Black people Racism in Workplace in Ireland

Gatling

Gatling wrote: »

Must the far right invasion of Ireland recently that's causing all of this ,,,,,,

Definitely.

AndrewJRenko

Mike Murdock wrote: »

I'll try and find the name of the guy, but there was another black activist recently talking about systemic racism in Ireland and how it was widespread.

Guy went from working in Supermacs to studying for a PhD in Law here.

Surely that is the absolute antithesis of systemic racism?

My granny smoked 80 cigarettes a day and never got lung cancer, so surely that proves that smoking doesn't cause lung cancer?

Anyway, how could there be racism against black people in the workplace when we don't have any black people in the workplace?

archfi

The central tenet of 'anti-racism' via critical race theory is if you don't see racism even when patently an incident/situation is not racist, then you are racist via your bias and privilege or to put it another way, 'you are not looking hard enough' thus the industry is neverending and will never provide 'solutions', which is not the purpose of it at all.
On the OP's call for more disussion, I don't know if he or she wants an honest conversation or a one-way lecture because all I see and hear in our media and from our government and politicians is dishonesty and most definitely promotion of an ideological theory with zero room available for an alternative view and if there is the odd sop thrown to look like there is honesty, well it is invariably someone with extreme, obnoxious views which do not have widespread acceptance.
All critical theories - social justice, race, gender, queer - is run on the same lines.

ThunbergsAreGo

Well if Boni Odoemene said it im all in...

Dyr

How about we address racism by sparing any more black people the ignominy of living our racist country?

Former Former Former

randd1 wrote: »

I'd be of the opinion that giving free education to immigrants would probably be far better for us as a society in the long run. And if they don't avail of it, then that's on them as will be the consequences.

Umm, don't we already do this?

AndrewJRenko

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

Anyway, how could there be racism against black people in the workplace when we don't have any black people in the workplace?

What?

anplaya27

Society takes time to change. It may never change fully as its indoctrinated over centuries. Ireland has a history of treating minorities or anyone who is deemed as different appallingly.

I would argue Deaf Irish Sign Language users have faced more marginalisation, exclusion, discrimination in this country than the black community has. I mean it's not so long ago our language was banned- we were segregated- we were not allowed to own property or land- had to get special permission to marry- the abuses- the list goes on. Hell we weren't even formally allowed an education in our own language until 2017.

Theres plenty of times I was made feel like a second class citizen because I cant hear.

Perhaps now with language recognition ( ISL is now an official language of Ireland) things will get better. Time will tell. We persevere anyway.

suicide_circus

Racism has been monetized.

Bobblehats

anplaya27 wrote: »

Society takes time to change. It may never change fully as its indoctrinated over centuries. Ireland has a history of treating minorities or anyone who is deemed as different appallingly.

I would argue Deaf Irish Sign Language users have faced more marginalisation, exclusion, discrimination in this country than the black community has. I mean it's not so long ago our language was banned- we were segregated- we were not allowed to own property or land- had to get special permission to marry- the abuses- the list goes on. Hell we weren't even formally allowed an education in our own language until 2017.

Theres plenty of times I was made feel like a second class citizen because I cant hear.

Perhaps now with language recognition ( ISL is now an official language of Ireland) things will get better. Time will tell. We persevere anyway.

I think if you realised just how vocal these people are in apparent discrimination you may change your tune. People are reluctant to allow this “minority” to gain too much of a foothold here, that’s just how it is

anplaya27

anplaya27 wrote: »

Society takes time to change. It may never change fully as its indoctrinated over centuries. Ireland has a history of treating minorities or anyone who is deemed as different appallingly.

I would argue Deaf Irish Sign Language users have faced more marginalisation, exclusion, discrimination in this country than the black community has. I mean it's not so long ago our language was banned- we were segregated- we were not allowed to own property or land- had to get special permission to marry- the abuses- the list goes on. Hell we weren't even formally allowed an education in our own language until 2017.

Theres plenty of times I was made feel like a second class citizen because I cant hear.

Perhaps now with language recognition ( ISL is now an official language of Ireland) things will get better. Time will tell. We persevere anyway.

But what about the deaf people with no hands?! How dare you marginalise them.

(Joking btw)

The problem is that if you go looking for racism, you'll find a while host of examples from your own life that could be interpreted as being racist. When, in fact, those examples may be there for any number of other reasons, from the manner of your behavior, your decisions, etc. or simply that the other person is a dick.

For Black people, the idea of racism is part of their overall culture. The expectation that racism is there all the time... and so confirmation bias exists strongly for them. For White people in a western nation, racism is unlikely to be a consideration, so we expect to find other reasons for what happens to us. For myself, from living in Asia, I can daily find examples of racism if I want to find it. Perception is key.

