Senior police officer faces sack over 'whiter than white' remark

[Angilion]

I think she is irrational but despite that we actually have a lot in common and have a lot of laughs and shared hobbies so it's a storm in a tea cup tbh.

I am tolerant of people with different opinions to mine, no matter how silly I think they are. It's important to mix with people you don't agree with even more so these days in my opinion because we live in a world where lots of people exist in echo chambers and spout rubbish completely unchallenged.

I think that gives me the moral high ground and I'm quite proud of it to be honest. It doesn't mean I'm right but at least I make an effort to understand the opposite position.

I am tolerant of people with different opinions to mine, but I am not friends with people who are irrationally prejudiced to such an extent that they choose their irrational prejudices as the way they identify themselves. Even more so when their irrational prejudices target me personally and they explicitly target me personally.

I think some degree of equality is necessary for friendship. She regards you as inherently inferior. She thinks you deserve inferior treatment in all things - legal rights, employment, education, everything - solely because she's sexist and racist. That's not how friendship works. Of course she thinks the same of the billions of people she thinks are untermensch, but when it comes to the relationship between you her targetting of you personally is most relevant.

I have known some feminists and other irrationally prejudiced people who are otherwise decent people. I'd mix with them. I'd listen to them. I'd be civil to them. But I wouldn't be friends with them, especially if I was their target. No matter how fashionable their irrational prejudices are.

It's not like one person supporting one football team and another person supporting another football team. It's not even like different people supporting different political parties. It's a far more serious division than that, all the more so when one person targets the other but still very serious when they don't. For example, I know someone who is a whitist. They think "whites" deserve superior social status, legal rights, etc. They think "blacks" in particular are the cause of most problems. Yadda yadda. Just like your "friend". Same way of thinking, slightly different targetting. I'm in their favoured biological group so I'm not personally targetted by their views, but I still couldn't be friends with them. I can tolerate their racism on the basis of free speech, but it's repulsive enough to me to make it impossible for me to be their friend even if I wanted to be.

As an aside, I'm curious as to why she'd want to be "friends" with someone who she regards as being so inferior because of their sex and "race" that she thinks they're not even worthy of being allowed to have an opinion. That's a rather strange position to take. I can understand irrationally prejuduced people, even extremely irrationally prejudiced people, wanted to be friends with one of their targets because they don't target them personally. There's ample evidence that humans have a small group of people (probably ~150) who they instinctively understand as being people and for everyone else they only intellectually understand them as being people. It's therefore possible for an irrationally prejudiced person to have one or a few people in their target group(s) inside the small group of people they instinctively understand as people and therefore genuinely not think of them as their target group. But that's not the case here - she explicitly targets you personally, so she does include you in her target group.

You know she's targetting you. You know she thinks that you personally (in addition to billions of other people) are unworthy of equal treatment and always will be. You should be wary of any apparent friendship. How can she really be your friend when she regards you as so inherently inferior that you're not even worthy of having an opinion? When she actively promotes prejudice and discrimination against you? When she regards those things as so important that she defines herself with them?

 

[Narj]

Actually it is like football teams. We disagree in a very robust sense and despite all that, the common ground is a creative one. I let any vitriol go over my head because it is a tiny part of our friendship and anything excessive is usually drink-fuelled.

It reminds me of those often spouted phrases like, "I could never be friends with a Tory" or "I'd never drink with a Cornynite." It's just bloody narrow-minded. We agree to disagree on lots of things and when I look at it, we should hate each others guts but manage to travel together a lot regardless.

We will have a robust argument about something then a day later one will text the other saying, "fancy a pint?"

We annoy the crap out of each other sometimes but are still friends. I actually quite enjoy the challenge and I think she feels the same.

I'm not sensitive enough to feel disrespected over an argument, I just sometimes feel sad for the other party being stuck in their obstinance.

Friendship doesn't have to revolve around politics, although it can be bloody disruptive sometimes.

 

[Angilion]

Actually it is like football teams. We disagree in a very robust sense and despite all that, the common ground is a creative one. I let any vitriol go over my head because it is a tiny part of our friendship and anything excessive is usually drink-fuelled.

It reminds me of those often spouted phrases like, "I could never be friends with a Tory" or "I'd never drink with a Cornynite." It's just bloody narrow-minded. We agree to disagree on lots of things and when I look at it, we should hate each others guts but manage to travel together a lot regardless.

We will have a robust argument about something then a day later one will text the other saying, "fancy a pint?"

We annoy the crap out of each other sometimes but are still friends. I actually quite enjoy the challenge and I think she feels the same.

I'm not sensitive enough to feel disrespected over an argument, I just sometimes feel sad for the other party being stuck in their obstinance.

Friendship doesn't have to revolve around politics, although it can be bloody disruptive sometimes.

I'm not sensitive enough to feel disrespected over an argument.

I am "sensitive" enough to feel disrepected over someone who believes that I'm unworthy of equal rights, unworthy even to be allowed an opinion, solely because of my sex, "race", sexual orientation or other trivial biological characteristic.

That's not at all like supporting different football teams.

 

[Qjumper]

The world has gone fr**cking mate..... Mad I tell ya...

 

[ivrytwr3]

During my basic training as Military Police, the phrase "Whiter than white" was a common phrase used. It's meaning was that we should have higher standards, integrity, honesty and beyond reproach.

