Prejudism extends beyonds skin colour

Rosycheeks

Polarbear2 and Redhead56. Im a titian haired pale skinned person.
I hated being called oi ginge or ginger mxxxge which people always thought was funny, or collers and cuffs match. But no one thought that it was out of order. Ive been called loads of names because of my hair colour but I dont care now, no grey hairs yet ,but when I was young it really hurt.?‍?

It’s Irish prejudice again ( ginger) rearing it’s ugly head.

As a 4'10" disabled woman, I get a load of prejudice all the time. People assume I'm thick, talk to me like I'm a child and think they know my limitations better than I do. Its more than annoying.

I worked all my life until my disability stopped me, but people tell me I don't know what its like to work for a living. My disability means I'm overweight because my lymphatic system is being crushed by osteochrondomas so I swell in various places, but I'm told, regularly, that I'm a 'lardy' who must sit around the house all day watching TV and eating junk food. When I needed to move house, I was offered a tiny flat and the housing officer made the comment that all I'd need in the lounge was a chair and the TV could go on the wall! When I pointed out that I don't have a TV, but I do have a large library, and needed space for crafts, I got a disapproving look for answering back!

Polarbear2 and Redhead56. Im a titian haired pale skinned person.
I hated being called oi ginge or ginger mxxxge which people always thought was funny, or collers and cuffs match. But no one thought that it was out of order. Ive been called loads of names because of my hair colour but I dont care now, no grey hairs yet ,but when I was young it really hurt.?‍?

I am from Essex and very often asked when did I last dance around my handbag. For the record I have never ever danced around a handbag, but I might one day.

Btw...it’s still prejudice ( as experienced by the OP) even if not as serious as some forms of it, and she has every right to be angered by it.

M0nica why would you think I was ‘shocked’ by my car being stolen in Oxford? Since you and I both live near there we both know that those sort of crimes happen there just as much as in Liverpool....which was the message I was putting out there.

Pammie1 As a disabled person you are talking about real and prolonged prejudice and exclusion from society and is a very different and serious issue compared with the boorish, unpleasant and stupid remarks this thread first soke about.

In reference to my previous post, your compkaints could never be described as 'hypersensitivity'. Yet people on this thread are also exhibiting what they are complaining about, buy in reverse, someone is shocked that their car was stolen and damaged in Oxford.

Oxford is a large industrial midland town and no different from any other such town. It has 2 large universities, which help define its character, but so do most cities and large towns these days and it has the crime rate that such cities have.

People are always throwing round these silly dismissive remarks, about where people come from, what kind of town or community they come from, what class they are etc etc. What is necessary is to differentiate between odd throwaway remarks, not in the best of taste and demeaning to the person who says them and real discrimiation and prejudice like that described by Pammie1

Puglady

Just read the Southend posts I live in Southend and whilst I mostly enjoy living here and the vast majority of people are great, like a lot of seaside towns it has its fair share of scumbags, lets not try to pretend that this is not true.

It certainly is true that there are thieves everywhere ( and scumbags) like the one who stole and later torched my car in Oxford...yes, the city of dreaming spires has as many as Southend or Liverpool ( or most other cities.)
Scousers do get a bad rep still, I think it’s because they were associated with Irish people in the past, and as we know there has been Irish prejudice for a long long time.
Still, nobody held that against The Beatles did they?

Yep, the prejudice extends to disabled people too. I’m a wheelchair user and have been passed up for promotion because it was felt I couldn’t cope ‘physically’ - it was a desk job !! I’ve been stopped in shops in my lunch hour and asked why I don’t work, and I’d be rich if I had a pound for everyone who has assumed on meeting me, that if there is something wrong with my legs, I must be intellectually challenged as well !! I don’t think it’s so much prejudice, I think it’s more to do with deeply ingrained and long standing stereotyping. Don’t get me wrong, there are some lovely, understanding and helpful people out there, but a couple of incidents recently have got me wondering why, in a climate where we worry about offending various sections of the community, this doesn’t extend to the disabled community.

Just read the Southend posts I live in Southend and whilst I mostly enjoy living here and the vast majority of people are great, like a lot of seaside towns it has its fair share of scumbags, lets not try to pretend that this is not true.

