Stereotypes and how to not beat them

I think we can all agree that, with the exception of all English ones, stereotypes are very funny things indeed. The image of an overweight, bearded man clad in lederhosen with a beer in one hand and a sausage on a fork in the other while chanting in something vaguely resembling a language would cause most of us to burst out in hearty guffaws and affirmations of “that’s Jerry!”

Stereotypes are a prime example of something I’ve always firmly believed in: “if it’s not offensive, it’s probably not funny”. The herzblut of good international relationships is on the one hand the ability to ridicule your neighbour’s culture (the potency of which usually in direct proportion to number of alcohol units per mL of blood) with your fellow compatriots, and on the other hand the grudging respect to admit to yourself that they do make fine cheese or have cool moustaches or whatever, and compliment them for that.

I like stereotypes. I’m not racist enough to think that most people fit them (except for in the case of suave, mysterious Englishmen who all talk like James Bond and suffer from chronic satyriasis), but at the same time I’m also not hippy enough to deny that there are quite a few people out there who do fit those stereotypes. You know who you are, Hans.


I think exposing people to stereotype clichés is a pretty good starting point for learning about other people’s culture too. I mean, imagine you had to tell someone about Indians and their culture, someone who had not an inkling of what an “Indian” was or whether or not they could eat one; for the sake of this argument, let’s say an Eskimo from the planet Mars. If you try to explain all about them in the...*shudder* “PC way”, you’re only gonna confuse them as to where the differences lay between them and us (and let’s not pretend that’s a racist statement). Saying things like “Indians are just like us, except with a darker complexion, although they come in loads of different races and ethnicities actually; also they live in India, a country which Britain used to rule, and so over the centuries both cultures have intertwined like the fingers of like two primary school children discovering the fuzzy feelings in their tummies for the time, etc etc” – it’s needless.

You can play on stereotypes without being offensive because you’re talking about traditional culture and that’s more often than not where stereotypes stem from. That and rape statistics *cough*. But there’s nothing wrong with telling people that they’re the brown-skinned natives of India, most of whom adhere to Hinduism and revere cows, or about the bindi (little spot on the forehead), half-naked tribal dances, dome-like architecture and families with truckloads of kids. You make things a lot more interesting that way, and besides, any intelligent person will already know that’s it only a small percentage of people (particularly the country bumpkins – oops!)* who fit the total stereotype like Cinderella’s slipper.


But then, like father with two children and only enough money to take one on holiday with him, we come to a problem. Some countries just don’t have stereotypes. Countries who haven’t invented anything remarkable enough so that we all associate them with the electric vibrator, not infamous enough for us to portray them as austere, soulless beings, and not big enough for us to care about them.

Countries like these make me angry, and so with a globe in one hand, a mouse in the other, and deviant, sleep-deprived mind acting as a malicious driving force, I sought to purge a few of them of their blissful anonymity. Let this be a lesson to the rest of you.

Luxembourg: Okay, this kinda sounds like “Sucks-‘em-bad”, so I’m thinking this is a country full of prostitutes that France and Germany occasionally visit when their wives aren’t looking. Sucks-‘em-badders take it deep!!

Faroe Islands: These people toil around a river all day and worship Tutankhamen. Millennia of warring with neighbouring tribes has made them distrustful of foreigners and so the gates to their settlements are guarded by hulking, 7 foot tall sentinels, specifically chosen from birth to serve the current ruler and protect the people.

Eritrea: This country is home to anomalously hairy folk who spend most of their time playing the piano and cart wheeling to their next destination. Known to have a considerably high IQ, an insatiable lust for moss and a hilarious, but unnecessary, tendency to lick the ears of passersby.

Chechnya: The small, ewok-like creatures of this unrecognised state are locked in an ongoing war with the Imperial Stormtroopers to the north, comprising multiple skirmishes in the Chechnyan heartlands. Have been noted by numerous sources to live in cities built entirely in the treetops, and to be wary, but approachable, people.

