Dear Mrs. Thatcher,
Do you know, when I sat down to write this letter it was supposed to be a thoughtful piece of correspondence on racial tolerance, the importance of circumstantial context and above all an semi investigation into the mentality of someone who could possibly have innocently compared a black tennis player to a childhood toy.
But as my fingers strike the keys of my laptop and deep fury is bubbling inside me. One which is rising from the pit of my soul and hijacking each and everyone of the neural pathways that carry information from my brain to the tips of my digits. There's a battle raging between my thoughts and my heart, and the heart is winning, convincingly. Overriding the intellectual response I want to give and causing me to give in to my desire to react emotionally. Luckily through my years of writing I have learnt to channel my feelings, so this will be no mere rant.
Mrs. Thatcher, I am angry and what follows is an analysis of that anger and your part in it's creation.
1. You offended me
Whatever the intention behind the statement made in the Green Room, you caused offence. You offended the people within ear shot and you offended me and you offended any other person that chooses to take offence. The term Golliwog has a history attached to it, a history of disparaging remarks against people of another race, this in itself means the word is loaded. A racial slur is a racial slur and just because a golliwog was once a childhood toy based on the Black Minstrel Show it soon became a way in which to hurt the feelings of fellow human beings. A person of your generation would know how this word was and still is used, so why you would choose to use it is beyond me, but I digress.
2. Your arrogance
While you using the term golliwog made me angry, your reaction to the response has added the paraffin to the proverbial flame. Why can you not just accept that while you didn't mean to, you insulted a large number of people, of all races. Accept it, say you didn't mean to cause offence, say you're sorry and move on. But the subconscious arrogance that you feel justifies you in this case just won't let you, will it? I mean anyone who is upset that you compared/called a black man a golliwog just didn't understand the humour and shouldn't be offended. That’s fine but if I was to say that you wouldn't look out of place on one of those Crystal Meth before and after adverts showing the results of years of drug abuse and you look like at any given moment your face is about to cave in on itself like a crème brulee baked by a blind paraplegic chef with arthritis in their neck, you might take offence but then I'd just say you don't get it. Can you see what I'm getting at???
3. The right wing media and their bullshit
Why is it that when something racially charged happens, the right wing media immediately try and pass the event off as a joke. Is the whole world full of comedians? Are we all just walking around telling each other jokes? I don't understand. While situations like the Prince Harry incident are unfortunate, you can at least explain that the prince and his Asian colleague, as with all friends, have an understanding of what is acceptable within the bounds of their relationship and what is not. But for the most part, in incidents like yours Mrs. Thatcher or that of Ron Atkinson, or the Shilpa Shetty affair in the Celebrity Big Brother house, the right wing media always tries to turn the remark or action into a bit of friendly banter or worse turn the aggressor into the victim. But while painting the situation into a case of a joke misunderstood, they are in fact insinuating that people who take offence have no sense of humour - I'm sorry I reject that argument, I have a fantastic sense of humour, in fact, I'm the funniest person I know... I'll tell you joke to prove it:
Person 1: Knock knock...
Person 2: Who's there...
Person 1: A Stu...
Person 2: A Stu who???
Person 1: A Stupid old woman who still thinks racially slurs are acceptable in this day and age and who should really learn to keep her archaic descriptive terms to the privacy of her own home!
See, I'm a regular stand-up comedian!
4. Small mindedness
Seriously, admitting a mistake is not the end of civilization, it's not the liberal left taking over and it certainly isn't the end of England. She got sacked, get over it. So why is it that when someone makes an error in judgement, whether the cause of that error is subconscious racism, ignorance or just plain stupidity that some people get up in arms and claim that freedom of speech has been impeded. Here's the problem with that rational is that if you and the rest of your Daily Mail reading regiment want to bleat on about the right to make racially charged comments and then protect them with the blanket of freedom of speech, then you have to accept that people who are offended by said comments have the freedom to speak out against them - that's the whole point of freedom of speech.
I guess that's all I have to say on the matter Mrs. Thatcher, and I feel I have wasted enough time on you and your actions. I should spend my time and effort engaging with people who actually matter... but I just had to tell you how I felt.
Yours
Mofoluwaso Merriman-Johnson (or if that's too hard to pronounce, just call me Golly!)
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aww mofo!
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