages can live harmoniously together, then it deserves praise.

But what will be disturbing to many people is top-down political manipulation – whether consciously or unthinkingly – at a major sporting event.”

It’s the most extraordinary change to the text, completely reversing the meaning the author originally intended, and completely incongruous to the paragraphs either side of it, which still endorse Aidan Burley’s “leftie multicultural crap” tweet.

You can see scans of the original article, before these changes were made, here: 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Original: I am very aware that getting cross with Daily Mail articles is like shouting about how the sun can be hot. However, my motivation is not to cry, “How dare they!”, but instead to say, “Please understand that they do.” I still meet many people who do not understand how the Daily Mail is not just another tabloid, not just as bad as the rest of them, but instead something far more despicable and dangerous. It’s one of the most popular papers in Britain, and when we say, “Just ignore it – they’re just trying to get hits,” I shudder. We do not ignore evil – we challenge it and get angry about it. We make more people aware. Some people reading won’t have realised. And others can maybe point someone this way when they ask what they’re getting so worked up about.

The particular piece that’s riled me this evening is elegantly titled, “The NHS did not deserve to be so disgracefully glorified in this bonanza of left-wing propaganda“. That the Mail would write a piece arguing that the NHS is a bad thing, and should have had no part in the Olympic opening ceremony, is not a surprise. They’re a vicious and spiteful paper, and their agenda against the poor and needy is over a hundred years old. The NHS is the antithesis of everything they stand for, a socialist blight on our nation they’d rather do without. And while there are a thousand reasons to get cross about that, it’s not the issue with this piece. The issue is what’s smuggled in there.

This is why the Mail is so insidious, and so dangerous. It’s written in a very particular way, designed to sweep readers up in a froth of anger, before then slipping in various suggestions of what else they should think. Although written as, “And here’s what you already think, of course.” While I have strong issues with many other newspapers, from the hypocrisy of the Murdoch press, to the near fascistic support for anything “left” in the Guardian, nothing upsets me nor fills me with fear as much as the prose style of the Mail.

So the story is utterly nonsensical from top to bottom. I don’t know the particulars of the sad case they describe, where they claim an NHS patient died because he was denied a glass of water for a few days. The story is so full of holes that I can’t even begin to imagine what actually happened. (Edit: Many people have informed me today about the sad story, and it certainly is an awful tale of a horrific mistake by some hospital staff. Obviously I don’t trivialise the severity of this incident.) But for the sake of argument, let’s assume that a young man was left to die by some incompetent medical practitioners. What on Earth does that have to do with the NHS as a concept? We’re asked to assume that whatever the unnamed issues with the NHS are, these mystery failings were directly the reason why this man died. While the NHS certainly does have very many serious problems, I’m fairly sure none of them is the routine practise of leaving people to die of thirst, as a policy. While the mess of management, and appalling treatment of nurses, lack of doctors, and so on are all matters that obviously deserve attention, it’s my guess that the idea of free access to medical care, funded by tax payers, doesn’t implicitly ban the giving of water to patients. But this is the evidence given in the idiotic piece for why it was so “disgraceful” to portray the NHS as something of which we could be proud, and the reader is assumed too stupid to stop to give it a moment’s thought.

But as I say, as stupid and as wildly inaccurate as that might be, that’s not what chills me about the article. That comes after we’re done being told how the National Health Service Act 1946 murdered a man, when it mentions the Olympic scene featuring Bond and the Queen and adds,

“But it was the absurdly unrealistic scene – and indeed one that would spring from the kind of nonsensical targets and equality quotas we see in the NHS – showing a mixed-race middle-class family in a detached new-build suburban home, which was most symptomatic of the politically correct agenda in modern Britain.”

There’s the right turn. While books could be written about the tragedy of the warping of the phrase “politically correct” (the absurd notion that we should be sensitive to others in how we speak and act – throw up our arms in unified horror), it’s thrown in to ensure the fervent Mail reader is adequately riled. “The NHS murdered that boy, and they had the temerity to not hate the entire institution, and now they’re being POLITICALLY CORRECT about something or other?!” And then it comes:

“This was supposed to be a representation of modern life in England but it is likely to be a challenge for the organisers to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family in such a set-up.”

Just wow.

Such a phenomenally racist statement, made with such nonchalance, in a piece about the failings of the NHS. Such a deeply wretched and despicable comment, suggesting the very notion of a stable mixed race family being even a possibility is ridiculous. It would be “a challenge” for the organisers of the Olympic opening ceremony to find a happy interracial couple? A ceremony taking place in EAST LONDON?

I live in Bath, for the love of God – a place so white that no one dares drink red wine in case they spill some and stain it forever. And I immediately think of two mixed race couples with children with whom I’m good friends, among a good deal more I know. (I realise I’m so damned close to saying, “Some of my best friends are…” but I’m just trying to make the point that even Aryan Bath would make a great place for the organisers to start their hunt.) Then there’s that word, “educated”. It’s a horribly written sentence, so it’s not clear if he’s deliberately only referring to the “white middle-aged mother” as such, and not the “black father”, but it wouldn’t be particularly surprising. But what does “educated” have to do with it? Does he believe that mixed-race couples can only be stupid people? That education would prevent such a thing happening? And what about “happy”? If they weren’t educated but happy, presumably that’s because they’re too stupid to know how awful their lives must be? But as soon as they get some smarts, there’s no chance of happiness, right?

It’s just horrendous. And it continues. The writer’s disgust cannot understand how an event representing Britain, taking place in London, should have continued including people who aren’t white:

“Almost, if not every, shot in the next sequence included an ethnic minority performer. The BBC presenter Hazel Irvine gushed about the importance of grime music (a form of awful electronic music popular among black youths) to east London. This multicultural equality agenda was so staged it was painful to watch.”

At this point any pretence at ambiguity is abandoned. It’s a man – Rick Dewsbury – just voicing his hate that there are black people living in London. He’s given up pretending this is about the NHS – now it’s just the unbridled horror that East London contains black youths, listening to their electronic music. In a master-strike, he then even endorses disgraced Tory MP Aidan Burley, and his appalling tweets from during the event, where he called it “leftie multicultural crap”.

“Yet predictably he has been castigated by Twitter’s Guadianista [sic] brigade.”

Well, no, he was castigated by people who think the Guardian is terrible too, because he made a statement that made him sound like a racist bigot. Because, Rick, when you call something “multicultural crap”, it means you’re a racist bigot.

Then he calls it “social engineering”, before insanely swerving back onto his original road of hating the NHS as if it were what he’d been talking about all along. Including adding a statement about how there are some parts of the NHS we can be proud of right at the end, seemingly contradicting the start of his own piece.

That’s a regular trick the Mail uses, too. Along with the bait-and-switch articles (being indignant about one subject wildly steers into being indignant about another), utterly unsupportable, or even downright untrue statements are made, then a contradictory line is added at the very bottom. It’s designed as a Get Out Of Jail, a way of justifying what comes before. But what comes before is designed to make it irrelevant. The Mail reader is supposed to be so incensed by this point that the cowardly reverse-ferret line (usually instantly contradicted once more, as it is here) has no effect at all.

It’s this insidious endorsing of bigotry, wormed into articles on any subject, that makes me so scared of the paper and its power. Because when a newspaper says, “Well, it’s because of those bloody blacks, isn’t it?” apropos of nothing, the reader will feel more comfortable with expressing and believing the same. Of course they will. And when it’s a best-selling daily newspaper, and printed published on the most popular newspaper website in the world, it’s racist bigotry presented as factual news in a mainstream form. And that’s bloody terrifying.

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247 Comments for this entry

  • djawiuphygnj
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:00

    I know this will sound more than a bit creepy, but:

    John Walker, you seem to be one of the most conscientious and humanistic people I’ve ever met or read. You really are incredibly good to the core, and it saddens me that your level of care for humanity is not the default.

    That sounds sarcastic but it’s really not. I just wanted to let you know that there’s someone out there that really appreciates what you’ve done and continue to do.

  • The Sombrero Kid
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:08

    I’ve never met a daily mail reader, I’d probably choke them to death on sight if I did, I’m increasingly losing my patience for intolerance.

    I understand the sentiment behind the people who say we should ignore them, the paper makes money from you reading the stories whether you agree with them or not, although I also strongly agree they should be called out for this hateful drivel & it’s hard to criticise without reading it.

  • d
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:14

    This is still only mild treachery compared to what goes on across the Atlantic. Be glad you don’t have people being convinced to support policies that run counter to their own self-interests.

  • Jeff
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:23

    Sombrero Kid, surely you will have to choke yourself, as you are intolerant of DM readers and you can’t stand intolerance?

  • Jim Huxter (Jimangi)
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:40

    Great article, John.
    I can’t understand how Conservatism can still be so prominent in the Western World. When you look at the fundaments of the Right-Wing ideology and of Conservatism in the UK or Republicanism in the US one can’t help but see… well… the bad guys!
    These visions of society supposedly revolve around working for what you deserve, which there is a valid argument for, but it becomes so horribly skewed that it can’t be viable, and it’s been going on for thousands of years. Of course a man working in a coal mine in Victorian England put just as much effort into his work as a banker, with far greater risk, of course the Steinbeckian Itinerant Workers of the Great Depression went through hell just like the men working the stock market did and of course someone with a managerial position isn’t as gruelling or as low-paid as someone who cleans public toilets. It’s comparable to Feudalism, we still have old Lordly families here for God’s sake! Conservatism is inherently selfish and goes against so many of the things we’re taught by Literature and the things we actively seek to teach our children. We’re taught to share, to not be greedy, to help others less fortunate than ourselves. These moral lessons have existed for millions of years, the Good Samaritan being the most obvious, how is it that a society force-fed these things can sustain Right Wing attitudes when they should seem so obviously ‘evil’?
    Off-topic I suppose, seeing as I didn’t talk about the Daily Mail, but it felt an appropriate enough place to speak my mind.

  • Ramsfeld
    July 28th, 2012 on 23:43

    I hope one day so-called journalists from papers such as The Mail candidly admit the agenda behind everything they write. I find it incomprehensible a professional journalist – who MUST be aware of ethics – would willingly write this off their own back. The only consolation, and it’s not much, is that we assume they’re under direction on the issues to prod and the hackles to raise.

    The alternative is so much darker.

  • Richard Harrison
    July 29th, 2012 on 01:55

    The Sombrero Kid, while I completly agree with you statement. The irony in

    “I’ve never met a daily mail reader, I’d probably choke them to death on sight if I did, I’m increasingly losing my patience for intolerance.”

    Is really quite amusing. Hope it was intended :)

    As for me, I do know a few Daily Mail readers. They are actually nice people, just scared of change, it’s wrong but there you are. They will get used to it

    We are becoming more and more tolerant as a nation. It doesn’t seem it at times but it is true. 30 years ago this article wouldn’t have even raised an eyebrow. The Mail will lose, I can’t wait for that day

  • Nac
    July 29th, 2012 on 06:14

    Having read a lot of blogs that dissect the Mail’s appalling writing style, it seems to be their use of “educated” in the original was indeed aimed solely at the mother and was used as a shorthand for class in addition to the racism. “Educated” (i.e. middle class) white female with black male (i.e. lower class benefit scrounger, in the mind of the Mail), that just won’t do.

  • Shirley
    July 29th, 2012 on 07:29

    I read the original Mail article with utter horror – so nasty, so bigoted, so racist. I hadn’t realised they had edited it though, so thank you. Sadly, they had the bones about the young man right, he did die because he wasn’t given fluids, but it was a much more complex case than that, as they always are – http://www.doctorschambers.co.uk/news/kane-gorny-dies-in-hospital-from-dehydration-after-asking-police-to-help-him-get-drink-of-water

    I live in multicultural Britain, I’m proud of that. I’m staying in the East End for the Olympics, as I’m volunteering there. I love that people here are different to each other, respect these differences and live together.

    I LOVE the NHS. Yes, there are mistakes made occasionally, and sometimes those mistakes lead to tragic circumstances, but it is the best Health Service in Europe, and when compared to the American alternative is frankly wonderful. I have friends in the USA that simply can’t afford to be ill, can’t afford to go to the doctor and dread having an illness that may require hospital treatment as they cannot afford it. I live near the first NHS hospital, opened by Nye Bevan, that has now been sold to Central Manchester Healthcare Trust, who are planning to downgrade its A&E department to save money. A large community will lose its A&E service to save money. I hate what this government is doing, hate what its doing to the NHS specifically.

  • Daniel Emery
    July 29th, 2012 on 07:51

    Thanks for screen grabbing the offending article before the Mail edited it – good thinking (should have done it myself)

  • Simon
    July 29th, 2012 on 07:54

    @TheSombreroKid – your first paragraph is supposed to be ironic, right?

  • John Lewis
    July 29th, 2012 on 08:12

    That the Mail changes stuff AFTER the fact fails to surprise.

    One Saturday morning, in the paper’s old offices just down off Fleet Street, I wrote an accurate piece about Terry Wogan.

    When it appeared the following morning in The Mail on Sunday, it had been rewritten to match exactly what the newsdesk had asked for, even though the facts, and what I wrote, did not.

    THAT was back in 1989/90.

    A leopard NEVER changes it’s spots.

  • Nick Mailer
    July 29th, 2012 on 08:15

    Ok. So now we’ve had The Daily Mail’s nasty far-right poison piece, I’m imagining the equivalent bizarro-world Guardian piece:

    “The Military Services did not deserve to be so disgracefully glorified in this bonanza of right-wing propaganda”

    The article would then produce an anecdote of a nasty squaddie, and extrapolate therefrom. And snidely interpolate a suggestion that the parading of black soldiers at the opening ceremony was ridiculous, because the military’s endemic racism would mean that in real life, the notion of a black soldier or officer’s being accepted into the squad would be ludicrous and unlikely.

  • sangue
    July 29th, 2012 on 08:28

    Nicely said and how interesting to see the two articles side by side. Thanks for highlighting this – I’ve linked to this entry. I hate that rag.

  • Katrina
    July 29th, 2012 on 08:43

    Bravo!! This has really cheered me up! I was sooooo angry about that article!!!

  • Lesley Cookman
    July 29th, 2012 on 08:47

    Thank you for this, even if it’s made me so angry I want to throttle someone. I shall send the link to anyone who reads the Mail.

  • AM
    July 29th, 2012 on 09:02

    The Daily Mail is a conduit for dated, offensive and ignorant views that represent the agenda of a tiny, ageing demo-graph.

    I’m glad it’s reminded us so recently of it’s odious leanings.

  • Nikki
    July 29th, 2012 on 09:19

    Look at yourselves, harping on and on about “tolerance”. I’m sorry, but what is there to tolerate? The very use of the word suggests that you think that these people shouldn’t be in our country really but you’ll put up with it.
    Well done- give yourselves a pat on the back. You could write for The Daily Mail!

    Great article though

  • PadraigO'H
    July 29th, 2012 on 09:26

    Great piece.

    Nick Mailer: Is there not something quite slippery about writing a fantastical ad hominem comment about what you imagine a newspaper might say (but hasn’t said). Just would serve to make me question you motives.

  • randy mandy shandy handy
    July 29th, 2012 on 09:46

    The Sombrero Kid
    I’ve never met a daily mail reader

    You’ve read the blog of one, though. Or what do you mean by ‘a daily mail reader’? Aren’t you generalising rather crudely? Did you mean ‘a Daily Mail writer’? There too, there are all sorts – Craig Murray writes leftie columns for the DM occasionally.

  • Geems
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:22

    My Mum is a Daily Mail reader. She is a fine 75 year old lady who has worked hard all her life and is a good-hearted person. However, it appears that because of her choice of newspaper she deserves to be choked to death.

  • Amy
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:24

    Great essay – I agree that the Mail is evil and dangerous. I have complained to the PCC about its coverage of underage grooming trials and how they say it has to do with how Muslims are, contrasted to how they report about white paedophile crimes, but the PCC is a waste of space. Despite point 12 of its Code of Practice being breached by the Daily Mail daily, it is allowed to carry on this way. I compare it to Der Stürmer and think they should be prosecuted for incitement to race hatred. They certainly should not be allowed to print such racist filth. Incidentally, my parents are mixed, white father black mother, who married in 1961, are still married, have 2 University educated daughters and can quote Shakespeare. These racist scum who report at the Daily Mail must surely be BNP voters and just want non-white people in this country airbrushed out of existence.

  • G
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:35

    How’s this for a bit of reactionary politics: seeing as we’ve already fought A WORLD WAR against Fascism we should send soldiers to destroy the Daily Mail. They would call it murder; I would call it ‘nipping World War Three in the bud’.

  • patrick graham (@smileoftdecade)
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:41

    We who value humanity need also to value out own courage –
    the fact remains that the Daily Mail is actually purchased by real people in any local newsagents where you see a copy un-returned…

    I live not far from “Aryan Bath” and when I next go into the newsagent I now feel empowered (thanks Danny Boyle) to say – “Good people do not buy this racist crap!” and laughingly suggest the owners of the shop cease stocking such a horrendous people of misanthropic bile…

    Can I suggest that we all do likewise?
    – or its just words in the online world where “Femail” still gets more readers than Shakespeare

  • al
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:44

    it’s all part of their madness, and i think it is an actual form of madness.

    i.e. when the Jubilee was on – make a bit of a fuss off the lack of non-white people there – “just goes to show only white people love England” complaining from their homes, not being there. but there are other white people there, so that’s ok.

    Then when there are a lot of non-white volunteers at the Olympics – claim that makes it “achingly PC”

    They can complain either way, not many white faces at the Jubilee means non-whites are traitors in some way, lots of non whites at olympics means it’s PCGAWNMAD and not a seconds thought will be taken thinking about the fact these people are volunteers, who volunteered their time to work for free for the ceremony, while the Burleys of this world sit at home and bitch about it on Twitter.

    the mail readers will lap it up.

  • Harry Payne
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:46

    Thank you, Mr. Walker. Your comment that: ‘…my motivation is not to cry, “How dare they!”, but instead to say, “Please understand that they do.” ‘ gets to the core of the Mail’s agenda as laid down by the first Rothmere: always give the readers something to fear and/or hate.

    I’ve linked to your article on Twitter and my blog: no cross-linking as I don’t have any amazing insights to add, just think that this needs as wide an audience as possible.

  • Shapey Fiend
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:46

    If videos of grime shows I’ve seen in the last couple of years are to be believed its audience has become almost exclusively white.

  • Tony
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:49

    The Daily Fail is the most obnoxious organ on the planet.
    It’s a reflection of it’s editor.

  • Martin
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:51

    Well said.

  • Jane Doe
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:52

    I feel slightly nervous in posting this but feel it necessary. I loathe hate and detest the Daily Fail like so many others. Also like so many others I voted Conservative at the last election and despite the tough time we’re going through right now would do so again. I find it particularly upsetting and insulting that people are so ready to assume Conservative voters and Daily Mail readers are one and the same. I’ve known quite a few people who would class themselves as socialists and yet devour the bile served up on a regular basis by this publication.

