Exeter supporters petition for club to drop 'racist' Native American branding.

[matelot22]

Agree re South Africa, albeit, that is an entirely different situation to what we face in the UK. I'd challenge your view with regard to the UK though as perhaps being out of date? I'd say definitely so during amateur days when "the old school tie" prevailed, but with the advent of professionalism, I think the game has opened up across the board. As a Northerner, I never played union until I joined up, I always regarded it as a Southern public school boy sport.

So was Simon McIntyre mistaken about his personal experience, or just lying for attention?

I must confess to having not read the interview, but I'd have thought that in terms of proportionality between black professional rugby players and percentage of population, there must be a fairly good representation? If I get time later I'll look into it, the figures must be fairly easy to find.....

Look for a Genge quote as he made this very point about two weeks ago.

That there was good representation or not? I just had a quick look and can't find a % figure of black professional players, but with a representative figure of 3% across the UK population, you have to assume the percentage of professional black players to be higher than that surely?

[Neils]

Genge quote from a podcast around about the 20th June-
"Does rugby have a racism problem?” 9/38 players in the Six Nations squad were BAME. 23.7%. Why does no one ever talk about the successes?! The public face of rugby is massively over representative of BAME! Always the negatives get the focus. Who cares about the RFU Council?!

[matelot22]

Genge quote from a podcast around about the 20th June-
"Does rugby have a racism problem?” 9/38 players in the Six Nations squad were BAME. 23.7%. Why does no one ever talk about the successes?! The public face of rugby is massively over representative of BAME! Always the negatives get the focus. Who cares about the RFU Council?!

That's even higher than I thought, my guess would have been 10-15%, but I agree with his views on highlighting the positives, and good on Genge for saying it. That's what my mate was doing in his Facebook rant. I've been involved with amateur boxing for close to 40 years, all of the black lads I have come to know (and there have been many) they have had that same positive mental attitude. To quote The Clash, "I don't believe in lying back saying how bad your luck is". That really is my last word on this thread.

[InBetweenWasp]

Good on Genge for bringing balance to things.  He's quite right to call out the likes of the BBC for quoting him and putting up a picture of Lewis Ludlam but to also point out where good things are happening.

He's spoken a few times about the major hurdle in getting into rugby as a career is a class thing, not an ethnicity thing.

[bigad82]

So Sting is also personna non grata too??

He should be, terrible songwriter.

[WonkyWasp]

Nice one, bigad!  Applause!

[Raggs]

So Sting is also personna non grata too??

Why would he be?

[WonkyWasp]

To which Sting are you referring?

[Raggs]

To which Sting are you referring?

I don't know, which one are you talking about? The mascot, or the singer (or some other)? Why would any of them be?

[WonkyWasp]

Originally - the mascot. Bigad28 sneaked the singer(?) in rather cleverly.

[Raggs]

Originally - the mascot. Bigad28 sneaked the singer(?) in rather cleverly.

That's what I thought. So why would the mascot need to go?

[WonkyWasp]

Because I always preferred the original Sting mascot,  and the present incumbent looks asf his mother had a fling with the Leeds Rugby League mascot - that's Reggie the Rhino.

[backdoc]

Unfortunately racism at a personal level is a two-way thing. The perception of one influences the behaviour of the other.

Much of what is discussed and written about is actually historic - a Caribbean cricketer is really talking about his experiences in the 70's and 80's to a greater degree than the current situation IMO.

My main concern here is the 'scab-picking' - nothing is ever allowed to settle which tends to make it worse.

DOI: I have been on the interviewing panel as Clinical Director for 12 Consultant Spinal Surgeons and Fellows at the RNOH Stanmore, and I have never appointed a White English Surgeon. There was one Romanian, but the rest were Iranian, Egyptian, Indian, Chinese, Mauritius, etc etc.

If only society realised that it is what you do that matters, not your spin.

[Rossm]

In today's Guardian:

Washington's NFL team will reportedly drop racist nickname on Monday

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2020/jul/13/washington-announce-redskins-nickname-changed

[andermt]

Now official

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-53390944?fbclid=IwAR1KJoxcGmpOppBpg9XWyEDh6YHh4drrIzdj3PXfJNKAJ7BkeKfysJdQzBY