{ apparently it's all about stats this week. }

[delga]

THIS POLL TELLS YOU NOTHING. For example, the sample, was it made up of first, second or third generation immigrants? Were these people educated in Britain, or abroad? Were they of mixed race? Do these people live in urban or rural communities? All these things make a difference.

You know what else? What the fuck qualifies as 'being British'? If you reject your cultural heritage, does that make you more or less British? More or less Asian?

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For the record, I class myself as a British Asian, though I could easily say that I am English, and not be incorrect. Polls like this infuriate me because the assumptions made from them can't really be backed up. Also, what the hell does this collation of data actually mean? And what is it going to lead to people saying? Is it a bad thing that these people do or don't identify themselves as British? Also: coconut, wtf? By wich they mean, brown-skined but no real connection back to the 'homelands'. Isn't that really what it means to become absorbed into the society? Is that a bad thing, too?

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Off to the post office, now.

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edit: Mike Reid died. I'm utterly shocked.

Comments

[muldy.livejournal.com]

Oh wtf? That poll's just harsh. I mean I count myself as Australian but there are things about me and habits I have and definately the foods I eat that are very much Dutch because even though I was born here I was brought up by a Dutch family. our furniture is Dutch-style and our food is Dutch and I mean we're Aussie but we kept the Dutch part of the family.

I hate it when people say that people need to let go of their culture to embrace another. You don't have to. The mother of the family I lived with in Canada for a while was always making racist comments about Asian people and how if they wanted to live in Canada they should just act like Canadians - and then she'd turn around and cook Polish food for dinner and talk in Polish to her family and do Polish stuff because her parents were from Poland.

Stupid hypocritical people like that shit me up the wall.

Sorry...

/rant.

[delgaserasca.livejournal.com]

The thing that bugs me is that forthat headline, they took one portion of the poll and sensationalised it. That's not reportage, that's spin, and fuck it, it's just not wha the cultural climate needs.

[wliberation.livejournal.com]

I find that polls, in general, are bollocks, especially those made my magazines and such. It all depends too much on what is asked, how it's asked, who's asking, how many answers, how the answers are read... Too many variables, in my opinion. And the media like scandalistic and above all simple results, and so you get readings like the one in that article. If they'd taken all the questions and points you mentioned into consideration, well, then they just wouldn't have flashy enough a story, and now that just wouldn't do. Argh. The sad thing is that most readers don't realise this or care to think about it.

[delgaserasca.livejournal.com]

It's sensationalism of facts - so, basically, an assertion. Many Asians 'do not feel British'. What does that even mean? Defining Asian is would appear fairly simple because you're gaging values by geography. Except, as I said, do you include second generation? Third? Are my children still Asian because they have brown skin? Does my ethnicity immediately deem me as non-English even though I was born and raised in this country, tended by this country's doctors, educated in this country's schools? To be English, to be British, does one have to be a white person? Or does one, as I always assumed, have to be born in England, born in a British occupied colony? How many people who took this poll mistook 'British' for 'English'? How many people see these things as the same, or as different?

Most of all: WHAT? WHAT DO THESE RESULTS EVEN MEAN? What is the importance of this poll? Is it meant to suggest cultural tension in the country? Is it meant to consolidate opinions, or to cause more tension?

These are sociological labels. Culture is a social construct, race is a social construct. Until the media stops trying to define these things as biological certainties, we are fucked.

End rant. Also: apologies.

[wliberation.livejournal.com]

No apologies because you're so very right. You get cookies, BBC doesn't. *nodnod*

[delgaserasca.livejournal.com]

You get cookies, BBC doesn't.
HAHA! Thank you for alleviating my escalating bad mood. Have I mentioned recently how much I love you? Because I do, a lot.

[wliberation.livejournal.com]

Aaww. And I love you too. :)