quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: It's more that lots of people are, in fact, stating that white people are the bad guy this time.
It's not that they're like "He's Hispanic, so we're not the bad guy, yay!"
It's more that people are saying "white people are the bad guys," and then they say "but... He's Hispanic!"
Perhaps the other thing is happening too. But I've seen a lot of the stuff I explain above.
If you take it a step further you might notice some extra perspective. The people who are complaining that this is a situation that involved racism aren't looking at it from a perspective of 'what's the white man done to us lately' but rather 'another young black man without a weapon shot and killed by someone'. Now we can pretend all we like that this isn't something it's quite reasonable for people-particularly people actually *in* the bloody community-to be exhausted with, exasperated with.
To the people in the community, they already know that white people aren't the only ones who are suspicious of and fearful of young black men on that basis alone. Frankly it seems likely to me that this was the case with Zimmerman, as even on the phone his reasons for deeming Martin suspicious are pretty vague. So from this perspective, the important thing is that another black kid was killed under circumstances that are shall we say uncertain. They mention that we should consider a racial component to this.
This is when, it seems to me, many people (understandably) look at it from their perspective and reply or at least point out that Zimmerman wasn't actually white, so why is this something I need to consider?
It's all murky and none of us have a handle on how much in what proportions our takes on these wider conversations really happen, but the least we can do is refrain from projecting our own anecdotal experiences onto the entirety of the discussion. As has been shown in this discussion recently, people have a way of remembering examples favorable to them and forgetting or at least not mentioning others. For example on many occasions I responded that no, in fact, I wasn't willing to say 'Zimmerman is a racist'-that as far as I, personally, was willing to go was to point out a lot of let's just call them warning factors.
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Next time I'm at my puter I'll look up the stats...but I suspect that there is at least some reasonablness to being more suspicious of young black men.
Is it racist to treat a statistically higher threat as such?
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quote:Is it racist to treat a statistically higher threat as such?
Again it depends on how one defines racism. Everyone means a different thing with it.
If you view racism as a memeplex of beliefs and behaviors, it's certainly part of the racism memeplex to "be more suspicious of young black men" (regardless of whether the holder of the meme considers it reasonable or not).
If you define racism as any behavior that contributes to racial oppression, it's probably still "racist" yes -- it means young black men will be treated with greater suspicion, which means they'll be having fewer opportunities in life, etc.
If you define racism as racial-power-and-privilege, then to discuss racial relations at all (when you are not at the bottom of the racial oppression pole) leads inevitably to a display of your privilege and thus racist. (By that definition, I'm behaving as a racist right now by writing these words)
If you define racism as a *wrong* epistemically belief about races, then it's probably not racist, because it is indeed statistically accurate, as you say, that the black population in America contributes to crime to a higher degree than the white population.
If the immediately previous definition is qualified so that your belief will have to do about the genetics of races, then I suppose it would depend on whether you believe that greater criminal rates in different populations stems from genetics or from external factors (culture, economics, etc)
So it all depends on what one means by "racism".
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Here's a disgusting fact: while the Zimmerman trial was going on, 61 people were murdered in Chicago. Almost all of them were black, seven of them were children as young or younger than Martin. One month, one city: 61 murders.
Yet national outrage, media coverage, and presidential comments are all strangely absent. Why is that?
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quote:Yet national outrage, media coverage, and presidential comments are all strangely absent. Why is that?
I think I've mentioned this before but I think it was in Ornery, rather than Hatrack: That's how I see structural racism work in a society who's ideology is *nominally* anti-racist.
High-profile white-on-black crime cases (like the Zimmerman-Martin case was initially presented, and before that the Duke Lacrosse case) are useful for people who want to loudly denounce the racism of society, and give themselves props for fighting against racism, WITHOUT actually doing much of anything to improve the lives of the actually underprivileged en masse.
In the meantime, invisibly in the background, thousands of young black people lose their lives to violent crime; a focus on reducing black-on-black crime would help save many more black people's lives and improve the black population's overall quality of life too -- but to attack black-on-black crime isn't politically useful in the sense of bashing other people's racism or calling oneself anti-racist.
