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Submitted by ROK

Above is a clip about Dr. Yosef Ben Jochannan’s perspective on the race card. Should we stop trying to be Rhodes Scholars? Hear who was John Rhodes. Also Dr. Ben spoke of our pregnant women being split open using horses so that the babies dropped out of their bellies.

My problem with those who would say that we are using this kind of information to spread hate should understand that these are facts. They are part of the historical record and if the white man did not inflict such atrocious acts on the black man, we would have nothing to talk about today. In the circumstances, the hate started with them. Yet our attempt to get it out of our psyche is being resisted by them. What does that tell you? It isn’t over yet!

Further, how we could be sure that they are still at it? The Rhodes Island Scholarship that has become so prestigious and that we line up to get, is named after a white man that massacred 50 million black people in South Africa according to Dr. Ben. His testimony is on the clip.

Dr. Ben is also insinuating that the first Jews were from Ethiopia and were black, so how come we associate Jews with a particular race of people? When we look at our economies for example, we see the damage that IMF did to those who accepted it and Barbados that did not, is doing far much better; although not the best.

HIV/AIDS and all the diseases that are targeting us were white man made. All the drugs that the big drug companies convincing us to fill our bodies with seems coincidental to the new wave of asthma, heart diseases, diabetes, etc. in our young children; would make it seem that the killings are still going on but in a different way.

The Rwanda genocide is a rather strange event. Even the Rwandans don’t seem to be able to understand what got into them to cause that slaughter. If this was sparked by the media, who authorised it? I am hoping that people watch the video and wake up. This is not a call to arms but a call for each black man and woman to do his/her duty to preserve our people. We are still under threat of extinction. Stop taking the drugs. Farmers need to start gathering their own seeds and we have to stop importing chicken eggs to be hatched.

We still have a lot going for us that we need to preserve. We still have our golden apples, sour-sop, mangoes, ackees (ginip), fat pork, guavas, dunks, sugar apples, yams, sweet potatoes, green peas, etc. but those crops like carrots, beets, lettuce, sweet peppers and the ones we get out of the supermarket that our farmers buy seeds to grow, we should try to get rid of them; purge the plants and start gathering the seeds and growing and developing a natural strain and ban the importation of seeds to corrupt our crops.

Apart from food security, we have to deal with health; those doctors with test kits need to stop buying them. Throw them through the door (gradually). We need to develop an herbal industry based on the herbs that grow naturally here. We need to look and see what is not yet corrupted and preserve them. It is one great conspiracy based on greed that started way back then. There are indicators to tell us that the conspiracy is still on. For example, the difficulty with black businesses getting loans from the banking system; the way the banks bounce checks and refuse to give businesses overdrafts; the suspicion with which the black man is viewed in general even by our own. Finally, the way our country is dictated to by the imperialists.

All of this is based on racism and unless we stand up against it, we will never be unshackled.


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  1. Is it the ‘colour’ of a person’s skin that thinks, makes decisions, and so on?

    Or, is it not the ‘mind’ soul, spirit, that thinks, makes choices; which has NO colour!


  2. Bimbro
    De only ting I recommenin fa my ROK is me, myself and I, and when we do, all that willl be on is de radio.
    Now leave my ROK of Gibralta plzzzzzzz.
    mwahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh


  3. Zoe
    I always feel at peace with myself after reading your comments. So angelic.Oh dear.

  4. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    I read your replies while I was watching some athletes who looked black win medals in a country where most people seemed to be white. You can analyse what happened for us later.

    In the meantime, congrats to Bolt (WR-200 M) and Brathwaite (NR-110 M Hurdles), and Melaine Walker (CR- 400 M Hurdles). Proud representatives of this region.

    Many people read some of the descriptions you have made and I think it is fair to say that all found it to be not very sensible, if I could be polite.

    I think you paint a world where you seem to be able to describe people with a series of amorphous notions and leave to one side a very salient feature.

    Why stop with colour. Let’s look at gender too. It could be a world of many mad people: people who look like black men, but you will tell us are white women.

    I find this really an unbelievable set of ideas.

  5. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    “See if you can do any research because racism is in the genes:
    1. How many white Bajans are married to black Bajans?
    How many white Bajans are married to foreign whites?
    How many white Bajans are married to their own family?”
    [Before I take on any thing, how are you defining white and black? Do I go by skin colour or am I going for the soul/inner probe?]


