Why Culture and Context are Key to Racism Ruling

By Liam Tomkins (@liam_tomkins) via Kopsource

Luis Suarez has been handed an eight-game ban and £40,000 fine for using a word which, in his culture, is completely commonplace and when used in the context he is claiming, far from offensive, let alone racist.

But that is the tag he must now wear as the Football Association have adjudged the use of the term ‘negrito’ to be pejorative and, thus, a breach of the rules worthy of unprecedented punishment. This verdict raises a profound question: what is racism? Is it in the intent of what is said, or the interpretation of how it is heard? It would seem, according to the FA at least, to be the latter.

Read the full article here - (well worth a read, whoever you support: The Urbanite)

David Starkey's New Career

Yesterday, The Urbanite blogger Talal predicted that David Starkey's career was on the brink of ending after his Enoch Powell inspired rant on Newsnight on Friday night, in which he argued that black culture was the reason that white people joined in the London riots and that black people who spoke well 'sounded white'.

Well, it seems that those predictions were slightly premature.  It has come to our attention that Starkey has already reinvented himself as....wait for it....a rapper! Check out the video below and tell me that the guy doesn't have bars.

Tinie Tempah watch out, this guy is coming for your crown.....

Sick....

The End of David Starkey, I hope

This Post is Brought to you by Talal Rajab, of The Urbanite

As a History graduate, I used to respect David Starkey.  Although Tudor history was not always my favourite subject I loved his style of writing and his Channel 4 programme on the monarchy excited the geek inside me. 

As I heard more of his political and moral views, however, I began to like him less and less.  It started with his appearances on Question Time and the lazy, stereotypical Daily Mail-esque attacks on New Labour.

It then got worse when he made an appearance on Jamie Oliver’s ‘Dream School’ and bullied a kid about his weight in order to get kudos from the other schoolchildren.  He ultimately failed to understand the troubled kids on the programme and appeared out of touch and erratic. 

So maybe I should not have been surprised by his comments on Newsnight last night.  Maybe I should have expected it.  For those that missed it, here is a selection:

David Starkey – “I have just been re-reading Enoch Powell, The Rivers of Blood Speech, his prophesy was absolutely right in one sense. The Tiber did not foam with blood but flames lambent, they wrapped around Tottenham and wrapped around Clapham.  But it wasn’t inter-communal violence.  This is where he was completely wrong. What’s happened is that a substantial section of chavs…have become black.  The whites have become black.  A particular sort of violent, nihilistic gangster culture has become the fashion.  And black and white, boy and girl, operate in this language together.  This language, which is wholly false, which is this Jamaican patois that has been intruded in England. And this is why so many of us have this sense of literally, a foreign country”.

The Riots That Will Define My Generation

This Post is brought to you by Talal Rajab, of The Urbanite

Having been bought up and raised in North London, right bang in between Tottenham and Enfield, this weekend’s events have left a sour taste in my throat.  Seeing the streets that you call home in disarray, the shops that you visit burnt down and the community that you love given a bad name hurts.  Shop keepers have lost businesses, people have been made homeless and the decades of community work that has gone in around this area has been rendered meaningless within the space of 48 hours by the actions of idiotic thugs. 

What hurts even more, however, is the misinformation and ill-advised comments that I have witnessed on various media platforms and social networking sites over the weekend regarding the trouble in North London. 

From the shotgun reaction from certain sections of the media, who quickly labelled Mark Duggan a ‘gangsta’ who shot at police without waiting for verification of the facts, to the completely idiotic muppets on twitter and Facebook who called for fellow North London residents to ‘rise up against the f***ing feds’, what we have witnessed here is a merry-go round of claims and counter-claims that has finally escalated into the apocalyptic headlines that we see today.  Some of these claims clearly need to be addressed.