    I only glanced at the article in question out of curiosity at the depths the Mail will sink to. After a few lines I couldn’t stomach any more so moved on. I believe any sane person regardless of political prefs would find the article abhorrent.

    The boy who died of thirst had a specific medical condition making even mild dehydration life threatening. It was a terrible case that I’m sure anyone in the NHS would find distressing but is was one incident amongst so many wonderful heartwarming stories.

    On the whole the NHS is something we should all rightly be proud of and well worth celebrating.

    The Daily Mail is something to be ashamed of.

  • lucy
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:54

    Although I agree with this article, I must say that the stories were off the website and not actually printed in the paper. I may be wrong, but I’m also pretty sure that freelance writers post articles on the website and are able to do this as they have access to the administration section. This writer is -as you say- a racist bigot, but I don’t feel this writer or story should reflect the overall reputation of the paper. I’m not – and I don’t know any- a Daily Mail reader, I normally read my local paper (the Wigan Observer) or a different national paper if I want to read a story affecting the nation; I’m not knowledgable on the subject, as I’ve never read it. Though the story is unacceptable, I’m just expressing my views that the it shouldn’t reflect onto the entire paper. Thanks.

  • New Holborn
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:57

    ‘I’ve never met a daily mail reader, I’d probably choke them to death on sight if I did, I’m increasingly losing my patience for intolerance’

    hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

  • siphil
    July 29th, 2012 on 10:57

    My initial thought was why not complain to the PCC but in reality that would probably be futile. It’s like, as the author says, complaining about the sun being hot.

    Of course, the worst part of the whole thing was the idea you have to be a Guardian reader to object to Burley’s asinine remarks. I am a long-standing Conservative voter and think he is an utter tool. The idea you have to be a ‘leftie’ to love the NHS is the most offensive thing I have heard in a long while. Speaking from extensive personal experience, it is a marvel for the country and our pioneering of state provision of health care is something we should be proud.

    My impression of Daily Mail readers I have known is that they are mostly intrinsically OK people, not many card carrying right wing loons. They just have an old fashioned view of the world. Can’t cope with the fact that attitudes have changed, mostly for better.

    The article itself doesn’t surprise me though. The ignorance, bile and half-truths you see on a daily basis in the DM are just routine for such ‘journalists’. I do think that such views are more marginalised though and fewer people think this way.

    Boycotting the DM is the obvious thing to do but in time, I think their influence, such as it is, will fade.

  • Smogo
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:00

    Nick Mailer: you can imagine that Guardian piece, but can you find it? Has The Guardian actually published it? No.

  • teobesta
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:13

    I really wanted to read this but as much as I tried, it’s unbearable. The contrasting of the black & white of the screen hurt the eyes. Even adjusting the brightness of the monitor wouldn’t help.

  • vavatch
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:19

    I was wondering why, when they cut to the school choir in Scotland, even there, where the population is about 0.1% black, the choir had a few black faces, that of course the camera focussed on.

    This is indeed “multicultural crap”. It is clearly the organisers going out of their way to send a message. If you randomly select some schoolchildren, or take some school choir, then that is representative. Once you start selecting people on the basis of their ethnicity, deliberately, you’re setting your agenda.

    While I liked the show overall, it was fairly right-on and patronising, of that there’s no doubt, and it doesn’t make you a racist to point out the obvious.

  • Will Hall
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:33

    Nick Mailer – thanks for reminding us of what people who don’t read the Guardian think about that particular paper (your description matches nothing I’ve ever read in the Guardian). I suppose, from your comment, we can take it that you (tacitly) approve of the Mail’s blatant, well-documented racism, and can only retaliate by making up stories about an easy target. Just like the Mail, in fact!

  • SarahLSTH
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:38

    Lord knows what the Mail would think of my family! I’m a post-grad educated NHS professional. My husband not so educated (White British). We have 2 children. Our eldest,12, is mixed Afro Carribean/White. Her father died when she was 15 months old. We also have a 3 yr old. We have a complex mix of step, half and full siblings in our very complex extended family. We don’t all see eye to eye, but we try to celebrate our family and it’s achievements. Be they educational, spiritual or physical.
    There is an insipid evil within some areas of our broad community that doesn’t want to acknowledge that the best of humanity comes from embracing our differences. The people who voice it are incapable of growth and change and use people’s fears to further their own misguided ideals!

  • Joe
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:41

    The only word that I took offence to was “Educated”, quite rightly it needed to be edited and should never have to been published.

    But the author is correct, “such a set up” with the whole wider family getting together is something that would be a challenge to find and certainly isn’t the norm. You wouldn’t find that the norm in non-mixed race set ups either.

    The whole section was about Britain being a multicultural environment and celebrating it as quite rightly a good thing.

    This blog however digs deeper and interprets the rest to it’s own agenda. And they say it is just Americans that don’t understand irony.

  • Anita gill
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:42

    Good on you

  • Sara
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:44

    My english teacher is always saying that it means you are a talented writer if you are able to dumb down your writing enough for a tabloid. No, no it doesn’t. It just means you’re stupid. Much like the bigot that wrote that article

  • hayles83
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:44

    I wonder if the GB athletes have read this? Andrew Osagie, an 800m runner, is the middle one of 3 children. His father is from Nigeria and his mother is white, born and bred in the UK. They are still together and are one happy family, obviously immensely proud of Andrew as we all are. This racist drivel makes me feel ill.

  • Syme
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:47

    The irony is that by editing the article, the mail are giving in to “leftist twitter guadianista brigade” they despise so much. They won’t even stand by their racist beliefs.

  • Panduroo
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:48

    Thank you for blowing the whistle on this disgusting piece of ‘journalism’, and doing so with great eloquence. I hope people will take note!

  • Doctor Dee
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:50

    Nick Mailer – Have you seen the Guardian reports on the ceremony? Positive, cheerful and not a bit of ire in them. They give a balanced viewpoint as they usually try to do, so mention bafflement or disinterest by foreign viewers, but they have none of the hatred of the mail. You do live in a Bizarro world, and like the inhabitants of that world, you see everything around you through a distorted lens, which is a neat description of Mail readers.

  • Paul McGlade
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:51

    I read the article and immediately complained to the companies whose ads appeared beside it. Not to the Mail, not to the IPCC. Unfortunately, that’s probably the best way to make some sort of difference.

  • sonicred
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:53

    Brilliantly argued … I tend to just tell people the rag supported Hitler and it shocks most readers … however this very real, contemporary analysis of how they are astoundingly out of touch with a popular opinion when they start raking over their nitty gritty … After the opening ceremony ended it’s impossible not read the Mails ugly review and respond to them by saying: NHS is great – save it … Black people live in Britain too – get over it … as Danny Baker tweeted: “The Daily Mail sits vile & contented pointing to its Online success. It must know that it will also be the internet that will Bring It Down.”

  • Hannah
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:55

    Brilliantly written (which is obviously more than I can say for the hateful Daily Mail piece).

    I read the original, unedited version yesterday and tried to leave a comment – funnily enough they had been disabled. My comment was simply to point out that I am an ‘educated white middle-class female’ and that I am with an EQUALLY educated black male. The Daily Mail will find it hard to believe that skin colour is irrelevant – I fell in love with a man because he is wonderful and we have so much in common: skin colour was not a factor in any way.

    We got rid of the News of the World. One more to go.

  • Mrs Spicerack
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:57

    One of my favourite passtimes is Daily Fail reader baiting – get on the website, sign up, and leave comments which expose the blatant nastiness and bigotry of a paper whose stated aim is to ‘leave people angry about something’. Really, if every reasonable, tolerant, thinking person in this country got on there and left comments every day to dilute the vitriol and ill-informed bile, the message boards would be overwhelmed with reason and would surely collapse…

  • Ruby Two
    July 29th, 2012 on 11:59

    The Olympics Opening Ceremony was a real surprise. I sat and watched it with my husband and kids and felt like this was “our” Britain being represented.

    My family is pretty much the one that the Daily Mail writer believes it would be a “challenge” to find. I’m an educated white middle aged mother, although not as educated as my non-white husband who went on to PhD level. We have three kids, one grown up, two still at home and we are happy. And we are not particularly unusual. The only reason I’m even mentioning it, is because the article in question seems to think we’re a rarity.

    The Olympic Opening Ceremony felt like a real breakthrough, an acknowledgement long overdue that modern British cities have an ethnically diverse population and that is who we are. From my family’s perspective, there was nothing “multicultural” about the performance. It was just British, and it was real. It looked like us.

    I say it felt like a breakthrough. The racist backlash has at times threatened to undo that feeling.

    I’ve noticed that the word “multicultural” in the backlash commentary is being used in a new and unpleasant way. You pick up from context that most people using it actually mean “non-white” or “ethnically diverse” but with very negative connotations. Check out the list the word is included in, in this paragraph from another, equally vile Daily Mail article on the opening ceremony:

    “This is supposed to be a light-hearted, generous-spirited event. But it isn’t really. It’s an overbearing, officious, self-important celebration of corporate greed, unpunished corruption, tolerated cheating and multiculturalism.”

    The Daily Mail is, and has always been, a hate-filled, twisted newspaper. Thank you for taking up the issue of opposing it and the viewpoint it projects. I agree with you that it needs to me done.

  • Nick
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:00

    Great post. What a worthless reactionary rag the mail is.

  • Keith 'mandrill' Neilson
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:03

    I propose the formation of a Daily Mail buyout fund, set up with the sole purpose of gaining a majority share in the paper or their publisher and shutting them down completely whilst retaining copyright and trademarks on the name so that it cannot be revived.

    It’s all very well defending freedom of speech, but the Daily Mail is a poisonous rag which sews disharmony and discontent in the hearts of all that read it. It must be destroyed utterly.

  • MLR
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:03

    Finally, people can wake up and understand just how damaging the articles they read every day whilst thy drink tea or relax on the sofa really are. When I read Rick Dewsbury’s article, all I could do was laugh from disbelief at the unmittigated racism unfolding before my eyes. Everyone I have come into contact with since Friday night’s opening ceremony has praised just what a brilliant job Danny Boyle did and said that they were proud of what we as a nation had achieved. To read this dispicable man’s take on it simply ruined it. And if that weren’t enough, to criticise a system which Britain is lucky to have in the first place and makes Britain the envy of every other country whose people wish they didn’t have to lose family members because they simply cannot afford medical bills, proves what a blinded, bigoted fool this man is. Thank you for voicing the true opinion of we Britons; one of equality, unity and forward-thinking.

  • MsAlliance
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:05

    Bravo. Thank you for writing this. So many people are so outraged and disgusted with what is par for the course from the despicable rag. We want to write but I’m not sure I had the words. And of course, you’re right about complaining that the sun is hot. But well done for saying this anyway.

  • Porty
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:06

    Could you imagine the uproar if Africa was hosting the games and their opening ceremony about their country featured a white main character?

    The opening ceremony focused on black people and even in the lines of mixed race children, the camera focus was pretty much always on the non-white in the group.

    This much was obvious to most who watched the games.

    Yet here you all are calling out anyone who notices it as racist. Typical sheep who are more interested in showing everyone how tolerant they are whilst ignoring the main point to bring out the racism card.

    Pathetic

  • Andy Allen
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:07

    Thanks for highlighting this and making some very clear and important points.

    Good work

  • nowinwriting
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:09

    Entirely appalling if unsuprising Daily Mail gubbins. I was personally thrilled to see such a wide spectrum of modern diversity in the Olympic opening ceremony as well as an emphasis on the common man and services juxtaposed with eccentricities and literary, artistic and industrial invention. The Daily Mail may never admit it and its readership may take comfort in their denial but the majority of Britain is tolerant, multi-cultural (even if only in the form of embracing or adopting cultural practices or cuisines) and better and richer for it. It may be tomorrow’s chip paper but it’s good to see somebody deconstructing and pointing out the glaringly incongruous slurs in articles like this, no matter how obvious. Great stuff John.

  • James Q
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:11

    Simply in shock about some of the stuff i read, that was the last straw i will get my news from somewhere else other then The Mail.

  • Betty Amazing
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:14

    Thank you for writing this – I went on a huge twitter rant yesterday about this because I just couldn’t believe what I was reading!

    I really enjoyed the opening ceremony, and it didn’t even occur to me that it could be construed as offensive – it was a really well made piece of theatre and performance – the fact that the NHS section was performed by real medical staff was a lovely touch, and most of us owe a lot to the NHS. It’s a huge part of our culture and a wonderful thing that the everyone – no matter what their background – has medical assistance readily available to them.

    When I read down the page to the section about the mixed race family I was just… so shocked that they were so blatant. I really don’t understand how they thought that was an acceptable thing to publish.

    x

  • Anonymous X
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:17

    Good for calling these disgusting bunch of bigots out on their back-peddling, Mr Botherer.

    IMO, the most depressing issue about DM articles such as this the one you criticise is that they reveal that the Tory Right isn’t much far removed from the US Republican, Tea Party ideological viewpoint.

  • Martin
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:18

    Great article, I hope this goes viral.

  • The Swine
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:21

    Tbh, I’m sick of both whining nannies being so outraged by what people say they’re willing to turn into a thought-crime stomping Nazi on the spot and in turn, also the risible cossetted rose-tinted view of some people who ‘should get out more’s’ dream that our country should still be like something out of Downton Abbey as they sit snapping their fingers for service.
    Both are soft Fascism by proxy and both show that for some reason, some people still love to show off the fact that they’re still uneducated enough to think that if someone thinks something different to them, the other person simply must be wrong.
    I find it also highly ironic that the people who who champion diversity the most are the very ones chomping at the bit to squash the parts they don’t like about it with the force of an altruistic jackboot, everyone has got to like Grime then have they?…Can’t people be themselves anymore?…Better the devil you know I would have thought, unless of course you want everyone so far underground not one iota of dialogue can be shared.
    Unfortunately, it seems never the twain will meet on this and as a result, people in the middle who want to live a normal life trying to be nice to people and just getting on with stuff will keep getting shafted by whichever government (and supporters of) is carrying out the program which is being inflicted upon us under some very stuck-up, divisive noses…This is the REAL ‘Squeezed Middle’, let me inform you.
    The Mail says ‘this’, The Guardian says ‘that’…
    Jesus, Just listen to yourselves.

  • Fran
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:32

    Thanks for your good work, John. As an educated white middle-aged woman, happily married to a black educated man, with a black educated teenage son, I really did not appreciate the article which appeared in the Dacist Mail. I’m just glad that people like yourself are fighting the good fight, as you are helping people to understand how deadly and pernicious that nasty little rag is..

  • steve watson
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:34

    Having read the mails article it is without doubt out of order, but the outcry is ott. I strongly object to this notion that people are brain washed by what they read and need u lot to point out the error of their ways. This is on either side of the political spectrum. In a democracy u should b allowed to think what u like and not b forced to comply with the drival that we must all get along and love each other, that’s not the real world. At the end of the day if some old duffer wants to read the mail and enjoy/agree then let him as to the guardian readers too. The problem with that is u won’t be able to sit there aloof thinking how u r so much more intellectual, morally upstanding and tolerant than these people, who u must save from themselves .

  • RightOn
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:37

    Jim Huxter – whilst I’m not one for outrage, I find your comments to be a bit difficult to swallow. I would describe myself as conservative, but find the attitude that it’s “evil” to be shallow and dangerous.

    Firstly, I believe whole heartedly that everyone should work for what they get. I also believe that the weakest people in society – those who can’t care for themselves should be cared for. I do not believe however that a welfare state should be allowed to have such reach that it makes it viable not to work.

    I don’t believe the state should be seen as the only mechanism to deliver healthcare (or many other things for that matter). I can’t see how a nationalised health service can possibly keep up with an ageing population, vastly increasing costs of medication, increasingly complex treatments and drugs

    I am comfortable with a level of government that protects the most vulnerable but not one that takes money from me in tax to give it back it back to me in benefits. I am not comfortable with a government that wants to take an ever greater share from wealth creators to redistribute in a haphazard, unbalanced and inefficient way. I would like the state to be as small as is possible, as I feel passionately that individuals and entrepreneurs are far better at spending money than governments are. I accept that there is no system that can avoid some people winning and others losing.

    I don’t want a government that thinks everything I earn is theirs and will allow me to keep some of it to suit their attempts to buy votes in order to control and dominate the people.

    I believe strongly in our armed forces and the need for a strong defence – though I think it’s vital that defence is exactly that.

    I’m not against immigration in fact I think it’s vital for the countries economic health – I do however believe that an uncontrolled immigration policy can be dangerous both economically and socially.

    If that makes me “evil” then so be it – but I find it difficult to think in that type of absolute. I think we probably disagree on things, but I don’t believe for a minute that you are “evil”.

  • Liz
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:43

    I wrote a comment complaining about the use of “banana republic” to describe some teams in the Parade of Nations. They had me register for the site and said after I received an email confirming my registration, my comment would be posted. I never received the email confirmation and this is the second time this has happened to me when I posted a critical comment. And, yes, I checked my spam folder. A great to avoid reader feedback.

  • Onizuka
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:45

    Thanks for article, i rarely read the papers any more and this more then justify my stance. Always though things like this only happens in the USA, but I can see how narrow i’ve been living.

    So thank you for opening the door a little and though it might be a bit unpleasant, it’s good to know there are still people here willing to speak up and show us how ad they are. Please keep up the good work!

  • Hana
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:52

    So. I grew up in a mixed race home. An Indian step father and a white british mother. My brother is obviously mixed race. Dad was a doctor, mum was a nurse, both still work in the NHS. They married in 91, we lived in a 1930s 3 bed semi, with two cars. How’s that for lefty multi cultural crap?! The daily mail is just a journal of convoluted logic.

  • Jennypen
    July 29th, 2012 on 12:57

    Loved the ‘you kids and your music’ snub about grime music. Popular among black youths, apparently. Well, I can tell you something for nothing, the only person singing Bonkers louder than my (not that it matters but not-black) four year old on the night was Dizzee Rascal himself!!!!! Honestly, DM, you’re just being laughable now.

  • Cooler King Hilts
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:01

    The Mail’s use of “educated” to describe the woman is also part of a well-known policy at the Daily Mail – negatives articles about women who ‘choose’ to go out to work.

    Amazingly for the only newspaper that sells more copies to women than men, they run a steady stream of stories about how women who have a job can’t have it all, are damaging their relationships/ children etc etc.

    I’m not suggesting anyone buys it, but if you have access to a daily copy (eg you work in a doctors surgery or, say, the UKIP offices), spot how often they run stories than hammer this point – you’d be amazed.

    Here are the results of a quick Google search: http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=daily+mail+working+mothers&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&client=safari

    All part of a policy from the editor Paul Dacre, who is openly against women working full-time. It’s right up there with wheelie bins and wind turbines in the Daily Mail Handbook of Things To Write Negatively About A Lot.

