Thursday, 15 September 2011

I can't believe it every day and every night....got caught queue jumping at Gatwick and Britain's racist slurs were in sight.... Kelis, an old man and Britain pull of a UN Racism event.... Britain again promotes itself in a negative light to the worl

So today I am going to take a sidestep from politics and refer to a topic, which has caused me to think of how our national pride and identity may have suffered two damaging blows in the space of 24 hours. First we will focus on what has turned into the main trending topic on Twitter, involving American R&B singer Kelis which had claimed she was racially abused and discriminated against at Gatwick airport when she jumped the queue at passport control.

This is where it is claimed that a man took offence to the queue jumping and according to Kelis on her Twitter was alleged to of been called a "disgusting Nigerian" and "kunta kinte", which is a character from the slavery novel Roots by Alex Haley. This was said in front of Kelis's two-year old Son Knight and over 50 people also queuing at passport control. Over the course of today more details of the story have been released through Kelis's Twitter, which have included that the racist remarks seemed to have happened after the flight  from Gatwick to Spain where Kelis has claimed that the man continued to call her a "slave" and obliged that she called him "sir", but this occured at passport control in Spain, not at Gatwick.

With all this information being released and the Home Office announcing they will take no action into the matter because the incident that took place was from a "member of the public" and because Kelis did not make a formal complaint. This could be seen as the Home Office following formal rules and regulations, but I think this is another example of an old fashioned way of thinking because even though it is only one individual it seems that we are trying to forget that any form of racism is wrong and should not be treated with contempt and should be treated with the most highest severity.

Then we can look at the other part of today's news that I feel has shown once again that sometimes Britain can be seen as part of the problem, even though we do help fight to bring a solution. Today was the beginning of events commemorating 10th anniversary of the United Nations World Conference on racism in South Africa and Prime Minister David Cameron announced that the UK would not be sending anyone over the commemorate the occasion and have "withdrawn" their invitation. This has been done due to the events of the original conference 10 years ago, which the Prime Minister felt was overshadowed by the immoral acts of "deplorable anti-semisitsm."


Now I fully agree with the Prime Minister when the conference took place days prior to the events of 9/11 and that the event was overshadowed by protests of Israel treatment of the Palestinians people by the Arab nations and the anti-semistic world of the draft documents, which led to the original withdrawal of the United States and Canada from the original conference, but the world has moved on since. I think that it would show a sign of unity that the UK agrees and joins the UN's stance on not tolerating any form of racism or abuse against human rights.

The conference has again been boycotted by the United States and Canada, as well as Australia, Italy and Israel, but the argument here is it a show of unity boycotting an event that was overshadowed by forms of racism or is it ignorance where these countries should be uniting in the continued fight against racism and equality across the world. It would show a sign that our government, as well as other are united in this cause and that any problems that the world face's is tackled in an united cause and not ignore the problem by boycotting an event.

We live in one of the most diverse multi-cultural societies in the world and racism is not something that is a problem with the majority, it is only the minority that cause this issue. What we need to realise those is sometimes it takes a twitter rant from a famous singer to spark an debate that will also be rife in society and I felt I needed to comment about something that gets on my nerves when you see something you want to speak up.

 I am also not saying that the government do not tackle the problem of racism at home and abroad because we do, but I do not feel ignore chance to show a sign of united solidarity is the way to do it.

Tomorrow we will be back to normal with my political views of the day, but I just needed a forum to vent my opinion on something that is not right.


Kelis who today felt that the UK showed how they are "racially decades behind progression."

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