Now, that's not to say that actual racism doesn't occur. It does.. it's a part of human behavior. Tribalism. Group think, and the perspective relating to outsiders. But it's not something exclusive to white people, and there's a tendency to ignore the racist beliefs of other racial groups, as if they're suddenly immune to displaying such motivations or attitudes.

Racism is always going to be around. The point is to minimize the effects of it. We have a host of laws, and social rules to minimize the impact of individual racism. We have had decades of social conditioning to encourage us to avoid applying racist attitudes to others. It's not perfect, but nothing ever is. The interesting thing though, is how rare it is. Look outside of Europe, and there's little consideration about racism. Little pressure on people not to enact or display it. Live in Africa, Asia, or whatever, and as a white person, you will experience being on the receiving end of racism... and there's little to no expectation for it to stop, or change. It's only in western nations that there's some kind of expectation that it'll be removed entirely from our society.

And how will it be removed? Education? We already have that. Laws? We already have them. I hear a lot about stopping racism, but extremely little on the details of how to stop it. Also little consideration that migrants coming from abroad, will be bringing their own brand of racism.. and no expectation that they will have to adapt.

Just to add... I have found that many black people push their race into every situation. Different/extreme behaviors, attitudes, appearance, etc.. all designed to attract attention (and be obviously different from others), but it's an attention that is strongly connected with the idea of being "black", and should someone react in an unfavorable manner, the accusation of racism is rolled out. If you go looking for reactions from others... don't be shocked when you get a variety of negative ones. The problem being that there's a design in place to link it to race.. as opposed to the individuals choices/behaviors.

anplaya27

anplaya27 wrote: »

If you knew anything about our language- very little involves the hands.

Apologies. It was a glib remark.

I know nothing about the language. It's something I am keen to look into due to a child of a close relative being recently born with a hearing impairment.

It was a throwaway remark with no offense intended.

Apologies if any was taken.

WrenBoy

anplaya27 wrote: »

If you knew anything about our language- very little involves the hands. It's a 3d spectrum- torso, shoulders, hands, face, eyes, facial features, lip patterns. Also notice how I use a capital D for deaf- not small d.

Thats interesting I had always thought that sign language was all hands and mouth movements , Am i right to say sign language differs from language to language as in deaf people in Ireland would use English sign language and a Spanish deaf person would use Spanish sign language ?

anplaya27

Deleted User wrote: »

Apologies. It was a glib remark.

I know nothing about the language. It's something I am keen to look into due to a child of a close relative being recently born with a hearing impairment.

It was a throwaway remark with no offense intended.

Apologies if any was taken.

Also we dont use the term impairment. Just Deaf- as in culture, languages, identity, traditions and so on. Impairment is a label. For us being deaf is as normal to a person who can hear being hearing.

anplaya27

WrenBoy wrote: »

Thats interesting I had always thought that sign language was all hands and mouth movements , Am i right to say sign language differs from language to language as in deaf people in Ireland would use English sign language and a Spanish deaf person would use Spanish sign language ?

The languages have nothing in common with spoken languages. They evolved in Deaf communities where people cant hear. It's called Irish sign language as it's the native language of the Deaf community here. All native sign languages are different just like spoken ones. Regional variations, accents etc too.

WrenBoy

anplaya27 wrote: »

The languages have nothing in common with spoken languages. They evolved in Deaf communities where people cant hear. It's called Irish sign language as it's the native language of the Deaf community here. All native sign languages are different just like spoken ones. Regional variations, accents etc too.

cool, thanks.

CucaFace

hawley wrote: »

Boni Odoemene, co-founder of Black and Irish, says while the demonstrations highlighted the issue of racism in Ireland, he believes there is still a long way to go.

"There has been somewhat change in the country, in regards to mainstream discourse, and highlighting the issues that are faced by many black and mixed race people in Ireland," he said.

"One year one, there is still a lot of work to be done.

"Overall there has been a lot more awareness around the issues around race and racism in Ireland, but there is still a lot of work to be done as we move forward as a country."

https://www.q102.ie/news/q102-news/black-and-irish-says-more-work-needed-to-address-racism-in-ireland/

We need to have a conversation around racism in Ireland. It was highlighted earlier in the week on the Claire Byrne. The problem doesn't seem to be getting any better. There is a massive problem with unemployment in the black community. People coming here as asylum seekers need to be supported in education with regard to language skills and suitable working skills. A lot of Irish people don't want to discuss this issue, but it has been shown that there is the problem with racism is worsening here.