  • Alex Mayor
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:07

    Great piece John,
    You would think that in this of all years, when newspapers partic. tabloids have had the most clarifying of lights shone into their ghastly mindsets and motivations by Leveson and #hackgate that at least a measure of populist positivity would be the better road. But not at the Mail. Oh no. People seeming to engage in a creative, social endeavour? Different racial groups not pointing pitchforks at each other? Better pour some dark liquid over that double quick.
    Hideous. They really are the worst of England.

  • Missile Smile
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:08

    “he was castigated by people who think the Guardian is terrible too, because he made a statement that made him sound like a racist bigot. Because, Rick, when you call something “multicultural crap”, it means you’re a racist bigot.”

    This point is so important. Too often hating on the Daily Mail is seen as a partisan activity, easily dismissed because the source is some ‘liberal’ (used as a pejorative). Many people identifying bigotry in the Mail also identify bigotry in Guardian. Their concern is motivated by their moral beliefs not their political ones.

  • alex c
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:18

    You have a good imagination Nick Mailer, but the Guardian is a bit more limp with its spin, and the fact that you have to make it up (as opposed to it actually happening) says a lot.

  • Sarah J
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:22

    Thank you for this article! I am particularly grateful to you for posting the original article – I have just used these to support my complain to the PCC. I recommend anyone else left fuming by the DM to do the same! http://www.pcc.org.uk/

  • Tasha Dhanraj
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:23

    I am mixed raced. My Mum is educated to degree level, white and middle class. My Dad is also educated (although he dropped out of uni), is black and whilst having grown up very poor and in rough parts of London is now also what you would call “middle class”. They are still together and very happy. We live in a detached house. I’m starting at a very good university in October. I know that anecdotal evidence is always a bit wishy washy but given that the Daily Mail seems to think that my family’s existence is up their with unicorns, I felt it was worth mentioning.
    Great blog. Thank you.

  • Patrick
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:27

    Firstly, What does racism actually mean any more? If it just means pointing out different attributes for different races, then it doesn’t really mean anything. The DM was trying to point out that white middle class Britain was grossly under-represented in the opening ceremony. But as soon as anyone dare state that white people might be repressed (affirmative action ehem!!!) in any way whatsoever, thus at odds with the narrative of the multicultural mainstream left, a barrage faux outrage and anger is unleashed… Of course all other races are allowed to be repressed… that’s just fine… White people… that’s totally not allowed…

    The Olympics are much more about corporatist apartheid, taxpayer abuse, troops on the streets and missiles on rooftops, but you all seem happy for London to descend into some Eastern European despot dictatorship police state just so Frankie Boyle can show everyone how we brought state healthcare to the world. I notice he left out the part about 130000 people a year being left to starve on the LCP… but whatever… I suppose that doesn’t matter to you either…

    Just like the Guardian claiming that any criticism whatsoever of the opening ceremony amounted to extremism, the mainstream Left is just proving itself to be a rabid, narrow-minded political machine every bit as bad as the mainstream right.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/jul/28/london-2012-boyle-olympics-opening-ceremony
    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/andrewgilligan/100173131/london-2012-how-the-olympics-suckered-the-left/

  • Slightlysuburbandad
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:32

    I wrote a shorter, angrier and far less good rant than this on my blog because he was actually describing perfectly my mixed race step family who livein the suburbs of London. While I agree they should be called to account it is posting this sort of sensationalist, extremist nonsense that keeps their online section in profit. The fact they ninja edited it shows even the Mail knew they’d gone too far this time.

  • Marc
    July 29th, 2012 on 13:56

    Haha does that guy Patrick actually think that it was frankie boyle who directed the olympic opening ceremony? Imagine how different it would have been if he had..

  • Lisa charnley
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:05

    I do not agree with your article at all. I and others can read whatever paper they wish too. Personally, the only reason I’d buy the guardian was to either wipe my nose or arse on it.

  • Lord Snot
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:07

    When I first read the article, I wasn’t even angry, just got a gnawing feeling in the pit of my stomach and a feeling that Rick Dewsbury is a vile piece of syphilitic sputum. It really is the most apologetically racist article I think I’ve ever read.

  • lucy nocella
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:11

    I watched the opening of the Olympic Ceremonies. I loved it. It was just amazing the old fashion way they did things and the rectro music the disco/rock wonderfull and the Queen herself in soft pink looked pretty and amazed. Now for some of the articles I read some were nice. To the people who are bigots/rassists/anarchy should keep there mouths shut let the world live in pease. Anarchy is people who don’t care about the law, there bigots, rasits and there probably more. I have an autistic child when I see people look at my 12 year like she’s a freak I want cry inside and I know my becca sees them stare she has feelisngs.
    Will the world rid of nasty people.

  • vicky
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:15

    Good article about the Daily Mail piece and it’s ridiculous view of the multi-cultural reality of modern Britain as some kind of anti-white reverse racism.

    Don’t understand your Guardian hate in the slightest, but fine. I think you’re confusing “fascistic support for anything left” with “genuine deeply held belief in left-wing values held by many readers and journalists.” The Guardian frequently makes the mistake of assuming its readership is entirely middle class, but otherwise I can’t see that it’s done anything to merit a mention in the same breath as the Daily Mail.

  • Steve Scott
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:17

    I’m currently busy collecting newspapers for the forthcoming toilet training of our imminently arriving puppy.I would not soil his bottom with the Daily Mail,however.If people stopped buying the hideous rag,it would have to change its schtick. I worry though that there is an uncomfortably large majority who can live with this sort of vile claptrap in their house.

  • Dan Brusca
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:18

    @Jim Huxter

    You’re right, your comments about Conservatism are off-topic, but perhaps on some level you associate Conservatism with the bigotry displayed in the Daily Mail article and by Aidan Burley and which I, as a Conservative-leaning individual, find just as awful as anyone else.

    Frankly, your views on Conservatism are as backward as the the view that Socialism is all about handing out billions of pounds of other people’s money to feckless and the work shy.

    Your idea that Conservatism is somehow at odds with people helping others less fortunate than themselves is nonsense. People who support Conservative ideals are just as likely as anyone else to, say, put their hands in their pockets for a good cause or get involved in their communities.

    Conservatism isn’t selfish. Conservatives just believe you put your family first and work outwards, to your community, your country, the world at large and that the individual, rather than politicians, is a better judge of how to spend or not spend their money in a way that aligns with this belief.

  • Proper Dave
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:18

    I used to know a guy who owned a news agency in London. He told me once about his calls from the Mail newsdesk.

    “So, what’s happening today?” they’d say.

    “Well, there’s a rape case on at the Old Bailey?”

    “What colour’s the victim?” they’d ask.

    As far as the Mail is concerned, all rapists are black. And it wants to publish stories about black men raping white women.

    Another time, they wanted him to find a case study for them: a single mum on benefits “preferably with six or seven kids, preferably some of them mixed race”.

    I’m not exactly left wing, but I do know that the Mail’s senior editorial team are racist scum.

  • Colin Day
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:23

    Its not The Guardian’s fault that they have to balance the Mail’s disgusting far-right propaganda machine with an equally to the left perspective. Papers like ‘the fail’ destroy the centre ground by throwing down a gauntlet that must be countered by all sane minded people.

  • Realredlobster
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:53

    Daily Mail rewrites history again. Good article. I read the original via Twitter and can vouch for what it originally said in the content of this article. Suggested that the content was IMEO in breach of the law for publishing content likely to incite racial prejudice. Maybe Daily Mail lawyers got their hands on it and guess what? Rewrote history again. Answer is to keep track of these racists, highlight their agenda and prosecute when we can. And stop buying their right wing rag!

  • Ruth Waterton
    July 29th, 2012 on 14:56

    Bravo you. I couldn’t have put it nearly as well as you, but the article and the insultingly obvious revisions moved me to post about it on my own blog – I will now be adding a link to yours.

    It’s almost become a joke to go on about the Daily Fail. But I totally agree, they have crossed a line into unrepentant racism here, and on their website too, which is generally regarded as being somewhat more liberal than the printed rag.

    I would support a campaign to encourage decent advertisers to boycott the Mail until they, at the very least, apologise and sack this so-called journalist. Racism is never acceptable, but is particularly abhorrant when we are playing host to what is meant to be a universal celebration of human excellence. Hopefully a big enough sense of revulsion will build to make meaningful change a possibility

  • Marcus
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:08

    The nhs is not the best tax payer funded health system in Europe, but it is one of the cheapest. To have an bigoted support for it is very sad and you are victim of propaganda if you don’t think that the dutch enjoy better tax payer funded health care than we do.

  • Emma
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:11

    Fantastic article- very true, what you said about the way they structure their articles.
    Just one question- at risk of sounding like a defensive bristling Guardianista, what do you mean by its “near-fascistic” defence of anything “left”?
    I have many criticisms of the Guardian, the main one that they seem to have scaled their staff down to five interns and a work-experience student, and thus you get badly-researched, hastily written news pieces full of mistakes. Or word-for-word Reuters and press releases. But I generally find editorials and comment pieces to be well-balanced and critical.
    Please do expand on what you mean? If you have time. Would be v interested to know.
    Thanks again for the above piece.

  • Rob
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:22

    To the person who said an African opening ceremony would not have featured a white character: it was notable that the Kenyan flag was carried by a white person, and the teams from a number of predominantly black African and Caribbean nations were also multiracial.

  • Mark
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:26

    The name of the gentleman who died in hospital of dehydration was Kane Gorny http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-18814487

  • John Walker
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:27

    To those asking about the Guardian comments – I’m going to discuss this with Nick in the next Rum Doings. Obviously I would far rather read the Guardian than the Mail, and most other papers. I’d happily write for the Gruaniad, but I would never contribute to the Mail, for instance. But unfortunately the Left they often portray is one I find very problematic, and one that endorses regimes of which I am extremely fearful.

    I only mentioned it in this piece to provide a counter to the inevitable “but you’re a leftie Guardian reader” responses that criticising the Mail tends to produce.

  • PollyUSA
    July 29th, 2012 on 15:59

    Wow, I’m an American and while I don’t read Murdock’s US papers, I don’t think they would dare print anything like this. Shocking

  • mister k
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:01

    The amusing thing about all this is that people really see what they want to see. To be clear, this was the narrative of the opening ceremony:

    Britain starts as a green land full of white people playing cricket. Then some white victorian gentlemen herald the industrial revolution, led by the very white Kenneth Branagh. This then leads into the 60s, where there was more immigration (although obviously historically people of all races have immigrated to Britain). There’s a bit of a detour for the NHS plus also a celebration of English children’s literature, featuring mostly white characters. Oh, and of course some Elgar, with Rowan Atkinson playing the massively popular Mr Bean. Who is also white.

    Finally leading into the cultural revolution/ internet revolution, and a modern British “mixed race” family.

    So basically, as the time line of the piece continued, there were more people of different races on stage. I suspect that were one to count, one would find quite a large amount of white people in total.

  • mister k
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:03

    This isn’t really the thread for it, but frequently on previous podcasts you have both made big of the Guardian’s often unfortunate commentary pieces (and unfortunate may be too small a word here), and not really focused on the excellent quality of journalism the rest of the paper really does represent. But I think thats a conversation for a future rum doings.

  • Bex Bellingham
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:06

    Great piece. I don’t like or read the Mail. For the record, nor do I like or read the Guardian. I wish I had stuck to that stance and hadn’t read that astonishingly hateful piece yesterday. That even the Mail saw the need to tone it down speaks volumes.

    Look. If anyone feels that a particular ethnic group or social class was underrepresented in the ceremony, fine. Make that point, as you are perfectly entitled to do. But try for a balanced review, ok? If you see no problem with the description of Olympic nations as “banana republics”, the assertion that black men are not good enough for any “educated” white woman or the idea that a free health service (Great Ormomd Street in particular, for goodness sake) should not be celebrated, I really do fear for you. That level of bitterness and disengagement from reality can only lead to serious mental health problems, leaving you in need of assistance from educated, commited individuals of all creeds and colours in the NHS. I do hope you enjoy the irony when you get there.

  • ghost whistler
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:11

    I like this article.

    I hate the Daily Mail.

    That it’s so popular is really depressing. People like Melanie Phillips and Kelvin McKenzie are CONSTANTLY on the tv/radio talking bollocks, and unchallenged too!

  • Dave
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:14

    They’ve taken it down…..!

  • Nick Mailer
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:17

    To those defending The Guardian: it recently published an article actively supporting fascism, the abolition of the free press, and the dismantling of the independent judiciary. Just take a look at some of the horrific antisemites on Comment is Free any day of the week, and you’ll realise it is now just the flip coin of the Mail. Just like the Mail, it sometimes writes good things by good people (the Mail championed Doreen Laurence, for example), but their overwhelming effect is corrosive and nasty.

  • mister k
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:20

    Forgive me, but I find a “little bit” of fascist turd in an otherwise lovely glass of orange juice still prevents my recommending a swig.

  • Paulo
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:28

    I completely agree with everything in this brilliant article but would like to add one caveat. The idea of the NHS as uniquely British, and something we should all wave our flags about is a myth, a national self-delusion. As we know, many other countries have universal healthcare, many of them funded by taxes. Some of those systems are older than ours and some of them are better.

    Btw, I broadly define myself as “left” and love the principle of a welfare state and universal healthcare- I’m just pointing out that it’s odd that people see it as a focal point for patriotism.

  • Andy
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:29

    Nick Mailer – a very disingenuous argument. Take a look at any comments section of any national paper (even local papers – in fact, especially local papers) and you will draw the same conclusions. Not sure why you single out the Guardian as opposed to e.g. the Telegraph, Indy etc etc. Fundamentally though the Daily Mail is one of the worst things about this nation. Paul Dacre is a bitter evil man, and we will be a whole lot better when that nasty spiteful little paper and its bigoted morally redundant boss bugger off.

  • YMC
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:44

    There are even more bones to pick with this article actually.

    “A whole 15 minutes at the top of the proceedings before viewers dozed off to the procession of banana republics and far-flung destinations nobody has heard of or even cares about.”

    Not only is it overly-racist, especially in its original iteration, it encompasses everything the Daily Mail reader is supposed to hate – the NHS, black people and foreigners. Just beautiful, isn’t it?

    Even though I am not from the UK and haven’t been to Britain in years I can’t help myself but be disgusted that not only a media exists that publishes such articles, but it’s more than a hundred years old. Absolutely revolting.

  • Chris Jones
    July 29th, 2012 on 16:59

    John Walker . Unfortunately you yourself show your own form of bigotry as well with this line;

    “This was supposed to be a representation of modern life in England”

    ….err…i think the idea was to represent the island of Britain – you know, that island that has other countries on it like Wales and Scotland…dear me…maybe you ignorantly believe that ‘England’ is the same as Britain? – come now, it really isnt that difficult to get your head round surely

    As it happens, the ceremony sadly failed to represent any of the Celtic culture of Britain (Wales,Scotland,Cornwall) – these were London/Englands ceremony really – nothing wrong with that but they shouldnt have tried to pretend that it repreented the whole of Britain

  • Mephis Topheles
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:01

    Dear god, who gives a damn, if you don’t like the Mail, don’t buy it! Aren’t we supposed to have freedom of expression in this country? You have your opinion, everybody else has theirs. I suggest you get out more into the real world .

  • Jamie Kitson
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:13

    I wonder if anyone at the Mail was watching the GP podium today. Nice to see Hamilton’s parent celebrating his win.

  • LeRustysherriff
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:19

    I don’t think that you can get enough words of support for this article.
    Well done also for being quick enough to get screen shots before they backtracked. I take it that I can assume from this that they do this on a relatively regular basis?

  • gemma brockis
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:28

    To those who dismiss this article as lefty nonsense:

    When i was small, i remember hearing criticism of people who insisted that ‘nigger’ or ‘wog’ was offensive as just such lefty nonsense. And the equivalent is also true for women’s rights.

    Being ‘liberal’ or ‘politically correct’ in this way is just not something that people get to dismiss as nonsense of any sort. When i was tiny, i didn’t know nigger was offensive. But i had to listen to people tell me it was. We have to be ready to listen.

    The daily mail first coined the word ‘suffragette’ . It was intended as a term of abuse (note the diminuative ‘ette’). Women asking for the vote and men supporting them were seen as overly liberal and pointlessly knocking the status quo and changing what they saw as Britain. Then when women got the vote, the argument for vote at the same age as men had criticism again – do we have to keep listening to these lefty self-righteous irritants? – and then arguments for same rates of pay – now they are getting pointlessly quibbly. But these people weren’t overly liberal, they were just right.

    Now, the mail might have sometimes some good writers, or the guardian bad ones, but this article in the mail is clearly racist and it is right that someone says so.

    We should not dismiss liberalism as partisan.

  • Jacqueline Phillip
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:29

    I am a middle aged white woman currently doing my PHD in Educational Pyschology who is happily married to an English born man of Jamacian parents for 18 years. We have two boys and a grandchild. Incidentally we also live in Barh. Look no further! Oh and we have many friends in similar circumstances.

  • Malise
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:45

    You know something – until I read that article, I hadn’t even twigged to the fact that the family was mixed race!

    Thank God the Daily Mail is there to ensure I do know and to tell me how incensed about it I should be…even if it was in the midst of a completely unrelated and pointless pile of nonsense

    Idiots :-p

  • Matt
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:52

    Brilliant. Wonderfully analytical and well put together arguments. I’ll save up this link for next time someone says ‘But what’s so wrong with the daily mail anyway?’ and also as a great piece of evidence for how powerful media manipulate popular opinion generally. Great to have some intelligent journalism out there. Will be going through older posts in the the coming days I’m sure. Thanks!

  • MrP
    July 29th, 2012 on 17:54

    Just thought I would say – the DM has completely pulled the entire article.

  • Mary Billington
    July 29th, 2012 on 18:04

    This says it’s racist to say there are not many middle class mixed race families but it isn’t racist to say there are many middle class mixed race families. Ludicrous.

    It’s thirst to find racism in the words of people who may just have a different opinion to the author on a matter of fact is, in its own way, racist and is damaging to racial tolerance.

    You are really saying that we cannot discuss how we represent our multi-ethnic society.

  • Amy
    July 29th, 2012 on 18:19

    They appear to have completely removed that article now, unless I’m mistaken.

  • Rab
    July 29th, 2012 on 18:28

    Interesting that the ‘top rated’ comment on this Telegraph article http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/london-2012/9433039/London-2012-Opening-Ceremony-first-review.html is:

    “John
    1 day ago
    What was really disappointing was how they decided to represent the modern family… a white woman and a black man with mixed children? I guess they forgot that the country is 92% white

    (Edited by a moderator)”

    followed by the reply:
    “Well naturally, the world power structure hates the white family unit so they denigrate it any chance they get.”