So with Democrats caring more about appearing anti-racist than helping black people, and with Republicans barely even pretending to care about black people at all, USA is at the situation as it is: A loud anti-racist ideology (understandably so, after so many major conflicts USA was involved in had something to do with racist enemies -- the Civil War, World War II, the Civil Rights movement, etc), but very little interest in actually improving the lives of black people in general.
This isn't surprising. The countries and political parties with a nominally Christian official religion are the ones you'll see care more about appearing Christian that behaving in a Christian fashion. After all they have "Christian" officially in their constitutions/programs, so that gets them the Christian votes automatically, why bother with *being* Christian?
China is nominally Communist and yet behaves as the most extreme colonialist capitalist of our times.
In a similar manner America (and even more so it's progressive portion) is nominally anti-racist and makes loud anti-racism noises, and yet racial injustice thrives invisibly at its core. Not just despite said loud anti-racism, but indirectly supported by loud anti-racism. If Americans cared less about whether they *appear* racist or anti-racist, they might actually start caring about improving the lives of black people, just out of sheer human decency rather than because of anti-racism.
(And yes, I'm lecturing Americans on how American racism works, all the way from the other side of the world, without ever having been to America at at all).
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quote:Yet national outrage, media coverage, and presidential comments are all strangely absent. Why is that?
Partly because, unlike the Zimmerman case, there was little controversial or atypical about it. Which is sad, but let's face it: people will do their best to prosecute those deaths, and no one is saying that the killer should get away scot-free.
quote: (And yes, I'm lecturing Americans on how American racism works, all the way from the other side of the world, without ever having been to America at at all).
Hey, you're only slightly less well-informed about American racism than Blayne is about American health care.
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White people lecturing America about Black-on-black crime usually comes across as either insulting or amusing to the black community.
This is often because the white person in question fails to recognize the role whites played in creating the situation. When whites stand back and say "wow, you guys are really killing each other a lot, maybe you should solve that and leave us alone," it implicitly suggests that they had nothing to do with it, when in reality the construction of the black inner city is very, very much a WHITE construction. Whites, through decades of policy and social engineering, put black people there and didn't let them out, then they abandoned the inner city to its fate.
That's why the phrase:
quote:If you define racism as a *wrong* epistemically belief about races, then it's probably not racist, because it is indeed statistically accurate, as you say, that the black population in America contributes to crime to a higher degree than the white population.
is so problematic. Because the white population built this problem, and now they're pretending its the fault of black people.
Furthermore, this case simply has too much historical weight behind it. America's history of whites killing young black men and getting off without any punishment is just too long, especially in the South. It cannot be viewed independently of that history. I guarantee you, the divergent views on this from a white or black perspective break right along the historical lens they view it between. Black people, old and young, grow up with that history in their faces, and it's part of their lives and personal histories (to say nothing of a life of being stopped by white police officers for the crime of being white). White people simply don't understand that. And without an explanation like the one Obama gave the other day, they never will, because they'll never experience it first hand.
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I'm white as milk and neither me nor any of my ancestors going back as many centuries as you'd like to had anything to do with the white construct you're describing.
I think it's immoral *not* to say "wow, you guys are really killing each other a lot, maybe you should solve that..." (not sure what the "and leave us alone" is about, given its a black-black murder epidemic we're discussing).
Or should whites just stand back and say "damn, almost 2 murders every day in Chicago - that sucks. Too bad it's rooted in the legacy of our forefather's racism and we really don't have any right to draw attention to it in 2013 - best of luck!"?
Anyway, whites aren't where I'd expect to see more attention brought to the problem. And I certainly won't hold my breath waiting for Jackson or Sharpton, or Obama for that matter, to start organizing demonstrations night and day until we have calls for a national discussion on black-black violence. Much cleaner to pick and choose the odd white-black injustice every year or two and ignore the daily shooting deaths under our noses.
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Ignore shooting deaths? Didn't we (or you, Americans, whatever) just do the whole gun control debate?
quote: A visibly infuriated President Barack Obama surrounded himself with tear-stained parents of Connecticut school shooting victims Wednesday and declared it a "pretty shameful day for Washington" after the Senate rejected a measure designed to make it tougher for criminals to get their hands on guns.
quote:I'm white as milk and neither me nor any of my ancestors going back as many centuries as you'd like to had anything to do with the white construct you're describing.