This week a Judge, dismissing a harrassment case warned against a culture of hyper sensitivity and I think most of the examples on this thread fall in that group.

Everything everyone quoted on this thread, is rude and bad mannered and those who said them should be ashamed of themselves, but were any to be applied to me, and I have received my fair share of these sort of comments over the years, much like Jaxjacky i have just dealt with them. According to DD I have a gorgon stare that can turn people like that to stone, certainly make them feel uncomfortable.

Had any of them shown real prejudice, that would have been different but they are all throw away jokes by the kind of person who deals in cheap stereotypes and thinks it funny.

My answer to the rude comment aimed at the OP would have been along the lines of "oh, that's original, you should be a comedian"
Scousers are known for being able to take a joke, but that was not even what you could call a joke, was it. ?

Direct experience of day to day prejudice and discrimination cannot compare to the news and politics board on Gransnet !!

Much worse when some are told they do not have a right to an opinion.

Agree maddyone I don’t enter the fray.

Some of the worst prejudice comes from people who have differing political views from others. This is sometimes apparent on Gransnet.

‘I think he had a chip on his shoulder for blond white women’
I know what you mean.

The human race as a whole is very tribal and prejudiced about anyone different, it doesn’t matter if you are black, white, tall, fat, clever or thick or any of the other targets mentioned. It’s in our nature and wether we say it out loud or think it, we are all guilty

Polarbear2 I was a freckly curly redhead I cannot tell what I was called! I got used to it but found it embarrassing when I was very young.

Try being Welsh and called a "sheepsha***r

Well done, Whiff, for losing so much weight. Larger people are often wrongly seen as lesser than slim people yet have so many qualities to give, the same as anyone else.
I had some online prejudice/racism a few months ago. I belonged to a Facebook piano teachers’ group, which had people from all over the world in it but with a large American contingent. Certain well-known pieces of music have titles that are “of their time” but on this occasion someone was asking whether The Irish Washerwoman was appropriate to teach these days. Everyone on this side of the Atlantic thought that this was somewhat bizarre to say the least but the Americans were very serious about the whole thing. Then one American woman decided that it would be funny to make a joke about the relationship between the Irish and the British, specifically about the English. I responded that, although I knew that she was joking, she should remember it was an international forum and that we get along fine now but some of our history was a touchy subject and that it was not a good idea to rake up old wounds. Her reply was to “tell that to my ancestor Grace O’Malley,” a more stereotypical Irish name it would be hard to find and the whole attitude seemed to be that merely by being English l had no right to a view. My reply was to reiterate that it was an international forum and that our histories are closely entwined and that many of us, myself included, have Irish ancestry anyway. I was trying to point out that history is not black and white, goodies versus baddies, but it obviously did not sink in. I left the group (lots of other silliness in that particular group and this was the straw that broke the camel’s back).

Floradora - if you stayed the night with your cousin how come you didn't take your overnight bag out of the car?

Also I feel your post was badly judged and insensitive and definitely not funny!

Forty years ago the Asian doctor who delivered my first baby (by forceps) said in disgust,
"Not another girl. I've delivered four babies tonight and they've all been b****y girls."
My husband and I were stunned.
The two midwives said nothing.

Apart from my Irish parentage, I was born and bred here in Birmingham. I have a broad Birmingham accent. Some people assume Brummies are thick and that Birmingham is a dark, dingy place. On holiday in Devon a few years ago a waitress asked me where I'd travelled from. I said 'Birmingham'. She said 'How awful for you'.

Gosh just try being a redhead. It’s accepted as perfectly ok to call us names. I pull people up now tho. I’m older and more confident these days. I was watching a tv programme with a friend and some friends of hers I didn’t know. The little lad said ‘oh there’s a ginger they’re horrible’. I said ‘Oi just watch it I’m a ginger’. He was very embarrassed as were his parents. Good I say. Let them be embarrassed. Hope he thinks twice next time.
As for Liverpool - well there’s horrible stereotypes for all cities and areas. We just have to stop being rude and adopt nicer attitudes to others.