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Jarvis Cocker or David Bowie or AVB or Johnny Borrell, she isn't picky

Cavey Cocker, Cup Cake Queen, Saint Thomas.

"I had the good fortune to command a battalion that was racially very mixed. Towards the end, I had five company sergeant majors who were all black. They were without exception UK-born, Nottingham-born men who were English - as English as you and me. They prospered inside my regiment, but if you'd said to them: 'Have you ever been called a nigger?' they would have said: 'Yes.' But equally, a chap with red hair, for example, would also get a hard time - a far harder time than a black man, in fact.

"But that's the way it is in the army. If someone is slow on the assault course, you'd get people shouting: 'Come on you fat bastard, come on you ginger bastard, come on you black bastard.'

"I came across a lot of ethnic minority soldiers who were idle and useless, but who used racism as cover for their misdemeanours. I remember one guy from St Anne's (Nottingham) who was constantly absent and who had a lot of girlfriends. When he came back one day I asked him why, and he would say: 'I was racially abused.' And we'd say: 'No you weren't, you were off with your girlfriends again.'

"In my experience, when you put on the uniform then all differences disappear. If you are a good soldier, you will do well. If you are a bad soldier, you will leave prematurely. There is a degree of colour-blindness among the vast majority of soldiers.

"I never came across a piece of nastiness inside the battalion that was based exclusively on racism."


Sorry, I don't see that at racism.

Yes, as a politician he should have realised that would have caused a fuss, but he does appear to be speaking his mind – I thought that’s what we wanted our politicians to do.

I see it as massive opportunism on Old Etonian Tory fuckpig’s part. He wants to be seen as purging the unsavoury elements of his party but he’s coming across as a complete Nazi himself.

But the thing that really gets me is why is not OK to call someone a “black shit” but totally fine to call someone a ginger or fat bastard. Discrimination is discrimination, after all?

As I’ve consistently said, what we need in this country is a proper debate on racism and that’s never going to happen when people are shot down for saying the slightest controversial thing, as is the case here...

Heh. It was called the 'Great global warming swindle' and people should watch it. It presented all the facts - there were men in white coats and everything - lots of diagrams with clouds (the second global warming factor) and quite basically a trip through history - apparently after the war (uncle albert's voice) when we had a boom in technology (the time period name escapes me but it has one) earth's temperatures dropped thus rendering the whole man made global warming theory useless. And they put Al Gore to bed. Al, wake up! Carbon monoxide is the result of global warming, it doesn't cause it. Hang on, were they talking about carbon monoxide? *shrugs shoulders* And even the co-founder of Greenpeace went on the record as saying that facts had lost their way. He went into this whole speech about how they (who are they?) tried to get rid of an element from the periodic table (can't remember which one - does it matter? Elements shmelements) and he was like 'whoah there, we can't eradicate a periodic table element' Well of course we can't. And then the berlin wall came down and turned green politics into well, just politics apparently with hidden agendas. 'They want to save squirrels but really they just want to...' The hypothesis/anti-thesis - yes, let's bring on the scientific garble - was that the fear behind global warming is man made and not global warming itself. I watched one and half hours of it and what I concluded was I loved the cockney weather man who took on the big boys by predicting the weather by use of the sun (not the tabloid) and placing bets with William Hill - he was right everytime, that little cockney weather sweeper. It had nothing to do with the subject really but made working class viewers like myself smile and say 'One in the eye for the big guy' Where was I? So to conclude - green journalists and politicians want you to believe that we're killing the planet to keep them in jobs and get funding. For once the scientists are being ignored? 'They are ignoring me' a scientist with a huge beard said. I get it all the time, I shouted back at the screen...

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Jarvis Cocker or David Bowie or AVB or Johnny Borrell, she isn't picky

Cavey Cocker, Cup Cake Queen, Saint Thomas.

Cavey, let me introduce you to a chum of mine, Mr Paragraph...

Cavey, Paragraph... Paragraph, Cavey.

As for the Tory twat, yes Old Etonian Tory fuckpig is an opportunist and yes, it is a strange world we live in where it's ok to be persecuted for having the hair colour of a citris fruit or carrying more lard round your midriff than is healthy but not for mentioning someone's skin colour.... BUT what was the point he was making? If he was saying that blacks use the race discrimination card to counteract any criticism's one thing but to say ethnic minorities are all lazy is plain stupid and racist.

Meet my best mate, Jack Kerouac. The day I start paragraphing on messageboards will be the day I have anything of interest to say. I'm a grammar slut and proud of it. I shall not let the constrains of the english language army hold me back. As for this race row - it's all twaddle then? The media always fly the race flag, no matter how many other discriminations are present. Skin colour is their fodder.
"In my experience, when you put on the uniform then all differences disappear" God, if only I could transfer that onto the world in general. I'm not going to read what he said before or after that line. I can't be arsed.

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Jarvis Cocker or David Bowie or AVB or Johnny Borrell, she isn't picky

Cavey Cocker, Cup Cake Queen, Saint Thomas.

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Pukka Pie pest

Embrace the margin
Always Changing at Retford http://sptxx.tumblr.com/
Not Changing at Retford http://sptxx2.tumblr.com/

what we have to remember is why mercer was making these comments. if what i read is correct, it was his response to the army wanting to set up a special support group for ethnic minority soldiers (or something like that).

So within the context of that, i think what he was saying was that he didn't feel there was any need for ethnic minority soldiers to get 'extra' support because hey, fat and ginger people get picked on too. thus, if anyone does comment on a soldiers skin colour, it's not racism, it's just the macho culture of the army.

frankly, i think that's incredibly naive but, in isolation, not necessarily an endorsement of racism in itself.

however, when a comment like that is followed on by talk of some black soldiers being soldiers being lazy and crying 'racism' when criticised, that for me is when you're stepping into dodgy territory.

because it suggests that the only time racism is a problem within the army, is when 'lazy' black soldiers use it as an excuse for being slack.

for me that's the crux of the matter. if he'd accepted and acknowledged that black soldiers can encounter racism, but that conversely, some soldiers can also use racism as an 'excuse', that would at least suggest a slightly more balanced view. but like i say, he doesn't. he lays the blame for any difficulties some black soldiers experience firmly at their own door.

what's also interesting is, when you reread what mercer said, it appears he was going out of his way not to appear racist. he made a point of saying he had the 'good fortune' to command a racially mixed regiment. he also states clearly that he say those black british born soldiers as being as 'english' as white british born ones.

which leaves us with the dilemma - is mercer actually a fusty old fucker who's trying to be even handed and getting it all wrong. or is he just a racist old bastard, who's said a couple of 'right on' things (ie: they're as english as us etc) to try to soften the blow of his prejudice?

based on my own prejudices, i'd say - he's a tory, it's probably the latter!

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Jarvis Cocker or David Bowie or AVB or Johnny Borrell, she isn't picky

Cavey Cocker, Cup Cake Queen, Saint Thomas.