    Which gets the second highest ‘best rating’!

    and those comments are mild compared to the usual racist, xenophobic comments found on the Telegraph website.

    This is a tweet from the editor of the Telegraph:
    Tony Gallagher ‏@gallaghereditor
    @AidanBurleyMP is quite the tool. Any sign of a craven apology? Or do we pass go and head for de-selection straight away?

    Perhaps he should read the comments made on his newspapers articles by his own readers.

  • Kevin Walsh
    July 29th, 2012 on 18:42

    ‘The Grauniads near fascistic support of anything left’ – take it that would include Nick Clegg and his bunch in the 2010 election?

  • Vicky
    July 29th, 2012 on 18:51

    @ Nick Mailer

    Can you post a link to that article?

    I don’t approve of everything the Guardian prints, but I haven’t noticed any anti-Semitism in the paper itself.

    When you say “Comment is Free” are you referring to the journalists who write in that section or the commenters below the line? Because in an age where articles go viral on Twitter at the drop of a hat, internet comments are no longer representative of a paper’s views or readership (especially since the Times paywall diverted many of their readers to the Guardian website).

    Or is this one of those “any criticism of the Israeli government or army is inherently anti-Semitic” things?

  • Jonathan
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:19

    Would you mind awfully if I reposted this on my blog? with proper and clear credits of course.

    Jonathan

  • Adam
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:29

    The Mail needs to die. It’s a massive shame that newspapers like The Independent and The Guardian have the lowest readership in the UK, whilst the tabloids are so popular. I don’t think people realize just how dangerous The Daily Fail actually is, and – like you said – we need to be calling it out. Sigh. Anyway, thanks for the article.

  • Carl
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:40

    Its not a buyout that’s needed (as much as I like the idea) its a boycott!!!!
    Articles of this nature continue to be published because we, as a nation, continue to consume them.
    Let’s say to no to racism, ignorance and manipulation

  • Mac
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:41

    The crow-barring in of non-white faces was sickening. It’s pathetic how Britain stoops to these levels.

    Representation is fine, but this constant insertion of ethnicity is pathetic.

    We should not ignore or pretend that black and asian people live and thrive and contribute greatly to Britain.

    HOWEVER

    Nor should we be constantly smashed in the face with scenes that simply are not representative of British life unless you live in one of a handful of urban areas. That is not the way to engender tolerance and inclusion.

  • James
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:52

    Thank you for throwing light on this horrendous, dangerous, bigoted crap. You’re right, we shouldn’t ignore it. I grew up in a middle class, suburban, mixed race family in Scotland in the 1960’s. I’d have hoped that almost half a century on I wouldn’t have to read shite like this. But then my life is a nightmare for the DM, which pleases me on a daily basis.

  • James
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:53

    The Daily Mail is the voice of the indigenous Briton. Respect that.

  • Jennie Kermode
    July 29th, 2012 on 19:58

    The story about the NHS patient dying because he was denied a glass of water is true, and the case has been the subject of formal complaints, but it’s important to note that it involved a patient with an existing sodium imbalance disorder. This means that he was unusually vulnerable to dehydration. It would not, therefore, be reasonable to assume on the basis of this case that the average NHS inpatient is vulnerable to being left to die of dehydration.

  • Matthew Smith
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:22

    From Rob: To the person who said an African opening ceremony would not have featured a white character: it was notable that the Kenyan flag was carried by a white person, and the teams from a number of predominantly black African and Caribbean nations were also multiracial.

    I saw white faces in the Zimbabwean team as well.

  • jemima101
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:22

    Articles like this deserve, and need to be pushed under the noses of everyone who says the fascism of the mail has no effect. The pure nastiness, racism and bigotry infect our society and make things like the current growth in disabled hate crime happen. Thank you for writing it.

  • Jim Johnston
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:35

    This has to be the best parody site I’ve ever read. My cap is doffed to the author(s). Thank goodness nobody in real life is this po-faced, imagine the living hell that would be.

  • Molly
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:46

    Thanks for writing this. I happen to be an educated middle aged woman married to an educated black man living in a happy family in a very diverse middle class community and this is why I love living in Britain. The multiculturalism we have here is very special and something to be proud of.

  • RandyH
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:47

    I watched the the opening olympic ceremoneys along with the billion others, anticipating a fantastic show and it was. I did however d find the love story and its represintation of modern Britan unusaully sad. It screamed, look at us politicly correct Brits and our ever going new moden family. One again as here in America, The poster girl was a white women and of course black man. The moden symbols of interracial love and multicultual harmony. The story continues with thier biracial daughter finding love with another boy. The truly sad part of this is not the fact that once again as it seems in real life were its white women/black man relationship. The sad part is they could have used a boy of another race. This would have aleast shown that interracial love is not just for the white women or light skined and black man. Maybe, if they used a white boy insted. We all could have felt better about the new modern family knowing that interracial love is full circle.
    Of course that might have made white men feel better about the covetest world we live in. It might have made white men feel better about the fact that white women by the millions and millions are spurning him because he isnt black and cant give her black biracial babies. It might have told the world that white men are not total loosers just because the symbol of peace, multiculture and love has to be a white women with a black man. What a wonderful way to shame and emberess white men all over the world, Using the Olypics as your stage.

  • Steve Arnold
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:48

    Well done for saying this. And well done for saying this so clearly, angrily and fairly.

    And I guess appealing to the PCC will be next to useless, but perhaps Paul McGlade’s suggestion to complain to the advertisers would be better.

    Oh, and I’m a lefty Guardian-reading sandal-wearing hypocrite, but I don’t agree with everything I read in the Guardian. And I’m incredibly cynical about the Olypmics but I loved the imagination and generosity in the opening ceremony.

  • Peter Harding
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:51

    Great piece – the Mail is just the epitome of all that’s rotten in the media. It’s attitudes are little short of despicable.

  • Cheryl Thomas
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:52

    where all de white women at?!?! I think it was Mr. Boyle’s ode to slavery :)

  • uncle yadda
    July 29th, 2012 on 20:54

    I read the Daily Mail yesterday. I got on the wrong train and was extended my journey time by 5 hours. I was ashamed but couldn’t help myself as it was the only newspaper on sale. I think it’s affected my mind as now don’t I like Dizzy Rascal. What a terrible day.

  • Annabel
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:03

    Wow. Just shocking – how this stuff gets published in a civilised country appalls me. Disgusting!
    And as an abuttal: “it is likely to be a challenge for the organisers to find an educated white middle-aged mother and black father living together with a happy family in such a set-up” Erm, try pretty much any street in the country! I live in rural Cheshire & there’s no shortage. (Also, why is the white woman assumed to be educated?)

    “Almost, if not every, shot in the next sequence included an ethnic minority performer” Yes; Kenneth Branagh, J.K. Rowling, Sir Tim Berners-Lee, Rowan Atkinson – the whole ceremony was shockingly multi-cultural! How appalling that Danny Boyle failed to only include white performers from the 1000’s of volunteers who offered to take part.

    And Dizzee Rascal? Ach, don’t get me started. I’ll admit, it’s possible my parents aren’t big fans, but I love Dizzee & I’m about as far away from their stereotypical black urban youth as they could(n’t) imagine.

    The Daily Mail should come with a warning attached: “warning, may cause barely containable anger, disgust & disheartening”

  • Vanilla Rose
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:15

    Yes, there was a case of a patient who died because of lack of water. It was in the news recently. He had various health problems which led to (a) his seeming aggressive as a result of brain damage and (b) his body having a lot of problems retaining any water. Unfortunately, hospital staff thought he was just being bolshy when he was desperate for water … the moral is never assume. I suppose that is not one of the “Mail”‘s mottos …

  • Emmy
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:27

    Marcus – the Dutch healthcare system is an insurance based system. And having extensive experience of both the Dutch system and the NHS, the latter is miles better.

  • Brian McNulty
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:35

    In the 30s, the Daily Mail infamously carried a front-page article headlined “Hurrah For The Blackshirts!”.

    Not that there’s no need to shoot this rag down at every opportunity.

    Just saying like.

  • Jim Brady
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:44

    Thank you for so eloquently articulating my anger at that article. And for highlighting their Orwellian manipulation of their own (5 mins ago!) history.
    I could just about manage a “why I ought-ta…!!! and only the feelings of blood vessels popping in my face forced me to calm down.
    Of course, thank the stars we have an NHS for me to go to, should the blood pressure get the better of me ;-)
    JB

  • John Walker
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:46

    @Chris Jones – Sorry to spoil your little froth, but I didn’t write that line. That was in a quote from the Mail article. In fact, from the most offensive quote in the article, that my piece was mostly about.

  • Martin
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:47

    OK, disregarding everything else can we please stop referring to Dizzee Rascals’ ‘Bonkers’ as grime music! I am pretty sure all the “black youths” out there would be highly offended to be associated with such bland, non creative music. Lazy, lazy journalism.

  • Greg Neate
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:56

    When it was being reported, I’d wondered about the death that’s referred to and have been prompted to find out more reporting on what happened.

    From what I could find, this report from the Mail before the verdict that gives a better understanding of the issues involved.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2171024/Kane-Gorny-Patient-died-thirst-hospital-denied-medication-doctors-did-know-there.html

    The likelihood is that water was being deliberately withheld and in that part the nurses were doing their job. What likely also made this such a tragic death was poor communication and a pressure for doctors to deal with issues of getting people treated and out of A&E, which is also described in… the Mail!

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2172642/Kane-Gorny-Coroner-blames-incompetence-NHS-staff-patient-dies-dehydration.html

    I worked as a liaison psychiatrist at St George’s Hospital in 2005 and can well imagine people’s attention being distracted from the in-patient wards. Although it’s not referred to, I suspect that part of his care would have occurred over the weekend when there would have been further lack of continuity in care.

    As well as the casual racism already described here, damning the whole of the NHS for following instructions for not giving someone water is a gross generalisation that is typical of the Mail. Ironically, it could have been clarified by carefully reading back over old reporting in… the Mail!

  • kate flood
    July 29th, 2012 on 21:58

    The Daily Mail opposed the founding of the NHS from the very beginning

  • Duncan
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:10

    @Nick mailer: yes, it’s usually good practice to link to at least on article if your going to accuse someone of posting similarly nasty articles, otherwise some may think you’re just making it up.

  • Ghoul
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:12

    Mac and RandyH, the pair of you can fuck off. You’re as bad as the Daily Mail’s article, if not worse.

    Thank you for writing this article, good sir. The Mail will eventually be downed by our numbers and morals.

  • Fiyenyaa
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:31

    Wow, a fair amount of people who seem to be supportive of the mails absolute and utter bilge seem to have crept out of their respective holes.

    James: “The Daily Mail is the voice of the indigenous Briton. Respect that.”
    – I am an “indigenous Briton” (3 English Grandparents, 1 Scottish if you must know). The Mail doesn’t speak for me, or indeed anyone who’s political opinion I remotely respect, “indigenous” or otherwise. I fear you are confusing “indigenous” with your own personal opinions.
    Let’s also ignore quite how stupid and arbitrary a distinction “indigenous” is, considering the malleability of culture and the complete meaninglessness of race.

    Mephis Topheles: “Dear god, who gives a damn, if you don’t like the Mail, don’t buy it! Aren’t we supposed to have freedom of expression in this country? You have your opinion, everybody else has theirs. I suggest you get out more into the real world .”
    – We do have freedom express out opinion. Didn’t you just read the opinion of one man, expressed here in words? Perhaps you realise that this post of yours is so amazingly hypocritical that anyone should really have recognised that it couldn’t possibly be taken seriously.

    Mac: “The crow-barring in of non-white faces was sickening. It’s pathetic how Britain stoops to these levels.

    Representation is fine, but this constant insertion of ethnicity is pathetic.”
    – Translation; “ethnic minorities are all well and good, as long as I don’t have to see them too often”. Am I close to the money here?
    How is it “crow-barring” to have people of various ethnicities in the show? Is it really so jarring to you to see a few darker faces that you are moved to comment about it? Honestly, someone who has a problem with the inclusion of non-white people in this show does indeed have a problem.

  • Hywel
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:33

    @Porty – I hope you noticed that even Zimbabwe, which is now almost synonymous with anti-white racism, had an olympic team comprising a number of white people. And there are fewer white people now in Zimbabwe than there are black people in the UK. Go figure, multiculturalism.

    Not all African people are black, you know. I’m African… and I’m white.

    I presume that Guardian readers will all instantly now think I’m inherently a racist and part of a terrible colonial past. Well, it’s true that my ancestors had a few dodgy members of the family, but “I ain’t my Grandad”. I also remember the UK sycophantism about ‘Saint’ Robert Mugabe when he came to power in Zimbabwe in 1980 – shame he turned out to be a bastard, isn’t it? But down here we all knew that from the start, just like we knew Ian Smith was a bastard too.

  • JulesLt
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:41

    ‘Mail will not be published’ – if only!

    The problem a lot of idiots have in comparing private health care and education is that by definition the private stuff has to be better than the universal tax-funded stuff or no one would pay for it. The NHS sets a floor.

    (and indeed already pays lots of private contractors to do a bad job. Because as we all know from dealing with shops, banks, telephone and power companies, the private sector is just as capable of bad service, despite the threat of competition. Because the competition is usually on price not quality).

  • Tim
    July 29th, 2012 on 22:50

    Well said. The only surprise is that we are still surprised by the actions and words of this Tory rag of a paper that I wouldn’t replace my toilet paper with

  • Dave Bell
    July 29th, 2012 on 23:21

    As a resident of rural England, I suppose I should point out that there are several non-white families in the village, with children in the village school. Is that a commonplace of modern England? I can’t really tell, I can only live in one place at a time, but the only other village I lived in, that was the same.

    Anyway, go back far enough, and we all have ancestors from Africa. We can still listen to different music.

  • Emma Maha
    July 30th, 2012 on 01:15

    Try not to get too excited, but I found one of these happy, middle-class, mixed-race households of myth and legend

    I’m living in it.

    (Do i get a nobel prize for finding such an oddity..?)

  • ADB
    July 30th, 2012 on 06:39

    LOL! What a liberal luvvie outrage fest this is! All competing to outdo each other in your expressions of “tolerance” – except of course, when you threaten to assault Daily Mail readers and call for opinions you don’t like to be silenced.

    BTW, to the commenter who wrote how the Daily Mail only wanted to report on black rapists: they wouldn’t have far to look. Blacks are 12% of London’s population, committing 54% of street crimes. I’m sure they are similarly over-represented in rape stats. Truth hurts, don’t it?

  • Vinny
    July 30th, 2012 on 06:55

    Oh waaaaaa…they are right. And they just succumbed to the same politically correct bullshit that they pointed out.

  • Ed
    July 30th, 2012 on 07:38

    Like a commenter above, I didn’t even notice the couple were mixed race until I was directed to this article. However, I did slightly balk at the sight of a black industrialist at the begininng of the ceremony. God, if only there had been a few black inustrialists. Black people were central to the industrial revolution. Unfortunately not in the way depicted. The overwhelmingly colonial aspect to Britain’s history was written out of the picture

  • John Walker
    July 30th, 2012 on 08:19

    I want to say, I’m aware of the vile racist crap that a very small minority are posting in the comments. But I think it’s revealing and important to see how willing people are to out themselves as bigots, and just how utterly stupid their arguments are. I’ve not removed or edited any comments, other than duplicates. I suggest not getting offended by their idiocy, but instead seeing it as inspiration to better educate people.

  • kingfelix
    July 30th, 2012 on 08:34

    This stuff is really a waste of time. Meta meta meta.

    If you want to use your analytic powers, apply them to something worthwhile.

    Your ‘please understand what they do’ rationale is just a waste of time. This really is like documenting a bear shitting in the woods.

  • Emma
    July 30th, 2012 on 08:42

    I love the comment about the DM being the voice of the “indigenous” population. Which one is that? As I am currently doing a Phd in Applied Linguistics, I am writing an essay on the great vowel shift, in which- due to constant influxes of different nations, our pronunciation of vowels changed. This happened in early English-think Chaucer- We come from Denmark, Germany, France, Spain, Middle East, Morocco. In 1066, some of the most important people who re-established themelves in Britain were from the Ottoman empire. I would love to DNA test DM readers and discover they all hail from the middle east or even worse, Africa! It is absolutely hilarious! Oh and I am a sephardic jew, engaged to an African American. I bet you love us DM readers.

  • Mac
    July 30th, 2012 on 09:19

    @Fiyenyaa

    “Translation; “ethnic minorities are all well and good, as long as I don’t have to see them too often”. Am I close to the money here?”

    No, you’re not. My issue is with cramming in people who are not representative of the vast, vast, vast majority of Britain. It’s leftist tokenism at its worst and is not going to help with the right and noble aim of making race less of an issue in this country.

    It’s also profoundly insulting and patronising to ethnic minorities. Do you really feel that they enjoy being used as sticks to beat the nation with?

    @Ghoul – Well done for being insulting and aggressive; you are clearly a great mind.

  • Andy Rake
    July 30th, 2012 on 10:41

    Actually i agree with the Mail, im not racist by any means but the opening ceremony made white people look like the minority. It started early on too, the opening sequence had a black boy and white boy fishing, then went to middle England cricket 200yrs ago and had a black man bowling, then when it went into the stadium they had a black engineer standing by the side of Brunel. Im sorry, but black people were slaves then and not engineers. As the ceremony rolled on, it was nothing but Asian and black people, asians and black kids on the hospital beds, a white mum married to a black man, close ups of Asian people. It was way over the top.
    As a white person whos is English born and bred, i found myself to be an ethnic minority in my own country. This whole ‘multi-cultural’ faff only applies to London, the minute you get out into the Cotswolds, Devon, Cornwall, up north in the Lake District, in fact pretty much 99% of Britain outside of London you barely see a black person unless its in war torn places like Bradford.
    Made me sick, was typical ‘look at us, we all get on’ cr*p and promoted more by the BBC which loves nothing more than hiring ethnic minorities to read the news.
    As i say, im not racist, but there comes a point when its promoted world-wide.

  • John Walker
    July 30th, 2012 on 10:46

    Hi Andy. I’m sorry to tell you that you *are* racist. It will probably help process things if you accept this.

  • Joe Soap
    July 30th, 2012 on 10:52

    Re: The Daily Mail – the public gets what the public wants. The fact that so many people are idiots should come as no surprise to anyone who has actually read their way to the bottom of this article.

    Re: The mixed family. I am one parent of an educated mixed-race couple living in London, I’m all about the melting pot and love the potential this country has to show the world how the future’s going to work…however, oh there had to be a however, I did find this aspect of the show a little forced. But not so much as I’d set off ranting about how unrealistic it was. It was a stage show / musical number after all, and a damn fine one at that !