Really? So you're a recent immigrant who just got here? Even if that were the case, you'd still benefit from the system that was created by whites over the last couple centuries, especially the last couple decades. And for younger Americans, even if they didn't create it, they benefit from it, and we're all part of the same country, so we bear responsibility for the actions of our government and our ancestors, which means we have to fix it.
quote:I think it's immoral *not* to say "wow, you guys are really killing each other a lot, maybe you should solve that..." (not sure what the "and leave us alone" is about, given its a black-black murder epidemic we're discussing).
Because your suggestion is that it's a black-created problem. They created the situation, they suffer the consequences, so they should fix it. That's awfully tidy for white America, but it's ridiculous. It's not. It's a problem whites played a huge role in creating, but have no particular interest in solving other than to wag their fingers at the inner city and say "why can't you all just behave?" It's insulting.
quote:Or should whites just stand back and say "damn, almost 2 murders every day in Chicago - that sucks. Too bad it's rooted in the legacy of our forefather's racism and we really don't have any right to draw attention to it in 2013 - best of luck!"?
You missed the point. We absolutely shouldn't "stand back" and say "best of luck." We should be devoting resources, time and effort to solving it WITH them, rather than sitting back in our often delightful white, safe, middle-class enclaves judging them and throwing up our hands and saying it's impossible. You certainly didn't hear me suggest we say and do nothing, you did hear me say we should do something and stop backseat driving.
And they've been trying on the issue of violent crime. Many cities have tried to pass handgun laws and other measures to reduce the level of violence, and in some cases it has worked. But then largely white groups come out of the woodworks to get those bans overturned. The result? They get to feel better about themselves, and more black people die. Of course they don't give a damn about the value of gun control, they aren't the ones being gunned down in the hood. There's your modern white-black divide.
quote:Anyway, whites aren't where I'd expect to see more attention brought to the problem. And I certainly won't hold my breath waiting for Jackson or Sharpton, or Obama for that matter, to start organizing demonstrations night and day until we have calls for a national discussion on black-black violence. Much cleaner to pick and choose the odd white-black injustice every year or two and ignore the daily shooting deaths under our noses.
It's not a problem they can solve themselves. And frankly, it's not a problem they should have to solve themselves. The US government and society at large owes more to Black America than a lecture.
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quote:I'm white as milk and neither me nor any of my ancestors going back as many centuries as you'd like to had anything to do with the white construct you're describing.
Setting aside your statements for your own person for the moment, how can you possibly speak with such authority about what your ancestors did when the history of nearly universal virulent racism and the legacy (and in the past) actual practice of slavery? Are your ancestors exclusively made up of Underground Railroad figures or abolitionists? If the answer is no, of course they had something to do with the system Lyrhawn spoke of.
Did they purchase cotton or other goods made in the South? Do business with businesses that did so? Did they join their communities in making the notion of integration not just impossible but not even considered? Did they ever even see a black person, or strive to see slavery ended? Did they ever work a job where they benefited from no black person, however qualified and hard working, would ever even be a consideration?
The list goes on to the extent we could talk about all of the ways everyone benefited from such a system-except its victims, of course, and in fact some victims found what small victories they could on the margins-and not be even half done. It's simply impossible to have a nationwide system of oppression of an entire group of people numbering in the millions and then look to anyone and say 'we had absolutely no part in it'. The only way you would have a leg to stand upon with such a claim would be if you were to say that your ancestors took absolutely no part in anything good wider than themselves, either.
quote: I think it's immoral *not* to say "wow, you guys are really killing each other a lot, maybe you should solve that..." (not sure what the "and leave us alone" is about, given its a black-black murder epidemic we're discussing).
It's patronizing, it's ignorant, and as for the 'leave us alone' part that is for example when the body on the pavement gets a headline and attention from the police, but much less before and certainly much less in, say, school districts years before the murder takes place.
It's also absurd because do you imagine there is a single black person that doesn't already know it?
quote: Or should whites just stand back and say "damn, almost 2 murders every day in Chicago - that sucks. Too bad it's rooted in the legacy of our forefather's racism and we really don't have any right to draw attention to it in 2013 - best of luck!"?
