Causing Racism...........?

They do within their own power base - and they have

Banks don't have the power to `ban` anything.

Well, they could always offer the option of lambkin-banks.

Um... have they banned "piggy" banks, or merely stopped making money boxes in the shape of pigs. In the latter case the only pig shaped money boxes I remember were the wade/Nat West ones which now sell for a packet at collectors fairs.

Islam is a religion, not a race.

Chris

{Sigh} for Crying out loud! Just checked and this story is being blown up out of proportion.

Piggy banks are only being banned from the banks advertising, nowhere else!

There is no suggestion that the non-Jewish&non-muslim kid who saves his money in his own piggy bank is being racist. And no suggestion that such a kid who turns up with his pig-shaped money box to open an account is boing to be sent away crying. Just that the bank is not going to feature them in its adverts.

When I were a wee tyke, I saved my pound notes in one of these:

Money boxes come in all shapes and sizes, and the bank is choosing not to use one particular shape. Sure it could make piggy banks, plus an alternative shape, but why bother with two shapes, it's just a box for putting coins in. What's the big deal?

I think some people's idea of what is racisim is a bit narrow, restricting who can be subject to it to

I think all predudice based on skin colour, culture, religion, sex, sexuality, infirmatiy, age or background is wrong, and to say one type is OK[1] because it isn't technically racism or sexism, is plain wrong. Its the hatred and discrimiation that's wrong, the target is irrelevant.

Now it's a moot point whether a money box in the shape of a pig is offensive, personally I would think a money box in the shape of a bacon sandwich would be offensive not a pig becuase its the actual eating of the flesh that's banned. A whole pig is plainly not ready to be eaten. However I'm neither Muslim nor Jewish, so couldn't say. However I don't see a bank refusing to show them in its advertising as an assault on my culture.

But the piggy-bank is a metaphor. Saving money in a piggy-bank which when full will be smashed with a hammer and the contents spent or put in a real bank is like feeding a piglet in order to fatten it up for when it's ready to be slaughtered.

X-No-Archive: yes In message , LJE writes

I'm not sure what the politics of any religion has to do with race, but I understand your sentiment and anger. Take heart from the fact that no democratic country can make hatred of political agenda illegal otherwise democracy cannot function.

There are nutty Mohammedans who want the 'Saints' dropped from the names of illustrious London hospitals. Thomas's, Bart's etc. This has nothing to do with religion. That a hospital has the name of a saint tacked onto it, or a bank dishes out piggy banks, doesn't in any way interfere with a religion's spirituality or the freedom of an individual to follow his or her religion. It's politics -- imposing the will or one person on another. And politics is always fair game for inciting a bit of hatred or ridicule of that which is deemed hateful or ridiculous. Take that away and the BNP will flourish.

Causing hysteria. The press love it. The newspaper in question wasn't the Sun, Mail or Express by any chance was it?

Just like the headlines on Saturday "Bird Flu in Britain" more hysteria. Nobody is going to die. People died in countries that have relatively poor medical services, and those who died had constant close contact with the infected birds as part of their job. The bird was in quarantine FFS. The whole reason for quarantine is that dodgy animals don't bring diseases into the country. This was an example of quarantine working very well!

Now last time I looked, there were not millions of people working closely with birds in this country, so we'll be fine.

There may not be millions of people working with birds, but there are millions working with other people. Many experts say its only a matter of time before the virus mutates to a form transmissible from human to human. We can quarantine all birds entering the country, but not all the people.

Chris

You learn somthing new...

"Chris Blunt" wrote

Yes, but many experts also say its only a matter of time before the common cold virus mutates to a more fatal form. It's *already* transmissible from human to human...

Shouldn't we be eradicating *all* virii, just in case one of them mutates into a "big baddy"??!

X-No-Archive: yes

The problem would stand if banks have a tradition of giving out piggy banks. If that were the case why isn't there a Radio 4 programme called "Piggy Bank" rather than "Money Box".

Banks model their money boxes in a variety of shapes and sizes, to attract the attention of child savers, or more likely their parents. Rarely are they modeled after pigs. My niece's savings account gave her a toy coin sorter to save her money in.

There is a difference between the name of a hundred or so year old institution, and a plastic money box.

Is it? To whom? It doesn't appear to have started that way:

Shano

No good. That just offends another group. The religion of the ethnic Tzotzil people of Chiapas in southern Mexico says that sheep are sacred, and can only be looked after by women. Its possible that at least some of them would have accounts with British banks.

I think we need another creature that has absolutely no connection with any religion to act as a repository for our kids coins.

How about a Golliwog?

Chris

"Virii" is already a big baddy, and yes, we should be eradicating all viriis from people's vocabularies.

Pleb!

Only from Robertson's Bank.

I know what you mean, there will always be some "experts" predicting some disaster or other, like mankind being wiped out by a meteor. But seriously, the warnings coming from reputable health organisations seem to be getting more urgent lately. Most say it is now inevitable that it will mutate, and some are talking in terms of months, not sometime in the dim and distant future.

Chris