    Re: The NHS dance number… so, if I’ve got it right this bloke invented chimneys, the smoke of which made all the kids hallucinate until Mary Poppins showed up and invented rock ‘n’roll and taught us all how to party. Is this shizz on the National Curriculum. I certainly hope so.
    Hard to tell if the celebration of the NHS will just help Cameron sell it off to his mates or wake up the nation to the fact they must defend, cherish and preserve this wonderful and unique cornerstone of British life… or if it’ll merely serve as a beacon to anyone in foreign climes who was already considering coming to our soggy little overcrowded islands. Time will tell.

  • James
    July 30th, 2012 on 11:06

    Pretty hilarious comments section. As always fascism must be vocally opposed lest the events of the mid-20th century sweep Europe once again. The idiots suggesting otherwise have already forgotten what it says on war memorials.
    The appearance of non-whites being taken as automatically bad is shocking in this day and age. We live in a majority-white nation and had the olympic opening been representative of the nation it would have had a greater majority of white faces in, true. But the olympics aren’t about representing the average of the nation, they are about getting people from all nations to come together in the spirit of shared endeavour. I’m afraid the “‘we all get on’ crap” is exactly what the games is about.
    It’s the whole bloody point.
    Since when was grime about being black? It’s about being poor. Not the musicians fault if the old remnants of institutional racism push certain sectors of society toward ghettoisation, is it?

  • DerAdvocate
    July 30th, 2012 on 11:18

    @Fiyenyaa

    “Let’s also ignore quite how stupid and arbitrary a distinction “indigenous” is, considering the malleability of culture and the complete meaninglessness of race”

    A different context (Australian point of view). Were you to say that to indigenous Australians, you would be castigated as a rampaging racist. No doubt references to your Empire and the result of British colonialism would be thrown in for good measure. I’d suggest you be careful bandying about the ‘stupidity of distinctions’ when they in fact do have meaning. And they’d be right to fire off back at you.

    My other half is of indigenous descent and being born in NZ I was classified as an octaroon. Mum’s European, Dad a Pacific Islander. Yup, I am on the cusp of an end of that era where colour and origin mattered. Reading your comment, I was struck at how ignorant it really was to see your knee jerk response. I see nothing wrong with a person of Scottish descent to be proud of that. Likewise an English person. Rich in history you lot are. Show a bit of backbone and say it with me. ‘I am British, and bloody awesome’. No one will think you BNP or a Daily Mail reader.

  • Richard
    July 30th, 2012 on 11:36

    Thanks you for sharing this. I find myself struggling to read anti Daily Mail rants nearly as much as Daily Mail articles themselves. Why? Because the anger and sadness it conjures up in me. However, in the same breath I find articles like this reassuring. They let me know that there are plenty of people in Britain who don’t share the Daily Mail’s racist extreme right wing views.

    Everything the Daily Mail has slated about the opening ceremony I see as a reason to celebrate. It’s a big old diverse world out there – let us celebrate that and more importantly, live and let live. We’d all be happier and better off for it.

  • ADB
    July 30th, 2012 on 11:46

    “Hi Andy. I’m sorry to tell you that you *are* racist.”

    Dear oh dear. John Walker is so behind the curve that he actually thinks that calling people “racist” (even when the poster referred to didn’t say anything racist at all) is enough to make people suddenly renounce their opinions. That trick doesn’t work anymore, John. It’s been done to death and has lost all potency.

    Look John, it’s not actually racist to object to being marginalised and presented as a minority in your own country, in a ceremony beamed to a world-wide audience. It’s also not racist to object to multicultural Britain being presented as something wonderful, when it is becoming painfully obvious to anyone outside of BBC-land that mass Third World immigration is actually a disaster. It’s also not racist to object to Britain being portrayed as a nation of immigrants throughout history, when – prior to New Labour’s insane immigration policies – the population has been overwhelmingly racially homogenous.

    But you keep name-calling, John, from your liberal ivory tower. Problem for you is, liberals yelling “racist” all the time now in fact has the opposite effect to that intended.

  • Sally
    July 30th, 2012 on 12:21

    Hi, I am a white middle class woman and I watched the ceremony with my husband of 9 years who is black British and my mixed race daughter who is 6. They family featured reflected very well our family make up and did not seem odd or manipulated. My daughter was mesmerised by the whole event and was thrilled to announce that the leading lady looked “just like me, even her hair mummy”. Isn’t it great that she can grow up in a country where role models and inspirational figures reflect the whole of society. The only disappointing factor is that many people are seeing it as unusual or contrived. Move on guys, let’s live in the present and enjoy it – we’ll done Danny!

  • ADB
    July 30th, 2012 on 12:34

    Sooo many liberal canards on here, it’s hard to know where to start.

    1. There is no such thing as indigenous British/ we are a nation of immigrants.

    Rubbish. The British people trace their origins back to the Northern and Western European tribes who arrived 14000 years ago. Since then, Saxons, Normans, Huguenots and Jews have arrived, but in very small numbers and over a very long period of time. These immigrants/ invaders amounted to no more than 1% of the total population at any one time, and were largely Northern Europeans of similar genetic stock. The distinct ethnicity of the British peoples has been established for thousands of years, Britain is our homeland and we have a right to keep it in our own image, no matter what social engineering mass immigrationists say.

    2. Race is meaningless.

    On no it isn’t. Certain racial groups are statistically proven to commit more violent crime, and to be similarly over-represented in welfare dependency. Certain racial groups have also been unable to create anything like a functioning Western-style civilisation in their homelands, meaning they cannot help sustain Britain as a First World country once here. Race matters. Basically, if you import enough Pakistanis or Africans into your country, your country becomes like Africa and Pakistan.

    3. Multicultural Britain will be a wonderful rainbow land.

    No it won’t. Historically, multi-racial (and often multi-ethnic) countries have been prone to conflict and strife, and have only been held together by authoritarian regimes. Because of the sheer scale of mass immigration, and differential breeding rates between different racial groups, whites are set to become a minority in the UK by about 2065. Many of the new majority will be Muslim, and history also shows that in countries with large Muslims populations, non-Muslims tend to suffer oppression. The future of multicultural Britain is one of conflict and Balkanization.

    Sorry to burst your liberal bubble, but some of his like to deal in facts rather than wishful thinking.

  • John S
    July 30th, 2012 on 13:07

    Last year saw the end of the NOTW. Perhaps we shall live to see the end of the DM too. I hope so.

    One of my major gripes about this “news”paper and its website is why is it so often the top link on Google News for stories? Very very worrying, as I fear those in other countries will believe it is therefore the “best” at reportage.

  • Terry Trumpets
    July 30th, 2012 on 13:25

    Q. When is incitement of racial hatred not a criminal offence?
    A. When it’s printed in the Daily Mail.

  • jc
    July 30th, 2012 on 14:00

    ADB – “Certain racial groups are statistically proven to commit more violent crime, and to be similarly over-represented in welfare dependency.”

    now is that caused by them being that racial group? or is it more to do with religion, culture and poverty? the answer here isn’t racial minorities are criminals, it’s we need to help those in need with education. and don’t claim i’m racist for saying some racial minorities are stupid and uneducated, frankly where i come from all the low life criminals are lazy white people

  • Andy
    July 30th, 2012 on 14:07

    @ADB: no, but it is racist to blame multiculturism for your woes rather than your own laziness, inepititude etc.

  • max
    July 30th, 2012 on 14:48

    Hello, I live in South London I’m not a racist but even I have noticed quite clearly the amount of white women young and old that are with a black or mixed race man. I work nights so I see many folk out and about and its very very obvious, easily 8 out of 10 women you see.

    This does make me wonder to be honest, what London may look like in 100yrs or so. Its also a bit intimidating actually, as a white young man I feel somewhat left out or unwanted almost, girls only seems to be interested in black guys!

    I just wanna know what’s happening here :(

  • Chris
    July 30th, 2012 on 15:18

    I live in leicester which is multicultural, so I am used to mixed races living in an area together. This to me is fine. However when I leave leicester I do notice almost everywhere is almost all white people, the exceptions seem to be birmingham, leicester and london. So to me I see 2 problems, the first is people refusing to accept multi race exists in the country as it does do, however the other problem is the likes of the bbc go too far and try to forcefully portray it over the top, even in leicester I do not see many mixed race families. Just a mixture of different race people living in one area.

  • Fiyenyaa
    July 30th, 2012 on 15:19

    @Mac; I can’t see the inclusion of a number of non-white faces as anything other than representative of the people who volunteered. I expect most of the people who volunteered to be in the opening ceremony were from the local area (i.e. Greater London).
    Or perhaps I’m wrong, and there were press-gangs out there, grabbing every person who was tanned enough to suit their nefarious ends?

    @DerAdvocate; You’re right to say that there’d be people who wouldn’t agree with me. I still don’t think that holding race to be anything other than cosmetic is a good idea though.
    I’m also not proud of what people who happen to be part of my distant ancestry did, particularly. I regularly read all sorts of things historical, and it honestly makes no difference to me if some great leap forward was made 10 miles away from where I love or 5,000 miles. I’d rather be proud of my own achievements, or that of my friends and loved ones. Why should I hold onto some kind of ethnic/national totem?
    Now, I should be clear – I don’t begrudge people celebrating their heritage, but I won’t I don’t think I’ll accept any criticism for not celebrating mine without a better reason.

    @ADB; Let’s ignore points 2 and 3, and stick with 1.
    Firstly, it’s ridiculous for you to say that waves of settlers to the UK represented “no more than 1%” of the population at a given time and give us no source for this information. Could you please give us some kind of a credible resource you’ve used?
    Secondly, what about those of us indigenous peoples (like me) who couldn’t give a hoot if we changed? Are our opinions not important or something?

  • Evert
    July 30th, 2012 on 15:58

    The Anglo-Saxon 1% did terribly well to push the Brythonic 99% to the fringe and to Brittany and totally surplant the indigenous language and culture (the occasional yan tan tethering notwithstanding).

  • Tom
    July 30th, 2012 on 15:59

    ADB:

    1. The 1% figure is an interesting one and I too would like to see some evidence to back that up. Let’s not forget several other facts while we’re here though. The Olympics is being held in London and London’s figure for non whites is rather higher than 1% these days. Also, wouldn’t some of those 1% have procreated with some of the 99% and thus spread a bit of multicultural love around while they were at it?
    Finally, why do we have a right to “keep Britain in our own image”? Because we arrived here 14,000 years ago? So we got lucky in finding a place where we could grow stuff effectively and are not unduly affected by natural disasters. It’s a combination that’s served our empire well and enabled us to rape and pillage all over the world and return with our winnings but I don’t think that slice of luck 14,000 years ago entitles us to tell everyone else to f’ off back to somewhere less fortunate. Love thy neighbour and all that.

    2. “Certain racial groups are statistically proven” – you’re missing the cause and effect relationship here. Just because more street crime is committed by black people does not mean that black people are genetically more predisposed to violence. The relationship is between poverty and crime, not race. It just so happens that most of the black people in this country are amongst the poorer residents. Why? Maybe because many of them migrated here only 75 or so years ago with absolutely nothing to their name. Oh and by the way, let’s not forget that as a nation we invited them.

    3. The most multi cultural states in the world today are the European and American states. Bust economies aside they’re all amongst the most successful on almost every measurement.

  • JUO
    July 30th, 2012 on 16:35

    It really is awful to read the thinking behind some of the mindsets currently held by some sections of the country…

    As a resident of Newham, I can vouch for the fact that so many multicultural children were seen in the ceremony because local primary schools were a large part of the ceremony. It would have been difficult for head teachers to conduct Auschwitz-style selections and only include white children. According to some on here that would not have been selective enough; DNA swabbing of the whites would have rooted out any Eastern europeans posing as ‘British’.

    The 2001 and 2011 census’ clearly allay any worries that the vast majority of Britain is anything but white. There is no takeover coming.

    Many feel that the ceremony did not adequately portray Britain as a white-majority nation, but it was London that won the games and so surely it’s expected that a major part of the story would be London’s rise as one of the major capital cities in the world, a large part of which is due to its ports having connections (some shameful and some to be celebrted) with places all over the world.

    Furthermore…when we watch drama/performance we suspend our disbelief. This means that a scene showing a black man fishing in the Thames circa 1600 is exempt from comments like ‘but blacks were slaves then’…it is a REPRESENTATION only. Even if the man fishing were white, that wouldn’t make him a Jacobean fisherman, it would still just be a representation.

    Unless one is watching a biopic, the race of the actors/performers ought not to cause such disgusted, angry confusion.

    Brunel was represented by a white man in order to avoid such reactions. Some of the metaphorical industrialists were played by black actors because none of these characters are ‘real’. A story is being told.

    I cannot think how dodgy eugenics about blacks being more likely to commit crime can be taken seriously without also mentioning that those living in poverty of any race are most likely to commit crime. The links between poverty and crime have been proven, the links between race and crime have not.

    Enjoy the Olympics everyone!

  • Jez Humble
    July 30th, 2012 on 16:49

    @Andy (and ADB) “This whole ‘multi-cultural’ faff only applies to London”. What, London as in the Olympic host city? If you actually lived in London you wouldn’t have noticed anything unusual at all. When you host the Godalming Olympics, by all means feel free to have an all-white cast.

  • Joe Casey
    July 30th, 2012 on 16:59

    I believe that Great Britain, and her Royal Navy, were instrumental in the decline and eventual fall of the slave trade in Europe following its outlaw in the UK on 25 March 1807. No doubt slavery paid an unsavoury contribution to labours in emerging industry of the preceding fifty odd years but thereafter any who came to this country with slaves found them free immediately upon arrival (and this at a time when the average man – let a lone a woman, catholic or jew – were not permitted to vote for their respective member of parliament). This decision appears to be guided by a moral imperative but perhaps not.

    The show is selling London and the UK to the world and as country hopefully will promote economic growth. Some of the people in the rest of the world aren’t white so maybe it was sensible for us portray a happier more optimistic side of UK. As it would ideally be; ethnicity: irrelevant; no racists. On the whole people in the UK – even people like my wife and I who live in an areas that is 99.5% white – are NOT massive racists; The UK has its fair share of racists of course (some perhaps like Andy who are racist enough to write racist comments on the internet but not to admit being so) but perhaps it is sensible when we blow millions of £ on marketing our country we choose a nice cosmopolitan looking bunch from local volunteers rather than marketing directly at racists. We have enough racists here already without deliberately targeting scum abroad to come holidaying in the UK!

  • tambougmans
    July 30th, 2012 on 20:32

    @ADB 1. Regardless of the accuracy of your claims, the Britain your talking about is already history. Commiserations. If you believe in the rights of peoples to their ancestral homelands, you’ll be longing for the blissfully homogeneous country that would result when all the ethnic brits return from former colonies and forfeit their resources?

    2. Would you like to see the social and economic equality between races that would dissolve this statistical link? Of course not, you’d continue to exclude groups as far as possible on the grounds that they’ve failed to be white, as your second point shows. Don’t complain about ethnic minorities not participating in British society when you like it that way.

    3. Just a touch ironic that, via a little racist literature and a little imagination, you arrive at a view of yourself as part of an oppressed ethnic minority. Fight the power.

  • Johnny Foreigner
    July 30th, 2012 on 20:35

    @ADG

    Response to 1) Britain may have initially been homogenous for many thousands of years but indeed this is now changing. Speaking for other non-white British people, Britain has become our homeland too. Do you imply that the right to keep Britain in your image means it should remain completely white? Is Britain less so our homeland because we are not indigenous white? Are we any less British because we simultaneously uphold the cultural values of our ancestry as well of that of this country in which we reside? Even if some of us bring a disproportionate amount of our ancestry to the table, why would this be a problem if this is not imposed on the indigenous population? We are atleast now becoming a nation of immigrants even if we weren’t before. We aren’t going anywhere, and we are happy to move forward, you can join the rest of us or get left behind.

    On a separate note, and this targets other people that have commented: The opening ceremony was a theatrical representation of British culture, forgive me but I don’t think I saw a celebration of African or Indian culture but again, British culture. Now with this in mind it would appear that the only issue is then is that a disproportionate amount of the ‘wrong’ ethnicities were cast in this representation. This could be explained by the ‘non white’ ethnic groups that make up the population of London which apparently is around 30%. If more than 30% of the cast in the ceremony wasn’t white then this begs to be scrutinised. Anybody fancy doing a proper head count?

    If indeed there were more than 30% non-white participants in the opening ceremony then it now becomes apparent that some kind of crazy conspiracy liberal agenda exists which has been perpetrated by the media and Olympic organisers in which they have deliberately warped the numbers of non-whites to be more inclusive. The question is why would they do this? What exactly is the liberal agenda? Why cater to us non-whites?

    Response to 2) If certain ethnicities are more predisposed to crime and welfare dependency, then what do you propose to be the solution? What are you implying? That subsequently all members of these races should thus not be allowed to reside in Britain? That these ethnicities, that do indeed play a part in popular British culture, should no longer be allowed to be represented at the opening ceremony? Such sweeping generalisations are incredibly dangerous. Race isn’t meaningless, true. But in the context of this opening ceremony, I’m pretty sure it should be. I personally feel that a theatrical performance is no less credible when a woman plays what is historically meant to be a man, or a black man plays a cricketer that is historically meant to be a white man.

    Furthermore, you present much of this paragraph as if it is to be assumed fact when it is a clearly a series of opinions fuelled by your contempt for certain races. It’s undeniable that first generation immigrants do bring their cultural tendencies with them and may make pockets of society reflect the country they had come from, but your baseless claim that somehow this translates into the whole of our country resultantly looking like Africa and Pakistan is difficult to comprehend and is almost laughable. Let me guess, we’ll all be living under Shariah law too. In addition your belief that certain ethnicities are incapable of sustaining Britain because they initially originate from a dysfunctional country is also baseless, are you a troll?

    Response to 3) You may be correct that history dictates that multicultural societies don’t hold together so well, but I’m pretty sure we’re doing fine right now as a society under a non-authoritarian regime, thanks. But your baseless statement that due to a supposedly large Muslim population, non-Muslims will suffer oppression makes no sense. At what threshold would this occur? Even if the white man becomes a minority, I’m not entirely sure how this implies that the Muslim population would suddenly become the majority and then proceed to take over the country and oppress everyone through what I assume is forcing everyone to adopt Islamic values. I’m not sure where you conjure these ideas up but if you’ve got numbers and evidence to support it I may begin to agree.

    What I can’t understand is the inherit fear of change and the worry of becoming a minority in your own country, if this was actually going to happen then so be it, why do you appear to feel personally threatened? We UK born non-whites have been a minority in this country our entire lives, it really isn’t so bad, and most people are accepting you know.

    I hate to burst your bubble, but you sir are guilty of fear mongering, and undoubtedly, full of fear.

  • Gareth
    July 30th, 2012 on 21:50

    I like to think that my political views are formed from what is “best” and “correct” rather than what is “left” or “right”. To this end I always try to approach a problem as objectively as possible, focusing only on the greater good and casting aside any personal bias.

