I must say I am enjoying watching the Guardian squirming after Trevor Phillips doc. They badly want

[Herbette Chapman - aged 15]

to denounce him but he's black so they can't. Joseph Harker has denounced him but he can because, well, he [Harker] is black.

I suspect the phrase being bandied around the dinner tables of Islington tonight will be 'Uncle Tom'.

[Berni]

Harker, bless him, wrote the timeless article 'Of course all white people are racist' in which he argued that he couldn't be racist because he was black. So that sort of tells you where he's coming from.

[Classic Jorge]

Of course all white people are racist, the clue is in the people bit. People are racist

[Berni]

It's really the 'I'm black so I can't be racist' bit that bothered me. As if racism were just about power structures rather than a fundamental facet of human nature.

[Classic Jorge]

Or, for that matter, ask someone from Africa what they think about Caribbean people.

The idea black people can't be racist as they are ethnic. This is the bull**** I don't agree with, safe to say.

Glossing entirely over the fact that it is, in itself, a racist thing to say, of course.

[redgunamo]

[Snin]

[Herbette Chapman - aged 15]

man, a reasonable fella but a bit 'Daily Express' was castigating the black fella for saying black people could not be classed as racist. I was younger, leftier, more idealistic and in tune with the mores of the day and naturally jumped to the defence of the black man.

Racism, I patiently explained to white man, was intrinsically about advantage. Simply disliking someone without essentially oppressing them might be unpleasant, but it wasn't racist until political, social or financial advantage was being sought.

I think I meant that it was perfectly acceptable for black man to despise white man because of the historical vileness visited by white on black. I regard all of this now, of course, as total *******s.

[Berni]

is justly responsible for the crimes of its forebears - or racial guilt, as it's also known.

Asking people espousing such an idea if they're comfortable with the historical company they're keeping by doing so does tend to slow them down a bit, in my experience.

[Snin]