In retrospect, this list looks more like a bestiary than a list of tongue-in-cheek pseudo-stereotypes. Well what the hell, I’ve vented and I feel a lot better for it anyway.

It’s worth noting that whereas racism is the malformed baby born from the womb of malevolence – the lovechild of Mr. Illogical Fear and his mistress Domina Contempt – stereotypes are not a direct manifestation of racism. Ignorance maybe, but just because you’re making a joke about something or someone doesn’t mean you hate it. I love foreign people, some people would say too much, but I don’t allow my little xenophilic fetish to get in the way of what really matters – making fun of other people to make yourself feel bigger. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a find a nerd to pick on.

Holy shit, one more post about race and I get my BNP membership card!

Race Schism

Articles on "racism" seem to come in two different types these days: the ones that rag on about propelling the master race into a golden age of supremacy, and the ones that criticise the modern approach of "political correctness" to perceived racism. I think most of you will be relieved to learn that this rant falls into the second category, and I also think that most of us will agree when I say that racism is generally a bad thing.

Racism has been around for umpteen thousands of years. Humans have always been eager to draw upon differences in one another, categorising those who they consider to be less desirable and seeking dominance over them. In many ways this puts racism on the same level as sexism and classism. The more recent African Slave Trade and South African apartheid laws overshadow most other examples of racism; in fairness not entirely due to their somewhat contemporary status, but the fact that they were mass organised campaigns, approved by the law and aided by the government makes it all the more worrying.

All the way up the 14th century Viking raiders regularly captured slaves from the British Isles and Eastern Europe, where they were prized in the Islamic world for their light skin. The word "slave" actually derives from the word "Slav" (an umbrella demonym used to classify native inhabitants of Eastern Europe) due the huge amount of slaves taken from those areas.

But before this turns into a one-sided debate on the slave trade, allow me to turn back to the original topic of racism.

I was inspired to write this after a few particularly nonsensical articles that I read recently made me wonder what the fuck was going on inside the heads of the people that wrote them. I don't agree with racism, even though I kinda do understand where it stems from in most cases. What I don't understand is the extent of the hypercorrection some societies strive towards, introducing truly ridiculous measures that only have detrimental effects on what they are trying to accomplish.

Allow me to demonstrate my point with an extract:

"In July 2008, the London-based National Children's Bureau released a 366-page guide counseling adults on recognizing racist behavior in young children. The guide, titled Young Children and Racial Justice, warns adults that babies must also be included in the effort to eliminate racism. The bureau says to be aware of children who "react negatively to a culinary tradition other than their own by saying 'yuck'." Nursery staff must be alert for racist remarks among toddlers, a government-sponsored agency report has said."

Okay, I don't even know where to begin to dissecting this...Let's start here: The bureau says to be aware of children who "react negatively to a culinary tradition other than their own by saying 'yuck'." So, what you're basically saying is that if you express dislike for another culture's food, that's a racist statement? A lot of children are fussy with food, so it's pretty much redundant to make judgements based on that. Moreover, most people favour the foods they were given as children, so if a child is suddenly given something completely different to what he's used to, it wouldn't be much of a surprise if he turns out not to like it.

Next up: The guide...warns adults that babies must also be included in the effort to eliminate racism. Babies? Not children, but BABIES? Okay, so a child's upbringing has a lot to do with how he feels about people outside of his community; the unhappiness of a childhood is often indirectly proportional to how much animosity is felt towards foreigners, but that's the ADULT'S responsibility to provide a proper environment and set an example, not the baby's. The baby cannot control where it grows up or what it's exposed to, so instead of trying to "include babies in eliminating racism", why not try focusing on the source of the problem instead, i.e. THE PARENTS?

