Ngozi Fulani and Sistah Space

[Blueblue123]

Everyone acting as if Ngozi is deceptive or appropriating African culture by dressing a certain way or changing her name needs to look into why the descendant of a slave has an anglicised name in the first place.

Black people, you know the people who originate from Africa, don't have the name Marlene Headley because it's traditionally African. Obviously something has happened along the way.

Maybe if her ancestor's owners allowed the slaves to retain their identities or better yet didn't separate them from their family to become property, then she'd have the African name she was originally intended to have.

Questioning her desire to connect with the roots that were stolen from her is ignorance and racism in itself. You're making light of the fact that she CAN'T trace her roots because they were stripped away from her ancestors.

 

[FogOfWar]

Ahhh, so she's Ethiopian now ? Despite not knowing her actual heritage ? With her West-African name ? Damn, just chuck some Zulu beads on there and she has the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa covered. What jolly dress-up japes !

Next time I'm invited to something I'm going in Lederhosen. The following time in a matador outfit. Then I'll drag my West African boubou out of the wardrobe and see how long it takes before someone unleashes their hate on me (!)

 

[Gloria Rostron]

If you cannot understand the concept of racism then there's nothing to discuss 🥱

It's you that does not understand it. The fact you are unwilling to accept that white people experience racism makes me think you could be racist.

 

[Ametrine]

Ngozi is on video, giving a public speech and asking the audience where they think she is from. I don't for one second believe she was distressed by such a question.

She chose to wear a traditional dress that reflects her ancestors' origin before they moved to the Caribbean. Why would she attend the event in heritage attire if she didn't want to draw attention to it?

I was talking generally about asking someone where they are from/what their ethnic origin is, and not Ngozi in this situation.

Ngozi is a scammer, a grifter and a race-baiter and probably went to the palace looking for a fight. But SH shouldn't have let herself be drawn into this. As soon as Ngozi said she was from Hackney, SH should have ended that line of questioning.

 

[monga]

Seems very coincidental that they want to move on as if nothings happened .

 

[Gloria Rostron]

She says she has to "profile a particular way". Now this is not that she feels obligated by society to look a particular way, as she is dressed in very different clothes at the beginning. This sounds to me like a woman in an agenda who is adopting a "profile" to cause ruption.

 

[Jen667]

it's a nice picture and a good statement. If the charity now turns out to be corrupt then that's nothing to do the Palace

 

[Blueblue123]

Right so now this lady is rude, not racist - hold the front page. Last time I heard being rude wasn't a crime or particularly newsworthy but NF has engineered it to be because she has conflated rudeness with racism.

What's all this about it being a crime when I never mentioned criminality in the first place? Direct it to your buddy @Gloria Rostron they brought it up. And rudeness and racism aren't mutually exclusive.

What's really going on here? Do you want evidence that she's a fraud or evidence that the racism never happened?

Those are two separate things but people seem to be conflating them because accusations of racism are too ghastly to confront so you'd rather find reasons as to why the person is undeserving of being heard.

What does everyone think of my screenshot? I take issue with it for several reasons, but too tired to get into it yet. Personally, I'm just not very interested in Fulani and Hussey's interaction. I was initially interested in SS and came to similar conclusions about it though. Made me wonder how many dodgy charities we have. Probably more than we think!


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I don't understand your post. The screenshot makes no mention of Sistah Space as a charity but makes many incorrect claims about West African cultures.

Also Ngozi is likely a descendant of West or Central Africa by the way of the slave trade so she's not imitating our culture, just reclaiming her own.

Also as a GHANAIAN myself (not Ghanayan) I'm offended at the inaccuracies in this email. Not all Igbos (not Ibos) are Muslim and there's no requirement for anyone to wear traditional garb when meeting royals. Kente cloth is also not woven with gold.

The email in the screenshot is written by someone who's clearly uneducated.

 

[Blueblue123]

If people in this thread genuinely understood racism and its effects on people, they would know that being treated as though you don't truly come from the place you've said you do, despite your appearance, is discriminatory.

No one probes white Americans, Australians, Canadians or South Africans about where they're really from or comments on their Europeans names/style of dress. When a white person from any of these areas tells you they're American/Australian/Canadian/South African then it's left at that.

Black and people of colour on the other hand are constantly reminded that they don't belong even if they are born and raised in the place they claim.

That's why it's racism.

 

[monga]

Is it all about Meghans colour or just that she’s not from upperclass British stock Wallace Simpson faced the same barrage of abuse and she wasn’t black . I couldn’t see a white woman being accepted if she was from a council estate, Camilla is accepted because she’s from the right stock regardless of her adulterous affairs and divorcee status.

 

[CarmenGhia]

We only have Ngozi Fulani's word for what happened during the conversation. Apparently Lady Susan is a bit deaf - someone asked upthread.

It's possible to believe that Lady Susan was probably being a bit insensitive at the same time as being skeptical of Sistah Space's operations.

 

[Gloria Rostron]

On the wider discussion, I'm white and have never experienced racism in the UK. It would be impossible for me to, because white people have been the majority in this country for countless years and hence things are rigged in our favour. Have I ever been followed around a shop? Nope. Have I ever been stopped and searched? Nope. Have I ever had racial slurs directed at me? Nope. And so on.

Just because you are in the majority does not mean you cannot experience discrimination. We hear time and time again of white people being explicitly refused jobs because they are white.

I went to a black Caribbean store once and the shop owner made it clear that me and my friend were not welcome in the store and effectively told us to leave. We were the only white people in the store.

I know a girl who has Jamaican ancestry and she says that her grandfather, who lives there says there are people in Jamaica who shoot any white person they see.

