General Chat

Point taken TW, maybe im a bit ignorant to village life, i've always lived in a town:)))) xx

Sorry all xxxx

FGS those that know me know I don't make things up, I have no need!!!!

Take it as the truth or leave it, doesn't worry me in the slightest...lol

Alko if you have an hour to waste try looking at the surnames in Betws Ifan, Dyfed (as it was) in the 80s via directories.

Sue

Spot on!! Thank you Teresa

Hi Rose xx

I understand what you are saying but come on tho we see it on TV if not in real life,

Anyway it doesnt matter what we look like, or what we believe its good nature that counts :)))))))))) xxxx

I grew up in London, Ontario, whitest little city on this side of the Atlantic - even today - in a tie with some burg in Alberta, per recent census info. (Actually there are much whiter places in the US - the US simply is not the multicultural place that Canada is, and you can drive for hours through New England, say, and never see an other than white face.)

Anyhow, one day in the late 1950s, my mother was on a city bus with my 3-yr-old brother. Upon seeing a sharply dressed black man get on the bus, my little bro stood up and pointed and said "mummy mummy look at the chocolate man!!" He had indeed never seen an other than white face. My mother was mortified, particularly since the "chocolate man" was not amused. But no, my little brother was not being racist.

And no, I just don't think that preschoolers reared in homogeneously white neighbourhoods expressing natural wonder at seeing their first person of colour are really the targets of this policy.

Supercrutch may be right - I lived in North Wales for 10 years. It is only very recently that people from other countries really started to move here. It was very rare to see and African. I can only recall one Indian, who was a friend I worked with.

Alko, in Sue's defense, she did say it was in the 80's. Her kids are grown up now...while you are saying 'in this day and age'. In some rural areas of the country, non-european immigrants were not often seen. I'll add also that until the last 10 years or so, the part of rural Cambridgeshire I grew up in only saw black or asian people because of the American Airbases in the area....

Janey, I think what Elizabeth is trying to express is the fear, natural in any parent of their child, particularly such a young child, being labelled unjustly because of an innocent and often used phrase, which was not intended as malicious.

Yes children bully other children. Some do even pick on others because they are different....and that is the point. DIFFERENT. Not black, asian, gay, disabled.....DIFFERENT. That's how kids are. What adults have to do is learn to differentiate between malicious intent, which is present in some children, and innocent remarks or phrases which are present in most.

The problem with this "hate register" is that all child will be placed on the register without the opportunity to explain. Innocent remarks will automatically be judged as guilty and there is no appeal to have the name removed from the register when the decision was incorrect.

Restorative justice would have been a far better approach - and tackle any problems at an early age more effectively.

Schools and parents should be roped in to address the matter through acceptable behaviour agreements.

Lets not fall out Janey - I just get tired of people in Ivory towers taking my parental responsibilities away, creating bizzare health & safety legislation that actually make matters worse and taring all children with the same brush.

Alko, twenty years ago i had just moved to a small welsh village, and started at college in the nearby town, one of the first students I met there was from the same village, he was mixed race welsh/african and on being introduced he said 'Hi I'm the only coloured person in the village, they couldn't cope with more than one!" Even now I think there are only two or three people of any other race than welsh/english there.

I cannot believe that wherever you live in any country, no children see anyone different in this day and age, shops. schools, the street your walking down.

Sorry but i cant buy that,

Not being nasty Supercrutch but i take it wales got no black sheep, good grief!!!!!!!!!!!!

My son is often 'accosted' ( bit of an overstatement but I can't think of another appropriate word lol) on his paper round by a few kids who will insist on calling him "gay boy", as far as I know / he knows, he's not gay ...(not that interested either way at the minute, he's in love with electronics lol) ... he doesn't really takke any notice,but it does seem to not really be a 'homophobic' insult as such more a word lots of youngsters throw about at anyone they don't know...or do know come to that...

we now live in a multi-cultural area ( as opposed to a small village with no-one of a different 'colour' ) and there is a definite sense of rascism being alive and well, but I find it is mostly older people...like the taxi driver who commented yesterday "where are all the english, you don't see many do you" !

I think personally that a 'register' of almost any type that potentially pigeonholes a child for the whole of its school life is dubious, whether that is a record of words they may use unknowingly because they have heard them elsewhere , ( till hopefully taught differently!) or simply that they didn't pass SATS at age 7.

Don't laugh George it's true...lol rural Wales in the 80s wasn't exactly the stuck in the middle ages but close enough :-)) Our neightbours (in their 70s) had never been further than Builth Wells and that was only once a year for the Royal Welsh show.

Sue

Bloody hell supercrutch, where do you live, on another planet, never seeing a coloured face until you went to London......LOL

Alko

She was five - it's not that she hadn't see anyone with different coloured skin before. Simply, that it was the first time she had really noticed it and considered things.

Alko,

My children had only ever seen one black person who happened to be my personal GP until I took them to London when they were 6,7 and 8. When they had previously visited they were babies/toddlers.

I had to gag them as they just spoke as they saw and that included every ethnicity. They were absolutely fascinated as they were just used to white Welsh and sheep!!

Sue

Of course it can happen - I never said it didn't. Simply that innocent remarks can also be misinterpreted at this age.

Janey where has anyone said that children don't bully other children?

It won't. It will simply create a problem. As a person who is not racist or homophobic I will be very angry that my child it being labeled. If she genuinely used this language in a way that was intended to bully I would be sharp to pull her up on it.

I love learning about other peoples cultures - (an I have Ancestors from India) - no one should view my comments are racially or homophobically motivated and they are not intend to offend. I am simply opening up a debate that many are afraid to do - as ALL cultures should respect our way of life too who live in the UK. It should be mutual.

Children are influenced by their peers - of course inappropriate behaviour should be challenged. (Start with you Janey)

Yes, children are all innocent.

Children never bully other children. Why, there are not constant threads at this very website about bullying. Nooo. Never happens.

Oh, I know. It happens, but it's never racists or homophobes doing the bullying. Children who are members of racial or sexual minorities are never bullied because of their skin colour or ethnic background, or their sexual orientation. Nooo. That doesn't happen.

Have I got it now?

Elizabeth, your child is 5 and never seen anyone before who isnt "white" has she never been out?

If i've read this wrong i apolgise, but surely she must see different races in school?