My tuppence worth on the Anton Ferdinand death threat, Twitter and political correctness: http://thisismyengland.blogspot.com/2011/11/twitter-twits-political-correctness-and.html
It's not without its downside, but I concur with Stewart Lee that a lot of it has been a necessary evil to replace something worse.
A really good blog mate, enjoyable as always. Definately agree with the sentiments of Mr Lee. If 'PC' is gonna go some way to stopping some of the things that we as youngsters saw as normal then it's a price i for one am willing to pay. At least my kids (who are mixed race) aint gonna suffer the same s### that my wife (mixed race) and my Father in law (Trinidad born and bred) had to suffer.
I can somewhat identify, feller. When my family moved from NW London (my first home was in Fortune Green, between the Finchley Road and West Hampstead proper), it was down to the sticks. Suddenly I was surrounded by people who routinely used the term "Jew" in a pejorative way. Few of them had ever knowingly met a Jew, of course. It was a bit of shocker, given all the Jewish family friends we had. Now married to a Jewish woman and raising a kid who, by dint of the maternal blood line is de facto Jewish, I hear tell of her brother being on the wrong end of racist bullying at his 99% non-Jewish school. Things do change for the better and I'm hopeful that the little guy will have to put up with much less of that sort of stuff as he finds his way in life and figures out his identity for himself.
As you say mate, it quite often seems to be the people who have never met a Jew, Asian, West Indian who come out with the sometimes hurtful remarks , a lot of times unwittingly. I've lost count of the number of times that people who i've only just met , have made a psuedo offensive remark about black people ...only to enjoy their embarresment when i've later shown them a picture of the Mrs. Oh how i laugh . I remember a few years ago playing Norwich away and me and a mate overhearing the conversation between two old fellas and the shock of one as he told his mate that the Rangers lads had bought down a lot of 'Blackies'. Me and my mate had a little chuckle, rolled our eyes and both said at the same time....'Only in Naarfoolk' .