RE: Intolerance in the UK
Well, nice of you to show an interest, Lance, but heaven only knows where you dug up that piece of blatant nonsense from.
In the first instance, Rowan Atkinson is a renowned media recluse. He doesn't even do proper interviews these days, let alone this sort of hooey. If it had been John Cheese, now...
Nobody has been arrested for calling a horse gay. We've been over this before, how the hate crime laws actually work as opposed to people who know nothing about it thinks it works. And I promise you, our massively overstretched police force are not arresting people because they called a horse gay. But I think you know that.
GoWst, I don't know about the celebrations you mentioned, but in this free country, yes, we do allow people from elsewhere to celebrate events that are important to them. It's not 'official', we don't have public holidays or anything like that, but we aren't the sort of Draconian regime that forbids anything other than cheering the red, white and blue.
RE: Intolerance in the UK
Incidentally, I have written before about Partition, but if you'd like to know more about the creation of Pakistan and why it might have a little bit of something to do with the UK, you can look it up. It makes very interesting reading.
I know Lance likes to think we live in some sort of present tense vacuum, where nothing we do in the past has any bearing on what is happening today and we don't owe anybody anything or have any responsibility for anything that we caused to happen in the (not very) distant past, but the existence of Pakistan is a direct result of our interference.
It would be a bit of a cheek if we didn't allow those with Pakistani origins to celebrate it, really.
RE: Intolerance in the UK
Thanks for your response, Scar.
How widespread is this allowance/tolerance of celebrations for Pakistani (or any other nation's) independence?
Are roads, villages or towns closed down/off for it?
Are non-Pakistani residents compelled to be significantly affected by these celebrations?
Are other (Western nation) ethnicities also afforded such cultural/national celebrations?
In general, how do these celebrations impact the non-Pakistani residents of those communities and the U.K. at large?
RE: Intolerance in the UK
In answer to your last question, very little, outside of London. I used to work years ago in a city with a very large Pakistani population and never heard anything about it.
There's a Pakistani population where I am now, and haven't heard anything of it either.
In London, roads get closed for all sorts of things. Celebrations, protests, coronations, etc, but in this instance, as with the Notting Hill Carnival, or St Patrick's day, the whole of London doesn't grind to a halt, it will be in a particular area.
Whole villages in England can get closed off for plenty of very English celebrations. Bonfire nights, carnivals, street parties, scarecrow weeks, cheese-rolling. Probably not Pakistani independence, because our rural areas aren't very diverse. And to be fair, you don't get EDL louts protesting in huge numbers at someone having the temerity to bung a few cheeses down a hill.
Think about it like this: America makes a big deal out of St Patrick's day. Whole streets get closed for that, don't they? Other than having an Irish diaspora, why is this celebrated there?
It's not even that big in actual Ireland.
Other cultures have their own celebrations in the UK. It's not made a big deal about by the GB news types who brought you that video, though, because we only care when Muslims are involved. Nobody gives a shit when the Chinese or Jewish quarters are closed off for cultural celebrations.
RE: Intolerance in the UK
"we only care when Muslims are involved. Nobody gives a shit when the Chinese or Jewish quarters are closed off for cultural celebrations."
{Just playing devil's advocate here}
Because, some might argue, the latter two groups aren't notorious for terrorism, suicide bombings and loping off people's heads. And, perhaps, they tend to assimilate better into the mainstream society.
