How To Ensure We Continue To Have An Inner City Drug Problem?

Well, this will certainly help!

The police panel, led by Hackney’s Basic Unit commander, Marcus Barnett, admitted that the Met has a problem with officers viewing inner London children as “adults”, adding that what happened to Child Q would probably not have happened to a child living in the Cotswolds, as an example.

Well, maybe because in the Cotswolds, a child is unlikely to go to school smelling so strongly of cannabis that teachers are concerned, perhaps? 

The meeting also revealed that Barnett knew about the girl being strip searched in January 2021. Officers were called due to a teacher wrongly suspecting that she had cannabis.

Not an unreasonable assumption, given her clothes stank of it.  

He added that the school “probably should not have called us and we should probably have understood very quickly that we had no role to play there”.

Why not? Drugs are illegal, aren't they? Aren't you always boasting about your successes when you find some?

"Better put them back, lads. The boss said we've no role to play here after all..."

What exactly do you think you're playing at? Reflexively cringing in front of the mob won't head off the usual suspects at the pass, will it? 

Chanel Dolcy, a solicitor at Bhatt Murphy, which is representing the family in proceedings against the police, said Child Q had launched civil proceedings against the force and her school seeking to hold both institutions to account “to ensure this never happens again to any other child”.

Translation: "Open the taxpayer's pockets, there's more money to be made!" 

The Attitude Holding You Back Has Nothing To Do With The Activity...

Annalize Butler said she felt "like a black unicorn" when she came to the West Midlands and realised how few black people swam.

The Londoner began teaching lessons in Birmingham and Wolverhampton after getting a strong response to a post on social media in 2020.

"I met with people in the West Midlands who were like 'where have you been?'" she said. She set up Black Owned Swim School and wants to teach in 100 pools.

All at once? That's going to be a bit of a tall order, isn't it? 

We have, of course, been here before. But why is there this disparity? Is it because black people have 'an inherent fear of water' as this idiot believes?

"It could be down to the fact that we are still dealing with our self image," Ms Butler said.

Can anyone translate? What does someone's 'self image' have to do with anything? 

Ms Butler runs the swim school with the help of Subira Dalila, from Wolverhampton, who first contacted her about lessons for her children.

"I phoned up Annalize looking for a teaching instructor and she offered either tuition for my children or she offered the opportunity for me to become a swim teacher," Ms Dalila said.

She said it was important to her for her children to have a black instructor as "I feel that they learn better when somebody looks like them".

Really? Why? Does anyone else feel this need to be taught something by someone who 'looks like them'? 

As well as getting more black adults and children swimming, Ms Butler said she wanted to prevent them from drowning.

Being part of an ethnic minority is associated with an increased risk of drowning, according to the World Health Organization.

Well, if that won't prompt them to learn, what will? Or will they just claim that water is racist now? 

But Do You Want Them To Learn About Everything, Troy?

The footballer Troy Deeney is launching an impassioned plea for more widespread teaching of black, Asian and minority ethnic experiences by schools in England, to help combat racism and give children “a balanced and inclusive understanding” of Britain.

'Balanced'..? Really? I suspect that that's the last thing he really wants. 

“I have seen more and more how important it is for my children to be able to see themselves represented in what they are being taught, and learn about the contribution and background of people who look like them,” Deeney said.

“The importance of education at an early age to inform identity and combat racist beliefs and stereotypes cannot be understated.”

As I suspected. What 'stereotypes' do you want to combat, I wonder? The stereotypes of black footballers as barely human savages given far too much money but unable to disguise their basic natures? The stereotype of black people as fools who see 'the enemy' even when the police are trying to help them catch the murderer of one of their own?

“As my mum always says to me, you can’t understand where you’re going if you don’t understand where you’ve come from. Whether it’s too late for my generation, we need to lay a pathway for longer-lasting change for our kids as I believe the current system is failing children from ethnic minorities,” Deeney said.

How, exactly, is it failing children? How did you do at school? 

He was excluded from school at the age of 15 and left without any qualifications. Later, as a professional footballer, he studied and passed GCSEs in English, maths and science.