  6. Black Power African Power Congratulations to Usain Bolt,Ryan Brathwaite & the Jamaican female sprinters who have done the Black People of the Caribbean proud.

    Jack the human rat Bowman.no inferior,disease half make sub-human European could never match the real human beings of this world that is the Black African.

    African Race is the superior race and it is shown in all of our achievements despite the wickedness perpetrated against us by the despicable inferior thieving,murderous Europeans.

    All hail African Black race.


  7. @LIB
    “Before I take on any thing, how are you defining white and black? Do I go by skin colour or am I going for the soul/inner probe?”

    I suppose that you just come into this world. I am not a child and happy that I am not yours. I ain’t in for the long talk and the s-bends that you trying to loop through. If what I said is nonsense, so be it. Let’s hear some sense from you. You obviously think that you were born with all.

    Stick to your profession and let me stick to mine. Go and read people like Fannon, Walter Rodney, Jonathan Lashley, etc. When you figure it out, we can talk, but talking to you is like trying to spoon feed a baby, because without any knowledge on the topic at all you know best and I am a senseless idiot.


  8. Of course, ur right, Bonny!! Wunna enjoy yuhselves!!

    Laaaaaaddddddddddddd!!

  9. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    “I suppose that you just come into this world. I am not a child and happy that I am not yours. I ain’t in for the long talk and the s-bends that you trying to loop through. If what I said is nonsense, so be it. Let’s hear some sense from you. You obviously think that you were born with all.”[An empty statement stays that way. We deal with substance not invective. I was not born with all the sense I have now, that I developed with schooling and with experience. I think the propostion you are putting forward makes no sense. I gave reasons why, you suggest I do research. I ask for guidance on methodology. You obfuscate.]

    “Stick to your profession and let me stick to mine. Go and read people like Fannon, Walter Rodney, Jonathan Lashley, etc. ..”[My profession has nothing to do with how well I can think, and how broad that thinking can be. I do not regard thinking as a ‘closed shop’. It would be very convenient if we left it to the ‘profession’ to profess. But what professing willl that be. In terms of qualifications, which one should I choose for this exercise? Many people suffer because they leave things to the ‘professionals”. You urge people to liberate themselves and then say, “stay with your knitting”, ROK knows best. Just trust me. That is having cake and eating it. No one used the terms you used. The point was that no one found the IDEA (not the person) sensible. That is not a trivial difference. Now, I still await responses to questions. If you dont have them or want to give them, then just say so.

    I’ve read the authors, but I have read many things. Why should I be bound by their analyses? Is it compulsory reading?]


  10. ROK my brother do not worry yourself with that pompous,conceited,arrogant puppet Living In Barbados.He pontificates on every subject matter and he is Mr Know all.A pompous jackass if ever there was one.


  11. livinginbarbados // August 20, 2009 at 3:33 PM

    @ROK
    “See if you can do any research because racism is in the genes:
    1. How many white Bajans are married to black Bajans?
    How many white Bajans are married to foreign whites?
    How many white Bajans are married to their own family?”
    [Before I take on any thing, how are you defining white and black? Do I go by skin colour or am I going for the soul/inner probe?]
    +++++++++++++++++++++++

    If skin colour is used, it is a fact that miscegination occurred in Barbados from earliest times.

    Just look at our National Heroes. Here are three prominent examples.

    The Right Excellent Sarah Ann Gill, Free Mulatto, married Alexander Gill, also a Free Mulatto in 1809.

    The Right Excellent Samuel Jackman Prescod born in 1806 was the son of Lydia Smith, a Free Mulatto and William Prescod, a large landowner.

    The Right Excellent Sir Grantley Herbert Adams was married to Grace Thorne.

    Lady Adams taught me at Harisson College and by today’s standards, she would be described as “White”.

    These three examples also demonstrate the point I was making earlier about the origins of the class structures in Barbados.

  12. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    When challenged the response is only ‘pompous’ and ‘conceited’, or similar? What happened to the substantive, intellectual destruction of the argument? You tell us the people are intelligent. So, let’s work with their intelligence.

  13. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @John
    Thanks for some pointers to the complexities. I do not know how one determines where the spectrum of colours and shades cross. A person who is ‘white’ to some we know is deemed at least ‘non white’ by others. We could easily have sample individuals who fit several categories simultaneously. That multidimensional prospect could be a real challenge. Perhaps ROK has already done it or tried it and will share some results.


