Not sure if you caught this over the Easter weekend because we weren’t working, but landlady Benice Ryley of The White Hart Inn, in Grays, Essex was reported for a hate crime after it emerged that she had loads of golli dolls hung from their necks on display in her pub, akin to a KKK style lynching.

Featured Image VIA

Anyway, there was some outrage after the police confiscated twenty of them as part of their investigation into Ryley’s alleged racism/hate crimes but she’s now decided to defy police rules and place some more of the gollis that she had hidden away on display to replace the ones that have been taken. Here’s what she had to say about her decision:

The whole thing is ridiculous. Its political correctness gone out of control.

I’m not going to let the authorities intimidate me and I’m proudly putting my other gollis back on display in the pub.

I’m still shocked that six officers came to my pub last week, surrounded me and took away my collection.

I’ve not committed any crime and haven’t set out to offend anyone. These gollis are a part of the pub, the customers love them, and they are reminder of our childhood.

Yeah I can sort of understand what she’s saying here, but when members of the black community talk about how deeply offensive these dolls are – to the extent that they’ve actually been banned for sale in this country for years – then it seems kind of weird that this woman is so desperate to have them on display. Especially when some of them are strung up by their necks like they’re being hanged. Surely there’s only one way that such a statement is going to be received by certain members of the community?

People always say stuff along the lines of ‘well, it doesn’t offend me’ or ‘it doesn’t mean anything to me so why should I change?’ but when it’s something that is quite clearly racist and the people that are directly affected by it are complaining about it, I don’t get why people like Ryley won’t just listen to them and try and help them out? Seems like the ‘happiness’ brought to her and her customers isn’t comparable to the racism felt by those in the area from their presence. Would it really be that hard?

Anyway, it’ll be interesting to see how this all plays out. I imagine that she’ll probably be allowed to keep the Gollys and then they’ll be an EDL meeting there next week or something. Seems like the natural conclusion.

For more of the same, check out KSI apologising for using a racial slur in a recent Sidemen video. It’s pretty much everywhere these days.