I watched this program yesterday on BBC called all white in Barking. Wow! What an eye-opening program. I found it very intriguing yet extremely disturbing. This program brought out a fear in me of the human nature. It is a program about the disturbing nature of integration and racism in modern day, multi cultural Britain. I fear for all those who think coming to the UK or any other developed country is the answer. Many of us left our countries for different reasons. Some left for further education, others for jobs, better life etc. No matter the reason, we all have one thing in common which is the fact that we are all considered as immigrants. One of the most disturbing comments by one of the people interviewed on the program is their description or perception of the African person. In light of this, one cannot help but see their ignorance. To one family, every black person is Nigerian and because of the way “Africans” are perceived, they would not want any Africans to stay in UK but would rather prefer Eastern Europeans because they are more of their own. Ignorance exhibits itself in that they cannot even differentiate that Africa is made of different countries and even the Nigeria they talk about is made up of different ethnicities, colours, beliefs and customs. One tends to overlook the fact that some of these ignorant xenophobic people who talk about immigration and how their country is been flooded by immigrants forget that their country contributed to the way Africa is now (please read how Europe underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney). I will not go into that topic now. They forgot that we tolerated slave trade; we tolerated colonialism, all our goods, raw materials etc was used to develop their precious country of today. Our men even fought in the wars for their country.
I can understand one of the interviewees’ anger with Nigerians. His daughter’s boyfriend and father of his grandchild beat and abused his daughter. No one supports an abusive man no matter what colour. Some of the interviewees said that Africans are arrogant, well so are some English people and people from other nationalities. I mean what does he expect? Blacks are also humans free to be whoever they want to be. Should blacks live just to please “some people”? Where was it written? Who says one race is more superior to the other? I believe we should all respect other peoples way of life, belief etc. some have conducted experiments to rubbish the black race, well, that is their own cup of tea. I believe I am who God says I am. Made in his Image, destined for great things so who is it that shall say otherwise? I love who I am. I am not like any white person neither am I like any black person. We are all different in who we all are.
One of the participants in the program said he did not believe in the mixture of races. That Whites should be with their own and black with theirs. I say totally rubbish. Who does he think he is? I respect his opinion. He can be with whom he wants to. To my opinion he is out of date and time. People of mixed marriages and mixed parentage have come a long way and do love who they are and accept who they are.
My happiness is that these people making most of these traumatizing comments are getting old. I am happy the younger generation are more tolerant and open minded than some of these old people. I have some of the most wonderful friends in the UK who are English. I am so happy with my life and the beautiful people around me who are of different ethnicities, races and countries. I believe the younger generation will have a better life without such hatred and ignorance around.
For every program like this, it annoys me when I see pictures or videos of African children on TV channels raising funds for African children. Some times I ask if they are patronising us Africans. Sometimes I am like are they mocking us by showing these pictures and videos of children in poverty. I know some might mean well but I think it is high time such cliché clips end.
The only way out of this misrepresentation and false impression is for Africa to get up and develop it self. It has everything, human, material resources. Use it then. Shame how we leave our children to starve, shame other countries has to show horrible pictures of our children to raise funds for their survival. What are we going to do? Well, be the best in anything you do. If you are in education, excel, if you are into science and technology, excel, no matter what you are doing, excel in it and tomorrow we will make a difference one way or the other.
Hope you had a lovely weekend?
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