  14. John // August 20, 2009 at 4:26 PM

    livinginbarbados // August 20, 2009 at 3:33 PM

    @ROK
    “See if you can do any research because racism is in the genes:
    1. How many white Bajans are married to black Bajans?
    How many white Bajans are married to foreign whites?
    How many white Bajans are married to their own family?”
    [Before I take on any thing, how are you defining white and black? Do I go by skin colour or am I going for the soul/inner probe?]
    +++++++++++++++++++++++

    I have a great grand father whose father, when he was baptised in the early 1800’s was recorded as the son of a Free Mulatto.

    He married family, his first cousin.

    I think this is another example to illustrate the origins of the class structure …….

    …. but it might have also have had something to do with the fact that he got her pregnant.

    Life is impossible to predict and generalisations are in many cases, meaningless.

  15. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    One reason I find this analysis confusing is that the lines drawn seem so fuzzy. Of the things that have supposedly warped our psyches, why is there no discussion of the latest technologies developed by white people. Are we to think that these are now benign? If so, why? Who is saying that this is not yet another form of manipulation and control?

    If that is a trivial consideration, then let’s move on.


  16. @John

    “By today’s standards, this is imagination.”

    Is it John? You telling me that you don’t know what goes on in Barbados. I went to a school that was predominantly white which I saw change to predominantly black while still there.

    I know how white men think because their children behaved by their example.

    Furthermore, a lot of them went places that we could only read about in books. Hear the stories of their vacation exploits.

    Then see the cruelty and humiliation they dished out to us black boys at school. I remember being made to bleat like a sheep because I looked like a sheep in their eyes. I saw other boys being made to grunts like pigs or moo like a cow or make noises like a rat.

    It never happened to me and I have never seen it but I was threatened that if I did not turn up to buy the white boys lunch from the canteen, I would get my head flushed in the toilet.

    The first hand experience I had at the hands of white boys at school allows me to know that racism is alive and well in Barbados; with no excuses either.


  17. livinginbarbados // August 20, 2009 at 4:28 PM

    When challenged the response is only ‘pompous’ and ‘conceited’, or similar? What happened to the substantive, intellectual destruction of the argument? You tell us the people are intelligent. So, let’s work with their intelligence.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++

    I believe the reason the response is as you say is because some of the “Black” White” talk originates with politicians of the 1950’s who came from a different class as the “masses” but who used the opportunity of Adult Suffrage to identify with them and push the position …. “all o’ we is one ….”Black”, oppressed by the “White” man”.

    Much of it is muddled thinking directed at muddling the thinking of the “Masses”.

    When challenged, there are no real first principles to go to that would lead to a cogent response so often if confronted face to face a whole set of arm waving and explanations ensue, usually accompanied by raised voices,

    …. but nothing of substance really gets said.

    The medium of the blogs quickly expose the flaws in logic because rereading and thinking is possible,

    …… and people are not inimidated by arm waving.

    Not for one moment am I saying that oppression isn’t alive and well in BIM.

    Among other things, it is based on economic position, skin colour (yes, skin colour, and it doesn’t matter which hue), mentality (the old get screwed) or generally, any weakness a person may present that can be exploited and lead to oppression.

  18. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    “The first hand experience I had at the hands of white boys at school allows me to know that racism is alive and well in Barbados; with no excuses either.”[No. It showed racism at the time you were at school in a particular setting. It also showed meanness that is also present within racial groups. You did not tell such stories, but is that because you did not know/see them. That set of particulars does not allow you to draw the general. Someone else could draw a benign situation and I would argue that that is equally valid.

    I went to an all boys school in London. Five black boys out of 600, in the mid 1960s–West Indian immigrants were quite new. Never had any stories like yours as far as inter racial things went. I did see boys have their heads shoved down toilets (1st years being ‘initiated’). I also saw lots of fights between white boys. I NEVER saw a black boy picked on. 2 of the black boys because prefects from 5th form. Several went on to be prize winners. All went to university. All had good careers in a country that was and remained predominantly white. That was the outcome for most pupils and it was a grammar school that took better 11-plus students. The system gave support and it was used by all.

    I argue that you had a very horrible set of boyhood experiences at school. Point.]


