Editor ~ Part one was published yesterday here on Independence Daily.
Recommendation 13 in the MacPherson Report is for police practice and is that “The term racist incident must be understood to include crimes and non-crimes in policing terms. Both must be reported, recorded and investigated with equal commitment”. So all acts (crimes and non-crimes) can be perceived or interpreted as “racist” and subject to police investigation.
“Non-crimes” deemed racist are termed “non-crime racist incidents”. The police can pursue the law-abiding (“non-crimes”) in their search for anybody “perceived” as racist. Recommendation 14 extended this guidance to those employed in local government or “other relevant agencies”, that are anywhere in the public sector.
Recommendation 39 was that racist speech “not in a public place” should be investigated; in other words, “racist” speech in private places, such as family homes. MacPherson implicitly recommends that, as in the former Soviet Union, schoolchildren should be encouraged to report the remarks of their parents, and that family homes should be invaded by hidden listening devices to enable detection of politically incorrect “racist” talk.
“Political Correctness” suppresses rational discussion in the areas where it holds sway. “Politically Correct” is a phrase imported from the former Soviet Union, where political dissent (political incorrectness) was a crime. But dissent is a police matter now in Britain too. At Wildern School in Hampshire, a teacher caught 15-year-old Joe Taylor looking at the website of the United Kingdom Independence Party on his computer. The police were called, and an officer told Joe and his father Mick, that what Joe had done was dangerous and “not right”. Looking at UKIP’s website was “wrong”, and showed that Joe was politically unreliable, and too curious for his own safety.
Likewise, in Rotherham, a fostering couple with an exemplary record had their foster children suddenly taken from them by social services staff. They were told that the “local safeguarding children team” had received an anonymous tip-off that they were members of UKIP and that UKIP had “racist policies”. Joyce Thacker, head of Rotherham’s children’s services, said that the children had been at risk from the foster couple’s “strong views”. This happened while underage Christian girls were being routinely raped by “grooming” gangs of Muslim men in Rotherham.
The search for “racists” by the police has ensured that spontaneous conversation is now dangerous in Britain. People have to be careful about what they say, even in their most casual conversation, just as in the former Soviet Union. People are now afraid to express certain opinions, for fear of being reported on social media or to the police.
Voiced concern about schools & housing being overwhelmed by immigrants is perceived as “racism”. As when erstwhile Prime Minister Gordon Brown dismissed lifelong Labour voter Gillian Duffy as a “bigoted woman” for expressing such concern. Penalties are now placed upon opinion. This reduces the trust that binds friends and acquaintances together, trust that can harbour resistance against Britain’s slide towards a police state.
Meanwhile, the police have an exciting task allotted to them by MacPherson, that of policing other people’s attitudes, beliefs, and opinions. The police must detect “institutional racism” that is pervasive throughout public institutions, although by its nature, it is covert & hidden—hidden as it is a matter of “unwitting” thoughts and feelings, attitudes, and states of mind. Consequently, this Racism can only be “perceived” or inferred, because thoughts are not available to public examination, like words or deeds.
So MacPherson had to insist on a presumption of guilt of Racist thought, as when Recommendation 12 says that racism is anything perceived as such, and consequently a racist is anyone perceived as such. (Anybody is racist if perceived as such, anyone who gets in the way…Question: “Why is he/she/it racist ?” Answer: “Because I say so !”). Anyone could be denounced as a class enemy or an Enemy of the People in the former Soviet Union. Anyone, anywhere, at any time, can be denounced as a racist in Britain now, or as an Uncle Tom if they are black.
Jack Straw, then Home Secretary, said in Parliament that he wanted the MacPherson Report to “act as a catalyst for permanent and irrevocable change, not just across our public services but across the whole of society”. That statement is on page 2 of the 2002 Hate Crime Manual of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO). On page 7, it continues, “Colour-blind policing means policing that purports to treat everyone the same way. Such an approach is flawed and unjust”. From then on, the police were not to treat everyone the same way but to give groups supposedly oppressed by Racism and other Hate Crime more protection than others.
