JAMES McAvoy has taken pelters and earned praise for his recent intervention regarding comments made to and about his co-stars (McAvoy hits out at racist abuse of show’s cast, Nov 30).

He is correct to make public these comments, his fellow thespians do not deserve to have to put up with these racist and sexist remarks, and a white male calling out predominantly fellow males for their ingrained attitudes is the right action not just for Mr McAvoy, but for many more of us.

From where is this ingrained attitude towards black women emanating?

Understanding attitudes towards women of any colour is easy – some males have been attempting to dominate women for a significant period of time, of almost geological timescales.

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Black skin has been a reason to discriminate, again for several hundreds of years since conquest of other territories was the way to get on.

When an individual is both black and a woman, it seems the ingrained attitudes can be easier to express.

The “red top” media has for many years fanned these flames of desire and derision.

In recent years they have toned down their salacious content by removing the “topless” content, but titillating stories persist, which says much about “us”, the readership.

So why would Lady Susan Hussey, late Queen’s lady-in-waiting, have a prejudicial attitude towards black women?

As an octogenarian, one would have thought that she would have had been “schooled” in the not-so-recent changes to the correct etiquette to address racist behaviour.

How ironic that her questioning of charity CEO Ngozi Fulani was at an event patronised by Queen Consort Camilla, honouring those working to end violence towards women and girls.

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Where is the “spring” from which this “river” of prejudice flows to flood our land?

It comes from the top, from the elite class, and the structures that have been in place for hundreds of years and the smoke and mirrors that have been allowed to persist, as can be seen from this latest exposé of the royals, where Lady Susan was allowed to resign rather than be dismissed, as it would have been the case with an ordinary person in a similar situation.

This prejudice isn’t only within the ingrained historic etiquette rules of the patrician family business, it also permeates into our government, with its unwritten but interpreted constitution.

So when the aristocracy, immensely rich or famous don’t show good behaviour, they should be called out and exposed.

People in positions of power, privilege and wealth cannot exclude them from adhering to society’s behavioural glue.

Alistair Ballantyne
Birkhill, Angus

I HAVE to thank your sports reporter for making me laugh when I read his take on the new Rangers manager’s first meeting with the press.

Matthew Lindsay tells us that Beale’s “assured performance augurs well for his reign in the Ibrox hotseat.”

Priceless. Rangers haven’t yet kicked a ball under his guidance, yet on the strength of one press meeting it looks like he will work wonders. Fantastic.

Pass on my thanks to Matthew for brightening up my morning with his hopes and dreams for the Queen’s Eleven, as Murdo Fraser calls them.

In common with most of the Scottish sports reporters, Mathew has taken a leaf out of the English football commentators book – say a thing often enough and maybe, just maybe, by some strange telepathy it will come true.

Fantastic right enough.

Jim Butchart
via email