  19. ROK

    Children can be brutal.

    At Lodge, part of the initiation was being put in a coffin.

    …. could never unerstand the sense of that from my relatively safe HC,

    … which I admit could also be a minefield of antagonism when the whim took various students!!


  20. @LIB
    “An empty statement stays that way. We deal with substance not invective.”

    By your proclamation, right. You would like to pull me into your foolishness that is leading nowhere. By the time you done, there will be no definition of white and away walks the white man. That seems to be your agenda.

    I can’t understand, all the foolishness you seeing all the turmoil in both this society and Jamaican society and you here trying to place the blame anywhere else besides where it should be placed. You let the white system tell you that all is well after they make you privileged and you now have no feelings for your own people and you would use their education to fight down your own, rather than build them up. Why you seeking at all times to make black people look suspect?

    Tell me what that makes you?


  21. Quoting Mr ROK, on August 20, 2009 at 1:44 PM:

    “racism is in the genes”

    Best, I think, to just let that hanging out there in cyberspace. For ever.


  22. Quoting Mr ROK, on August 20, 2009 at 3:49 PM:

    “I am a senseless idiot.”

    Best, I think, to just let that hanging out there in cyberspace. For ever.

  23. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    In fact I am not placing the blame in ONE place, or with ONE race, that is the major difference. You wish to absolve blacks and blame whites. I find that that thesis does not work.

    Looking at your biography, I would say that you went to school at places in Barbados that were peculiar in the history of this country. Lodge School I did not attend but I know some old boys and have heard stories from them (including those who were ignored by blood relatives because their skin tones were not the same). Codrington College cannot in my mind be separated from the history of slavery in Barbados and its significant role in perpetuating that. The reading I have done confirms that.

    Thus, as I said above, your schoolboy and young person experiences need to be set in that VERY EXCLUSIVE Bajan upbringing. It is not the life of the same people that you mention as being ‘sufferers’ elsewhere in the country.

    What does it make me? Not blinkered.


  24. @John,
    “At Lodge, part of the initiation was being put in a coffin.”

    The coffin was mild compared to some other things that were perpetrated against us. The coffin was probably a scare tactic to stop black boys from coming. Many fellas went to Lodge School with fear in their hearts about the coffin and endured worse. Up to today, student passing for Lodge still have that fear and the coffin stopped about 30 years ago.

    Actually, by the time I reached Lodge School, the coffin was fun. It was a time for Lodge School to take over Massiah Street and parade our masculinity in front of the girls attending our sister school; although that was not populated with as many blacks as Lodge School.

    “Children can be brutal…”

    Well at that age, you were dealing with young adults up to 18-20 yrs, not little children. There is no doubt that they followed what their parents were doing and telling them about their whiteness. That is not something out of their imaginations and it served to demonstrate their superiority. That would have been very coincidental.


  25. @LIB
    “In fact I am not placing the blame in ONE place, or with ONE race, that is the major difference. You wish to absolve blacks and blame whites. I find that that thesis does not work.”

    You need to place the blame where it squarely belongs and stop looking for excuses. You should be on the bench. All the criminals would be out and the victims in jail.

  26. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    Frankly, I think the argument can easily be reversed in terms of whom one wants to blame and who is chasing excuses. You say Jack. I say Jill. But the budgie is still dead.

    I will pit my experiences against yours and say they are equally valid. In fact, I would say mine are more pertinent, having lived most of my life in the country from where the dastardly colonial rulers came. I lived most of my in a country where my race did not gain political power and have a chance to correct some or all wrongs.

    My time living in west Africa I will cede if yours is at least as long and in at least as harsh a country. If not, then I gracefully request that you put your life experiences as an exhibit, and we collect more examples.


  27. @LIB
    “Thus, as I said above, your schoolboy and young person experiences need to be set in that VERY EXCLUSIVE Bajan upbringing. ”

    Yes, I was wondering when you would get there, but I was right all along. You think that they only did that at school? All the rest of the population was sheltered from that, right?

    You think those fellas have changed? Think again skipper. They are at large in this population.

  28. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    I feel more assured that our times should be seen equally as I see that we were born in the same year. So, little inter-temporal difference. Much geographical difference. Much actual life experience difference too. We are apples and pears, but I will be you if you will be me.


