Racism and sexism

A couple of things bugged me over the weekend regarding racism and sexism. We've already had people claiming that the economic crisis was caused by white blue-eyed men - yeah, maybe ... but if it was it was because white, blue-eyed men were lending money to black and Hispanic people who didn't have the means to pay back what they owed. I'd also argue that African economics is largely controlled by black, brown eyed men and they don't make a particularly good job of that.

We've also had the usual bunch of femiloons telling us that the credit crunch is the result of male, testosterone fuelled dominance in the banking sector and that this would never have happened if there were more women at the top of the industry. From my experience of the banking sector (which isn't inconsiderable although mostly indirect) it is not so much testosterone that fuels the risk-taking as cocaine and greed - and women seem just as prone as men to those. It's also worth bearing in mind that before there were ANY women in banking it was a very cautious and conservative industry.

It's also worth pointing out that other industries which have become female dominated - notably education and social services - are falling apart. For some reason, this leads me to the conclusion that feminising an industry doesn't necessarily make it better, although there could be some merit to the argument that the more women there are in an industry the more "testosterone" fuelled men become as a result of their instinctive desire to impress the female - and once an industry becomes dominated by women the men become effete and ineffective.

It seems to me to be a stupid thing to suggest that the crisis is down to men - white or black. It's down to all of us - male, female, black white, brown or green with yellow spots - and our addiction to debt. You might just as well argue that it's down to the Scottish seeing how both our Chancellors and Prime Ministers have come from that nation over the last 12 years or so. Maybe if they'd be English we wouldn't be in the cack we are, but I doubt it.

I also got annoyed at the weekend when I read something by someone about the lack of black managers in "English" football. I'm not much of a sports fan, but I used to be. Before football became obsessed by money I used to enjoy it - and I'm looking forward to watching the film about one of my all time heroes of football management, Brian Clough, in The Damned United.

The thing is, though, black people have been part of English football for some considerable time. There is a shortage of good black managers - maybe they just have more sense than to get involved in the merry-go-round that calls itself football management these days - but you could equally argue that there is something of a shortage of good English managers seeing how our national side is managed by an Italian.

The thing that really irked me though is that English football stands accused of putting barriers to black progression that do not exist - but no one bothers about Scottish or Welsh football. How many black players are there in the Scottish football team? How many in the Welsh? How many have there ever been in either of those national sides?

Why is England the only part of Britain where racism can exist?