First thing's first: KEEP. THIS. SHIT. CIVIL. If you can't talk about race without resorting to childish insults and rude generalizations or getting angry at people who don't see it your way, leave the thread.
With that said, I bring you to what can hopefully be the general thread about race.
First, a few starter questions.
- How, if at all, do you feel your race affects your everyday life?
- Do you believe that white people (or whatever the majority race in your area is) receive privileges simply because of the color of their skin. How much?
- Do you believe minorities are discriminated against for the same reason? How much?
- Do you believe that assimilation of cultures is better than people trying to keep their own?
- Affirmative Action. Yea, Nay? Why or why not?
Also, a personal question from me.
- Why (in my experience, not trying to generalize) do white people often try to insist that they aren't white? I can't count the number of times I've heard "I'm not white, I'm 1/4th English, 1/4th German, 1/4th Scandinavian 1/8th Cherokee, and 1/8th Russian," as though 4 of 5 of those things aren't considered "white" by the masses. Is it because you have pride for your ancestry, or an attempt to try and differentiate yourself from all those "other" white people? Or something else altogether?
edited 30th May '11 9:16:04 PM by Wulf
Yeah, I mean I suspect that many BLM people do when it's possible protest about gang violence, they don't it under the BLM banner because it's a separate problem. It's like asking why LGBT rights groups don't complain about the wage gap or why Feminist groups aren't protesting for equal marriage. The people commonly are, but they use specific groups for specific jobs, BLM is about police violence, you'll find separate organisations for addressing gang violence.
edited 18th Apr '16 5:44:00 PM by Silasw
“And the Bunny nails it!” ~ Gabrael “If the UN can get through a day without everyone strangling everyone else so can we.” ~ CyranPoverty. Assuming of course, that both poverty and violence are demographically real, and not just stereotypes.
Most of this extra violence, I believe, is gang violence, and gangs, I believe, are caused by poverty. Not just financial poverty either. Lack of access to educational resources would make both gangs and violence more likely.
If there is excess black on black violence outside of gangs, then I cannot even begin to guess.
@Hellomoto, I figured "poor due to poor station in life due to historical racism and current prejudice resulting in the need to be part of criminal activities and gangs in order to get by and criminals tend to conduct violent acts" was sort of a logical conclusion that wouldn't need explanation. It's not complicated.
The Blog The ArtThere are, needless to say, people who will try to point to the various problems that plague the black community as proof that black people are somehow inherently inferior to white people. These people are, equally needless to say, a bunch of racist bastards.
"We'll take the next chance, and the next, until we win, or the chances are spent."A lot of people talk about how stereotypes are based on reality and point out how it isn't inaccurate to say that black people have a problem with criminality and violence, so they deserved to be judged on that, but the problem is they don't really ask why they're in that situation. People don't really become criminals for no reason, and while shits and giggles DO motivate crimes, it's pretty clear from even a superficial analysis that there's more at hand here.
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If I might open up a huge can of worms, there is something i've been wondering about for the last few weeks: what is you guys' opinion on the concept of N-Word Privileges? I have a hard time weighing in because I don't really feel like I have a right to tell black people and other racial groups how to socialize and how they use their language. I'm not white (mixed race), but my peruvian ancestry is rarely ever relevant to me on a day-to-day basis to make this a concept I personally experience within members of my own ethnicity (also I don't personally know any peruvians outside of my family).
This is indeed a mighty can of worms, that I probably shouldn't touch, but here's my two cents. I'm a biracial Asian-American, and when I'm around my family, I occasionally get an ironic kick out of referring to myself as "yellowish" or something similar. I also use the terms "Chinaman" or "Oriental" once in a while - again, with deliberate irony. When my father writes notes around the house, he signs them with a little squinty-eyed, buck-toothed smiley face, as a joke.
I probably wouldn't appreciate someone who wasn't Asian telling me I couldn't ever use those terms, because the first thought through my mind would be essentially "what business is it of yours?" Trying to control what terms someone can or cannot use to refer to themselves is a dangerous game to be playing, and many people will not take too kindly to it.