Which is nothing like what Lyrhawn actually said, I'm not sure if you can tell.
quote: Anyway, whites aren't where I'd expect to see more attention brought to the problem. And I certainly won't hold my breath waiting for Jackson or Sharpton, or Obama for that matter, to start organizing demonstrations night and day until we have calls for a national discussion on black-black violence. Much cleaner to pick and choose the odd white-black injustice every year or two and ignore the daily shooting deaths under our nosesx
First, having read this post I very much doubt you have more than a passing familiarity with the kinds of activism people such as Jackson and Sharpton actually engage in. In fact I would be mildly surprised if you could tell me where both are from without looking it up.
Second, it's interesting how you say 'odd white-black injustice'-is that because you imagine these events are relatively rare, or because you're suggesting they're only rarely picked out?
Third, you're an American who proudly denied having anything to do in your own person or your legacy with this racist system we're referring to. You're far from the only white American who thinks that way. Given that, I'm sure an Obama who talks loudly and often about having a national dialogue on race relations would be just delightful.
Racism: nothing to do with us! Right?
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The macro problem the whole country should deal with is poverty...and it should deal with it without any consideration of "race".
That Detroit is Mad Max crazy town is not something that should be thrown at the "whites" as if we have real culpability that a young man pulls the trigger of an illegaly purchased and used firearm and murders another young man.
If you feel it is -your- fault someone shoots someone else, fine. You can take up the burden of this weary world on your shoulders, but for Budduh's sake, leave me the heck out of it. I, for one, have -never- murdered anyone nor directlt contributed to murder either.
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quote:That Detroit is Mad Max crazy town is not something that should be thrown at the "whites" as if we have real culpability that a young man pulls the trigger of an illegaly purchased and used firearm and murders another young man.
Just as an example, whatever your position on gun control and education, if we as a nation make it easy (light and infrequent punishment and outlawing) to get an illegal gun, and if we as a country toss kids into failure factory schools by the tens of thousands in the wealthiest civilization in human history...
Well. If we get to disavow ourselves of that, we none of us get to lay collective claim to the good things our society does.
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Rakeesh -
A small quibble. So far as I know, my ancestors consisted of entirely poor Welsh and Irish peasants, with a smidge or two of Jewish and black Spanish Moor blood. I'm also a first generation immigrant. Some people really don't have slavers in their ancestry.
That doesn't mean that I don't benefit from living in a white dominant society, but my ancestors and I are not culpable for slavery.
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As I said, we should all do something to remove poverty from our planet. But that hardly equates to "whites are at fault for black on black violence."
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: As I said, we should all do something to remove poverty from our planet. But that hardly equates to "whites are at fault for black on black violence."
Well if you insist on rebutting a radical oversimplification of what was said...
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: As I said, we should all do something to remove poverty from our planet. But that hardly equates to "whites are at fault for black on black violence."
How do you think black poverty came about?
I think you're right that solving poverty would solve a lot of problems. It's basically what I have been advocating. But do you really not see the connection between white actions and black poverty? And dont you see how separating them makes it impossible to fix it? Too many people say its not their fault or problem and wash their hands of it.
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A small quibble. So far as I know, my ancestors consisted of entirely poor Welsh and Irish peasants, with a smidge or two of Jewish and black Spanish Moor blood. I'm also a first generation immigrant. Some people really don't have slavers in their ancestry.
That doesn't mean that I don't benefit from living in a white dominant society, but my ancestors and I are not culpable for slavery.
Two things.
1. Slavery is only one issue. I would argue its not even the most important one. Keeping blacks in pseudo slavery during the Gilded Age hurt more. But the worst was post WW2 racist policies by white governments that made it impossible for most blacks to develop any wealth. They were trapped in the inner city with declining property values and a disappearing tax base. The jobs fled with the whites. What happened in rye 40s, 50s, 60s and what resumed when Reagan dismantled the Great Society is where the heaviest damage was done. This is a crime committed by the Greatest Generation, not Lincolns.
2. You live in America. Presumably are American. You are responsible for the crimes of your government.
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A small quibble. So far as I know, my ancestors consisted of entirely poor Welsh and Irish peasants, with a smidge or two of Jewish and black Spanish Moor blood. I'm also a first generation immigrant. Some people really don't have slavers in their ancestry.