  29. @LIB
    “In fact, I would say mine are more pertinent, having lived most of my life in the country from where the dastardly colonial rulers came. I lived most of my in a country where my race did not gain political power and have a chance to correct some or all wrongs.”

    If you were really smart you would see and know that living in UK and living in Barbados amounts to two different experiences. If I am not mistaken, it was that slavery was such a horrible thing that the British were not encouraged to have slaves in Britain.

    When you have a population that is white, what threat does a few blacks have on them? In contrast, we live in a predominantly black society where the white man must issue a constant reminder of who is in charge.


  30. @LIB
    “I feel more assured that our times should be seen equally as I see that we were born in the same year.”

    Why don’t you speak to a South African that born the same year as you and lived all their lives in South Africa. We are speaking about Barbados when last I checked, where you by your own admission had no childhood experiences.

    “We are apples and pears, but I will be you if you will be me.”

    Sorry fella, I don’t think I could stand being you. I would commit suicide rather than concoct evidence to support a white view. That is all you are doing. You arguing like a white man. The trash you write about Barbados is sickening and you could be assured that I would never write the likes of that about Jamaica.

    That is why white people like your colour frightened to walk the streets; day or night. Roll up your windows and don’t even stop at traffic lights at night. That is why Jamaica is so full of violence and murder. You sit in your lofty white towers and look down on your own people with all types of scorn.

    They are only people and if positions were reversed, you would be out there murdering people too… but you privileged, right?


  31. “You let the white system tell you that all is well after they make you privileged ”

    And this is the major flaw with the “graduate” class of people.

  32. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    Which South African? Boer descendant? Zulu? Mixed Race? Black Zimbabwean/Rhodesian fleeing from Smith; white Zimbawean fleeing Mugabe? There is not some neat homogeneous blob of people to fit into a box.

    You did cite Barbados, and I cited that the bit of Barbados you cited is FAR FROM BEING THE NORM. If that is wrong then I will say you are really not telling the truth.

    If you want to critique my writing we can do that, but we are critiquing your arguments. Lodge and Codrington should not be seen as the norm.

    Now you confuse again. I am a black person who is white. If you want to check the tincture, go to my blog. Stop taking it that you are right because you say so.

    I did not go before to your mention of my father and I will gladly take you to see him in his hilly town in rural Jamaica and you can go and dig yam and cassava together. He’ll tell you what life has been like over 80 years for a black Jamaican. My mother rests in peace.

    Now, I will rest in peace knowing that you have a lot of the world yet to know.

  33. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    “That is why white people like your colour”[My skin is black/dark brown–my picture has been in the papers, and one of your fellow commentators flipped one in the other day on a thread]

    “frightened to walk the streets; day or night.”[No, and I will be liming in Brittons Hill/Villa Road again tomorrow evening, on the road side…]

    “Roll up your windows and don’t evenstop at traffic lights at night.”[Detest AC. Window always open; doors never locked. Always stop at red lights. I do note that many drivers run red lights, day and night.]

    Baseless generalisations.


  34. You know John anyone that ignores the fact that there is a class divide in Barbados is silly. Class demographics and the contempt and distrust that it brings are natural results of the type of economic development that is pursued in this neck of the woods. But race on the other hand is a whole different ball game.

    Lodge School was a typical English Public School (I am sure there is a school some where in London with the same School tie and blazer) with all the hazing and pecking orders but with a racial twist.

    On Weekends the fellas at Lodge would be welcome at the many Yacht Club balls or hang outs on Rockley Golf Course at moonlight, or take part in beach parties on Sunday at Cattle Wash which was all very fine, except that they could easily have posted signs at any of these events – “Whites Only”.

    By the time Blacks began to out number Whites at Lodge the group started huddling together in groups (deny that this did not happen at Kolij as well) and there was a sense of just tolerance between the two groups. The Indians that I knew just hung out with the Black kids.

    Today in the secondary schools (including Luther Thorne) that really has not changed much.

    Wha you think..?


  35. @LIB
    “You say Jack. I say Jill. But the budgie is still dead.”

    Look at you. The budgie should not be dead and if we don’t do something about it more budgies will die.

    So when each budgie dies we will only have to say, no sense worrying about it, the budgie dead.

    In case you lost your antenna, the last I heard about the role of the justice system is to extract revenge for wrong doing. It is supposed to force the perpetrator into remorse and to show remorse. Forgiveness is not extracted from the victim.