Say no more. Maybe if young black children aspired to do more with their lives than kick a ball (or their cat!) around, it'd be a start, eh? 

Maybe The Fact Their 'Significant Relationships' Aren't With Parents Is The Issue..?

Former footballer Ian Wright has lamented cuts to youth centres and linked them to “lives being wasted” as he discussed an Arsenal-backed anti-knife crime campaign he is fronting alongside Idris Elba.

*sighs* Here we go again. Why are 'youth clubs' regarded as a key to stopping (mostly) black youths from acting like animals? 

Wright and Elba said one of its aims was to increase spaces for young people which may offer an alternative to gang violence.

Speaking to ITV, the former Arsenal striker said he had been “lucky” when he was growing up to have access to youth workers and “people who were looking out for me”.

You mean, your parents and relatives weren't..? 

“When you look at the last 10 years, 750 youth centres closed down, 4,500 people out of work, youth workers, people you build relationships with, people who know you, and then when you look at the lives that are being wasted… this campaign is about… inspiration and action.”

No, this campaign is about avoiding the elephant in the room. And it's clearly a Loxodonta africana. I don't see a rise in knife crime among young Chinese or Thai youth. 

The campaign was praised by Home Secretary Priti Patel, who described it as “hugely powerful” while Mayor of London Sadiq Khan also backed the drive.

That's all you need to know how effective it'll be, isn't it? 

I Guess You Don't Need To Be Well-Read To Be A Literary Agent...

...at the height of last year’s Black Lives Matter protests I was sent a list, with accompanying photographs, of the top editors working across the major publishing houses in the UK. When I read it I burst into tears. It showed a sea of almost totally white faces...

So whines Natalie Jerome, who clearly never published any history books, or she'd surely have noticed she's living in a majority white country.

...for years, loud and growing calls to diversify its teams have been pretty much ignored. No wonder the industry today finds itself in a complete mess on race.

Does it? According to whom?  

There is a crippling and toxic silence around everyday racism and how it manifests in the media: erasure, sidelining, stunting of careers, the sheer mental exhaustion of operating daily in a predominantly white space and the routine grind of being marginalised.

Surely there must be countries where you'd feel more at home, then? I'm sure they have publishing houses in Africa, and I've no doubt they don't fret over seeing a sea of black faces around the board table... 

Meanwhile, I’ve observed within publishing the increasing mention and use of “sensitivity readers”. What on earth are they, you might ask.

No, I've no need to - I suspect I already know.  

Essentially a little freelance cottage industry of marginalised folk has sprung up, post-Clanchy, to check that books aren’t racist, disablist or any other -ist before they’re sent to print.

Who is stupid enough to voluntarily employ a group of censors and allow th...

Oh. Of course. 

What this means is that the predominantly white editors commissioning and publishing books featuring characters from diverse backgrounds are now checking these books with readers from these backgrounds in order to ensure publication does not cause accidental offence.

Which is an impossible task, because as soon as they've appeased one group, another will spring up, or the existing groups will move the goalposts. 

It's the fallacy of identity politics, and anyone giving people like this woman and her fellow activists a foot in the door deserves to be held hostage to their demands forever. 

Maybe This Doesn't Say What You Think It Says, Gary...

Perennial race-baiter Gary Younge opines once more:

We were not protesting against some new manifestation of racism in Britain, but the enduring nature of it. The YouGov poll from June revealed the percentage of non-white people who think racism was present in society 30 years ago is virtually identical to the proportion who think it is present today.

Maybe that does tell us something, Gary, but I suspect a lot of people - myself included - draw a rather different conclusion from it. 

And wonder why our government and all its agents seem hell-bent on appeasing people who can't, by this evidence, ever be appeased. Whose dissatisfaction with their lot in life isn't based on objective reality. And never will be. 

Here is my proposal. We should do this again; only without the Home Office. We could hold a series of themed public meetings, independent of political parties, across England, on a range of issues, at which a few experts and practitioners in each field could lay out the challenges and then open the floor for people to bear witness (race in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland has its own dynamics, and will need specific proposals).