Its amazing how many black Brazilians with little to no English can find work here with very little trouble (as they receive no Government handouts as they are not entitled due to their student visa's) but so many Africans who do get free money and housing seem to struggle to find work.... clearly this is because of their colour and Irish being horrible racists and nothing to do with their attitude towards actually getting a job.

biko

Whenever I hear these calls that Ireland is so racist I think of the Mayor of Portlaoise.

Even 15 years ago a Nigerian refugee, Rotimi Adebari, became mayor of a town of 20 thousand people, almost all white.
No-one cared then or now.

That's how racist Ireland is.

biko

If you find cases of racism then challenge them there and then.
If you say it's systemic then you say it's everywhere, when it demonstrably isn't.

Why do these leftists get to generalise when if the rest of use do it's a bad thing?

biko

There is a lot of "seems" and "I think". Not directed at you Fuzzy.

The debate would be better with some actual real examples.
Then we can discuss how common those examples are.

WrenBoy

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

Just to go slightly off in a tangent here.

Irish Sign Language has a very interesting history. It originates in LSF (French sign language) and has a lot in common with other sign languages of the same root - American Sign Language, many continental sign languages.

LSF itself originally evolved organically amongst deaf communities in Paris. It was formalised by early deaf schools, but the underlying language is very much like any other and evolved.

British Sign Language evolved in parallel but separately and, while there are signs familiar to ISL, it’s a different underlying grammar, syntax and approach.

Sign languages use some degree of finger spelling for imported words, so they have a relationship with a spoken / written verbal language, but as those words become more used to they often evolve their own, more flowing gestures and signs.

ISL is a very fluid and interesting language. It’s far from just some kind of tool to convert English into signs. There’s a whole complex grammar, syntax, vocabulary and culture.

A rather narrow-minded (to be polite about it) policy in deaf schools took a view that using lip reading and oralism was more important for integration and banned and even punished the use of sign language. It was an incredibly cruel approach, when you consider that it’s someone’s primary language and most efficient and fluid way or communication. They were being expected to drop their language to suit some notion of conformity within broader society. It’s a history that quite closely parallels the oppression of Irish and other minority languages, yet it went on far longer and later.

Humans are hardwired to communicate so whether it’s verbal or visual, it becomes very rich and complex.

I always thought it’s a terrible shame that we didn’t embrace what is our national visual language much sooner than we did.

I’d encourage anyone to explore it. It’s a bit of Ireland’s culture that was long and very unfairly hidden away and even oppressed.

To get back to topic, when a minority group expresses that they’re being discriminated against, suffering from racism or exclusion : pay attention and don’t dismiss their concerns.

We’re in the majority position and the world can seem a lot smoother and more flawlessly free of those issues, if you’re not experiencing them first hand.

I remember being on the receiving end of some fairly nasty xenophobic stuff in England - just the usual anti Irish nonsense that’s spewed by a small minority. When I explained what happened to English friends of mine they totally downplayed it, because they genuinely didn’t believe it could happen in the England they know.

It’s not that they’re nasty or dismissive but they didn’t experience it themselves and they identify as being similar to me, so they assumed it was wasn’t likely or possible, yet it happened.

You hear the same stories from minority groups all the time and it’s often a well intentioned person who isn’t able to get their head around that attitudes like those exist who’ll dismiss it.

Claims have to be backed up and shown in reality though. Just taking someones word as gospel because of their race is not enough imo. Racist policies and practices that disadvantage someone because of their race should be challenged, calling a country racist just because they are majority white is a nonsense.

Gatling

biko wrote: »

Whenever I hear these calls that Ireland is so racist I think of the Mayor of Portlaoise.

Even 15 years ago a Nigerian refugee, Rotimi Adebari, became mayor of a town of 20 thousand people, almost all white.
No-one cared then or now.

That's how racist Ireland is.

The one that fled Nigeria fearing for her life yet returned to Nigeria to a hero's welcome ,

anplaya27

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

Just to go slightly off in a tangent here.

Irish Sign Language has a very interesting history. It originates in LSF (French sign language) and has a lot in common with other sign languages of the same root - American Sign Language, many continental sign languages.

LSF itself originally evolved organically amongst deaf communities in Paris. It was formalised by early deaf schools, but the underlying language is very much like any other and evolved.

British Sign Language evolved in parallel but separately and, while there are signs familiar to ISL, it’s a different underlying grammar, syntax and approach.

Sign languages use some degree of finger spelling for imported words, so they have a relationship with a spoken / written verbal language, but as those words become more used to they often evolve their own, more flowing gestures and signs.