Back to England, I have been called racial slurs several times this year. I have friends who have been turned down for promotion because they are white. I see with my own eyes racial slurs against white people on Twitter almost every day.

Public sectors are systematically racist - towards white people.

 

[Moderator]

All, let's move on from derailing into just arguments. Agree to disagree and move on.

Back on the topic at hand about the person and the charity. We've had general racism threads and they were locked as they weren't achieving anything.

 

[monga]

 

[FogOfWar]

Or indeed if you yourself had, Fog.

How so ? Do you believe NF without unconscious bias towards LH ? Misconceptions as to her motivation ? That it wouldn't have been worth NF giving a bit more thought to it before plastering shit all over social media ?

"Shit, perhaps I just assumed that an white lady who works for the RF would be telling me I don't belong here. Maybe she was just cack-handedly asking after my family's heritage. Perhaps if I had stayed Marlene Headley and worn regular UK clothes, rather than christening myself Ngozi Fulani and dripping cowrie shells despite absolutely no cultural connection to Africa beyond the colour of my skin, the whole conversation might never have happened at all ? Anyway, back to my centre where I support people based on the colour of their skin whilst decrying racism."

 

[Crabbypatty00]

Who are you to make judgement on what that lady lost? That was her job, her life and her identity for 60 years!

"found to be communicating in a discriminatory way be that in the form of a statement or question then there are consequences." Listen to yourself! I think you need a re read of 1984! It's not a crime to ask questions, offend someone, hurt feelings or be rude. It's just not, no matter how much you think it should be.

 

[Incywincy]

You're correct, I don't. Because I won't pretend to suddenly concern myself with SS's conduct to justify going after a woman who claimed to be a victim of racism. As I stated above, I have a general distrust for charities and I'm not about to defend the practices of SS because I don't know what goes on there.

But I do care about the faux concern which has led to this scrutiny of the charity. It has been used as a tool to discredit NF and shut her down, not as a means to ensure there is good conduct in the third sector or the natural discovery of bad practice.

The Twitter thread suggests NF/SS has a history of using race/racism to get what they want.

I think the issue surrounding the transcript is that we only have NF version of events and some of her friends (even if they didn't hear the conversation, if your friend told you x, y, z had happened, you'd probably support them, right?).

We have no idea and no proof that what they said happened, is what happened.

If SH/BP had put out a statement denying this version of events I am almost certain it would have looked even worse for SH/BP.

But, just because a person has a particular colour skin or particular heritage, doesn't automatically mean we should believe everyword they say.

If SS was squeaky clean then I suspect many would take NF at face value. But because there is a history of similar behaviour and accusations, it casts doubt over the whole event.

And it's not a case of SS is only being delved into because of NF heritage.. it's suddenly appeared in the public eye so of course people are going to be curious, and perhaps their research set off with good intentions "oh how can I support them/the people they help"... and then they uncovered some interesting information.

People ended up looking Captain Tom Foundation, obviously not off the back off a racism claim but off the back of something and following a rise in people taking an interest.

We can't just ignore questionable people and questionable charities because of where those people come from or what the charities claim to do.

If it was really about weeding out bad actors in the charity sector, you'd dedicate just as much time to other organisations and you'd realise that there are worse people representing charities than those who make accusations of racism.

I'm not sure you can make a statement like this without fully knowing what SS have or haven't done. The evidence I have seen suggests they have fraudulently obtained tens of thousands of pounds in grants and fundraisers under the guise of helping black (not BAME!) DV victims but are not providing as much support as they could be and have obtained funds for. (I wouldn't be so bold as to say they aren't helping anyone because I have not seen anyone speak out about the support they've received). A large portion of the Hackney DV budget has been spent on SS, and if their claims are false then this is obviously to the detriment of many other DV victims in the area.

So yes, there may well be worse people and worse charities out there but this is the one people are interested in at the moment and I don't feel very happy that there could potentially be hundreds of families suffering because one family was greedy and potentially only in it for their own gain.

 

[Blueblue123]

I have many thoughts about this but I won't share them all except to say it's interesting who receives almost immediate trust and scrutiny versus who gets put under a spotlight.

This pikachoo guy claims to be an anonymous "James" who as @Jen667 pointed out is now requesting money for something he seemed to already be able to do at very little cost. The Charity Commission exists, no one needs to pay a twitter user to look into a charity and if such an investigation is being done for the greater good, then money shouldn't be required. A five minute search showed this guy has unsavoury thoughts towards people from minority groups, not just black people but all kinds.

If we're talking about people whose motives we aren't aware of and don't trust, this twitter user is no less questionable than Ngozi or Sistah Space but I supposed he served a purpose so it didn't matter.

 

[Eltonjohnsflorist]

There is no racism directed at white people?! If you actually think that then you are very, very naive.

Believe me, I actually very, very knowledgable

 

[Baby Giraffe]

How magnaminous that after all that publicity which has, for better and worse, shone a light on the activities of her charity, that the complainant has accepted that no malice was intended. Perhaps if she had engaged a smidgen of compassion / empathy she might have been able to realise a little more quickly that it's not really reasonable to expect an 85-year-old woman to be perfectly au fait with the sensibilities of exactly how to enquire after the heritage of a woman who has changed her name to appear "more African". Perhaps if she'd remained Ms Headley the whole sorry mess would have been averted in the first place.

Being old does not give you a free pass to be rude and racist, I have called elderly relatives out on it in the past and will always do so when necessary otherwise things don’t change. Plus she wasn’t somebody’s granny in the comfort of her own home, she was representing the RF and as such, most certainly should know what is acceptable and know she’d crossed way over the line of acceptable behaviour