As above, the world has gone mad.

 

[Liquidfox]

When it comes to the egg and spoon comment, I'd imagine they have an absolute meltdown when it comes to a certain Belgian hardstyle DJ.

 

[Yadda]

I assume nobody minds that many of these words, "egg & spoon" etc, are banned from many public forums, including this one I expect?

 

[aardvark]

ive never even heard of the egg and spoon thing, but then i'm not a cheeky cockney.

 

[Yadda]

ive never even heard of the egg and spoon thing, but then i'm not a cheeky cockney.

When I grew up in the 70s & 80s it was one of the "cool words" to use when describing black people. The actual word that is, not the rhyming slang.

 

[ivrytwr3]

I had to google it and i'm no spring chicken. I can see why that is deemed offensive, however, everything should be taken in context and a senior officer telling everyone they should be whiter than white, it telling his team to uphold the law and be at your best - no racial connotations there are at all.

Mind you, i was at a briefing recently and the briefing officer told everyone that if they discover a suspect package they should "make like like a swastika" - definitely a "did he really say that?", but i roared!!!

 

[dowie]

I assume nobody minds that many of these words, "egg & spoon" etc, are banned from many public forums, including this one I expect?

I'd assume so too, I'm not sure why people would mind that being banned if the rhyming slang implies what I think it implies (a certain racist word?).

Using something like that is rather different to the idiom in the OP.

 

[Yadda]

I'd assume so too, I'm not sure why people would mind that being banned if the rhyming slang implies what I think it implies (a certain racist word?).

Using something like that is rather different to the idiom in the OP.

Yes, of course. My comment was more of a general one.

Regarding the OP, it's very easy to assume the context in which the phrase was used, and that assumption may well be correct, but does anyone know for sure?

 

[dowie]

Regarding the OP, it's very easy to assume the context in which the phrase was used, and that assumption may well be correct, but does anyone know for sure?

Well we can only go on the reported context which according to the article in the OP was:

"The detective superintendent is said to have made the comment in a briefing to colleagues during which he discussed the need to be faultless and above reproach in carrying out inquiries."

I'm not sure that people are making assumptions beyond what has been reported, perhaps there is more to it but currently the context is simply correctly using an idiom in briefing.

 

[Yadda]

Well we can only go on the reported context which according to the article in the OP was:

"The detective superintendent is said to have made the comment in a briefing to colleagues during which he discussed the need to be faultless and above reproach in carrying out inquiries."

Yes, that's all we have to go on. If it's the whole story and all there is to it then I agree, he has nothing to answer for.

Let's wait until the inquiry is over and all the facts are known before jumping to conclusions.

 

[Roar87]

I didn't know there was any sort of racial connotations behind the saying "whiter than white", it would seem to me that it means things just need to be spotlessly clean, like a white bed sheet or something, and I'm 31 as well.

 

[Yadda]

I didn't know there was any sort of racial connotations behind the saying "whiter than white", it would seem to me that it means things just need to be spotlessly clean, like a white bed sheet or something, and I'm 31 as well.

I suppose one way it could be construed as being racist is if, for example, the comment was aimed specifically at a black person without justification, i.e. their conduct was no different to anyone else present and didn't warrant being singled out.

I'm in no way that's what happened, just that it's one way such a phrase could be used abusively.

 

[dowie]

Yes, that's all we have to go on. If it's the whole story and all there is to it then I agree, he has nothing to answer for.

Let's wait until the enquiry is over and all the facts are known before jumping to conclusions.

I'm not jumping to conclusions, it is perfectly possible to comment on the information given.

I suppose one way it could be construed as being racist is if, for example, the comment was aimed specifically at a black person without justification, i.e. their conduct was no different to anyone else present and didn't warrant being singled out.

I'm in no way that's what happened, just that it's one way such a phrase could be used abusively.

But then that would ignore the context that we seemingly already have re: it being made as part of a briefing to a group. Of course there is the possibility that the reporting is incorrect.

If he had say singled out a black person then that would be a very dubious thing to leave out of the reporting.

edit - some further context: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/cri...-using-whiter-than-white-phrase-a3936041.html

One said: “There was no bad intent in this comment, it may have been a poor use of language but this is not what the misconduct process is for. This is not corruption, this is not serious wrongdoing. There should be informal ways of dealing with this, particularly at a time when we are so short of experienced officers.”

 

[Yadda]

I'm not jumping to conclusions, it is perfectly possible to comment on the information given.



But then that would ignore the context that we seemingly already have re: it being made as part of a briefing to a group. Of course there is the possibility that the reporting is incorrect.

If he had say singled out a black person then that would be a very dubious thing to leave out of the reporting.

edit - some further context: https://www.standard.co.uk/news/cri...-using-whiter-than-white-phrase-a3936041.html

You're basing all this on newspaper stories and the assumption that the comment was aimed at the whole group and not any individuals within the group.

I'm not saying the assumptions are incorrect, but they are assumptions all the same.

"Assume nothing" is a mantra I try to apply to all stories, especially those I read in newspapers.

 

[Tefal]

I assume nobody minds that many of these words, "egg & spoon" etc, are banned from many public forums, including this one I expect?

What what's wrong with egg and spoon

 

[Yadda]

What what's wrong with egg and spoon

Nothing, I was referring to the word it's rhyming slang for.