MacPherson in 1999 gave Black advocacy groups the preferential treatment that they wanted for black people. But there were other advocacy groups also, those for the gay, lesbian, bisexual & transgender lobbies, the feminists, and Islamists among them. So it was that ACPO and the Crown Prosecution Service [CPS] developed the concept of the Hate Incident.
The ACPO and CPS are agreed that a Hate Incident is a crime or non-criminal offence (such as verbal aggression) that any member of an “oppressed” group perceives as springing from hatred of the “oppressed” group that they belong to.
So if you have a row with a lesbian over a parking space, that is a Hate Incident, if she perceives that you are shouting at her because she is gay, even if you don’t know that she is gay. Since MacPherson, anyone can unexpectedly be labelled as a Hate offender without any intention of committing Hate offence.
And many people have been labelled Hate offenders without committing a crime. Hate “offences” are recorded in the same police database as crimes, so that “non-crime hate incidents” appear in DBS criminal background checks on unfortunate job applicants.
Ralph I don’t subscribe to DT but the link works for me OK.
Here is an Independent link on the early retirement of Ellis – he was first suspended and then took early retirement on standard terms – he was not dismissed as there was no evidence to be found of him treating any students differently.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/lecturer-who-said-blacks-were-inferior-retires-early-6095602.html
And a BBC link
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/4838498.stm
This case IMHO was nothing more than a witch hunt by the Left. They are very successful in this sort of thing but they didn’t bargain coming up against a very brave man who was not prepared to be intimidated by the bullying Left.
That’s right Jake, the BBC and the Independent both admit that Frank Ellis did nothing wrong in his treatment of black students. Leeds University excommunicated him because of his beliefs, and was preparing to use the Race Relations (Amendment) Act (2000) to expel him. In Britain now penalties are placed upon opinion.
Unfortunately a lot of this is above my pay grade, so I hope no one minds my asking a few basic questions.
Yes I did know about the Lawrence enquiry and the Macpherson report and the too numerous recommendations, but I am not clear how they became Law, or even are they law.
I would understand that the government of the day could accept some or all of them and lay them before parliament and tell them of their decisions, but do they have to be a bill and passed by both houses..
I understand the police may have objected but been over ruled by the government
I understand there has been a 20 year parliamentary committee enquiry in Room 8 to assess the implementation of them, which has now been cancelled due to the 12th December 2019 General Election.This is unfortunate because I believe there was an opportunity for private representation to have a say, which I take it would have been an excellent opportunity for Mr Prothero and others to have pointed out the shocking consequences he has described so thoroughly in this article.
Meanwhile I would be grateful for an answer as to whether the recommendations are actually law or not?t
Thank you Roger for your comment & question, which I confess I have only seen today. I should have checked for readers’ comments after I replied to Jake yesterday, that was careless of me.
Jack Straw, then Home Secretary, set up the commission of enquiry chaired by Lord MacPherson to give expert advice to the government on what had gone wrong in the Met Police’s failure to catch the murderers of Stephen Lawrence. So it was like a Royal Commission, set up to give expert advice to government on what to do about a particular problem.
The government accepted MacPherson’s advice, just as the government accepts the advice of experts on the the Coronavirus today.
Successive governments have adopted the recommendations of MacPherson as policies to be applied by the police and all public sector employees.
When your boss gives you a job to do, his command is not enshrined in law, but it is his executive decision. And if you disobey your boss then you will suffer consequences, and state employees will likewise if they disobey the recommendations of the MacPherson Report.
Thank you Ralph and apology for lateness which is not strictly necessary.
We used to have a system whereby if I(we) commented on another’s comment, we would receive a copy of that comment by email and thus be able to answer promptly if necessary
That system appears to have passed into history, with the result I have no ready method of recording my comments and even if I can remember having commented at all, remembering the title of the thread and finding it again is an Hurculean task, if it has already been whisked away from easy view..
I liked your explanation of the effect of similarity to a Royal Commission and the recommendations of experts to Government Enquiries are a system of passing on orders from the boss and in this case they are all government employees ( I might ask if this is also so with private companies)
What employees should do if the orders subsequently appear impractical or unpalatable or even inhumane , I am not quite sure, although perhaps the post war commission on Naziism and those who supervised the gas chambers might provide answers to the plea that “it was just orders from above which must be obeyed”
I do believe the police authority took umbrage at the finding of Institutional Racism, but did they question any of the other 70 findings?