    Both extremes of the political spectrum have some valid points in their own ways and I often end up with opinions that contain elements from both sides. However, as I was reminded while reading the above article, both sides also talk a lot of tripe at times.

    So, “multicultural crap”. Mr Walker concludes from this statement that Aidan Burley thinks that multiculturism itself is crap and that he is therefore a racist bigot. There are so many problems with this conclusion and the way in which it is made and reacted to that I’m not sure where to begin.

    Firstly Mr Walker, as has already been said further up the page everyone is entitled to an opinion. The fact that you disagree with it doesn’t automatically make it wrong: you don’t possess some Divine right on opinions or anything.

    Secondly, “lefties” really need to cut down on the use of “racist bigot”: you’re using it everywhere. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before someone is called a “racist bigot” for being late with a library book or something. Using the phrase every time someone says something that you disagree with like this is going to blunt its significance until no meaning remains, much like when the boy cried wolf once too many.

    Lastly, the quote itself. Is Aidan really saying that multiculturism itself is a load of crap or is he saying that the multiculturism as exhibited during the opening ceremony is a load of crap? You were more than happy to assume the former without first seeking clarification, but the latter is more than a possibility – especially as this is what he claimed to have meant. Yes he could be lying, but he could also be telling the truth.

    The clip at the centre of all this featured a family of mixed race and under the circumstances I think was supposed to be representative of an average British family. Since by definition ethnic minorities are a minority in the UK (at least until around 2070 when at the current rate of change whites are predicted to become the minority (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/8142176/White-Britons-to-become-minority-by-2066.html)), a simple law of averages states that most families in the UK must be white. Given that most families must be white then surely a scene that is supposed to be representative of a British family that is of mixed race must be forced (unless there were no suitable white volunteers for the role, which on balance I think is an unlikely scenario) and as such could legitimately be deemed an attempt to be “politically correct” in that it aims to be inclusive above and beyond reality. In conclusion, such an approach could be deemed “crap” as a term used to describe something that is untrue.

    On the subject of the family’s happiness – or in this case the implausibility of such a family setup being happy – well of course that’s ridiculous and very stupid thing to say. I can’t say that I would have continued to read his article beyond that point if it had been me because I would have made the automatic decision that Rick was an idiot and nothing that he had to say would be of any worth to me. Even so, he’s entitled to his opinion because that’s the society that we live in – largely in thanks to you, the “lefties”. I’m not sure I would have automatically come to the conclusion that his opinion must be a racist one though, because although racism is a possible reason for such a stupid comment it is only one of several.

    Personally I think the other nations that make up the UK were under-represented in the ceremony. It’s Team GB, not Team England, and although London is the host city Hampden Park in Scotland and the Millennium Stadium in Wales are involved too. Where was their representation? Where was their inclusion? Were the organisers so concerned with making sure that minorities didn’t feel left out that they forgot about these countries?

    If you’re going to be inclusive then be inclusive and do it right: failing to do it right just makes it look like you have an agenda or are simply ticking boxes.

  • Moz
    July 30th, 2012 on 22:16

    I wouldn’t wipe my arse on The Daily Mail……

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    July 30th, 2012 on 22:33

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  • Tom (iow)
    July 30th, 2012 on 23:40

    It’s not just the odious original article, but the way they have covered it up, like a thieving employee falsifying the till records to disguise the £10 that’s missing.

    Some people will undoubtedly want to complain about that article, which will have been seen in hard copy by thousands of people. If we grant the (dubious) concession that the PCC investigates complaints, the online article will be a critical part of the evidence when that complaint is adjudicated on.

    If the newspapers are truly claiming they are subject to a serious system of self-regulation, that is not a complete sham, this kind of ninja editing to destroy or distort evidence should be viewed as equivalent to perverting the course of justice.

  • Christoph
    July 31st, 2012 on 00:25

    Another happily married mixed race couple here… i didnt know i was stupid until the article told me!

  • Joel
    July 31st, 2012 on 02:05

    There were some comments above about there being upper-class black people in the industrial era and that colonial pieces were written out. Of course they were! You wouldn’t leave in the bad bits, would you? Boyle used art to rectify the past, he removed the racism of the industrial era and made it obvious. He made the statement that colonialism wasn’t a part of history Britain looks back on fondly, otherwise it would have been included. He is saying the very things you are saying – just through the medium of ‘Opening Ceremony’.

  • JD
    July 31st, 2012 on 04:26

    Interesting article. I just feel people are taking the whole opening ceremony too literally. James Bond isn’t real and the Queen doesn’t often go sky diving, so to get so hung up on what colour peoples faces were at any particular point in the ceremony is probably the wrong way to look at it. You’d be hard pushed to work out why they chose to do a lot of things they did.

    Having said that, I suspect the reason the Daily Mail pulled the article is because they forgot to mention “benefit cheats” in it. How could they live with the shame in the Daily Mail office after that.

  • max
    July 31st, 2012 on 04:34

    I’m reading what people are saying here and I agree but at the same time I really think many of you need to actually live in London to experience what its really like.

    It does have an effect on you, to walk down the street and hear nothing but foreign languages and see very few white folk…accept for Eastern European white folk.

    Many schools in South London and East London are almost fully black now, fully Asian, only schools on the outskirts are mainly white. I had an Australian girl friend who came over to teach and was gobsmacked that the school she taught in was 100% black including the staff.

    I realise survey’s say otherwise but it sure doesn’t seem like it when you live here believe me.

    I don’t wish to sound racist even though I know it probably does sound it, I’m just trying to be honest here and say what’s on my chest. These are merely my observations from living in South London the last 12yrs, its changed a lot in that short time.

  • ADB
    July 31st, 2012 on 06:58

    To all those arguing that Black crime is due to poverty, think again. By dint of being the (for now) ovrewhelming majority of the population, there are more poor whites in the UK than poor blacks. Yet blacks commit more violent crime. It’s the same in the US: Blacks are 12% of the US population, but commit 40% of all rapes. They are also seven times more likely to commit homicide than a white person. Google “Color of Crime Report” for more details.

    JUO: “The 2001 and 2011 census’ clearly allay any worries that the vast majority of Britain is anything but white. There is no takeover coming.”

    Wrong. Due to differential birth-rathes between racial groups, whites are set to become a minority in the UK in fifty years’ time. That’s not multi-culturalism, that’s colonisation.

    TOM: “The most multi cultural states in the world today are the European and American states. Bust economies aside they’re all amongst the most successful on almost every measurement.”

    That’s because those countries have so far been predominantly white. If/when the demographcs changes, these countries will no longer be successful.

    “Finally, why do we have a right to “keep Britain in our own image”?”

    Because no-one is suggesting the Chinese become a minority in China, or that the Indians import immigrants until India changes beyond all recognition for Indians. This is a duty or “honour” accorded only to white, Western countries. As for the whole “atoning for past sins” thing, would you seriously sell out your grand-childrens’ birth-right because of things done before they were born and over which they had no say? Man, your loathing for your own kind is truly pitiful.

    FLYENYAA: “Secondly, what about those of us indigenous peoples (like me) who couldn’t give a hoot if we changed? Are our opinions not important or something?”

    Because those changes will be negative and drastic. Let’s have a look at what mass, unselective Third World immigration has done for Britain so far:

    Introduced Islamic Law (Sharia courts already operate in Britain – the thin end of the wedge).

    Honour killings.

    FGM.

    Increased levels of violent crime.

    The oveloading of a welfare system by people who have not and will not be able to sustain that system.

    Increased social unrest (as in the London riots, in which Blacks were significantly over-represented).

    Increased electoral fraud (and car insurance fraud, too – the spike in this activity just happens to have occurred in areas with large Muslim populations).

    The loss of free speech and other liberties due to political correctness. I refer you to the shrill rantings of John Walker.

    An increased risk of terrorism, often from “home-grown” Islamist terrorists.

    And it will only get worse, as the Third World element of Britain’s population grows.

    Re-read my earlier Point 3 – Britain is on course to devolve into an impoverished, strife-torn, violent, Islamicised dump. Your opinion matters as much as anyone else’s, and I am sure you mean well, but you are seriously misguided if you think the future of multi-cultural Britain is rosy.

  • BusyRaT
    July 31st, 2012 on 07:25

    Can we please stop hearing about what things are ‘racist’? Let’s just talk about things without this life- and career-destroying word threatening us and shutting down free speech.

  • notjarvis (@notjarvis)
    July 31st, 2012 on 07:37

    max.

    The London you describe does tie up with the facts to an extent.
    It’s similar in places I have lived, there are majority asian schools literally just down the road from me.

    Why is this necessarily a bad thing though? We are a country that has always been about immigrants, and many cultures joining all down it’s history. Our royal family is genetically German and Greek for christ’s sake.

    Our Education secretary promotes the choice of parents to choose a school which matches their culture (I disagree I think more mixing of cultures at a young age can only be good). He is widely praised by the right in general – but the right often criticises majority black schools.

  • Kate Rixson
    July 31st, 2012 on 08:35

    I know this will probably get slammed for being “lefty multicultural crap” by all the ignorents here, but are we still in a place where it’s “them and us”?
    Ethnic minorities this, black people that… To quote shakespeare, if you cut us, do we not bleed?
    Though there are different races and their traditions and values, at the heart of it, we’re all people. We’re all the same. Stop pretending that your faux-educated white ass is any better than anyone else’s.

  • Becca
    July 31st, 2012 on 09:08

    What a spectacularly well-written article. It’s easy to descend into hysteria when facing such hideousness, but you have remained level-headed.

    Oh, and I’ll join the club – I can also name several happy, “educated”, mixed-race families, even in my rural, Tory-voting area.

  • Matthew
    July 31st, 2012 on 09:41

    I find it funny how many people in these comments are peculiarly troubled by the innacuracies of a mixed race cast representing those periods in history where black people were the underclass. Are you people under some misguided impression that the opening ceremony was supposed to be a history lesson? Should any or you be labouring under this absurd misunderstanding I feel it ought to be pointed out that the ceremony was art, entertainment, and a celebration. Excluding non-white Britons from a celebration of British history on the grounds of accuracy seems pretty crass. And as a celebration, of course it is not going to dwell on such ugly parts of our history as slavery and imperialist occupation. At your birthday celebrations, is it appropriate to dwell on dark, shameful moments in your own past, or do your family and friends choose to celebrate you for your good points and your you-ness?
    When an artist / director creates a work they are telling the story or making the statement they want to communicate. If the audience fails to receive that message then it is either the artists poor communication or the audience bringing all their baggage to the show. In this instance I watched a ceremony that was utterly British but also used those parts of british culture that had permeated to the rest of the world and so stood a good chance of being recognised by a very broad audience. I saw a celebration of Britain and Britishness and the great things we have created and brought to the world. The openning act was a master stroke simultaneously showing the ugliness of the industrial revolution whilst also celebrating where it has brought us; it seemed to successfully show both it’s awfulness and wonder simultaneously. No small feat.
    The ceremony was about Britain as it was and as it is. It was performed by a cast of Britons. In my opinion it was wonderful and a great spectacle for the world. Before this I was not very aware of Danny Boyle but now hold him in high regard for what he has achieved here. I dread to think what you naysayers would have done differently.

  • Frank
    July 31st, 2012 on 09:51

    Sir, there are many things to hate about the Daily Mail but none if it is as offensive as your use of white text on a black background.

  • Plot Tracer
    July 31st, 2012 on 10:41

    Excellent article. With the Murdoch method on the ropes, the bigots of the Mail should be exposed. All of their most disgusting articles should be deconstructed and analysed in this way online. In the age of the www, scales are falling from some peoples eyes. If people don’t call these bigots to account, in no time we will have a fascism so insidious and dressed up, people will not realise they are voting in those who will suppress them and have them living in fear. In 1932 Hitler seemed reasonable to a cowed population who took the racist option out of austerity.

  • Evert
    July 31st, 2012 on 10:52

    “The loss of free speech and other liberties due to political correctness. I refer you to the shrill rantings of John Walker. ”

    Oh for gods’ sake, how have John’s “shrill rantings” deprived you of free speech or any other liberty?

  • Christopher Tulloch
    July 31st, 2012 on 10:54

    A question no one has thought to ask is, was it meant to be representational of the population as a whole or of the make up of Team GB competitors. I don’t hear many people complaining when all us darkies win you racists medals in the games oh no we are all one nation then aren’t we! Seriously have a think about what percentage of black and mixed race people are competing in the games and the tell them they don’t deserve representation in the Olympic ceremony. Oh hey @ADB heres a idea for you how about for 2016 all us immigrants who dare darken your tv screen with our faces don’t compete for GB. Lets see how well you purely aryan indigenous olymipic team do then yeah………..Racist!

  • Jka
    July 31st, 2012 on 10:56

    Oh lord god, let’s just leave it: it only encourages the mail and this backlash is why they do it. Just ignore the racists until they die out.

  • Andy Rake
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:03

    @ ADB. Thank you very much for pointing out what i was saying in my post.

    @ John Walker. Sorry mate, that stuff doesnt wash with me anymore, what? you think calling me racist is going to have me scurrying back into my hole, all scared that the Internet Police geeks are going to come and get me? i would seriously like to see that seeing as i grew up with links to the mafia. Yes, im afraid so its true, in the big scheme of life some people just dont buy into this ‘feel frightened’ life we like to create in Britain. I grew up watching my uncles sort people out, i saw them covered in blood, i saw guns, i saw some nasty things. Thankfully, i never went down that route, but if you think ‘name calling’ gives you power, then go right ahead mate. Some people just arent bothered.

    Also, just because i have opinion doesnt mean im wrong. As my opinion to me is always right. I saw my grandad live with one kidney after getting shot at Dunkirk, and that was for freedom of speech, so the younger generation didnt have to live under oppressive rule, which is pretty much what you are doing when you throw labels about like ‘racist’, trying to pigeon-hole me because it makes you feel better.

    The fact is, the opening ceremony wasnt reflective of Britain, why should i change what i know to be right ie: we are mainly white, white domination of the world is why we are here today and where we are today, we cant just re-write history because a few liberals like yourself think it might upset a few blacks or asians. Look back at any invading force, the Vikings, the Romans, the Conquistadors, all white. Sure, if Danny Boyle got his hand on the re-make im sure it would be filled with Dizzie Rascal as Christopher Columbus and Snoop Dog as Queen Elizabeth 1st but you know, it just wasnt like that. Sorry.

    Why should i put my heritage down just because it might offend someome? i dont go to a foreign country and expect them to change their history just because it might upset me, you deal with it.

    My point was about balance, it wasnt about wether blacks should have been in or asians, of course they should, as i say im not against anyone, but the balance has to be right and in the opening ceremony it wasnt, and that was my point. Why do we feel in this country we have to sweep under the carpet anything that white people have done and promote this ‘multi-racial’ society? yes we may get along, yes there may be blacks and asians in this country, but they are still a minority and make up a total of less than 10% of the entire population, but according to the opening ceremony they are the 90%. The balance wasnt right.

    The BBC is no different, take the childrens show ‘Balamorey” its one road, in a remote Scottish fishing village. In that village there is an asian, a black person a gay person and 1 white person. Now, im all for children learning about life, but have you ever been to a remote Scottish fishing village? i have, its strangely enough, full of red-haired old Scottish blokes with gravelly faces who will happily sell you a box of Langoustines for a tenner. And guess what, not a f*cking black, asian or batty-boi in sight. I know, shocking!! call the ‘Multi-Cultural Police” its a crime! Or maybe its just real life.

    The trouble with people like you John, is you try and re-write history. According to people like you we didnt solve the Enigma code in WW2, it was in fact, Lenny Henrys great-great grandad, and he wasnt even English, he was African, with a big bone through his nose, married to an Indian goddess who live in the Taj Mahal.
    Or of course, we can believe the real story, that it was a little white man from Berkshire.
    Now, John, scurry along and go liberal bash someone who gives a sh*t. And next time, as my good old uncle used to say, dont start a f8cking war you cant finish.

  • Harry
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:25

    “I grew up watching my uncles sort people out, i saw them covered in blood, i saw guns, i saw some nasty things. Thankfully, i never went down that route, but if you think ‘name calling’ gives you power, then go right ahead mate. Some people just arent bothered.”

    “Now, John, scurry along and go liberal bash someone who gives a sh*t. And next time, as my good old uncle used to say, dont start a f8cking war you cant finish.”

    Ahahahaha. Watch out guys, we’ve got an internet badass on our hands! We better not mess with him by arguing with his idiotic opinions!

  • fhnuzoag
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:27

    Btw here’s a study that is not done by a white supremacist hate group:

    http://rds.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs09/horr19c.pdf

    “The analysis does not indicate any significant influence on trajectories associated with ethnicity or religious affiliation, after controlling for other factors included in the models. As noted earlier, some analyses of the OCJS (e.g. Sharp and Budd, 2005) have pointed to the evidence that levels of offending and drug use were lower for young people of non-White ethnic identities and those with religious affiliation. Our findings suggest this pattern is attributable to other characteristics of these sample members.”

  • Dr Brian Robinson
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:37

    Absolutely brilliant, devastating analysis, John Walker. (I haven’t read — and am not going to read any of the comments, no time.) I think I’ll print this out and have it laminated. Thank you.

  • JUO
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:45

    @ADB – without wanting to appear facetious, I have to ask where you are getting your statistics, particularly the ones on crime. Aligning crime with race is so dangerous as by your thinking, statistics in England and Wales would unfortunately show that it is a majority of white citizens who sexually abuse their children. I would never say that this somehow means deviant sexual appetites are inherent to white people. Each case has got to be viewed individually.
    If it makes you happier the majority of the victims of violent crime in London are also black, and so if we just let them get on with it…
    Remember our political landscape, we have had Muslims in the country for over 50 years now and yet it is generally since 9/11 that populist ideas about Sharia law and takeovers have become popular. We suffered terribly as a country on 7/7, but we’ve been through worse during the troubles. Many postulated about what life would be like as the violence escalated with the IRA, but thanks to rational thinking and diplomacy, relations between UK/N.Ireland gradually calmed. It took time, but it did happen.
    No one will deny the upsurge in radicalised Islam in isolated areas of the country, but I believe time and diplomacy will once again return calm to the country.
    You speak as though you are a patriot and yet you don’t appear to have any faith in this great country of ours.
    As a patriot I’m sure you’re well-versed in how England has led the world in many fantastic endeavours and how we have helped and supported other nations consistently throughout our history.
    We are a world superpower and our best leaders past and present haven’t adopted your fearful stance. Can they all have been wrong, whilst you hold the real way forward?…
    You’re scared and your fear makes you suspect people want to take over your country and make you pray five times a day and listen to gangsta rap on repeat. It’s not happening, now or ever. It has never happened in the modern age to any developed country (bar Russia in 1917 and it was Russians taking over Russia then…)
    Stop being scared, have some faith, have a drink and get ready for the multi-cultural athletics!

