Race & Riots

Recently I watched an interview on BBC Newsnight with David Starkey, he was discussing the UK riots and the things he was saying had shocked and offended me greatly. If you have not seen the interview you can watch it here. What surprised me is the fact that he is a historian saying all these ignorant things, you would think that someone as educated as him would have more sense. He was blaming the UK riots on black culture. He stated that it was black people who started rioting in Tottenham due to the shooting of a black man. However he failed to note that it was a white man that shot Mark Duggan which caused the protests in the first place which then escalated into the riots. It is a shame how these riots have become racialized even though people of every race was involved. Here's a quote from the interview

"The whites have become black. A particular sort of violent, destructive, nihilistic gangster culture has become the fashion,"

Here Starkey is associating gangsterism and violence with black culture and saying that white people have adopted this so called black behaviour. As a historian he should know that gangster culture exists in all racial groups. Take the Maffia as an example one of the most known notorious gangs and they are Italians and last time I checked Italians were not Black. Even the show 'Ross Kemp on Gangs' is proof that there are gangs everywhere; it is not something which occurs in only one racial group. Anyways back to the riots, yes there were many black people who did partake in the riots but it should also be noted that riots had also occurred in areas that have an extremely low black population. There were many white people who took part in the riots and there is proof of this in the numerous video footage there are of the riots.

Another quote David Starkey said in reference to the MP David Lammy:

"If you turn the screen off, so you were listening to him on radio, you would think he was white."

From this statement Starkey is implying that speaking proper English is a 'white' characteristic. It is a shame that in society there are people who associate everything positive with being white' and everything negative with being black. This reinforces the whole "white is right" ideology. Can't a black person be educated and speak proper English without it being said that they are acting white? Actually what is acting white and what is acting black? Yes culture influences our behaviours but just because you are a particular race it does not mean you have to act a certain way. For example I despise the terms 'coconut' and 'wigger'. If you get a white child and black child and they are brought up in the same way I guarantee they will act the same. The way you behave is due to environmental factors, culture and most importantly the way you have been socialised. Being a particular skin tone does not mean you automatically adopt characteristics associated with a certain race, it is something that is learned. For example just because you are black it does not mean that you will automatically like chicken. Whether you like it or not depends on your experiences with food growing up.

Here is a video I saw of Nabil Abdul Rashid rebutting David Starkey's point. It is a great video and I advise you to watch it, this guy makes a great argument and he is very knowledgeable in the points he makes.

Written By Dinah