In 1958 West indians had been invited to England to help rebuild the country. Given a frosty welcome by locals they were forced to live in the bombed out and rundown inner city areas in over-crowded conditions and suffered constant racist discrimination. Groups of young white men, commonly known as 'Teddy boys' would randomly attack black people because of their colour In August 1958 the black community fought back under the leadership of Baron Baker. This was the first incident of black people fighting back literally and symbolically which lead to a significant event - The Notting Hill Riots.
It was made sure by the white people that the Black community was not welcome. A black person who witnessed the riots said it was made to feel like 'a home away from home' this shows that white people felt strongly about this. White people felt like the Black community was invading their space as it was more popular that black people would be living in the same area and getting jobs which clearly enraged the white people and gave an incentive leading to the riots. This dilemma was put across in the film 'Flame in the Streets' as in the film there are quite a few scenes where the employees of a company have a meeting and on the agenda is deciding whether a black man should be put in charge. He is obviously as capable as anyone else to work in that position but because of the colour of his skin, it has to be debated and obviously is brought across as an issue because many people have different views on the situation. I think in those days white men felt they were more superior then black men so for a black man to be in charge irritated them.
Other problems arose due to these race issues. It was hard for a black person to find somewhere to live in cities as they were over-crowded and everyone had a different view on black people so if the homeowner was a white person there may of been a hiccup with trying to stay there. 'Sapphire' a film made in 1959 by Basil Dearden about the social landscape of that era and a murder case of a woman who looked white but was of a black background and it follows the investigation the police go through to find the murderer of the case. It is very interesting to see the different views that people had of black people around that time. It is evident in this film of people of the black community finding it hard getting a place to stay as the police ask a lady if the murdered woman 'Sapphire' had ever stayed in her house that she rents out, the woman said no and that she would never let a black person stay with her.
Both 'Sapphire' and 'Flame in the Streets' were very interesting to watch as they opened my eyes as to how hard it was as a black person in those days. Especially as Sapphire looked like a white person, as her boyfriend's family didn't know she was of a black ethnic background they treated her like any other person but she was murdered shortly after they found out she was actually black. I think it portrays how people were treated and how people reacted to black people. It shows a wide variety of peoples perspective on the matter. Some people didn't care and looked past the colour of the skin and cared for the persons feelings like any other.
In 1968, over 12,000 Kenyan-asian refugees arrived in the UK fleeing vicious persecution from the Black african majority after Kenya had become an independent country. This resulted in Kenyan- african living in parts of Britain as the British government had told the newly arrived people that as commonwealth citizens they were always legally entitled to live in Britain.
The National Labour Party, one of the British political groups had a big impact on the social landscape at the time. The National Labour Party was part of the BNP causing an uproar over the matter. This lead to campaigns held in Trafalgar Square leading to thousands of people hearing racist speeches held about how to keep Britain white. This included slogans like ' Stop the coloured invasion'
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