    All the talk about rehabilitation, where is it? When I called for rehabilitation programmes in the prison, the media did not even carry my interview; they discarded it. When I spoke of prison being as punishment and not for punishment, I was asked what am I talking about… but the same brutal behaviour of prison wardens caused the burning of Glendairy.

    Most of all, what I want to get through to you is that the justice system behaves as if you are guilty and treats you as if you are guilty before you are tried, even if you are innocent. This has a serious effect on our people because the system deems them all guilty even before they are arrested.


  36. Black boys betrayed by racist school system, says report

    Black schoolboys have been betrayed by the education authorities for almost half a century and are struggling to overcome racism from many of their own teachers, according to a damning new report out today.
    Members of an influential education commission say the failure of the schools system and individuals within it to successfully engage with students of African-Caribbean origin has severely hindered them and contributed to massive underachievement.

    Last year 70% of African-Caribbean boys in London left school with fewer than five or more GCSEs at the top grades of A*-C or equivalent, while African-Caribbean men are the least likely of any group to have a degree.

    During the research, which was commissioned by the London mayor, Ken Livingstone, and conducted over the past year, black boys complained of racism and stereotyping from teachers. They said chances of success were also limited by an archaic curriculum.

    Their parents told researchers they felt schools did not welcome their input. Black teachers spoke of discrimination. Only 7.4% of London’s teachers are from ethnic minorities and 2.9% are black.

    The 285-page report, which represents the most exhaustive study to date of the educational underachievement of black boys, concludes that “the English schooling system has produced dismal academic results for a high percentage of black pupils for the best part of 50 years”.

    Mr Livingstone, who has called for action to ensure that the number of ethnic minority teachers in the capital rises to least 33%, said: “The composition of the teaching staff, governors and other professionals dealing with the education of our children must change dramatically to fully reflect the diversity of London’s children.”

    His officials have organised the London Schools and the Black Child conference to be addressed by schools minister Stephen Twigg on Saturday.

    In the study, conducted under the direction of the mayor’s London Development Agency and an advisory board led by MP Diane Abbott, focus groups reached a wide degree of agreement: “The consensus was that low teacher expectations played a major part in the underachievement of African-Caribbean pupils. In addition, inadequate levels of positive teacher attention, unfair behaviour management practices, disproportionately high levels of exclusions and an inappropriate curriculum took their toll.”

    Pupils were acknowledged to suffer from negative peer pressure and many are said to be disadvantaged by inadequately funded schools with a high turnover of teachers. The insufficient level of involvement by some black parents is also singled out.

    The commission also heard evidence of direct discrimination. “Racism manifested itself most harshly in being over looked for answering questions, verbal aggression from teachers and harsher reprimands than for students from other ethnic groups for the same misdemeanour.” The report says that relationships between black pupils and white teachers was generally characterised by “conflict and fear”. One participant complained: “When it is white boys, it is a ‘group’ but when it is black boys it is a ‘gang’. I think that’s wrong.”

    The commission found that in 2002, black boys started to lag behind from primary school year two. The gap widened every year after that. It plays down the role of social backgrounds because working class boys from other communities outperformed middle class African-Caribbean boys.

    In a series of recommendations, the commission calls for intervention on several levels. It urges ministers to give every parent three days a year paid leave so they can play a part in the schooling process. It also says black teachers should benefit from fast-tracking and “golden handshakes”.

    The commission calls for urgent action to reduce the number of black pupils excluded. Controversially, it suggests that heads should not exclude pupils for a first serious offence unless the catalyst is an incident involving a knife or gun. It calls for clear procedures which would allow pupils to report racism by teachers. But they also call on black parents to play a more proactive role with their children and schools, “regardless of resistance”.

    Last year the government launched a new package – Aiming High – backed with £10m of extra funding to tackle the problem of African-Caribbean pupils’ underachievement in both primary and secondary schools.

    A spokeswoman for the Department for Education and Skills said: “We recognise that many pupils, particularly from African-Caribbean backgrounds are not achieving their full potential. That is why we are working with parents and community representatives to raise the achievement of minority ethnic pupils.”

    Steve Sinnott, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “It is grossly unfair to blame teachers alone for a phenomenon which is more complex than the report appears to make out.”

