Richard Branson apologises for photo

Danzy

Overheal wrote: »

If he wants to apologize then good for him. It did certainly give off the impression Branson had hand selected a whitewashed team for his venture in SA - which historically in SA is a bit of a problem, to say the least.

I’m not the people he is apologizing to or the market he now finds himself in so I don’t really have the good sense to say whether the apology is warranted or not.

Thanks for the Corporate Press Release.

HorrorScope

Overheal wrote: »

Give it up

I like how you called people wacist over that but refuse to do anything but cheerlead the blacks opposed to Bransons photo. Bravo.

Quantum Erasure

Tasfasdf wrote: »

Would you have any contextual problem with an all black photo in Ireland...?

are they on a business trip from Nigeria? or South Africa? (in which case I'd expect 20% to be white...)

Tell me how

HorrorScope wrote: »

I like how you called people wacist over that but refuse to do anything but cheerlead the blacks opposed to Bransons photo. Bravo.

A, They're not cheer leading anyone.
B, It is not the same situation, by any stretch.

James Brown

TBF, the OP is hawking for outrage. We see it all the time in here.
Promote any semblance of annoyance to counter with '[insert term of the day] kicking off over nothing'.
Numerous threads started in here complaining about the complaining. Tiresome.

Branson posted a picture of all whites promoting an event in S. Africa. He was criticised for not showing the diversity present, including ministers etc.
Branson apologised for not using one of the other many pictures that show'd a more diverse mix.
Storm in a jockstrap.

Quantum Erasure

I actually had a look at the photo there....

there's one lad who is definitely asian, one lad who looks like like he could be an arab, two girls who could be mixed race or it could be fake tan...

plenty of diversity there

Phoebas

Deleted User wrote: »

I see absolutely no reason for an apology. Am I wrong?

You didn't make an apology.
Richard Branson did. For the reasons he gave.

Why are people getting so worked up over Richard Branson?

Quantum Erasure

Phoebas wrote: »

You didn't make an apology.
Richard Branson did. For the reasons he gave.

Why are people getting so worked up over Richard Branson?

something about getting triggered over lack of diversity in a photo, I think it was

Overheal

HorrorScope wrote: »

I like how you called people wacist over that but refuse to do anything but cheerlead the blacks opposed to Bransons photo. Bravo.

When did I do that? Please quote or link.

Phoebas

Quantum Erasure wrote: »

something about getting triggered over lack of diversity in a photo, I think it was

and another set of people getting triggered over that triggering.
We have a trigger chain reaction.

HorrorScope

Overheal wrote: »

When did I do that? Please quote or link.

Overheal wrote:

Indeed, these type of centers are basically business embassies and you’re not going to have an easy time tapping into the SA economy when the population looks at your efforts as a relic of apartheid

So a group of white people taking a photo together is a “relic of apartheid” now yeah?.

monkeysnapper

Jeeeez ..... I took a photo of my kids the other day ..... and my two white westie dogs .....

Maybe I should have gone and asked neighbor if I could have borrowed her collie....

pinkyeye

Deleted User wrote: »

My brother-in-law is white South African. Which doesn't reflect the black majority. Better hastily delete all photos of us from twatter.

Self-consciously staged ops never ring true. Branson should have let things stand instead of succumbing to bullying tactics.

What a stupid stupid stupid analogy. Your brother in law is not Richard Branson launching a multi million pound operation right?? :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

Overheal

Phoebas wrote: »

and another set of people getting triggered over that triggering.
We have a trigger chain reaction.

The wonderful thing about triggers
Is triggers are wonderful things!
Their tops are made out of rubber
Their bottoms are made out of springs!

sbsquarepants

Tell me how wrote: »

I was being forgiving with suggesting the 50% likelihood but, yes, I agree that the chances of 8 successive hires being white should be smaller than .39% in South Africa.

You might argue that while percentage wise, more whites have a higher degree of education, given that there are many times more blacks in the population, that the actual split of applicants would have worked out at 50/50 and hence we are back to the 0.39%

Even assuming your percentages are correct (which is a big assumption by the way, but for the sake of simplicity lets assume they are) you are still looking at just 8 random people, not 8 people for what is a fairly specialised role. That specialisation is going to skew your numbers hugely.

o1s1n states that in the universities the split is actually a good bit more even, but who knows what they are studying for example? In Ireland it would be roughly 50 / 50 men and women for example, but if you were to base a calculation on the "fact" that 50% of engineering students are women, or 50% of nursing students are men then your resulting figures would just be nonsense.

Your calculations are absolutely meaningless i'm afraid.

My guess would be that Richard Branson probably knows a bit more about entrepreneurship than me or you, if he reckons those 8 were the best fit for the job, they probably are probably at the very least a decent fit, regardless of their skin colour!

Throwing in a token dark face or two is the very definition of racism.

Matt Barrett

Matt Barrett wrote: »

TBF, the OP is hawking for outrage. We see it all the time in here.
Promote any semblance of annoyance to counter with '[insert term of the day] kicking off over nothing'.
Numerous threads started in here complaining about the complaining. Tiresome.

:rolleyes: So it is "hawking" to see an article and ask whether or not people felt that the situation warranted an apology? Ok so.

Also, nobody asked you to participate in the conversation Matt. If you find it so tiresome, don't engage.