Didn't Russia try this sort of public denunciation once? I'm sure it did. How'd that turn out, Gary?  

If You Take Your Foot Out Of Your Mouth...

Brook Love, a 63-year-old from Milwaukee, said the outcome was typical of the racial injustice she’s seen throughout her life as a Black woman.

“What happened today is not right,” she said. “Any reasonable person can see that. People call this a judicial system. I call it a non-system, because most systems work. This non-system is not working. It’s a miscarriage of justice.

“If a person of colour would have shot those people, they’d be under the jail. There’s a double standard. How dare anyone call this a judicial system?”

...I'll treat you to a nice cup of Coffee, Brook: 

Case closed.

 

This Isn't The Cause Célèbre You Think It Is...

Cell phone video captured the harrowing moment a teenage mother from California was shot in the back of the head by a school safety officer, leaving her brain dead.

And the non-left on Twitter are making much of the fact that she's not receiving the Saint George Floyd treatment from activists and the press, because the official who fired the shots is black, and she's Hispanic. 

But let's look more closely at the actual details, shall we?  

Rodriguez, who has a five-month-old son, was shot as she drove away from the scene near Millikan High School in Long Beach on Monday.

The scene of what? Well, not just the shooting: 

That afternoon, Rodriguez had gotten into a fight with a 15-year-old girl. She was struck by a bullet while leaving the school in a car with the father of her child, Rafeul Chowdhury, 20, and his 16-year-old brother. None of the people in the car were students at the school.

Translation: She went to finish her beef with the girl, aided by her baby-daddy. But surely, you cry, that shouldn't warrant shooting her?  

Video shows the officer fire two shots at the car, which nearly hits him as it speeds out of the parking lot. Chowdhury was driving the vehicle.

Gosh, that puts a different complexion on it, doesn't it? 

Alex Cervantes, Mona's cousin, told reported she did not deserve to get shot. 'She might have been doing something she wasn't supposed to, but she was unarmed,' he said.

She was in a deadly weapon being aimed at an official trying to stop her fleeing the scene of a crime, though...  

The family have launched up a GoFundMe page to help cover funeral and legal expenses, and to help support Rodriguez's son.

I hope she gets what she's worth. 

Bringing Back The One Drop Rule...

One of Britain’s greatest painters has fallen victim to woke culture, as art-lovers are being warned not to ‘idolise’ J. M. W. Turner because he once held a single share in a Jamaican business that used slave labour.

One share. One... 

During his lifetime, the artist was a liberal and an abolitionist, and his iconic painting The Slave Ship captured the horror of the trade in human lives. But a new exhibition of his work at Tate Britain comes with a warning that some of his pieces could be considered problematic.

To whom? To the real 'general public', or to the tiny but loud minority of woke activists? And if tenuous  slavery links weren't enough... 

The gallery’s director, Alex Farquharson, even warns that Turner’s depictions of steam power are linked to climate change.

*sighs* 

Mr Farquharson says: ‘We should not idolise Turner. His investment in 1805 in a Jamaican cattle ranch worked by enslaved labour suggests he had reset his own moral compass by 1840 when he painted Slave Ship as an indictment of the slave trade.’

The painting was inspired by the Zong massacre of 1781, in which a captain of a British ship ordered 133 slaves to be thrown overboard when drinking water ran low so he could claim insurance money.

Mr Farquharson describes The Slave Ship as salient today because ‘Black Lives Matter demands we confront histories of enslavement, exploitation and genocide whose legacies live on’, but says some critics ‘see its visual splendour as mitigating the horror of its subject’.

Probably the sort of 'experts' who fawn over modern 'art' like this... 

Michael Daley, the director of ArtWatch UK, said it was wrong to impose modern values on historical figures, adding: ‘The trouble is that everybody in the arts wants to play politics and not talk about art.’

Spot on, Mr Daley, and it suffers as a result. 

The episode could expose the Tate to allegations of hypocrisy – ancestors of founder Sir Henry Tate made their fortune from a sugar empire built on the slave trade.