  • Mark B
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:54

    Andy Rake frothed: “The BBC is no different, take the childrens show ‘Balamorey” its one road, in a remote Scottish fishing village. In that village there is an asian, a black person a gay person and 1 white person. Now, im all for children learning about life, but have you ever been to a remote Scottish fishing village? i have, its strangely enough, full of red-haired old Scottish blokes with gravelly faces who will happily sell you a box of Langoustines for a tenner. And guess what, not a f*cking black, asian or batty-boi in sight. I know, shocking!! call the ‘Multi-Cultural Police” its a crime! Or maybe its just real life.”

    Balamory is actually truer to life than your skewed depiction of ginger fishmongers. My sister lives in Tobermory, on which Balamory is based on. Her son is half-Tunisian. He has classmates of Chinese, Indian and Black African descent. I’m not certain about the sexual orientation of the entire town, but surely among a population of over 1000 there has to be one gay person?

    (Also, the pedant in me would like to point out that Balamory has more than 1 white person in it… and since when is “gay” a racial distinction?)

  • ADB
    July 31st, 2012 on 13:05

    JUO: The UK crime stats are from a Telegraph article citing official figures. The US stats are from the “Color of Crime Report”, drawn from official US Gov’t figures.

    Regrading paedophilia crimes, I think the recent spate of Muslim child-grooming of WWC girls has kind of put to rest the myth that mainly whites sexually abuse children, and suggests strongly that any stats supporting this are the result of under-reporting from closed ethnic communities. Not that I am saying that whites do not commit crime – many do, meaning we’ve got enough of our own crims before we import many more from the Third World.

    BTW, the fact that the Muslim child-grooming was ignored for years by the authorities because it would “harm community relations”, is a symptom of the sort of sickening politically correct censorship we see endorsed by this blog. If an opinion doesn’t fit the politically correct narrative, it’s “racist” – never mind that it’s actually based on facts.

    As for “It has never happened in the modern age to any developed country..”, are you trying to say no modern country has been invaded? Populations haven’t been driven out of their homelands? If so, brush up on your history. What is new, though, is a country being totally sold out by a suicidal liberal political class, to the point where the existence of the people, country and culture is placed at risk. That is indeed unprecedented.

    Finally, it’s not about fear. It’s about taking on liberal dogma head-on, and calling it for what it is: utter cr@p. Multi-culturalism is totally against human nature, and as such will end in tears. It will eventually be resolved. My fear is that, unless liberal elites start listening, it will be done via civil conflict, rather than political means.

  • Tom (iow)
    July 31st, 2012 on 13:30

    It’s not just the odious original article, but the way they have changed it so insidiously.

    Some people will undoubtedly want to complain about that article, which will have been seen in hard copy by thousands of people. If we grant the (dubious) concession that the PCC investigates complaints, the online article will be a critical part of the evidence when that complaint is adjudicated on.

    If the newspapers are truly claiming they are subject to a reak, serious system of self-regulation, this kind of ninja editing to destroy or distort evidence should be viewed as equivalent to perverting the course of justice.

  • Fiyenyaa
    July 31st, 2012 on 15:18

    @ADB – firstly, you haven’t even attempted to address your “historical settlers to the UK were less than 1% of the total population” stat. I wonder if that could be because it’s a load of old nonsense?
    Anyway, you’re right to say that different races have different levels of representation in various different categories. So I’m a student nurse, just started. I wonder if you would notice, as I have, that Asian people and black people are over-represented in the healthcare industry? Now, what does this tell us? Does it mean that white people are horrible selfish people who don’t want to contribute to the well-being of society? I think not. So how about you look at these interesting statistics with an eye to actually investigating the reasons why they happen, instead of jerking your knee so hard that I imagine your desk is in need of some serious repairs.
    @Andy Rake – “any invading force”? Let’s think of a few more to flesh out your examples, shall we?
    The Mongols. The Arabs. The Zulu. The Aztecs.
    All white, huh? I suggest you get an understand of history that doesn’t come directly from Mein Kampf, buddy.

  • Wing Co. Bob
    July 31st, 2012 on 15:25

    @AndyRake, re: Fear and Racism.

    He called you a racist as your comments paint you as such. Given your anonymity online, it doesn’t really matter whether he calls you that or not, but its interesting as it quite succinctly tags your output here. Fear doesn’t quite work in the way you’ve pointed out, I’ve been on the business end of a sidearm before and was pretty sure I was going to buy the farm, but it was the most peaceful and aware I’ve been in my life… the first time I abseiled though I could feel the fear then. Not sure he was using name calling in any other way than labelling your comments TBH.

    Re: Opinions. They’re like arseholes… Your grandfather got shot at Dunkirk, because like most others of people here, he was born here instead of in Germany.

    Re: Opening ceremony. It was representative of the people that gave their time free to dance in the show. Dizzee was their because he comes from Bow and represents the Grime scene which is essentially a British phenom.

    Re: Invading forces: Vikings (Norse…White) Romans (Not White) Conquistadors (Spaniards…White-ish) Moors (Not-White) Ottomans (Not-White) Mongolians (Not-White) Egyptians (Not-White).

    Re: Changing your history: No one is asking you to, just be aware that there we’re less than 50 million people in a world of 6 billion that were lucky for a 600 year stretch. The Khem-ists were on the top of the pile for 6000 years and they bought the farm… we won’t have even gotten to their stage.

    Re: Balance. The balance was to whoever would have the time to turn up and perform. The family was multi-cultural to show how our colonial past worked. We went out and stole things but gave in other ways, with our system of education and law actually still working in our old colonies like Australia/India/West Indies etc. The people in those places felt British enough to fight for us during the WWII, with India alone raising 2.5 million men to fight in the war.

    Re: BBC. Nice to see that you met everyone in the village and got them to sign forms to outline their sexual persuasion for you.

    Re:John. Turing broke the code… but according to your ideas he was a “Batty boy” so either he shouldn’t have done or it must have been some odd form of revisionist history.

    Also: YOU’RE A TROLL, I claim my £2.50.

  • Evert
    July 31st, 2012 on 15:35

    •
    ADB
    July 31st, 2012 on 06:58
    “Wrong. Due to differential birth-rathes between racial groups, whites are set to become a minority in the UK in fifty years’ time. That’s not multi-culturalism, that’s colonisation.”
    To you have any genuine stats for this (as in links to the actual statistics, not vague recollections of the paper that you saw it in)? I am interest because what you say sounds very similar to the hoary old conspiracy theory about “Eurabia” handily debunked years ago on More or Less:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/more_or_less/8189480.stm
    “That’s because those countries have so far been predominantly white. If/when the demographcs changes, these countries will no longer be successful. “
    Oh please, that is rather blatant special pleading.
    America has had mass immigration for ages. Back in the 19th century we had racists, no-nothings, and assorted nativists warning Americans of the danger of mass-Catholic and Jewish immigration and how they weren’t WASP enough, and they would drastically change the demography and the culture (for the worse). Now we are told they are not WAS enough.
    “ Let’s have a look at what mass, unselective Third World immigration has done for Britain so far:
    Introduced Islamic Law (Sharia courts already operate in Britain – the thin end of the wedge).
    Honour killings.
    FGM.
    Increased levels of violent crime.
    The oveloading of a welfare system by people who have not and will not be able to sustain that system.”
    Honour killings, FGM and other things are totally abominable and more should be done. I’ll agree. I’m not much of a fan of multi-culturalism (largely defined as allowing the ghettoisation of immigrants without demanding much in the way of integrating and assimilation) – I’m more of a melting pot kinda guy.
    Sharia, as far as I know, is only allowed as part of arbitration. Where any set of mutually agreed terms can be made legally binding (again AFAIK). This is obviously open to abuse, but it is not an insurmountable problem. We are not at risk of incorporating Sharia any time soon as a successor to common law.
    Violent crime is falling. Not sure if that is because of immigration, but it certainly hasn’t been rising.
    http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/publications/science-research-statistics/research-statistics/crime-research/hosb1011/hosb1011?view=Binary
    “Increased social unrest (as in the London riots, in which Blacks were significantly over-represented).”
    Proof and by what metric?
    The riots occurred in areas where blacks make a significant proportion of the population. Where I lived (Manchester), rioters were mainly white. But that is accepting granularity, and will never do.
    “The loss of free speech and other liberties due to political correctness. I refer you to the shrill rantings of John Walker. “
    I asked about this before, but it bears repeating. How has John made you loose you free speech or liberty? He is allowing you to post on his blog. If he wanted he could delete your comments (or not allow them through moderation in the first place).
    •
    Andy Rake
    July 31st, 2012 on 11:03
    “@ John Walker. Sorry mate, that stuff doesnt wash with me anymore, what? you think calling me racist is going to have me scurrying back into my hole, all scared that the Internet Police geeks are going to come and get me?”
    No, you simply claimed your not racist, and he disagreed and said you were.
    It is rather amazing that racists rarely have the courage of their convictions and get all prissy when called out on their racism.
    “ i would seriously like to see that seeing as i grew up with links to the mafia. Yes, im afraid so its true, in the big scheme of life some people just dont buy into this ‘feel frightened’ life we like to create in Britain. I grew up watching my uncles sort people out, i saw them covered in blood, i saw guns, i saw some nasty things. “
    There is only one thing to say to this:
    HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa HaHa

    “Also, just because i have opinion doesnt mean im wrong. As my opinion to me is always right.”
    Genius!
    “I saw my grandad live with one kidney after getting shot at Dunkirk, and that was for freedom of speech, so the younger generation didnt have to live under oppressive rule, which is pretty much what you are doing when you throw labels about like ‘racist’, trying to pigeon-hole me because it makes you feel better”
    No. He is calling you racist because you say racist things. Don’t overthink this.
    •
    ADB
    July 31st, 2012 on 13:05
    “JUO: The UK crime stats are from a Telegraph article citing official figures. The US stats are from the “Color of Crime Report”, drawn from official US Gov’t figures.”
    Citation doesn’t work that way.
    “Regrading paedophilia crimes, I think the recent spate of Muslim child-grooming of WWC girls has kind of put to rest the myth that mainly whites sexually abuse children, and suggests strongly that any stats supporting this are the result of under-reporting from closed ethnic communities.”
    Data does not work that way. A few contrary data points do not overturn a trend.
    Now, I’m not saying there are problems here. There are, but the best way to solve isn’t by racialising the discussion.

  • Evert
    July 31st, 2012 on 15:41

    Oh dear, something weird happened to my formatting.

    “take the childrens show ‘Balamorey” its one road, in a remote Scottish fishing village. In that village there is an asian, a black person a gay person and 1 white person. Now, im all for children learning about life, but have you ever been to a remote Scottish fishing village? i have, its strangely enough, full of red-haired old Scottish blokes with gravelly faces who will happily sell you a box of Langoustines for a tenner.”

    And there is not a single professor who lives in a pink house!

  • JUO
    July 31st, 2012 on 16:16

    @ADB – I don’t want us to fight. You’ve read your stats and ‘facts’ and interpreted them in a way that supports what you inherently believe; in many ways I’ve done the same and just come out with a very different view. This obviously calls into question whether what we’re looking at are indeed infallible facts, as if they were infallible surely we’d come to the same conclusion….
    I stand by my point about modern developed countries not being invaded and taken over (look at the G8 and G20) When Hitlet tried it aggressively half a century ago, the other developed nations wouldn’t let him. I still really don’t think you have anything to worry about.
    I wonder if the dangers you see in multi-culturalism are from (a) races mixing, or from (b)all the practices of all cultures being valued and upheld. If you’re coming from point (b) then that is a completely different debate we should be having and one where we may agree on a number of points. If you’re coming from point (a) then science will tell you that through races mixing, hundreds of inherited debilitating diseases and disorders are actually weakened. Think cystis fibrosis (in whites) or sickle cell (in blacks) it’s called heterozygous advantage.
    Anyway I hope you don’t spend too many of your days angry and worried about the onset of civil war in Britain. We should meet back on here in fifty years and see the lay of the land.

  • John Walker
    July 31st, 2012 on 16:31

    Andy, sweety. I wasn’t calling you names. I was just pointing out that you are a racist, when you mistakenly thought you weren’t. I wasn’t saying, “And therefore I hate you.” Nor, “And therefore you don’t have a right to have an opinion.” I was merely pointing out that the comments you make, and the way you express yourself, are those that a racist would employ.

    My recognising your racism doesn’t affect you in the catastrophic ways you appear to think. I just think you would have an easier time processing the world and the reactions around you if you took this on board. If you don’t like the label, then you can re-think saying things like “I felt like an ethnic minority in my own country”. “My own”, you see – that’s the racist bit right there. You do that sort of thing quite a lot in your two comments.

    Also, if you want to be taken seriously, it’s perhaps best not to tell me that I attribute the solving of the Enigma code to people related to the only other black person you could think of. I haven’t done that, have I? I’ve written a piece criticising the racism in the Daily Mail. It’s kind of weird that – as someone who is determined he isn’t racist – you’re arguing quite so hard in its defence.

  • Dave
    July 31st, 2012 on 16:32

    Hi there Andy. I’m so impressed to hear about your families links with organised crime, it really makes me respect you more as a person. At the same time, good on you for resisting the urge to follow their example by turning into a violent gun-wielding psychopath – clearly this must have taken a huge effort on your part. Also, thank you for posting such a long and detailed description of how much you aren’t bothered by people calling you a racist. I can’t think of a better example of how not bothered you are than almost 700 words on just how not-bothered you obviously are. Aren’t. Whichever it is.

    Of course you are quite right, nobody’s opinion is wrong which obviously means everyone’s opinion is right. Always. Even when flying in the face of all reason – because it’s an *opinion*, so it must be valid! Especially since your granddad was a soldier injured in the war, which obviously gives your opinion so much more *weight* doesn’t it. I can’t think of anyone else whose granddad got injured or killed in the great conflicts of the 20th century fighting for our freedoms, so naturally this is another great reason to be respectful of the opinion of you, someone was so remotely involved in these events. Naturally this tenuous link means you are therefore exempt from any and all criticism that you ever face in your life. Good on you Andy!

    How clever of you to notice that Britain is predominantly full of white people, while the opening ceremony had so many people who weren’t. How very dare they! OK so London itself is made up of 30% non-white people, and the density of non-white people increases as you get closer to the poorer inner-city areas where these non-white people seem to live, and the ceremony was in fact held in one of these inner city areas, but so what? They could have at least given the all those non-white people suitable roles as slaves or something couldn’t they? I’m sure the Olympic representatives from all those countries in Africa and Asia wouldn’t have minded at all, because it’s *historical* you see. Surely no-one can object to history, can they? And everyone knows there were no free or even educated non-white people in pre-industrial Britain. Christ, I *hate* it when people sweep facts under the carpet to suit their own agenda! Good job you’re not like that, eh Andy?

    And what’s the deal with Balamorey? I mean, isn’t it obvious that teaching kids about diversity and freeing them from the prejudices of the older generations is so much less important than accurately depicting life in a remote, Scottish, FICTIONAL fishing village? Obviously the BBC needs to get its priorities straight! Good job we’ve got the right idea though, eh Andy?

    The trouble with people not-like us Andy, is that they don’t *understand* us do they Andy? We wouldn’t try to rewrite history by implying the little white man from Berkshire was anything but a fine upstanding citizen doing his duty, and we know there’s no better reward can a man have than the respect of his countrymen. As long as they’re white, and straight. Eh Andy?

  • Dave
    July 31st, 2012 on 16:36

    Oops! I meant “not” turning into a psychopath. Obviously maintaining that level of satire was too much. Oh well, I’m not bothered because my aunt’s best-friend’s room-mate was an SAS assassin ninja chef!

  • Gareth
    July 31st, 2012 on 20:30

    Kate Rixson, do you not think that your questions are somewhat idealistic, utopian and naive?

    It’s all very well asking “do we not all bleed?” when looking for reasons why we should all be BFFs, but could you please tell me what kind of response you got from the Islamic extremists who killed 52 people on 7/11 when you asked them that question?

    Or how about the Islamists who were arrested in Manchester last year while plotting another terrorist attack? Or the ones from London earlier this year who were doing the same?

    Peace only works if it’s what both sides want. If only one side wants peace then the other will simply take advantage of a soft touch – look at Hitler and Chamberlain for example.

    I think from the number of terrorist attacks in recent times – both failed and successful – it’s clear that there are communities that have infiltrated Western society that do not want peace and I believe that it would be stupid and irresponsible of us to continue to ignore the signs and pretend they’re not there. They are there and we need to be prepared. Under such circumstances there is very little time for hippy-like ideals of free love.

    Mi5 is currently tracking around 3,000 individuals that it deems a risk to national security, and there are almost certainly many more that it is not yet aware of. Given those statistics it seems more than likely that we will see another attack before the end of the decade and it will be interesting to see how many “lefties” will change their mantra on how we all need to join the Getalong Gang should any of the victims be members of their own immediate families.

    Of course, the above isn’t so much a matter of race but religion so I do hope you will all refrain from calling me a “racist bigot” however tempting it is for you.

  • ADB
    August 1st, 2012 on 06:58

    NOTJARVIS: “We are a country that has always been about immigrants, and many cultures joining all down it’s history. Our royal family is genetically German and Greek for christ’s sake.”

    Those immigrants have arrived in small numbers, spaced over a very long period of time, and have been assimilable, by virtue of being of European genetic stock. There is absolutuely no comparison to what is happening today, in which vast numbers of Third World immigrants have been imported, to the extent that the indigenous Brits could become a minority in fifty years time. Show me a country or territory from any time in history in which a people (or rather, their political masters)have deliberately chosen to make themselves a minority in their own homeland. You can’t, because everybody except liberal luvvies have considered it to be suicide. We are in uncharted waters here, and liberal assertions that it will be alright on the night are just fluffy wishful thinking.

    KATE RIXSON: “We’re all the same.”

    No we’re not, as demonstrated by the disproportionate levels of violent crime and welfare dependancy displayed by certain racial groups. Individuals from any given group may be good or bad, and I’m sure you’re much lovelier than a lot of white people I have come across, but to deliberately import groups who are proven to exhibit the above characteristics is madness.

    EVERT: “Oh for gods’ sake, how have John’s “shrill rantings” deprived you of free speech or any other liberty?”

    The DM article was pulled becasue of pressure from outraged faux-liberals such as John Walker. Walker and his kind are also keen to extend the definition of “racist” to include unpalatable facts about mass immigration that do not fit the politically correct narrative. My point stands.

    TULLOCH: “heres a idea for you how about for 2016 all us immigrants who dare darken your tv screen with our faces don’t compete for GB. Lets see how well you purely aryan indigenous olymipic team do then yeah………..Racist!”

    Hmm, let’s see. Less Olympic medals versus more violent crime, welfare dependancy and rioting? I’ll take less Olympic medals, thanks.