That doesn't mean that I don't benefit from living in a white dominant society, but my ancestors and I are not culpable for slavery.
This is the kind of thing Lyrhawn (I suspect) and I are getting at: 'whites have culpability for current and past racism, and its consequences' doesn't equal 'every single white person and all of their answers are culpable for slavery'. The problem doesn't start and stop at slavery, for pity's sake.
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Stone Wolf,
I don't follow. Are you saying the responses are silly, or the (supposed) challenge of 'whites have culpability for current minority problems in the US'?
It's not as simple as one single, easily defined group being at fault. It's frustrating how quickly so many people are to attempt to reduce such a complex set of human issues to 'one person is at fault'. Lyrhawn and I certainly aren't.
Now, to get back to what was said: are you suggesting whites have no culpability for current intra-minority violence?
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quote:2. You live in America. Presumably are American. You are responsible for the crimes of your government.
Or he is an American, but isn't responsible for the crimes of our government. In which case he gets no credit for anything good it's done either, past or present, but it comes as no surprise people are a lot quicker to pick up a shiny piece of historical pride than they are to admit to a spotted piece of historical blame.
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I'm not sure if that's the right word. I think you're just plain wrong.
I think you're an outlier in the sense that you don't recognize historical facts of what happened, but you still believe in fighting systemic poverty. Most people use it as an excuse to brush that problem under the rug. So kudos to you, and I mean that seriously, on being a solid human being.
But as for what happened, you either just plain don't know, or you have a bizarre personal definition of responsibility.
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it's black people killing black people! since i'm white i totally eschew any sort of responsibility for that whatsoever! i do this knowing that everything about that is a vacuum condition with no issue of predominant socioeconomic legacies and discrimination and prejudice impacting entire generations.
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I'm just wondering on what historical grounds anyone could seriously disagree.
Who brought black people here against their will, and kept them in bondage? Once that was (finally) ended in the land of the free, who made laws and upheld social systems that inflicted generational poverty? Which group of people has had to be dragged, kicking and screaming and not uncommonly with blood spilt, to nearer stages of equality?
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It was people. Some lighter then others. But individuals all. And here is a news flash...lots of abolitionists had creamy complexion. As a nation, we have made many mistakes and also many correct steps. But "whites"...no such club ever existed. I may owe the "black" man something as an American (yellow, brown, red, etc, our great country has effed over quite a few) but I owe no one a thing as a "white". Of course strictly speaking I am a Jew, but that is neither here nor there. I might owe those with less then myself my help, but that is because of who I am and not how much melatonin resides in my epidermis.
Want to overcome racism? Try belonging to the human race.
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I see your point, and while I might have a certain amount of sympathy for it, it's just impossible to remove the racial component from our history.
It was a group of people who were not just self-professed racists who said specifically they were out to keep black people down, but were self-professed white supremacists.
I mean come on man, it wasn't just people who happen to be white keeping down people who happened to be black. It wasn't a coincidence. It was people who were white who wanted whites to stay in power who kept down blacks they wanted to keep in subservient roles.
Not every white person was a bad guy, but the vast majority of bad guys were white. I'd like it very much if we lived in a colorblind society, but pretending like race doesn't matter is, at this point, far more harmful than helpful to our society.
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I'm not saying that the group of evil people who oppressed the blacks -weren't- white. I'm saying that it is much more poinient that they were evil.
As to all people who remotely resemble those who evil guys now owing a debt for thier misdeeds...just silly.
Saying that black on black inner city violence should be seen as a macro economic/educational epidemic is just. Saying that -whites- owe it to blacks to fix things makes as much sense as saying those of German decent are culpable for the holocaust.
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Well on some level it's moot, because it's impossible to impose a special tax on white people to pay for fixing black people's problems, though I suspect if you created a special poverty fighting tax and only taxed those above the median income level, it would largely have the same effect. The cost would and should be a shared burden by all.
But to sort of get back to the root of this whole thing, it's impossible to understand the black reaction to Trayvon Martin without understanding where that white-black friction comes from, and it's impossible to understand why "you should focus more on your black on black violence problem" coming from white people is so insulting. We, as a society run by white people, created the poverty-stricken situation they live in that breeds such violence, then we proceed to lecture them on fixing it without much help? It's no wonder they aren't reacting cheerily.