But, by the same token, I would never use any of those terms when talking to an Asian person who I did not know was, for a fact, completely comfortable with it. Using those terms is purely a quirk of mine, and trying to insist to another Asian person that they shouldn't be offended when I call them an Oriental would basically make me a total jerk. It's about respect - me being comfortable enough with those terms to use them in an ironic sense does not give me the right to use them to use them around someone who isn't comfortable with them.
And, this probably goes without saying, but I would never dream of using, say, the N-word, ironically or not. I am not black, I do not have the privilege of even considering using that term. Neither would I ever tell a black person that they shouldn't use it themselves - I have no business trying to participate in that conversation. I have no business trying to tell people of another racial group what self-defining or self-referential terms they can and cannot use.
Hopefully this all makes a lick of sense.
edited 19th Apr '16 6:24:52 PM by RBluefish
"We'll take the next chance, and the next, until we win, or the chances are spent."I tend to relate to Nigger and Nigga as I relate to most euphemismed words, with an active disinterest in their continuing social censure, these are words that worked in their historical context as a way to demonstrate an actual privilege over the black community. Nowadays it feels entirely redundant to self-censor that specific word when smart racists have moved over into words like thugs. The US culture makes me irritated in that aspect, it makes spanish lessons a minefield when you can get fired for saying black in my language, so fuck trying to phase out insults. Let them go.
It's a complicated thing, because back in the earliest days "black" was like the nastiest thing you could call someone of African descent, and "negro" or even "nigger" itself were actually considered classier and more respectable terms for them. Sometime around the 1960's or so black power groups started bringing back the term "black" to the point that I'd say it's been successfully reclaimed so it can be done.
What's wrong with "Oriental" ? Seems no more or less sucky than "Asian" or "Asiatic".
As for Spanish class, dodge the issue by replacing "negro" with "oscuro". It's stupid, but it gets you through.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.I am not talking about myself, I live in a country where a singer of mestizo descent picked Nigga as his stage name. I am talking about this
Here's my own two cents on this, as an American-Israeli.
There is absolutely no PC culture in Israel, so people just say whatever the hell they want and it doesn't really offend others. There are some words that are considered slurs and could be somewhat offensive, but nobody objects to saying the Hebrew word for "black" (there's a band whose members are all of Ethiopian background called "Strong Black Coffee") - or even the Hebrew equivalent of the N-word, or actually the N-word itself (which is mostly used humorously, the way vandro said).
Because of this, American PC culture causes somewhat of a Values Dissonance between me and my surroundings when I'm in the States. I often use the word "black" without thinking, and while no African-American has ever gotten offended by me saying it, I've had a number of white people call me out on it. Then there's the whole thing where the word "Jew" is not considered PC, which I never got, and honestly it bugs me quite a bit when people try to get around saying that word. I don't care if you call me a Jew, and neither do most Jews, so just call us Jews and that's it!
Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.
But that's stupid, because people decide what words mean. In reality, they're just a bunch of weird sounds humans make with their mouths and vocal cords.
In Israel, the word "Ashkenazi" (European Jew) is used as an sort-of insult for a cold, no-fun, and humorless kind of person, e.g. "Don't be such an Ashkenazi, come dance with us!" and no one takes offense at that.
Besides that, we Jews do like our money.
edited 20th Apr '16 1:22:10 AM by yoneld
Fear of a name increases fear of the thing itself.I wrote a bit
about this in the Film Diversity thread. Keep in mind I'm not really an authority on this.
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And the people of America have decided that Jew is an insult to be used against people you don't like.
And the whole "words only hurt you if you let them" argument is a load of shit. Nothing is more powerful than words. They define thought and culture. And honestly Israel would be one of the last places I'd look towards when it comes to racial tolerance.
There's a reason our far right parties love Israel so much and it's got nothing to do with liking Jews.
edited 20th Apr '16 1:23:34 AM by LeGarcon
Oh really when?

BLM as I understand it is about something very specific, the treatment of black people by government authorities, including police brutality, racial profiling, etc, which is a legitimate issue not only in the US but in other countries as well. I don't see it as them not caring about other people dying, it's just not what that specific movement is about.
edited 18th Apr '16 5:44:54 PM by wehrmacht