    As for Brits cheering on the “darkies” (your word, not mine) who win the UK medals, any goodwill generated will be fleeting, as the true cost of mass Third World immigration becomes ever more apparent. A decade ago, an ethnically mixed French football team won the World Cup, and were lauded as a triumph of multiculturalism. Now, Le Pen has 20% of the vote. Because the costs of mass immigration far outweigh the benefits.

  • Evert
    August 1st, 2012 on 07:54

    “The DM article was pulled becasue of pressure from outraged faux-liberals such as John Walker. Walker and his kind are also keen to extend the definition of “racist” to include unpalatable facts about mass immigration that do not fit the politically correct narrative. My point stands. ”

    Given that the DM hasn’t pulled similar articles that produced mass outrage (cf Jan Moir) I very much doubt that was the reason. It is ironic that you claiming this on the blog of the person that saved the article for all to see. That does not fit the narrative of a PC thug who is trying to shut down debate.

    Anyway, if I wanted to be tetchy I would point out, I a asked how has John Walker deprived you of your free speech and liberties.

    But meh.

  • ADB
    August 1st, 2012 on 08:45

    EVERT: If you google “white britons to become a minority by 2066”, you should get to the article I was referring to, re population trends.

    Whether or not violent crime is falling is a debateable point (there have been accusations of massaging of figures to make politicians look good), but it does not change the fact that blacks are committing disproportionate amounts of it.

    “America has had mass immigration for ages”. Yeah, white immigration. My point still stands.

    The riots did indeed occur in areas where blacks make a significant proportion ot the population – because it was predominantly blacks who were rioting. Anyone who saw the coverage could see blacks were predominant. Hard facts and figures re a racial breakdown of the rioters are hard to come by, however – most likley becasue it suited the powers that be to ignore this aspect. For a taste of the level of censorship employed by the powers that be, Google “Big Jim London riots” for a Youtube clip to see the extent to which the liberal luvvies tried to prevent people pointing out the obvious.

    Actually, as you probably won’t bother googling it, here’s a rough transcript:

    BIG JIM (store-owner): “I came down to the shop and saw 100, probably 200 black youths just rampaging..”

    BBC-luvvie (talking over the top of the BIG JIM): You’re not being stereotypical are you? Are you sure they were Black? I’m sure they weren’t all black…”

    BIG JIM: “Let me say they weren’t all black, I was the white guy there”.

    It would be funny if it wasn’t so serious.

    FIYENYAA: “firstly, you haven’t even attempted to address your “historical settlers to the UK were less than 1% of the total population” stat.

    I’ve been busy. But I think I must concede your point: the 1% figure is nonsense: Ryan Sykes in “Blood of the Isles” reckons the Roman invaders made up 1% of the population at the time, Flemings and Walloons, less than 1%, Jews 0.3%, but Anglo-Saxons possibly 4% and Huguenots at most 2%. With emigrations bringing numbers down a bit, the accumulative effect was that the various invasions etc contributed about 5% of Britain’s population.

    This change, however, occurred over a great length of time, and the immigrants were assimilable, being of mostly Northern European stock. The immigrant population of today is (officially) said to be 10%, but they have arrived in the space of 60 years (with a huge increase in the last 15 years), are often from cultures completely incompatible with Western civilisation, and are breeding at a rate that will see whites become a minority by 2066. The “we are a nation of immigrants” argument is liberal bollocks designed to lull people into a false sense of security re mass Third World immigration. There is simply no comparison between Britain’s previous immigration history, and what has happened in the last half-century.

    I see you conveniently haven’t attempted to address the other two points in the original post. And my knee is fine, thankyou.

    DAVE: pulling out one or two examples of white criminals etc does not change the fact that blacks and certain other groups are disproportionately represented in crime stats.

    JUO: sorry, I missed your later post. I don’t want us to fight, either. Believe it or not, I used to have absolutely no problem with multi-culturalism. My first serious girlfriend was Malaysian-Chinese, for crying out loud. When friends were travelling around Europe, I took myself off to Egypt and the ME, and East and Southern Africa. And loved it.

    Unfortunately, I don’t think we’ll have to wait fifty years to see which one of us is wrong and who is right. Let’s make a deal to meet here in ten years’ time to see how things are panning out.

    Cheers.

  • ADB
    August 1st, 2012 on 09:06

    JOHN WALKER: Can I just clarify, would it be “racist” for a Chinese to refer to China as “my country”?

    Thought not.

  • Mister k
    August 1st, 2012 on 09:28

    Its probably a bit racist to say “a chinese”…

  • Evert
    August 1st, 2012 on 10:09

    That is an admirable point by point rebuttal to the statistics there. Oh wait…
    Sorry, but no I will not go on a wild google chase to find your evidence, supply it yourself and I will look at it then.

    You also haven’t countered the suggestion that the emphasis on “white” is anything but special pleading, your point doesn’t stand it is an old arguement that has moved the goal posts. I pointed out a broadly parallel trend from history when the argument was that the mass-immration wasn’t White Anglo-Saxon Protestant enough. The nativists were wrong then so I find the arguement “but they are not white” unconvincong until you provide evidence to the contrary (ie, not Google keyword suggestions).

    Also, anecdote != data, and I can’t access youtube at the moment anyway.

  • Evert
    August 1st, 2012 on 10:14

    Also, it’s Bryan Sykes.

  • ADB
    August 1st, 2012 on 10:48

    EVERT: sorry didn’t realise you needed to be spoon fed.

    From the article “White Britons to become a minority by 2066”:

    “Figures from the Office of National Statistics show that if immigration remains at a long-term rate of around 180,000 a year the proportion of the white British-born population will fall from 80 per cent to 59 per cent by 2051.

    “In that time the white immigrant population will have risen from four to 10 per cent and ethnic minority population from 16 to 31 per cent.

    “Writing in Prospect magazine, Prof Coleman wrote: “On those assumptions the ‘white British’ population would decline to 45 million by 2051.

    “Were the assumptions to hold, the ‘white British’ population of Britain would become the minority after about 2066. It’s a milestone that would be passed much earlier in younger age groups.”

    And becasue I’m in a generous mood, here’s an extract from the Telegraph article “Violent city crime and a question of race”:

    “Just over 12 per cent of London’s 7.5 million population is black, including those of mixed black and white parentage, while 69 per cent is white, according to the Office for National Statistics.

    “The (MET) data provide a breakdown of the ethnicity of the 18,091 men and boys who police took action against for a range of violent and sexual offences in London in 2009-10.

    “They show that among those proceeded against for street crimes, 54 per cent were black; for robbery, 59 per cent; and for gun crimes, 67 per cent. Street crimes include muggings, assault with intent to rob and snatching property.”

    Here’s a bit about rates of violent crime. (Can’t remember the name of the Telegraph article, but it from 2010).

    “Violent attacks are estimated to be 44 per cent higher than they were in 1998 after research on the way police record them allowed comparisons for the first time.

    “The study, by the independent House of Commons Library, shows violence against the person increased from 618,417 to 887,942 last year.

    “The devastating review comes despite repeated claims by the Government that violent crime has come down substantially since it took power.”

    Regarding your comments on US immigration – whatever. Someone claimed the US as an example os successful model of multi-culturalism, I pointed out the immigration was predominantly white. Waffling on about whether Protestants or Catholics or whatever is mere obfuscation.

  • Evert
    August 1st, 2012 on 10:58

    Sorry, I hoped to leave it there. But I can be like a dog with a bone sometimes.

    ADB, contrary to your claim that “the British people trace their origins back to the Northern and Western European tribes who arrived 14000 years ago”, Sykes actually says that the British Celts arrived on these islands 7,000 years ago. And rather than ‘invaders’ making up a paltry 5%, infact:

    “Even in England, about 64 per cent of people are descended from these Celts, outnumbering the descendants of Anglo- Saxons by about three to one.

    The proportion of Celts is only slightly higher in Scotland, at 73 per cent. Wales is the most Celtic part of mainland Britain, with 83 per cent.”
    http://www.scotsman.com/news/arts/we-re-nearly-all-celts-under-the-skin-1-1141420

    I am sorry to say ADB, but your expert doesn’t agree with you.

    Now whilst Bryan Sykes is a good scientist (Oezti the Iceman is quite frankly amazing too), I did not think much of Blood of the Isles (too poppy, not enough stats). However, it seemed to me that he spends a lot of the book exploding the traditional self-identity myth of English exceptionalism and the idea that the English are fundementally different from the Celtic fringe.

    It is rather ironic that it is being used to support a racist arguement then.

  • Evert
    August 1st, 2012 on 11:01

    It is not a question of being spoon-fed, it is a question of finding your own evidence and not expecting your opponent to find it for you. I don’t suggest you go into academia, there they expect you to supply whole bibliographies, search criteria and stuff. All I’m asking for is a few paltry URLs and properly referenced documents

    Still no URL though I see.

  • Dave
    August 1st, 2012 on 11:21

    ABD: I said nothing about crime stats, so I’m not sure how your reply relates to my post? However you seem to have spectacularly missed the missed the point I was making. Andy’s rant against diversity and “re-writing history” was somewhat undermined by his triumphant reference to Alan Turing (codebreaker, father of computer science and one of the finest British minds of the 20th century). While Turing was white rather than black (as “humorously” suggested), he was also gay rather than straight.

    Once the war was over, and in spite of all he did for our country, Turing was tried for “indecency” (that is, for having sexual relations with another man in the privacy of his own home), convicted, chemically castrated and cast out of his old life at GCHQ. When he died under ten years later of cyanide poisoning at the age of 42, an inquest determined that he committed suicide. While some dispute the inquest’s finding, it’s not much of a stretch to imagine that his mistreatment earlier in his life may have contributed to a suicide attempt. It took over 50 years and a massive amount of public campaigning to get the UK government to admit that Turing’s treatment was wrong, and issue a formal posthumous apology (in 2009, really quite recently).

    My point was to highlight the ridiculousness of Andy using a fictional misattribution of Turing’s achievements as a demonstration of “rewriting history” in support of his anti-diversity arguments, while *simultaneously* ignoring the fact that Turing was a notable homosexual and the victim of one of the most notorious acts of bigotry our government has committed in recent times. If that’s not an example of sweeping facts under the carpet, I don’t know what is!

  • ADB
    August 1st, 2012 on 13:33

    EVERT: But we DO trace our origins back to people who arrived after the last Ice Age.

    “British have changed little since Ice Age Gene Study Says” (National Geographic News, 2005):

    “In The Tribes of Britain, archaeologist David Miles says around 80 percent of the genetic characteristics of most white Britons have been passed down from a few thousand Ice Age hunters.

    Despite invasions by Saxons, Romans, Vikings, Normans, and others, the genetic makeup of today’s white Britons is much the same as it was 12,000 (years) ago, a new book claims.”

    I don’t particularly care if a majority of Britons TODAY are descended from the secondary but significant migration of Celts 7000 years ago. The point is and remains that previous immigration into Britain has been on a much smaller scale than we have seen in the last 50 years, and earlier immigrants and invaders were much more assimilable because they were overwhelmingly of European genetic stock (ie white people). There is simply no comparison to the mass, Third World immigration we have experienced in the last fifty years.

    DAVE: You’re right, I did spectacularly miss the point. Sorry. In my defence , I was trying to respond to half a dozen different posters at the same time.

  • Fiyenyaa
    August 1st, 2012 on 15:21

    ADB; I have a question for you, since you seem pretty set in your ways.

    Let’s say you’re right about everything, any all us proud-and-proper indigenous folks agree with you. What then? What’s the big solution to this terrible problem which you have enlightened us about?

    Do we start deporting people who have lived here their whole life because they happen to have a different ancestry?
    Since you seem a little focused on Muslims (which seems to be in-fashion these days), what about indigenous converts to Islam?
    How about all the British people who live in other countries? Do we tell them (force them somehow?) to come back here, because surely we shouldn’t subject any other nation to the same problem we’re apparently having?
    What about mixed-race people? Do they have a place *anywhere* at all, in your view of the world?

    The simple fact is that you’re too late. We already live in a multi-ethnic, multi-faith, multi-cultural society (with all it’s advantages and disadvantages), and there’s nothing anyone can do to change that without committing war-crimes. Live in the real world.

  • Lord Snot
    August 1st, 2012 on 16:34

    You really are a revolting human being, ADB.

  • Xercies
    August 1st, 2012 on 23:00

    @ADB What about the fact that you know that crime is more to do with poverty and race and unfortunately it just happens to be that blacks seem to live in the highest poor regions. And i’ve watched many news items about the north that has many criminals being white and i’m guessing they have predomintly white poor people so there crime is predomintly white. i don’t know though because i don’t have the whole facts but i would guesits that other then theres some crazy gene in blacks that just makes them all criminals.

  • max
    August 2nd, 2012 on 05:44

    I really think people should stop calling others racist as it has become a very overused term that is thrown around at a ridiculous rate, even when trying to speak about immigration you get branded. The fact is this term is used for a quick attack to cut down many people whom are often not allowed to view their opinions (free country?). Its a typical modern day trend and its really annoying, just like all this extreme health and safety nonsense the UK has delved into.

    Actually Chris Tulloch, ADB has some very good points that are not racist a tall, they are simply laying it all out on the table plain to see, if you want to look. The problem with this country is whenever people try to speak the truth about these kind of issues eg.immigration and multi cultural England especially, people are hounded, blasted and shouted down as racists straight away, as you have done.

    Its very difficult to make progress in this country now as everything can be deemed racist or not PC or against human rights etc…this country is so so very soft and this is the problem. We don’t see Australia or Canada act this way with immigration for one, and they have much bigger land masses than we do.

    I don’t know about everything ADB says but some is very accurate I’m afraid, despite you not liking it. I understand why you would feel the way you do but its the truth of the situation for the UK, it has come down to this. I agree that the UK COULD be a terrible place in the next 100yrs or so, completely unrecognisable.

    The UK has exploded with a complete country alteration, and to be honest…were we asked by our government whether we wanted these HUGE changes?

    I also agree on ADB’s comment about other countries. Would other countries allow their ways of life, cultures, cities/towns etc…to be changed so vastly as we allow ours to be?

  • ADB
    August 2nd, 2012 on 06:49

    FIYENYAA:

    I see you have not addressed any of the points I have made, bar the “nation of immigrants” debate. Now you have moved on to saying “it’s all too late to change anything”. Does that mean you actually concede my points, and if not can you counter them?

    As for it being all too late, and what can be done: plenty. Firstly, you stop all official Third World immigration, today. Secondly, you deport all illegal immigrants in the UK, and ship them home. Thirdly, you amend the welfare system so that Third World immigrants can no longer afford to have five children and outbreed the locals. Fourthly, you ban Islam – Mulsims either stop practicing their religion, or leave. This will have the highly desirable effect of sending Islamic fundamentalists packing, or see them revolt, allowing the identification of the hard-liners. Thus brings us to the fifth point, deporting immigrant criminals and terrorists.

    The above measures may sound abhorrent to you, but these measures may – and I say may – control immigrant numbers enough that the those who remain can be assimilated, and the indigenous population don’t end up feeling so marginlaised and threatened that their tribal and survival instincts kick in, and all hell breaks loose. The alternative is the kind of stuff you saw in the break-up of Yugoslavia, times ten.

    XERCIES: I’ve already answered that question.

    LORD SNOT: Personal abuse merely suggests you have nothing to counter my arguments.

  • FhnuZoag
    August 2nd, 2012 on 11:01

    “Given those statistics it seems more than likely that we will see another attack before the end of the decade and it will be interesting to see how many “lefties” will change their mantra on how we all need to join the Getalong Gang should any of the victims be members of their own immediate families.”

    Why don’t you look at how the families of the 7/7 victims reacted, before using them as fuel for your hateful ideology? The only way to defeat madness and violence is through human decency.

  • Fiyenyaa
    August 2nd, 2012 on 14:01

    ADB – Ban Islam? Are you serious? I’m going to assume you’re the world’s biggest troll, because if you think that’s viable then you’re insane.
    That goes against any respectable human rights ideology ever thought up; any country that did that would be kicked out of every international organisation it was a part of and become an international pariah.
    It’s also utterly unjust – to punish the tiny minority of Islamic terrorists, you suppress freedom of religion for *every* Muslim in the UK? I think you’ll find that plotting terrorist atrocities is already illegal, but apparently that isn’t enough for you.

    (By the way, I haven’t countered any other points because it seems like you don’t want to talk about them with other people so much as just say your piece and dismiss anything else. I couldn’t give a hoot whether our ancestors were Celts, Saxons, Normans, Xhosa, Han, or anything else.)

  • Rab
    August 2nd, 2012 on 23:19

    I see that M&S are doing yet another co-promotion with the Daily Mail which is given prominent space on the front page (buy the Mail get a voucher for £5 off a £25 spend at Marks and Spencer).

    As this goes beyond just buying ad space in the newspaper, perhaps a boycott M&S campaign would be a good idea. Does a reputable company like M&S really want to be associated with a racist rag like the Mail?

  • Bernard
    August 5th, 2012 on 20:23

    @andy rake: a batty boi from berkshire, actually.

  • turbonator
    August 6th, 2012 on 23:54

    @Adam Sykes Well for starters I can name the Mongols, the Arabs, the Japanese… and secondly, a small scottish fishing town could very well contain two black people and would almost certainly have a gay person residing within it. You have a very limited world view

  • Jacob Lawton
    August 18th, 2012 on 19:50

    Andy, it would seem your the one trying to rewrite history. At one moment you are arguing against the ideas of a gay being able to live in a Scottish fishing village (despite the village its self already setting a new standard for camp in its multicolored housing scheme) “take the childrens show ‘Balamorey” its one road, in a remote Scottish fishing village. In that village there is an asian, a black person a gay person and 1 white person.”
    Then the next paragraph you are all for the white Britain’s who solved the enigma code. However despite not being the grandfather of Lenny Henry, Alan Turing was gay (which would make it very difficult for him to be the grandfather of Lenny Henry now that i think about it), now not to put words in your mouth but I’m not sure he was gay in your version of history

  • akl
    August 23rd, 2012 on 13:15

    Guy with ‘links to the mafia’ – aren’t the mafia italian?

  • Cath Wilson
    August 28th, 2012 on 10:53

    Hi Have to say this was a great article and for some of you who comment to say that we are taking an ‘OTT’ stance on this is just ridiculous, ignorant and bigoted.

    I am proud to be British, proud to live in London a metropolitan city with a mix of race, colour, sex and sexuality and so am proud that we were represented as such. people just are happy to have something to hate and blame for their dull lives so to all you I say you are OTT get over it and stop writing racist rubbish!

  • Leafy Leaf
    September 24th, 2012 on 14:05

    stop buying GMO foods from the supermarkets… stop taking vaccines and flu shots…. the American and European Government are SICK EVIL WAR CRIMINALS who inject toxic chemicals and poisons into our food supply

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