Big Ron tries to bounce back?!

[Nos]

Former football pundit Ron Atkinson is to make a documentary about racism.
Atkinson resigned from ITV Sport after he made a racist comment about Chelsea player Marcel Desailly during a live TV broadcast in April this year.

Big Ron - Am I A Racist? will see the former Manchester United and Aston Villa boss travelling the UK examining race issues.

He will meet critics and supporters, including footballers and television presenters for the BBC programme.

More over at BBC News

Seems like he's trying to somehow justify what he said, think he'd do well to stop digging his hole at some point.

 

[Turamber]

Anything said on this issue can be misinterpreted, so it's better to keep comments to a minimum. If the program opens up race issues to be discussed maturely and responsibly then it's a good thing, surely.

I know people of Big Ron's ilk, same sort of age, similar background, and they use similar language to his. Yet they don't consider themselves to be racist ... heck if you ever see re-runs of plenty of TV from the 70's and early 80's you will see similar sentiments and language used.

When I was at school (left in '83) it was extremely common for offensive language and slang words to be used about people of other races - much worse than Big Ron's infamous comments. It's so good that we've moved on from that here in the UK.

 

[Mazling]

This reminds me of a "conversation" with some people (whom shall remain nameless ) in IRC the other week. There was an argument about the word **** . (otherwise known as the "see you en tea" word)
One side basically said that a word was just a word, and that the users intent is what mattered - while the other decided that a word could just be offensive, or that they should be offended regardless of context or intent or simple truth. 'The word' being unable to be simply derisory.

All words have origin and there's no such thing as a situation suddenly being isolated from the rest of the universe (a nice black hole or something, which Stephen Hawking said tonight all of which will eventually explode anyway) - one wouldn't say "****" if you meant "nice bunch of flowers and fluffy bunnies", but I personally cannot reconcile having something to say and being told "you cannot point that out, someone may be offended" when I'm doing nothing other than being honest.

 

[Tom]

My mum and dad (and a few friends parents too) regularly refer to 'Pakkies'. They're not racists, its just a word they use to describe a person, and its easier for them than saying 'South Asians' or 'Indian type people' etc...

As regards Ron, its typical that a man's private comments can cause so much fuss in this day and age. You'd think he was caught eating rotten babies from a bin liner.

 

[Damini]

I think it's just a remnant of an old way of thinking. My granmother, and I'm sure she was a lovely woman and not regulary going to klu klux meetings, had a black cat called ******. When she died, we inherited it, and changed its name to Nigey (it was 15 years old when we got it, and so you can't change it's name too much or it won't have a clue what was going on!). My little old granmother thought nothing at all of standing on her doorstep in London at night, tin of food in one hand, fork in the other, chanting " Here, ****** ******", where as I find the whole idea monumentally offensive.

If you think of the time scale, it's really not that long ago that in America there was still segragated seating for white people and black people, the rights movement was really picking up momentum in the sixties. The Martin Luther King speech was only 1963 (a year before the Beetles got a number one, to put it in perspective) and so it's hardly surprising that some remnants of discrimination still linger in the Western world, whether it is deliberately malicious or not. Of course, England was not the hotbed of racial tension that America was, but it gives a good illustration of how fast things are moving.

Big Ron probably genuinely doesn't see himself as racist, and it's telling that many black players that have played under him don't either, but the semantics of it remain - if you use ****** as an insult, the implication is that to be black is an undesirable trait, a fault, and that's where the offense lies. Which is why it's okay for coloured people to call each other ******, because there's no judgement there, no higher ground - it's unifying rather than segregating.

 

[Louster]

My little old granmother thought nothing at all of standing on her doorstep in London at night, tin of food in one hand, fork in the other, chanting " Here, ****** ******"

Ahahahaha, that's hilarious. Awesome.

 

[Wazzerphuk]

Old people are to blame.

For a lot of things, but mainly this.

DIE ALREADY!

 

[Sigurd]

Having met him IRL, the man's a twat. Sooner or later his twattishness was bound to come out in the open.

 

[Tom]

Explain please.

 

[leggy]

He is a twat.

Explained.

 

[mank!]

He played for and managed O*ford. That's your explaination in footballing terms.

 

[Mobius]

I always liked him, just a shame he ruined his career.
I know its no excuse but I think its just the old fashioned way of thinking, like Damini said, the elderly haven't grown up with different cultures like us and things which are offensive to us don't appear as offensive to them. But since he's in the media...

 

[glabbin]

Black is the night, metal we fight, power amps set to explode!

do i see venom lyrics.... :worthy: :worthy:



kinda offtopic but wtf...

 

[Mobius]

Hehe, yep. Although I prefer the covers that have been done.

 

[Wazzerphuk]

Having met him IRL, the man's a twat. Sooner or later his twattishness was bound to come out in the open.

I'd like to point out who said this.

 

[Bodhi]

That Swift is a lazy fucking honky.


That is why I love him.