Good. Let them be hoist by their own petard. 

Stop Pandering To These Idiot Snowflakes!

Much of Dan Guthrie’s life has been haunted by...

A family tragedy? Escaping war and strife? Being caught up in a natural disaster like a tornado or earthquake?

...a disturbing mechanised figure resembling a tethered black slave boy, which is supposed to strike a bell hourly in the centre of Stroud.

*blinks* 

He first passed the automaton, which is known in clockmaking circles as a jacquemart, on his way to primary school in the 2000s and then secondary school – and now on his daily journey into work in the Cotswold town.

Has he not heard of Google Maps and their ability to find you an alternate route? Do all roads in Stroud lead past this automaton? 

“It is an offensive racist relic from the transatlantic slave trade, and the fact that it is still up in Stroud is a mystery to me.”

Oh, I can help you with that. It's because the world doesn't revolve around you.

...the debate about the clock’s future has become increasingly fraught since the town’s Conservative MP, Siobhan Baillie, criticised local anti-racists campaigning to have the divisive figure relocated. Baillie said “a certain minority of people with loud voices have an unquenchable desire to be constantly finding things to be outraged at” in a statement published in the local press and on her website last month.

Good lord, I think we might have found an actual real Conservative for once!  

Naturally, the usual suspects spring into action:

The founder of the group, Polly Stratton, a Stroud-based English teacher, says Baillie has poisoned the debate about the clock, which has been moved twice during its history and was last restored in 2004.

By expressing an opinion that the majority in the town probably have, Polly? 

“We didn’t look for this fight...

Oh, really? What, teaching doesn't keep you busy enough? 

... – all we are doing is raising awareness about a racist caricature that is having a traumatic effect on many people of colour in Stroud. Their views should be heard, not shouted down by someone with a public platform,” she says.

Like...you're trying to do to everyone else? 

“We’re not trying to hide it or tear it down. We want it on public display in a museum.”

To do that, wouldn't you have to tear it down? Or do you plan to build the museum around it? 

For an English teacher, you don't seem very bright. Or to appreciate what English words mean...

Baillie – who has spoken in parliament about the distress caused by anonymous racist and misogynistic social media trolls – has also worked with the Kick it Out charity, which campaigns against racism in football. But it firmly disagrees with her stance. “Whether it’s on the football pitch, online or in our town centres, we have to fight racism wherever we find it,” says Tony Burnett, the CEO of Kick it Out. “With that in mind, I would remind Ms Baillie that her work with Kick It Out on online anonymity does not give her a free pass to undermine anti-racist groups.”

What on earth gives this twerp the right to pronounce on this matter? Is the automaton depicted kicking a football? 

Is This Really The Message You Want To Send..?

Racists have been warned to stay away from Ben Nevis after a far-right group unfurled a...

Message banner saying 'Darkies Go Home'? A flaming cross? 

...“white lives matter” banner at the top of Scotland’s highest mountain peak on Sunday.

Wait, what? In what possible universe is that controversial? 

Politicians, anti-racism campaigners, environmentalists and mountain rescue experts united to condemn the action by Patriotic Alternative, a UK white-nationalist group founded by Mark Collett, the British National party’s former director of publicity.

Hang on, I see all the usual pearl-clutching suspects there, but .... mountain rescue experts!? What the hell has it got to do with them?

John Stevenson, the leader of Lochaber Mountain Rescue Team, which covers Ben Nevis, said: “We don’t need this type of political protest on the mountain – especially when it reflects such appalling views. ”

Hang on, chum, you're not there to criticise people's political opinions! And what's so 'appalling' about this message? Do you believe that white lives don't matter?

That'd be a strange thing to believe, wouldn't it?  

Nav Bakhsh, the co-founder of the Glasgow-based Asian hiking group Boots and Beards, which aims to “bring colour to the hills”, said the weekend’s events had made members very uneasy. “Since we set up five years ago, our challenge has been to encourage the BME community to go out and explore Scotland,” said Bakhsh. “Now people are not only worried about health and safety in the hills but whether they will get abuse thrown at them. We’ve tried to calm nerves and explain this is a very small group.”

