Was Britain 'racist' throughout the 19th century?

Question

Not in so far as people were segregated by virtue of what race they belonged to, but the through the prevailing belief that non-white races (particularly blacks) were inherently inferior and more closely related to apes.

It would appear that Jews and Indians were accepted by many people even at that time. Lord Liverpool was a quarter Indian, Disraeli was Jewish by racial descent, and Britain elected its first fully Indian MP in 1892.

Answer 1

Judaism is not a race. The Nazis declared it so, but that does not make it so.

Judaism is a faith and Disraeli had converted to Christianity to be successful in politics.

Racism and prejudice was and is prevalent in all centuries, in all cultures and in all countries.

To deny that is blinding oneself to the character of humanity.

Answer 2

There had always been a prejudice against foreigners in Britain, and even within Britain some of the sterotypes of the Irish and even the Scots were very racist in the 18th and 19th centuries. Although Jews had returned to Britain under the Commonwealth there was still a great deal of prejudice against them even when they were as wealthy as the Rothschilds. People were perfectly capable of tolerating Jews or wealthy Indians as a social necessity while still seeing them in negative terms. Just have a look at the cartoons of Disraeli. The influx of poor east European Jews to London, Leeds and other cities did not help. These people were profoundly alien, and some of them had attitudes of their own that certainly did not help assimilation.

Attitudes to Asians and Africans generally got worse as time went on and for this the new 'scientific' racial categorisation can be blamed. It helped when building an empire if you could believe the conquered were inferior. The earlier British occupiers of India were primarily interested in making money out of the sub-continent. They were often of weak religious conviction and could not care less how people lived their lives. After the Evangelical revival the idea of "lesser breeds without the law" gained force and there was an increasing belief in the inferiority of other races and the need to educate them.

In Africa there was a move away from the 'noble savage' portrayal to the sub-human. The comparison of blacks with apes was used very frequently in a Darwinian categorisation of mankind.

Even outside the empire racial stereotypes were common, there was a frequent use of the term 'Levantine' in literature up to the mid-20th century, to describe someone as effeminate, untrustworthy, fawning. Latins were still "dagoes". The British really only respected the Germans and their kin in America.

Popular attitudes could be as mixed then as they are now. They were plenty of exceptions made. Gandhi was popular during his stay in London, African Chiefs were brought to Britain by the Churches and feted everywhere. Japanese were treated as honoured guests. This did not prevent even liberals from making the most blatant racist comments.

Please do not repeat the common error of assuming racism is something only whites do. There are plenty examples of racist attitudes among non-white communities today. e.g. Black and Indian West Indians, Malays and Chinese.

Answer 3

In answer to the question, most likely "No" - however, I would advert you to the use of the word "racist". This has connotations of making a value-judgement on a historical situation; which is not the purpose of the study of history. Using terms like "racist" indicates a political agenda to use a distorted view of the past to justify - usually quite unsavoury - political actions in the present.



With all historical analysis, the context of the time is important. To define something as "racist" in our current early 21st Century, politically-corrected, left leaning liberal mindset is wholly inappropriate for a 19th Century context.



Britain, the most powerful Imperial power of the 19th Century was, probably, the most humane and paternalistic of the European Imperial powers - what went on in the Congo under the Belgians, and how the French treated their subject citizens is often ignored by "racist" left-wing Brit-bashing historians. Even a cursory examination of the literature of the time will indicate a far greater predilection amongst the British to "Go Native" than the French, Germans, Belgians or even Americans.



The notion of "we British" were cruel to our subjects, but the Belgians, French, Germans etc were cruel as well has no meaning to left-wing historians - after all they were just "Johnny Foreigners" and wouldn't know any better - whilst us superior Brits should have known better, is just anti-British (hence, "racist") nonsense.



The notion that here might be a racial hierarchy in 19th century science (not just specifically Britain) is not entirely unexpected. Simple observation would indicate that Jews had been integrated into British society since the middle ages. The experiences of the British in India where cultures like the Mughals had flourished and built magnificent palaces and public buildings would be more closely akin to the British perception of "Civilisation" than the African condition of living in mud or grass huts. Thus, it would be easy to judge the Africans as more primitive than the Indians by simple observation.