    Rampton Revisited, The Educational Experiences and Achievements of Black Boys in London Schools , published by the LDA Education Commission.

  37. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @John // August 20, 2009 at 5:10 PM
    Agree with most of the sentiments. Lots of muddled thinking and arm waving.
    “Not for one moment am I saying that oppression isn’t alive and well in BIM.

    Among other things, it is based on economic position, skin colour (yes, skin colour, and it doesn’t matter which hue), mentality (the old get screwed) or generally, any weakness a person may present that can be exploited and lead to oppression.”[Agreed, and it is universal.]


  38. @
    “My skin is black/dark brown–my picture has been in the papers, and one of your fellow commentators flipped one in the other day on a thread…”

    I know man, you too bright. You never see a white man that looked like you yet, right? They used to call them house niggers.

  39. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    “Black boys betrayed by racist school system, says report”[What research also shows, and predates the arrival of black immigrants in the UK, is that there have been whole classes of people, obviously white, and mainly poor, who had been failed by the education system for decades. Many immigrants descended into the same geographical areas. Cycles of poverty and poor educational attainment have not been raced based throughout the last 100 years in the UK. Blacks are part of the new poor, no doubt. Yet the experience is not the same for children from Asian backgrounds.]


  40. @LIB
    “Agreed, and it is universal…”

    Foolishness! Could only come from a HN. You cannot differentiate between natural selection and racism. You saying that racism is natural selection, right?

  41. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    @ROK
    When a ‘black’ man calls another ‘black’ man “I know man, you too bright” we know exactly where you are–though it could be the academics that are being appreciated (odd word ‘bright’). Really. I guess I will tell all those people at Starcom that they’re too bright too.


  42. @Ruel Daniels: “Black boys betrayed by racist school system, says report

    Not wishing to take away from your above. But, I’m seriously interested in the following question:

    What does this same report say about “Black Girls”?

  43. livinginbarbados Avatar
    livinginbarbados

    Gotta be honest Mr. K, we are exactly the same colour, judging by your thumbnail pic.

    Done.


  44. I need to get away from this madness that is being perpetrated here by LIB. You understand that you inciting me, right? You ain’t come with no hate speech but you inciting me. Therefore I done with you cause what you saying there worse than any hate speech. You need to be charged for inciting hate.


  45. @LIB
    “Really. I guess I will tell all those people at Starcom that they’re too bright too.”

    They are not the reserve of starcom alone, look further afield and count yourself as a statistic in the process.


  46. @LIB
    “What research also shows, and predates the arrival of black immigrants in the UK”

    You comparing UK with Barbados? The origin of poverty in UK is different to the origin and perpetrating of poverty in Barbados.

    With every sentence you write you show how you are betraying your own. The Irish that got banished to Barbados were white too and were considered by the British to be the scum of the earth. When we arrived we were second or third or at the bottom of the class for these same scum of the earth. They still white. You should ask them how they feel about their supposedly shameful past and the way their ancestors were treated, as much as they are the privileged class in Barbados????

    I am sure you will hear the bitterness and complaints of poverty. Yet, they never hit rock bottom like us. These were the massas. If they complaining, what should we be doing?


  47. ROK,
    This is about two days now that you haven’t ‘scored’ me. Not even a smooch, mwahhhh, nutton. I being real patient but I don’t know how long I can last. You giving dat P-hole LIB more of your time than me. You know what happens when you neglect your sweetP? Ask Kerri.


  48. @ROK: “You understand that you inciting me, right?

    With the deepest of respect ROK…

    No one can make you do anything. As the Buddhists during the Vietnam War proved so very clearly and exactly… (By publically setting themselves on fire using gasoline, and thus committing the ultimate sacrifice…)

    IMHO, each individual makes their own decisions. (This is one of the definitions of freedom.)

    ROK: If LIB “incited” you to jump off a bridge, would you?


  49. @LIB
    “Which South African? Boer descendant? Zulu? Mixed Race? Black Zimbabwean/Rhodesian fleeing from Smith; white Zimbawean fleeing Mugabe? There is not some neat homogeneous blob of people to fit into a box.”

    hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
    hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
    hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

    I tell you that you too bright. The part that in north America.


  50. @Chris
    “If LIB “incited” you to jump off a bridge, would you?”

    haha… have no fear Chris. He could not even incite me to jump in a pot hole. LOL!

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