If they need their nerves calming because someone expresses the view that white people matter too, then there's more wrong with society than I thought... 

Bakhsh also raised concerns about the many foreign tourists at the summit who may have seen the banner. “What message does that give about Scotland, to say that the country is only for white people? We need tourists, especially now.”

That banner doesn't say that, does it, though? It has done an admirable job of smoking out racists, mind you.

Just...not the ones these people imagine. 

Self Censorship Isn't Leadership...

Christian Horner has been accused of giving ‘racists an excuse to let fly their vitriol and evil’ at Lewis Hamilton following his criticism of the Mercedes driver after Sunday’s British Grand Prix.

We can't criticise someone now if they have a touch too much melanin? No matter what they do? 

Lord Hain, vice-chairman of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Formula One, believes Horner will ‘regret’ the remarks he made in the wake of Hamilton’s 180mph collision with Max Verstappen on the opening lap of the Silverstone race.

So did he say something racist? 

‘I am not suggesting that Christian was implying anything racist in what he said. He was talking in pure racing terms and not racist terms and that is obvious.’

If it's 'obvious', why are you complaining? 

‘I hope it was something said in the heat of the moment when Christian was feeling aggrieved. But these are moments when leadership is required and not intemperate outbursts.’

Like the sort of leadership you're showing, in demanding that if the person you feel requires criticism is black, you shouldn't criticise them? 

Close, Hugh, But No Cigar...

Hugh Muir in the 'Guardian':

One could dismiss this as a football terraces thing, but I suspect it is the sharp end of something that’s happening more widely in society. I think we have reached the point in the race in Britain debate where a section of white establishment Britain is saying: “That’s it. We have heard your plight and George Floyd was terrible and yes, perhaps you do need a few more jobs and we can do that, but you keep going on about it and you are making us feel responsible and uncomfortable: we have heard you, but we have heard enough.”

Well, no, Hugh. 

It's more a case of: “That’s it. We have heard your constant whining about your supposed awful life in this country and how you are 'in pain' for the not-untimely death of yet another member of your wretched 'community' across the pond who spent his time on earth preying mostly on you, and we are just about reaching saturation point; if you don't like the way we run our country, you're free to leave, and frankly, we'd be happy to see the back of you.” 

Six months ago the pollsters Opinium asked people what they thought about BLM and were told that 55% of adults polled believed BLM had increased racial tension.

One wonders just what the other 45% think - surely it can't be that they've decreased it?!? 

Free Speech For Me, Never For Thee...

Mike Roper, the headteacher of Allerton Grange high school in Leeds, was forced to apologise after he claimed in an assembly that some people saw the flag as a “symbol of antisemitism”.

Video of the speech was posted online, going viral and prompting a backlash and protests, with extra police having to be posted outside the school.

'The flag' being the Palestinian flag, of course. If he'd said the same about the Union flag the 'Guardian' would probably be giving him a guest writer's spot...

The assembly was intended, the school said, to address tensions within its multiracial student community caused by the situation in Israel.

But instead the speech brought accusations of “blatant Islamophobia” and staff being instructed to help students into and out of school safely following the furious response.

In other words, teachers had to plan for the usual screeching outside the school gates from the usual mob. 

Similar disputes have occurred in schools across the UK since the latest deadly violence in Israel and Gaza, with questions raised over why children expressing support for Palestine are being accused of antisemitism and in some cases subjected to disciplinary action.

So they are being disciplined for expressing an opinion? 

No. Don't be silly. That only happens to the staff!

During a protest at Clapton girls’ academy in east London, students sat down and chanted “free Palestine”, refusing to return to lessons.

See? They weren't disciplined for having an opinion at all, but for their actions in refusing to attend school and learn something other than the tribal hatreds they undoubtedly learn at home, or at the local mosque. 

The Scottish Green MSP Ross Greer said: “Imagine being a Palestinian kid at this guy’s school, being told your national flag is inherently hateful. Absolutely outrageous.”

We get told ours is that all the time, usually by morons like you. We just laugh and shrug it off. 