I am sure that you can see the irony in complaining about the complaining about complaining.

Matt Barrett wrote: »

Branson posted a picture of all whites promoting an event in S. Africa. He was criticised for not showing the diversity present, including ministers etc.
Branson apologised for not using one of the other many pictures that show'd a more diverse mix.
Storm in a jockstrap.

I am aware of what happened Matt. I was just wondering if others thought that not showing diversity or having a photo which consisted of only white people is grounds for an apology to be made. I also wondered if it had been any other race other than white, would the same people also think that an apology was required.

No storm, no outrage, no complaining.

Keyzer

punisher5112 wrote: »

How many blacks does Branson employ among say Asian and Eskimos and so on?

Funny you mention Asians - I don't recall ever hearing Asian's from th Far East moaning about diversity and all that codswollop.

Tell me how

sbsquarepants wrote: »

Even assuming your percentages are correct (which is a big assumption by the way, but for the sake of simplicity lets assume they are) you are still looking at just 8 random people, not 8 people for what is a fairly specialised role. That specialisation is going to skew your numbers hugely.

o1s1n states that in the universities the split is actually a good bit more even, but who knows what they are studying for example? In Ireland it would be roughly 50 / 50 men and women for example, but if you were to base a calculation on the "fact" that 50% of engineering students are women, or 50% of nursing students are men then your resulting figures would just be nonsense.

Your calculations are absolutely meaningless i'm afraid.

My guess would be that Richard Branson probably knows a bit more about entrepreneurship than me or you, if he reckons those 8 were the best fit for the job, they probably are probably at the very least a decent fit, regardless of their skin colour!

Throwing in a token dark face or two is the very definition of racism.

Wow. 'You're calculations are absolutely meaningless I'm afraid' :D:D
Brilliant. Right up there with Healy-Rae on the radio this morning saying 'Let's not get caught up in the facts'

Glad to see you trust Richard Bransons opinion and as a consequence agree with him that it was correct to apologise.

Overheal

HorrorScope wrote: »

So a group of white people taking a photo together is a “relic of apartheid” now yeah?.

How does what I said “cheerlead for the blacks?”

sbsquarepants

Tell me how wrote: »

Wow. 'You're calculations are absolutely meaningless I'm afraid' :D:D

Do you still think they bore some kind of relationship to reality?

It's nice that you felt sufficiently morally outraged to take pen to paper and calculate exactly how racist the photo was (turned out to be 99.61% racist for those just tuning in:D) But surely you can see that any calculation based on a wildly inaccurate assumption is hardly going to yield an accurate answer now is it? Therefore it was.......Rebecca Vardy i mean meaningless.

Tell me how wrote: »

Glad to see you trust Richard Bransons opinion and as a consequence agree with him that it was correct to apologise.

I feel it's important to know your limits (statistics being one of yours:D) So with that in mind I have a sneaking suspicion that Richard is probably in possession of quite a bit more entrepreneurial savvy than i am!;)

Tell me how

sbsquarepants wrote: »

Do you still think they bore some kind of relationship to reality?

It's nice that you felt sufficiently morally outraged to take pen to paper and calculate exactly how racist the photo was (turned out to be 99.61% racist for those just tuning in:D) But surely you can see that any calculation based on a wildly inaccurate assumption is hardly going to yield an accurate answer now is it?




I feel it's important to know your limits (statistics being one of yours:D) So with that in mind I have a sneaking suspicion that Richard is probably in possession of quite a bit more entrepreneurial savvy than i am!;)

Glad to see you are using 99.61% as evidence on the unlikelihood of this occurring, all things being equal, which we have to take given no evidence to the contrary.

I'm quite happy with my awareness of statistics is more than yours given your lack of understanding on how to use them.

sbsquarepants

Tell me how wrote: »

Glad to see you are using 99.61% as evidence on the unlikelihood of this occurring, all things being equal, which we have to take given no evidence to the contrary.

I'm quite happy with my awareness of statistics is more than yours given your lack of understanding on how to use them.

I love the username, very apt:D

James Brown

Deleted User wrote: »

:rolleyes: So it is "hawking" to see an article and ask whether or not people felt that the situation warranted an apology? Ok so.

Also, nobody asked you to participate in the conversation Matt. If you find it so tiresome, don't engage.

I am sure that you can see the irony in complaining about the complaining about complaining.



I am aware of what happened Matt. I was just wondering if others thought that not showing diversity or having a photo which consisted of only white people is grounds for an apology to be made. I also wondered if it had been any other race other than white, would the same people also think that an apology was required.

No storm, no outrage, no complaining.

Yes. You set it up without explaining he was apologising about the photo he used, not for posing with no blacks. It's a storm in a teacup with you doing a Teresa Mannion.
Participating to call it out for what it is. My humanity was crossed.
Nah, that's not as fair minded as it came across.
Be more honest if you said Branson used an all white photo from a diverse event in S.A. and apologised for not using one more representative of those there.
It wasn't a 'Is Branson cowtowing to the liberals/PC gone mad?' issue. It was a should he have apologised for not using a better photo of the event. Less salacious though.

Tell me how

sbsquarepants wrote: »

I love the username, very apt:D

Says someone literally living with their head in the sand....