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Why in the world would I claim credit for the good things that America has done, even if I was American? I'm not an American yet; my green card requires renewal next year, and whether I take a citizenship oath or get the renewal depends on which costs less.
I get it. White people did bad things. My skin is white. I presumably should have to pay for their crimes based upon the color of my skin. I don't have to like it.
Whichever solutions end up being put in place should revolve more around socioeconomic status then race. Successful black people don't need the help; generationally poor white people often do.
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If your stance is to deny race as a quality by which human beings are grouped entirely, as a concept, then there really can't be much discussion much less agreement on the matter it seems. All I can say is that this idea, while it is probably a nice one, seems very divorced from the actual reality of human events. But then you go on to point out that there was a particular racial group, so I really don't understand which angle you're coming from.
But as to the notion that 'everyone who resembles them owes for their misdeeds', it's been explained at least twice now in some detail that the reason isn't 'you look like these historical bad guys, therefore you owe'. The reason is 'your ancestors set up an oppressive, racist system from which you continue to benefit, and since it is difficult or impossible not to benefit, something is owed'. I'm not sure why you've latched onto the never-said idea that the grounds are 'we look the same'.
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Here is the problem with all that. My ancestors didn't set up anything resembling what you have described. If your ansestors did that that might explain your guilt. But mine didn't. And here is why it really comes down to appearances. You assume simply because I have the low quantity of melatonin in my epidermis that my ancestors are culpable for some crime. They are not.
As to so called "white privledge" I'm half Russian Jew on my mother's side, so I guess my country club invitation got lost in the mail.
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Yeah, the focus should not be on the fact that white ancestors set up the system, but rather that present-day white people unjustly benefit from it (insofar as they do).
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quote:Originally posted by Stone_Wolf_: Here is the problem with all that. My ancestors didn't set up anything resembling what you have described. If your ansestors did that that might explain your guilt. But mine didn't. And here is why it really comes down to appearances. You assume simply because I have the low quantity of melatonin in my epidermis that my ancestors are culpable for some crime. They are not.
As to so called "white privledge" I'm half Russian Jew on my mother's side, so I guess my country club invitation got lost in the mail.
This is getting pretty frustrating. It's been said at least twice each by both Lyrhawn and I that the point is not 'your ancestors did this, therefore you share blame' but rather 'an oppressive system was set up from which you presently benefit, whether or not your ancestors or even yourself have any hand in crafting it'. I'm not sure how that point can be made any plainer at this point.
As to white privilege, do you think there aren't any benefits to appearing white even if the details aren't 'traditionally' white? And by the way, on what basis do you completely eschew racial groupings (no such group as 'whites') but not religious, cultural, and national groupings (Russian Jew)?
You're more likely to be viewed more favorably by more people on a variety of issues from employment, housing, business, legal dealings, the list goes on, than you were if you appeared to belong to a minority. All of those people who don't benefit from that arbitrary genetic advantage, if playing field were truly level competition for all of those things would be steeper and more difficult and/or more expensive for you to access. There's the benefits for you.
Now you can take the approach 'I didn't set it up, therefore I owe nothing to its removal' (or because you do acknowledge an obligation to eliminate poverty, switch 'owe' to 'should do something for'). But please don't suggest that all of these things aren't happening and that they simply don't exist. Yes, poverty is the larger, wider problem. You know who is more poor, proportionally? It ain't white people (or if you insist, 'people with varying levels of melatonin').
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But if we scaled aid to socioeconomic status, you'd still get minorities benefitting more (as most minorities do indeed have a higher proportion of poor people) while also not ignoring any poor white people who also need the help.
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Yep. If the motivation isn't white guilt, what's the logic behind racial aid instead of socioeconomic aid?
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quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Yep. If the motivation isn't white guilt, what's the logic behind racial aid instead of socioeconomic aid?
What type of aid are we talking about? Most government financial aid for food, housing, etc. is already based on socioeconomic status.
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I'm just waiting for protesters try to spin this with some idiotic idea that Zimmerman caused the accident or that the family crashed because Zimmerman was following them.
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quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: The reason is 'your ancestors set up an oppressive, racist system ...