The author and Cambridge University academic Priyamvada Gopal also reacted with dismay to the video.

Oh, well, this'll be good! 

She said: “Young people can be taught about the evils of antisemitism, and they can learn about the Palestinian flag and its importance to a people’s struggle for self-determination. We are all capable of holding more than one thought in our head at the same time, and students should not be patronised by pretending otherwise.”

There's no evidence you can manage even one, love. 

Daniel Kebede, a senior vice-president of the National Education Union, said schools should be a safe space that allowed young people to explore difficult subjects.

It should. But it should be the same for the staff, too. And it's not, is it? 

"Gissa Job!"

Hollywood figures are calling for...

Roast swan? A pet yak in their trailer every night? 

...more diversity in hair and makeup departments on sets, after Black actors came forward about their experiences of racism including being told there was no budget to cut hair of their type.

Oh...apparently, this is a thing now. Racist hairstyling. Who knew? 

Camille Friend, a top stylist who has worked on Black Panther, Tenet and Captain Marvel, said hair stylists who don’t know how to work with Black hair should not be working on film or TV sets.

Even if the show has no black actors? 

Friend also believes the actors’ union needs to make the necessary changes as they hold much of the power. “[The Screen Actors Guild] is a very powerful union and they have the power to change the rules for their actors of color,” she said.

“They can require Black actors to have a say in who is hired for hair and makeup departments, including barbers. This should be a requirement.”

Let me guess - one of those people they'd then insist on would be...you? 

Sheffield Hallam's Gain Is Surrey Police's Loss...

As students and staff contemplate returning to campus after a long time away, I am moving in the opposite direction. After 13 years as an academic, in love with my subject and with teaching, and in the midst of a pandemic, I’m leaving – to join the police and contribute to society in a different way.

So declares Eddie Tembo. But ... why?

As a black academic in a UK university, I became accustomed to defending myself to students and sometimes to staff. “Yes, I really do have a doctorate.” “No, it was not awarded to me to fill a quota.” At early career conferences I encountered disbelief that I could have published a book.

Well, yes, and how much of this is fallout from the sort of affirmative action projects and schemes that the progressives have demanded? 

I’ve had painful experiences at the hands of former colleagues, including the use of racist language and the overt propagation of racist stereotypes.

Such as? We get no examples in the article. We never do, do we, Reader..? 

More subtle racism was harder to deal with, such as sidelining (always hard to prove) or the use of strategic appointments – a modern variant of the old boys’ club – to fill vacancies.

Ah, yes, the old 'I can't prove it's racism but that's what it must be' gambit. But ... why didn't you say anything at the time?

What I perhaps should have done was to report every incident to my line managers. Instead, I remained largely silent, confiding only in colleagues, friends and family. It is hard to say why it was difficult to speak up. Concern about being asked to provide tangible evidence of racism, not being supported, or simply being labelled a troublemaker by a management body that was far from ethnically diverse were all factors.

So you'd have fely better complaining to others of your own race? But we're the racists, not you? 

There has been some recognition of my work. I gained fellowship status of the Higher Education Academy. I was nominated for or won student-led awards: best dissertation supervisor; inspirational teaching; most inspiring lecturer; outstanding personal academic tutor. In 2019 I was shortlisted for a Nottinghamshire Black Achiever’s award.

And that wasn't enough to convince you? 

Despite this I had grown increasingly disillusioned by the lack of diversity and felt more needed to be done – an effort with which I had indicated I was willing to assist.

By leaving? For a 'company' that clearly hasn't done any due diligence into the sort of person they are hiring?

Is It 'Justice' You Want, Or Someone With Deep Pockets To Blame?

Sonali Bhattacharyya, a volunteer with the Justice for Belly campaign group, said campaigners were calling for an inquest into her death and a public inquiry to determine if GTR was culpable.

She said: “We’re here today on the first anniversary of Belly Mujinga’s death, united in anger and grief.

“A year on, and her family still have no answers. They still wait for justice.”

But they do have answers. They just aren't the ones they want... 