The current left-wing fascination for the "Noble Savage" - living at one with Nature, in touch with the rhythms of Mother Earth - is just the usual Utopian wishful thinking, which glosses over the poverty, disease, superstition, educational ignorance, early deaths and hardship that were inherent in that lifestyle.



So, when you are thinking about applying terms like "racist" to the past - beware - and think in terms of context.

Answer 4

I love their accents :D especially little kids!!! its one of the reasons beside the good universities that I want to move there, I want my children to have that accent :) Also, I love their vocabulary and the people I have met from Britain so far have been really nice :) I'm only jealous that they get to drink 3 years before us, and they have some of the most fittest famous chaps (1D, the Harries twins, Marcus Butler and more).

Answer 5

It was called Imperialism and based on system of class.

Japanese Imperialism at onset of World War Two had

three classes of people. Axis Powers enjoyed a dual

level of class as active combatants which is why Adolf

Hitler attempted to supply Japanese with technology.

Second Class was accorded to Korean Nationals and

those who assisted the Japanese Greater East Asia Co-

Prosperity Sphere plans. Third Class was anyone else.

Allied surrender terms required termination of Imperialism.

WASP Imperialism has been in decline since 1945 but,

like the Falkland Islands, is still worthy of defense.

Answer 6

There is no doubt Britain was racist, but most Europena countries and even teh United States could be attacked as having Racist policys. But look at the litrature of the time, people like Kipling and Ryder-Haggard were writing stuff that would be toatly unaccpetable today.

Answer 7

A country can hardly be racist: a country has no opinions. It is made up of many people, with as many shades of opinion and attitude.



With that slight correction, your question is an interesting one. The answer is, as so often, that it all depends.



Among the millions who lived here, there were probably fewer racists than there are now, since many (perhaps most) of them lived lives which did not bring them into contact with those of other races. For most of the 19thC a farm or mill-worker, a clerk in a lawyer's office in Birmingham or York would see very few, probably no, outsiders, even from his own country. Therefore he would not think much about Africans or Chinese; he might be only vaguely aware of their existence.



Where they did come into contact, attitudes varied enormously. Until the Indian Mutiny spoiled things, many British (soldiers and civilians alike, and of all classes) who worked in India made Indian friends, adopted Indian food, took Indian wives and raised families of mixed race. Arthur Wellesley (later the Duke of Wellington), for instance, had a best friend who was Indian and fostered (leaving money in trust for his education after Wellesley returned to Britain) the son of an Indian enemy who had died in battle against the British. After the mutiny, and unsurprisingly, racist attitudes among the British became commoner. It became usual to refer to Indians as 'nig gers', which the Indians, themselves often intensely racist, naturally resented.



Jews were widely accepted among the upper classes; lower-class Jews often met hostility from the natives whose urban areas they were colonising. There is a parallel here with the similar reactions to Asians today.



Africans came into a different category. The slave trade was illegal for most of the 19thC, and those (the majority of the British natives who thought about it at all) who opposed slavery naturally had positive feelings towards the black men and women whose cause they supported. Nonetheless, those who had taken part in the slave trade, and there were quite a lot of them, could hardly have shared those feelings, any more than a slaughterman can empathise with sheep. There were of course (and this is an attitude scarcely met with today) those for whom race was irrelevant: about as interesting as hair colour. In 'Sanditon' Jane Austen introduces a young woman clearly intended to be a main sympathetic character as being 'mulatto, tender and chilly.' There were of course black people in Britain, and I have seen no evidence that they were generally discriminated against: for instance (in the late 18thC) Francis Barber, Samuel Johnson's black manservant, married a white girl with the hearty consent of her family; I have met a distant descendant of this union - though of course the African genes are now diluted to the point where there is no trace in her complexion nor in that of her children of African colouring.



It's a complicated picture. A good question, though: please accept a star.

Answer 8

it was more openly accepted back then . where as now it still is very much alive but more covert and underhanded because of anti hate and racism bills . back then a person could happily call an ethnic person a derogatory name - and they would more than likely get away with it, there were no repercussions.

Answer 9

there is such a thing as a jewish race visit Isreal.