ISL is a very fluid and interesting language. It’s far from just some kind of tool to convert English into signs. There’s a whole complex grammar, syntax, vocabulary and culture.

A rather narrow-minded (to be polite about it) policy in deaf schools took a view that using lip reading and oralism was more important for integration and banned and even punished the use of sign language. It was an incredibly cruel approach, when you consider that it’s someone’s primary language and most efficient and fluid way or communication. They were being expected to drop their language to suit some notion of conformity within broader society. It’s a history that quite closely parallels the oppression of Irish and other minority languages, yet it went on far longer and later.

Humans are hardwired to communicate so whether it’s verbal or visual, it becomes very rich and complex.

I always thought it’s a terrible shame that we didn’t embrace what is our national visual language much sooner than we did.

I’d encourage anyone to explore it. It’s a bit of Ireland’s culture that was long and very unfairly hidden away and even oppressed.

To get back to topic, when a minority group expresses that they’re being discriminated against, suffering from racism or exclusion : pay attention and don’t dismiss their concerns.

We’re in the majority position and the world can seem a lot smoother and more flawlessly free of those issues, if you’re not experiencing them first hand.

I remember being on the receiving end of some fairly nasty xenophobic stuff in England - just the usual anti Irish nonsense that’s spewed by a small minority. When I explained what happened to English friends of mine they totally downplayed it, because they genuinely didn’t believe it could happen in the England they know.

It’s not that they’re nasty or dismissive but they didn’t experience it themselves and they identify as being similar to me, so they assumed it was wasn’t likely or possible, yet it happened.

You hear the same stories from minority groups all the time and it’s often a well intentioned person who isn’t able to get their head around that attitudes like those exist who’ll dismiss it.

LSF just offered more linguistic structure as it was taught in Deaf schools in in Cabra from 1840 onwards. As long as there have been Deaf people in Ireland there has been a form of sign language. So ISL would have been in place prior to the introduction of LSF. It has commonalities with American due to the FSL influence. British Sign Language is completely different - just look at the alphabets. A Deaf joke is that ISL evolved to be single handed so we could hold our pints and converse.

biko

Gatling wrote: »

The one that fled Nigeria fearing for her life yet returned to Nigeria to a hero's welcome ,

Yes, there are some issues with his story but that's for another thread.

malinheader

I'm white and Irish, if someone at work told me I was a useless Tool I suppose this would be abuse.

I'm black and Irish now,if someone shouted the same is this racist abuse.

anplaya27

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

I’m speaking for me. My point is about broader Irish culture being far too linguistically unaware of its own languages. It just surprises me that it took as long as it did to wake up to the fact we’ve three native languages.

That’s speaking for me. I’m entitled to be critical of Irish politics and culture and have an opinion on the recognition of ISL as much as I have opinions on Gaeilge or English.

My point is just that the broader Irish culture should have been a lot more aware, yet wasn’t and dragged its feet on recognition which didn’t happen properly until extremely recently and I think as a society as it’s something we need a kick up the arse over as it took far too long.

Irish , Irish Sign Language and ? What's the third native language? English is an official one but not native.

FuzzyThinking

FuzzyThinking wrote: »

So we should at least have a better appreciation of what it means to be an equal society, rather than adopting tropes from the horror show that is the US when it comes to polarised politics and horrendous rave relations based on a history of very recent extreme oppression.

The problem is that an equal society would be considered to be unfair. After all, in an equal society where the majority population were white, there would be no need for quotas, positive discrimination, etc. No need for sponsorships exclusively based on race, or any number of other benefits assigned to people based on their race or gender.

The simple truth is that "people" (that would be considered a minority) don't want an equal society... because then their success would be entirely dependent on their life choices, educational successes, skill development, etc. It's simply much easier to claim some kind of discrimination is involved...

hawley

hawley wrote: »

It was highlighted earlier in the week on the Claire Byrne. The problem doesn't seem to be getting any better. There is a massive problem with unemployment in the black community.

Claire Byrne at it again...It's boring at this stage. There is nothing stopping anyone getting a job and then an education and then a better job. It takes hard work and dedication.

If there is a massive problem with unemployment in the black community then they need to sort it out themselves. Jesus wept, there are communities from all over the world living in Ireland getting on with it and not constantly playing the victim card.

KyussB

In the EU, only Finland/Luxembourg have a higher prevalence of perceived racism against black people, than Ireland:
https://fra.europa.eu/sites/default/files/fra_uploads/fra-2019-being-black-in-the-eu-summary_en.pdf

That looks pretty bad for Ireland. This is the kind of thing you likely wouldn't know much about, unless you're from said ethnicity.