Racism...

This is like one of those puzzle photos… remember those little games you had when you were wee when one square was missing and you had to slide the other squares round so the pictures were in the right place… it's a bit like the Blip app only better! Spot the weird babysitter...

Tonight I got on the bus home after work. Halfway home a couple of blokes got on, they appeared to be having some sort of barney so I took my headphones out my ears cause I'm a nosy cow only to realise that one man was quite clearly shouting at the other.

The shouty man sat down in front of me and the other guy was just standing silently, looking a bit bewildered as the shouty man kept shouting. Meanwhile, the bus full of typically British people looked at their feet. When he started the racist abuse I couldn't keep my mouth shut any longer so I told him off in proper mumsy style. At that point he called me a fascist and told me he was going to murder me cause I was picking on a disabled man. Bless. I laughed and put my headphones back in one day I'm gonna get a total kicking. At least he stopped being a racist tosser and was leaving the other man alone. Someone else dared to look at him so he started shouting at him too. The bus driver told that man to go and sit down.

Sometimes I wonder what sort of society we live in. It's perfectly okay to tell some poor soul who's minding his own business but just happened to look in the wrong direction to go and sit down but it's not the done thing to tell the racist shouty twat to shut the fuck up and get off the bus?

There's something wrong with our world when it's acceptable for a bus full of people to sit in silence while someone is verbally abused because of the colour of his skin. Maybe staying quiet is the smart thing to do… maybe we shouldn't get involved but I physically couldn't stop myself from saying something and I hope that I never change and never get murdered on the bus on the way home because that sort of behaviour is totally unacceptable. I've never suffered from any sort of prejudice so I don't really understand it but I won't sit back and watch someone else be abused for no reason at all.

I called Lothian Buses this morning and spoke to a lovely chap who's going to go hunt down the bus and the relevant CCTV. Some days I think I'm a bit of a busy body but I can't help that I have a seriously strong idea of what's right and wrong and that was definitely not right. Too many people say nothing and that sort of behaviour is allowed to continue.

There will never be a world that I live in where it's acceptable to abuse someone because of the colour of their skin or their sexuality or their beliefs.

Nor will there ever be a world that I live in where I can keep my gob shut on just such an occasion.

I shall carry on living in my little world.