Scottish Police are investigating a possible “hate speech” crime after signs appeared throughout Perth reading: “It’s okay to be white.”
Dozens of signs with the phrase “it’s okay to be white” were anonymously plastered on drainpipes and streetlights in the city of Perth, drawing criticism from a local anti-racism group and prompting Police Scotland to investigate.
“Although no complaint has been made to police regarding these posters, they have been brought to our attention and officers are currently looking into the matter,” a police spokesman told the Scottish newspaper The Courier.
The signs drew condemnation from John Swinney, a member of the Scottish National Party (SNP) and the Deputy First Minister of the Scottish Government — roughly equivalent to a state government in the United States.
“This is atrocious and has no place in Perth or any other part of our country. We must stand together to resist this unacceptable material”, Swinney declared.
Peter Barrett, a Perth councillor, said: “This is despicable hate speech. It is covert racism disguising white supremacist views. People should be in no doubt this is no innocuous joke.”
“It is the thin end of the wedge and an attempt by racists to get their foot in the door. I don’t want a white supremacist racist campaign to be imported from the U.S. on to the streets of Perth,” he added.
Local anti-racism activists were quick to denounce the “it’s okay to be white” signs.
“This is worrying, we find it disturbing and we’ve contacted the police. They have been very clever not to use any racial slurs, but the connotation is there,” a spokesman from Perth Against Racism claimed.
“We reject division in Perth and believe the people who hold these views are the minority. We stand by anyone who feels uncomfortable or unsafe after reading these and would urge them to contact us on Facebook if they’d like to speak,” the spokesman added.
Perth Against Racism said they had been contacted by one resident who remarked that they were “worried now for my daughters who are not white but are from Perth”, according to the BBC.
“It’s sickening and disgusting to know that people think like this,” the person said.
In 2017, Breitbart News reported that 20 “it’s okay to be white” stickers were put up across the Harvard University in the United States, leading the dean to denounce the stickers.
“HLS [Harvard Law School] will not let that happen here. We live, work, teach, and learn together in a community that is stronger, better, and deeper because of our diversity and because we encourage open, respectful, and constructive discourse,” the dean wrote in an email.
The phrase is believed to have originated a month before the incident at Harvard on the website 4chan, where a user reportedly called on followers to post the phrase in their area on Halloween night.
It seems that the purpose of the “It’s okay to be white” slogan is to trigger left-liberals into denouncing it as hateful and racist — despite its seeming innocuousness — and thus demonstrate anti-white bias.
Follow Kurt on Twitter @KurtZindulka
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