I would also like a reply if possible on this now cancelled 20 year after Enquiry aspect of being able to submit private comment and objections,
Roger, you wrote “I liked your explanation of the effect of similarity to a Royal Commission and the recommendations of experts to Government Enquiries are a system of passing on orders from the boss and in this case they are all government employees ( I might ask if this is also so with private companies)”……………………… I conjecture that you are asking if private companies also have to join the MacPherson Report’s war on” institutional racism” that by its definition is “unwitting, unintentional and unconscious.”
Well, the Hate Crime Manual of the Association of Chief Police Officers quotes Jack Straw’s statement in Parliament that he wanted the MacPherson Report to “act as a catalyst for permanent and irrevocable change, not just across our public services but across the whole of society”.
So everybody has to wage war on racism, including private companies. But the MacPherson Report’s chief target was and is white people the public sector, especially in the police. Whereas since MacPherson private companies have steadily become subject to numerous laws against discrimination & bias on grounds not just of race but also of sex, sexual orientation, religion, disability and so forth.
You wrote “I do believe the police authority took umbrage at the finding of Institutional Racism, but did they question any of the other 70 findings?”……. I don’t know much about any resistance within the Met police or any other police force to MacPherson. Any resistance there was seems to have been completely crushed.
You wrote “I would also like a reply if possible on this now cancelled 20 year after Enquiry aspect of being able to submit private comment and objections”……… I was unaware of this Parliamentary Committee making an enquiry into compliance with the MacPherson Report, until you mentioned it. However I doubt very much if this Committee would want to hear any criticism of the MacPherson Report.
Because we dont have blasphemy laws, which upsets muslims, our dear government decided on ‘hate speech laws. These laws are no different than blasphemy laws.
Agree fully with the contents of this article. Macpherson an establishment man to the core served his masters well in their agenda.
No person can now survive in academia unless they swallow the whole leftist thinking and agenda on race and gender.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2006/mar/16/highereducation.raceineducation
Jake, I’ve looked up this Guardian article, it is about when the university lecturer Frank Ellis was forced into early retirement for racism. If the Guardian article is truthful, then Frank Ellis was a racist, because he said that the intelligence of black people is inferior to that of white people. He believed in white superiority, the core tenet of Racism.
This is in marked contrast to Ray Honeyford, a school headmaster who was forced to take early retirement from teaching, for objecting to Muslim parents breaking the law by habitually keeping their children out of school. Of course Ray Honeyford was accused of Racism, but there is little evidence that he ever said or did anything racist. He was merely perceived as racist, for expecting Muslim parents to obey the law.
Ralph I gave the Guardian link because it was the first link that came up that was not paywalled. I have found a Daily Telegraph link that is not paywalled that gives a more balanced view. We must remember he was alleged to have made racist remarks; he did not break any race law!
My personal view is that the university lost its bottle preferring to capitulate to left wing lobbying rather than uphold freedom of intellectual expression.
Dr Ellis did give speeches to far right groups in the UK and US and thus I suppose he was considered guilty by association.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1512274/Race-inquiry-into-lecturer-who-says-blacks-are-less-intelligent.html
In America where intellectual freedom of expression is defended more enthusiastically the points that Ellis raised still goes on.
Jake, when I tap on the link you gave to the Telegraph article about Frank Ellis, a notice comes up saying “Continue reading for just £1 a month” which totally hides the article. How did you get round it?
This would have been truly astonishing a few years ago. Now I guess it is what we must expect; attempts to control our thoughts as well as our actions. We’ve allowed this to creep up on us. Too many too busy in following distractions from reality such as sports and endless shopping.
How we defeat it is now the pressing question. Clearly too many have been infected with political correctness to rely on them for support. The support of many, who surely cannot all be homosexuals, for the various “Gay Pride” events around the country is surprising to say the least.
However, defeat it we must, not just for our own benefit but for that of those who will come after us. Perhaps home schooling for those who have time would be a start.