Did Moira Stuart’s demise at the BBC signify the beginning of the (bbc presenters.wmv by graceplant)

Ever since the BBC dropped Moira from her regular BBC News slots we’ve noticed how White the BBC is.  We also noticed that there seemed to be a cut off time for presenters of colour.  Before 6.00 am there is usually at least one Asian or Black presenter, but as soon as 6.00 am arrives all the presenters are White.  The only exception is Rita Chakrabarti who is the political correspondent for the BBC and she comes on when something news worthy is happening in the political forum.  

This is not representative of the UK. Is this institutional racism?
It seems as though there is something wrong with being different than white.  Lewis Hamilton, Tiger Woods and Serena Williams are high achieving sports personalities in the media who have a voice.  Is this the only way people of colour can get on TV by being exceptional sports people.  Millions watched and flocked to see Lewis Hamilton the other week.  He’s phenomenal, so why do GMTV and the BBC think that viewers will have a problem seeing people of colour presenting the news informing us of what’s going on in the world.

When I started teaching in schools I noticed that I was treated differently than other teachers in small ways.  Things like different looks, odd questions, suspicion over my qualifications.  I spoke to another Black teacher in a Leeds School and she told of about the stress she was under because of the Racism she faced in a school that she had worked in.  Her story became the basis of my PhD.

I was reading for my Masters degree at Leeds University at the time and I wrote a research proposal to look at the link between stress and ethnicity in teachers.  You see, just telling people it exists wasn’t enough.  People didn’t believe me.  Because they hadn’t experienced it – it couldn’t possibly happen.  So I wanted to prove it did.  The only way I would get people to listen to me and to change things was to prove it academically.  So I sent my research proposal to Loughborough University and got funding for it.   I also managed to get £3,000 from the National Union of Teachers, the biggest teaching union in England.

I spent 3 months reading and writing and another 9 months of data collection.  Interviewing, questionnaires and dairy collection (based on stressful events happening).  I wrote a book chapter, papers and attended conferences to disseminate my results.  I received shocked and surprised interest.  Many people talked about it, how terrible it all is that people are suffering in such a way.  

So what can we do about it I asked the Professors and Government-related research groups?  Get more money to research it further I was told.  Research what?  I’ve proven it.  It’s been published.  People can’t deny it anymore.  So why do we need to research it further?  Why don’t we come up with ideas to make it go away?  That’s not what it’s about unfortunately.  It’s about Research funding and prestige.

So I lost interest.  I wrote 40,000 words, put it all in a box and gave it to them.  They are still using it by the way.  One of my papers was presented at the European conference for Work and Organizational Psychology 2 months ago, by my co-author.

It just occurred to me this morning that students have been coming to England for many years and yet we are so exclusive here.  I spent nearly 3 years with my PhD supervisor and she didn’t know anything about me.  She was 2 years older than me, and we had so many things in common.  So many times she’d say to me that she’d been longing to get some Jamaican food from a particular shop in Leicester, but she hadn’t gotten around to it.  There was also a time when I was invited to a buffet type thing and I was to bring along some Caribbean food.  I was born in Birmingham, England and not Jamaica, my husband has Irish background but wasn’t asked to bring any boxty.  That was the only thing she could use to connect with me, even though I was her colleague.  Strange, don’t you think?  Or is it because I is black? (Ali G – lol).

GMTV is no better – white, mainly southern England – well living in the country of London really.
No blame or recrimination for all the great tv presenters and tv journalist they are all great at their job – that’s not the point here. We need to see the multi-cultural society that we see on the streets, buses, shops and workplaces reflected on our TV. So ignorant xenophobes can relax and see that ‘they’ are just like ‘us’ (which is the start of integration) and different ethnic groups can see themselves represented and so grow up feeling like they are accepted instead of the exception.

So let’s get some British lady with a middle eastern heritage wearing a head scarf and a young black man – hey and not brown of mixed race lets have some colour up there – racism in the ethnic communities needs to be addressed too. So no ‘redibow’ skin - because that colour is considered more acceptable - which goes back to Caribbean girls getting pregnant by white slave owners having a paler brown skin (redibow), where those kids being the children of land and slave owners got better treatment and maybe land and inheritance.  Lets get dark skin and dreadlocks up there!  Take a look at ‘Eastenders’ – a soap opera here in the UK.  They are spot on with their racial mix and the same people who watch Eastenders go to BBC and GMTV for their morning news – some 10 million people.

Next time your up before 6am (GMT) look through the news channels – lots of talented attractive presenters of colour come 6am ‘white’ the slate clean’.  It’s not right…….