A lawyer for Mrs Mujinga’s family, Lawrence Davies, said the force had refused to disclose the suspect’s name, preventing them from pursuing a private prosecution and further civil claims.

Because there's no evidence that the supposed incident had anything to do with her death, and a lot - specifically, a negative covid test - that it didn't: 

BTP asked the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) to review the evidence and look into whether there were any further lines of inquiry, but prosecutors ruled out homicide charges.

CCTV footage of the interaction, which lasted around 15 seconds, was said to not show any conclusive evidence a criminal offence took place, while results from a Covid-19 test on March 25 confirmed the suspect had not been infected with the virus.

DNA evidence from Mrs Mujinga’s clothing was inconclusive, while witness accounts did not provide a consistent enough picture to bring charges, according to the CPS.

So what sort of 'justice' is it that you - or more accurately, the leeches battening on to you - want to see, exactly? 

You Shouldn't Ask A Question When You Might Not Like The Answer...

As the discussions around gender violence continue, a story about a young Black woman has resurfaced.

Blessing Olusegun’s body was found last September on Bexhill seafront.Blessing was a 21-year-old from south London who worked in Sussex caring for elderly patients. Just one week into her placement, she was reported as missing and later found dead in Bexhill-on-Sea. Her death was “inconclusive” (Ed: I think she means 'cause of death', she's pretty conclusively dead!) and the postmortem examination found no external or internal injuries on her body.

Now people are starting to ask for more answers.

Like...what? That she was murdered by those cunning white supremacists that supposedly infest this green and pleasant land?  

Would Blessing’s death have garnered more attention if she was a white woman?

Ah. Right. Well, maybe, maybe not. 

Sarah Everard, of course, was murdered. And allegedly by a serving policeman. That would make her story newsworthy no matter what colour she was. 

How can people be concerned with Black women’s welfare if we aren’t included in gender violence conversations?

I'll include you, happily. But given you mostly meet your deaths and injuries at the hands of your own race, you might not like how that conversation develops... 

Well, You've Convinced Me...

Yaa Gyasi, a novelist apparently, and one can only hope she writes more coherently than in this whine for the 'Guardian':

I was thinking about that driver’s words again last summer as news poured in about the killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor. I was thinking about the way in which white people, in order to justify their own grotesque violence, so often engage in a kind of fiction, an utterly insidious denialism that creates the reality it claims to protest. By which I mean an unwillingness to see the violence that is actually happening before you because of a presumption of violence that might happen, is itself a kind of violence. What exactly can a man with a knee on his neck do, what can a sleeping woman do to deserve their own murder?

Well, on the one hand, be a convicted career criminal who held a gun to a pregnant woman's belly, and on the other, be the ex-girlfriend of a drug dealer and sleeping with a man who shoots at the police when they enter with a warrant.  

You've never heard that expression 'Lie down with dogs, wake up with 9mm bullet holes', Yaa?

So many of the writers of colour that I know have had white people treat their work as though it were a kind of medicine. Something they have to swallow in order to improve their condition, but they don’t really want it, they don’t really enjoy it, and if they’re being totally honest, they don’t actually even take the medicine half the time.

You've convinced me your brand of snake oil isn't worth taking, that's for sure. I won't be buying your opus. Or reading it for free, either.

It's The 'No Smoke Without Fire' Campaign...

Cambridgeshire Police have received dozens of allegations of racism by their staff over the last five years - but not one of them have been upheld.

132 police officers and staff were investigated between 2015 and 2020, but not one faced disciplinary action.

So, two conclusions to be drawn here. Anyone want to guess who is drawing the most advantageous one for their hobby horse? 

Campaigners have called for allegations to be re-investigated after the figures were branded "disgusting" and forces were accused of "gaslighting" victims of discrimination.

Yes, they are disgusting, when you think about it. But I suspect I think so for vastly different reasons than you... 

Katrina Ffrench, chief executive of StopWatch, which campaigns to make police more accountable, said the figures highlight a toxic culture within the UK's law enforcement.

They highlight a toxic culture, all right. But I don't think it's in the police...