Finally: Nursery staff must be alert for racist remarks among toddlers, a government-sponsored agency report has said. The younger generations of this country are some of the most tolerant and anti-racist people ever. And do you know why? It's not because they were monitored as children and reprimanded every time they uttered some perceived racist statement; it's not because they had their behaviour judged and "corrected" every time they interacted with someone slightly higher up than them on the Von Luschan Scale; it's not even because they were brainwashed into liking chicken korma and Jollof rice.

It's because they were left alone. Letting children be in a multi-cultural environment is what dispels racist feelings, and it's the lack of interference that directly allows that to happen. Take this example: if you were to make a huge deal about the acceptance of ginger-haired kids, with loads of workshops and lessons dedicated to that, then you'd inadvertently be making it a bigger issue than it really is and drawing more and more attention to something that doesn't warrant it.

Yes, racism is an issue, but hardly in the primary schools of the UK. This isn't 1950s America where groups of white students would make plans to "beat up the black kid" after school, nor is it Middle Africa where racism is a HUGE problem and results in entire ethnic groups being enslaved by more powerful groups. This is the UK, which is and always has been an open hub for cultures to mix, mesh and occasionally clash together.

I actually believe that racism is independent of the law. Giving equality status is a very good thing, don't get me wrong, but it isn't a magical legislation that all of a sudden means alters peoples' tolerance towards those of other races. Take this extract for example, referring to Rosa Parks, the famous African-American woman who refused to give up her seat on the bus to a white man in 1955.

When Parks refused to give up her seat, a police officer arrested her. As the officer took her away, she recalled that she asked, "Why do you push us around?" The officer's response as she remembered it was, "I don't know, but the law's the law, and you're under arrest."

The officer's response was not, "You have violated the law by not giving up your seat to a white man", it was just "I don't know, it's the law". The man probably had a lower opinion of black people, as was the standard at the time, but I'd put bets on him not feeling a genuine hatred for them. And even after the law was changed and black people were given equal rights to the white folk, there was still strong racism amongst the masses. The main reason why it's a lot less prominent these days is because people have just gotten used to living in close proximity to people of other races.

It's silly to try and enforce pointless "anti-racist" principles, such as the banning of national flags on establishments, because that only drives different groups into isolation. The truth is that people don't want to be a homogenous mass of un-individuals with no liberty to flaunt their differences, because most people are proud of where they're from and like to openly express it. It even causes perfectly reasonable things, like a Muslim mosque being given thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money to promote their religion, to arouse ire in the surrounding non-Muslim community because it gives the impression that you're favouring one group over another; or more importantly, a foreign group over the native peoples.

A truly anti-racist society wouldn't try to impose any restrictions other than equality laws for all people sharing the common land, because the fastest way a government can evoke xenophobic sentiments in its population is by putting an ethnic minority group in the spotlight and glamorising them.

Letting the populace alone encourages groups to form their own communities, i.e. the Black Community, the Muslim Community, the Gypsy Community, which lets people revel in their own culture, but the proximity factor and the fact that all the people will be working the same jobs, attending the same schools and walking the same streets encourages the groups to mix - which is a good thing. It's all about finding the right balance between respecting different communities and promoting your own, which at the moment works very well in this country.


Deviating back to my earlier point, people hate being grouped into a mass. It's the reason why a lot of people not only hate, but fear, communism and on a sub-conscious level it's why we're so repulsed by zombies - they're all like-minded, interchangeable blobs with no determining differences between them.

I dislike a lot of things, but Political Correctness is something I truly hate. Those two words conjure up images in my mind of brainless, middle-aged white men and women clad in generic business suits who act like characters from the Sims; doing the same things over and over again for the sake of it with no perception of the bigger picture, and whose emotions are limited to either complete apathy, or the polar extremes of happy and sad, and solve all their problems with algorithms. They only address issues superficially, and even then they manage to fuck that up.

I just hope I live to see the day when black, white, Asian and Eskimos can all gleefully skip down the street together holding hands and singing songs, because when that day comes, I'll know I've finally lost it.

If all races are supposedly equal in this country, why do black people get more melanin than us?