Job Discussion Forums

[usool]

I would like to engage here. I'm an Asian British. The Racism that I have personally experienced in Saudi takes some beating. I hear Kuwait is worse. No excuses should be offered for this. There is raxism here in England, but what makes the situation in Saudi worse is that they make an overt claim to follow Islam and yet Saudi is one of the least Islamic places I have experienced.

[Cleopatra]

What was the nature of the racism you were subjected to?

Did it involve guys in cars shouting insults, comments from students or colleagues, or was it more subtle?

[Frank Verity]

At GPT in Riyadh the geriatric Yorkshire freemason used to stagger along the corridors shouting rudeness at various teachers.He also used to make snide and saucy comments to students about teachers.
I blame Madam Thatcher for closing down the public lunatic asylums.

[kanterbrau]

Usool, thank you very much for your contribution.

When I read your comments I was happy and sad at the same time. Happy that you were willing to share your first-hand experiences with us and also sad that you had to go through them at all.

I particularly enjoyed your comment about Saudi Arabia and Islam. A good point - well made.

Best regards.

Good Luck.

[Frank Verity]

You don't have to endure gratuitous racial abuse;I explained to an elderly
English drunk who had the physique of a goblin, that if he persisted in crass verbal insolence he would have the sybaritic pleasure of my company in court whereupon this particular piece of antiquated imbecility
became very taciturn.

[dmb]

[veiledsentiments]

This is really getting tiresome. Little Frankie seems to sing only one note...

People in glass houses...

VS

[dmb]

[veiledsentiments]

... a leaf? You'd probably just roll it and smoke it...

VS

[Frank Verity]

[quote="veiledsentiments"]This is really getting tiresome. Little Frankie seems to sing only one note...



We shall overcome.

[blindjackdog]

I think Frank would concur that the greatest gift the British Isles have given the world is their brand of absurdist humour, which can always be guaranteed to sail stratospherically over the heads of any passing North Americans.

A recurring feature of the genre is the pathological repetition of neurotic obsessions.

To wit: I find Frank's single note increasingly hilarious.

And I'm sure he's as aware as any of us that Susan Sontag would eat him at one sitting (intellectually speaking).

And don't you find, VS, that the insults become less 'offensive' with each re-iteration?

At which (detecting a suggestion of thinness of skin) you'll say that you wouldn't be offended by such a pathetic man's attempted insults anyway. Which is a fair point. Perhaps the point.

But you did refer to 'hate posts'. Drawing rather a long bow don't you think?

And the old 'racist is a racist is a racist whatever their skin colour' is, I think, a bit reductivist really. I like Derrida's remark that the West invented racism, and you'd at least have to agree that context (historical I mean) makes quite a difference in these matters.

I can't be bothered going into it much, but, well, don't you think that in, say, the US for argument's sake, a hateful comment about a person's race is going to resonate more deeply if the victim is of African, Asian or American descent, rather than European? Ie if their skin-colour is darker than the blotchy reddy pink that passes for 'white' in our adorably classless and value-free language.

There's nothing more revolting than a 'white' Western tourist (or teacher for that matter) who's pride has just been dented (owing generally to their ignorance of local languages and customs more than anything else), turning to their mates and accusing the noodle-seller, prostitute, ticket salesperson or begger who has offended them of 'racism'. Or even better, the entire country is similarly condemned on the basis of this incident.

Another benefit of the liberal education so unreflectively celebrated by Shadowfax (the feel-good fascist): it gives us to believe that we have the right to speak authoritatively (and the more authoritatively the better) about that which we know - can know - absolutely nothing.

[veiledsentiments]

The difference is that in the US at least the existence of racism, sexism, and hate is recognised and even now supposedly banned by laws. Thoughtful people see it and make some attempt to change it... though human nature being what it is, the success rate is low.

Go back to dear Frank's posts and in place of his repetetive little scree on a certain type of UK expat (which we have all encountered) and women and substitute some typical anti Black or Brown or Arab or Muslim or Subcon stereotype - repeat it endlessly every day on various threads. I suspect that he would have been banned on here under those circumstances. The fact that he uses big words and pompous prose doesn't make him any better than those who use the more common gutter language. His supposed attempts at 'absurdist humor' are obvious, but weak and don't change his message.

It would be awfully nice if the theoretically equality of Islam were followed any more closely than the laws on the books in the US. But, I too often found that there are just as many brown-skinned hatemongers like Frank in the ME as there are KKK members on the US. Both thankfully rare, but still too many... The difference is that in the ME they declare that it does not exist because it would be haram, but of course it does exist... the same as it seems to among all humans.

BTW... has anyone ever noticed if Mr Frank ever provided a useful piece of practical information on here?

VS

[Frank Verity]

A truly scintillating post Mr Blindjackdog,with all the penetration of Kant and the certitude of Malenbranche.However,whether Susan Sontag could actually devour Verity is highly debatable (cosmically) because Ms Sontag who referred to the white race as 'the cancer of human history actually expired earlier this year-of cancer.On hearing of her demise I was reminded of the haunting lines of Catullus:-
Death devours all lovely things;
Lesbia with her sparrow
Shares the darkness- presently
Every bed is narrow

[Frank Verity]

For those who prefer the more common gutter language a more earthy if not actually cloacal epitaph might be the 16th century English ditty;
February fill dyke,be it black or be it white.

[KSA-UK]

Easy Frank !