Race- Privilege, Relations, Racism, etc.

Actually, I just discovered to my surprise that there is a Leif Erikson Day. It was last Thursday.

Not often I can use a Spongebob video as something relevant to this thread

I, for one, welcome our Germanic Overlords

@ Achaemenid #3874: Ah yes, the Vikings were there early on, weren't they? John Cabot was there before Columbus, too. And possibly some Welshmen.

edited 13th Oct '14 11:33:07 AM by Greenmantle

If the tobacco found in the mouths of Egyptian mummies is any indication Africa beat Europe by at least 2000 years.

Speaking of Egypt, I keep forgetting that Egypt is a place where people still live, not just an endless field of ruins. Makes me feel stupid.

The Chinese hit our west coast as well way before a lot of other people, (people argue over exactly when and I don't have the time to look it up exactly.)

"Actually, I just discovered to my surprise that there is a Leif Erikson Day. It was last Thursday."

You dig around and you'll find a lot of immigrants to America have a holiday. St. Patrick's Day and Cinco de Mayo being the obvious ones, but also Poles have Pulaski Day and Germans have Von Stueban Day and German American Day

Wasn't that something Gavin Menzies pulled out his ass and is pretty much dismissed by professional sinologists? Certainly, I thought the consensus was that the Chinese only got as far as East Africa.

Yes, Minneapolis also has Indigenous People's Day though they stopped short of changing the name of the holiday from Columbus Day, it's just that the city is celebrating the first one more. To be honest, Minneapolis simply doesn't have a large Italian-American population, unlike some other cities that really do up Columbus Day.

I noticed back in 1992 how much more low-key the Columbus Quincentennial celebrations were than the Quadcentennial celebrations of 1892 were (from all reports of the latter.)

In other news, there's a book out about the last year of Dr. Martin Luther King's life; I was interested to be reminded that he was pivoting his work to focus more on systemic poverty than strictly civil rights issues.

I've heard different reports. Not just by him. So who knows. Otherwise it's worth looking into.

edited 13th Oct '14 8:11:21 PM by SilentColossus

Well, the two aren't mutually exclusive. Sail east (and south) to hit east Africa, while a different ship sails west to hit the western coast. On the other hand, it would be much easier to cross the Indian Ocean than the Pacific.

And I think this is a bit of a derail. Sorry.

edited 13th Oct '14 9:19:10 PM by Sharur

George Africanus: From slave to respected businessman

Britain's most racist election, 50 years on.

The small, predominantly white working-class constituency of Smethwick saw, in 1964, a campaign so ugly that Malcolm X came to visit.

edited 15th Oct '14 7:55:15 PM by Achaemenid

A very strong argument to stop using the phrase "First-World Problems"

Black Moms Tell White Moms About the Race Talk

I enjoyed that, aside from some Trot-ish moaning. The three worlds theory is something Mao pulled out his ass anyway.

edited 16th Oct '14 10:04:18 AM by Achaemenid

The "first world problems" article seems full of manufactured outrage. The whole point of the phrase is that it's about trivial things. "Oh no, my bluetooth headset ran out of batteries, so now I have to take my phone out of my pocket to answer a call" is a first world problem. Serious issues — like discrimination, oppression, harassment, etc — are by definition not "first world problems".

You can nitpick about the technical definition of "third world" (hint: it doesn't mean now what it meant during the Cold War — language shifts like that), but you're making mountains out of molehills. Calling something a "first world problem" is shorthand for "stop bitching about trivial shit". No, not all people in the third world are subsistence farmers using iron age technology. And no, not all people in the first world are able to support the upper-middle-class lifestyle that "first world problems" tend to revolve around. But that doesn't mean everyone who uses the phrase first world problems are "massive racist, imperialist, dismissive assholes".

What is Trot-ish moaning? I'm not familiar with the term, but it sounds like you're referring what I like to call Tumblr rage: "THIS is a problem, yet NO ONE understands this fucking thing that upsets me, and other so-called "advocates" are being condescending to the people of such-and-such, which only feeds the fucking problem with X, Y and Z. Why doesn't ANYONE ever fucking talk about X, Y and Z!? So the next time you do X, Y and Z, go fuck yourself, you imperialist patriarchal so-and-so!"

And then someone else comes along and says "THIS! SO THIS!"

To be crystal clear, I'm poking fun at some of the more colorful social justice advocates, not condemning them. Presentation and delivery style count for something, folks. Having said that, I do agree with the basic underlying message the author presents. People in Laos and Tajikistan probably read Buzz Feed articles and play Candy Crush like everyone else.

edited 16th Oct '14 11:40:15 AM by Aprilla

The problem is that the phrase "first-world problems", requires the acceptance of subtly racist tropes like the reductive "starving pot-bellied children" image of Africa to make sense.

That doesn't mean everyone who says it is a white supremacist, but it's still a phrase with ugly racist baggage that would be better off dropped.

Not really, it just requires one to assume that people in the third world (under the current definition of third world) tend to have actual problems to deal with rather than trivial not real problems that wealthy, middle class, (and often white) people in the first world occasionally get incredibly upset over.

The assumption is that people in the third world don't get massively bent out of shape because of stuff that is trivial, while people in the first world do.

Now I can see a problem in that the phrase does rather ignore the many people in the first world who have serious real problems, but even then, those are real problems that people face, a problem is only a first world problem if it's something silly that only an entitled fool would get really upset about.

edited 16th Oct '14 12:38:51 PM by SilasW

Implying that gripping about minor inconvinieces is the sole privilege of the first world is really patronising.

Exactly.

Seems like it's a Positive Discrimination thing.

Only these real badass mofos in the third world deal with real problems, unlike your whiny little fake bitch ass first world problems, or something like that.