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: This is getting pretty frustrating. It's been said at least twice each by both Lyrhawn and I that the point is not 'your ancestors did this, therefore you share blame'
A great way to alleviate frustration is to actually read your own posts.
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I'm just waiting for protesters try to spin this with some idiotic idea that Zimmerman caused the accident or that the family crashed because Zimmerman was following them.
Anyone who says 'this happened because Zimmerman set it or caused it' with any kind of certainty would of course be more than a little silly.
That said, it is a fortunate coincidence that such a thing happened so shortly after he was acquitted. I'm not saying that means anyone should think he did something wrong-far from it. I'm saying that the initial, "Huh, that's surprising," for the timing is hardly unreasonable. It's what comes after that first thought that will likely be.
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Stone_Wolf,
OK, so you decided...I don't know...to latch onto one single point in a post, and completely ignore the rest of it? Are you going now to claim "when Rakeesh said 'ancestors' he obviously meant everyone, even those whose ancestors didn't live here" or something?
Come on. Gimme a freaking break. It should be obvious I didn't mean 'every single living white person in America ever has an ancestral piece of slavery' but since apparently it's not (to you), I'll clarify (again): the main modern reason for the sorts of things I'm talking about, and I think Lyrhawn is talking about, is because-ancestors or not-white people currently benefit from this setup and there's simply no way to avoid it, no amount of 'I don't see color' or 'races aren't real groups' that will wish it away.
Now are you going to continue to insist on focusing exclusively on bits and pieces and wasn't-actually-saids or what?
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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quote:Rakeesh and Lyr are both talking a lot about alleviating various racial disparities.
Well there are white privilege issues with hiring, admissions, lending, and other situations which unfairly advantage whites over blacks regardless of income level. Addressing income level rather than race for affirmative action seems like maybe not such a great idea. But that wouldn't be aid, it would be regulation.
Posts: 3275 | Registered: May 2007
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posted
I'm not totally sure what I'd do to fix a problem as long-standing, complex and damaging as the one we've created.
Direct payments to blacks is politically impossible. I'm not even sure it's totally fair, only because plenty of white immigrants had problems, but at some point just about all of them had a chance, with shifting societal perceptions of whiteness, to become mainstream Americans. It was a barrier almost totally eradicated for ethnic whites by WW2.
But even so, none of them were held back for as long or as completely as blacks were.
I think if you want to help, not so much to repay every dime they might be "owed" for past injustices the way you might if this was a lawsuit, but help in a way that gives the black community a fighting chance, you do it in four ways.
1. Education. Massive funding for inner city schools. Erase the gap between an inner city and suburban education and create a massive scholarship fund for inner city youths who can make it to college but can't afford it. This helps to ensure that, for all our other problems, maybe time will solve half the problem for us simply by getting them an education and a better chance at a good job.
2. Housing. Restrictive housing policies is probably the single most lasting, damaging legacy of damage done to the black community. White governments made it impossible for blacks to leave the inner city, and then created a situation where black housing values plummeted. The single greatest investment most families make is their house. Whites got to make those investments in the suburbs and reaped the benefits. Blacks did not. Many were forced to abandon their homes and become renters, thousands were destroyed by gentrification, highway projects and other developments under eminent domain. A huge investment is needed to clean up inner city housing. Knock down blighted buildings, fix up old ones, and work on getting anyone who wants to own into a house, even if it's just a small starter home, so they can start somewhere, and property values can start to rise. It's probably the most direct form of justice as well since we've denied them the chance for decades.
3. Jobs. This ties back to education because many simply aren't qualified. The government should enter into a private-public partnership with business to fund a program of job training. The government will fund, maybe with a small portion from corporations, the training of workers for specific jobs waiting for them when they finish their training. That way they gain job skills and experience they can take with them to the next job if this one doesn't last long. It's not a giveaway, they'd still have to work hard, but they'd get a big leg up that they need.
4. Public safety. I think this would be a medium-term investment that wouldn't have to be sustained long term. A big investment now to flood the street with cops and other crime fighting technologies to sort of shock and awe the inner city would be a good start. As more people get jobs, schools improve, and kids get more positively involved, crime will naturally drop, and the police presence can be reduced.
