I have sat back and watched while some in the movement have blatantly missed the point of the blog that I have written.

It was a blog that was highlighting that racism is still alive and kicking in society. I addressed many points but it seems like one paragraph is the only part that some have chosen to focus on.

Since uploading my blog, for every one supportive comment I received (which I thank you for), I received the same number of comments claiming that I am a bully for not naming the people involved(How?), I should be ashamed of myself for some reason for writing this in the first place (Why?), that I should just get over it (Get over yourself), I am irresponsible because I haven't thought about how this would effect NUS (Are-you-serious), that I am looking for some sort of attention (Not me love), not to mention that there were also some who think that I am doing this for politic gain!?!(Now that's a step too far!). I decided to write this blog because I have something to say, it would have been so easy to put up and shut up, but why should I?

There are a few people who have decided that I have written this blog it is now "public" and used that logic to apply that it is OK for them to wade in and take this into their own hands and decide what the next steps should be without even speaking to me, because somehow I am not capable of deciding what should happen in this circumstance. Do they honestly believe that this type of incident has never happened to me before?

I spoke with the Black students officer about this specific incident while she wrote her response and therefore agree with what she has written. What I am disappointed with are those that have set up facebook groups demanding a "public inquiry", demanded they know who the un-named people were, and the removal of Dave, Wes, Beth and Bubble.

I don't believe for one moment this paragraph was the most important in the blog, judging by the reaction it seems some thought it was. They have not read my blog thoroughly enough. When the things have settled, we will still have people walking around with pure intent to cause harm, black people will still have to be over qualified for jobs, racist stop and search will be escalated with the planned introduction of ID cards, racist anti terror laws will still be here, there will still be people telling me I am not "British" and Richard Barnbrook will still be representing a multicultural London. This is what my blog was about!

When Dave realised that what he said was wrong after talking to him and simply educating him in what it is like to be on the fringes for my entire life, the impact of their comments, how what they said is a reflection of a society at the moment which says that some forms of racism are OK if you evolve it enough and other just are not acceptable. He then very quickly realised that he needed more education on the issues and the little knowledge that he has was just not going to cut it, especially if he was going to make the comment he did.

One of the reasons why I did not name anyone in this blog was because there are many people who would, if I had, done what they have done once they found out who was involved.
Calling for the removal of these NEC members is in my eyes is the wrong route to go down, which does not in anyway deal with the fundamental issues we have on the table right now. If you get rid of someone without allowing them to understand what they have done wrong we become extremely naive and we loose sight of the goal that we are trying to achieve.

We have to realise that we were not all born in the same place and even if we were we have all gone through different journeys in our lives to get to where we are now and so people will come with all types of ignorance to a variety of things some much more sinister than others.
The actual words Dave used was the name Chukwuma was too foreign, to be on the NUS Extra card promo material as they have never heard this name before or know anyone that has this name. There is no excuse for this and names on promo material are not decided by the tally of people who have heard such name. However looking back I do wonder what the response would have been if I said put Mohammed on the card, that's a common name.

Now, My family are Nigerian, Chukwuma is my younger brothers name and "Chukwu" would be a common beginning to Nigerian (Igbo) names.

This is in no way an excuse for what was said or the silence of others; people are not born racist, you can change people.

I am coming from a position that behaviours of people can change through education and experience and I know how sorry Dave was at the time, but that 'sorry' did not mean anything when they tried to justify what they were saying and used different words to say the same thing.

I don't want an apology if they are only apologising for offending me and not understanding their actions. I did accept Daves apology when he understood what he actually said. All four people I know have learnt from experience but are still yet to be educated and they are all around next year and I have asked that we all receive diversity training as part of the NEC induction and constant updates to that throughout the year which will be happening without a doubt. Today it was an issue of race but tomorrow it could easily be something else.

In all honesty I will and always have in the past decided how I react to racism, my blog was the way I dealt with it for what happened during that week. It was not a starting gun, to release a witch hunt, demand that people stand down from their positions, demand that Dave publicly apologise and certainly not for public inquiries to be called for.

Would people have taken this much interest if that paragraph was not in there? The disappointing thing is that I actually don't think people would.

Dave should not have to apology publicly. Because Dave is known, somehow he should apologise to the entire membership as the wheels of I deserve an apology too start moving. I expect that it is because you may feel let down by him or you take into account the position he holds.

Well, why has there not been the same call for a public apology from people involved in the other incidences spoken about in my blog. I believe that these people owe society an apology, I feel let down by them and they hold important roles in society as all people help frame the environment in which we live. But I expect because we don't know them, that's OK, we can just get on with our lives and just say "SHAME" to the people we don't know and "ACT NOW" to the people we do. That is not how we should be doing things.

The Blogs on this site represent the individual views of their authors and do not necessarily reflect the policies or practices of the National Union of Students.

All links in blogs will open in a new browser window.

The permanent URL for this specific blog entry is: http://www.officeronline.co.uk/blogs/amauzowuru/275519.aspx