There are more things, of course, but I think big investments, over time, would solve the biggest problems involved with poverty. A lot of white families still in cities will find themselves uplifted by this as well. A rising tide lifts all boats.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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posted
I've been without access for a bit so wasn't able to see responses. Without digging too far down I'll say:
I'm Canadian now living in the US, past 10+ years. I go a few generations back in Canada, and then German/Russian back farther. If my great-great grandfather somehow purchasing some imported cotton(?) on the Canadian prairies somehow makes my family culpable for the black person's plight,then guilty as charged.
Rakeesh, your posting style comes across snide and a bit angry. I'm all for spirited debate, and you might be someone I'd enjoy having a beer with in the real world but I'm not all that interested in engaging with you here.
Posts: 135 | Registered: Apr 2006
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Well, if you're a non-citizen alien living here on what I'm guess is whatever the equivalent of a green card is right now, I guess this doesn't necessarily apply to you as much.
Your parentage doesn't matter. Your ancestry doesn't matter. If you're an American, you have a duty to address the wrongs committed by your government, whether those wrongs are happening now or happened 200 years ago, if the ill-effects are still lasting to the present. I think this is something that Stone Wolf might basically agree with, because he agrees that as a society we should help each other, his problem is with the issue of guilt or blame. I'm much, much less interested in this debate. We can argue genealogy until we are all blue in the face, but it doesn't change anything.
No one here is advocating a special tax on white people to give money only to black people. So it's really a moot point. But I think we should all recognize white mostly white America did to mostly Black America if we want to even get a tiny glimpse into the current mindset and situation of black Americans.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Originally posted by ScottF: I've been without access for a bit so wasn't able to see responses. Without digging too far down I'll say:
I'm Canadian now living in the US, past 10+ years. I go a few generations back in Canada, and then German/Russian back farther. If my great-great grandfather somehow purchasing some imported cotton(?) on the Canadian prairies somehow makes my family culpable for the black person's plight,then guilty as charged.
Rakeesh, your posting style comes across snide and a bit angry. I'm all for spirited debate, and you might be someone I'd enjoy having a beer with in the real world but I'm not all that interested in engaging with you here.
Well I can't fault you for that perception, since after what came across to me as something of a sneering, condescending talk about the immorality of not lecturing black America on intra-racial violence...well, perhaps you get the idea. If I read condescension into that where none was intended, I'll cop to your having no ill intent and offer a conditional apology, but...
Here's the thing: it doesn't really matter if anything negative was meant as to whether it was a patronizing set of remarks on race relations. Furthermore, as has been pretty common in this thread, you latched exclusively onto the question of blame even (as of this post) after repeated explanations that that wasn't the main or even an important point.
Lyrhawn is a more thoughtful, courteous poster than I am. He doesn't get irritated or snarky as quickly which is to his credit even though that's not always a high bar. As for me, though, I'll just reiterate my frustration that other, *much* more important components of what we're saying are being almost completely ignored in favor of focusing on what is all but a straw man argument.
No special tax. No historical blame for everyone with fair skin. No modern white people owe a guilt debt for slavery. No modern white people ought to feel guilty about slavery. I'm wondering if I should throw up even more of these ahead of time (and again).
Here is what I (and possbly Lyrhawn, and MattP) are saying: Americans who appear to be white cannot just ignore the special problems of race relations and systems of prejudice because they still benefit from them. It's almost in the dang air. Oh! Here's another one: no every white person is a racist of some form or another, and no every white person is guilty of racial prejudice to even a small degree. That's irrelevant. In order to benefit from these things that have been done and are still being done, it's not required that a person have even prejudiced thoughts.
Posts: 17164 | Registered: Jun 2001
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Programs designed to alleviate these issues will necessarily be targeted on racial lines, because they will understand how profoundly race is at issue in furthering the perpetuation of entrapping socioeconomic and sociocultural issues. Beyond that, though, the issue isn't about marketing white guilt (or shouldn't be). It's about spades and spades.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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posted
Rakeesh: I find your comments as tiresome as predictable.
Lyr: I find your comments as thoughtful as agreeable.
Personally I think it has far more to do with culture then "race". This guy is far more employable then this guy.Posts: 6683 | Registered: Jun 2005
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