AProudLefty
He cries for attention. :)
The real open thread. 
Let's talk about race. Open thread, really I promise!
- Thread starter AProudLefty
- Start date
Jade Dragon
And I'm the one that jaded you.
Difference is easy. I'm racially white, but ethnically I'm Dutch/German. Unfortunately for most African Americans, their ethnicity was mostly taken from them coming from slave ancestry and it's a lot harder to have a connection.
AProudLefty
He cries for attention. :)
The plague of racism has, in many ways, been increasing in the last few years. Whether one looks at Hungary, Germany, Myanmar, India or Brazil, racists are becoming more visible and getting elected to public office.
Then there were the horrors of the slaughters in New Zealand and Sri Lanka.
In the United States, the president has denounced Mexicans as drug dealers and rapists, described some poor nations as, “shithole countries,” and failed to reject an endorsement from a former leader of the Ku Klux Klan. He even went so far as to call at least some neo-Nazis, “very fine people.” One might be forgiven for thinking that what his campaign slogan really meant was “Make America White Again.”
Hate crimes in the U.S. rose in 2017 for the third consecutive year, and they are increasing in Canada too—up 47 percent in the latter in 2017, primarily targeting Muslims but also attacking Jews and people of color.
In combating this increase in racism, there are two primary aspects to consider. The first is that the very idea of “race” is a lie: as the American Society of Human Genetics, the largest professional organization of scientists in the field, explained in an essay:
“The science of genetics demonstrates that humans cannot be divided into biologically distinct subcategories”; and it “challenges the traditional concept of different races of humans as biologically separate and distinct. This is validated by many decades of research.” In other words, “race itself is a social construct,” with no biological basis.
In 2014, more than 130 leading population geneticists condemned the idea that genetic differences account for the economic, political, social and behavioral diversity around the world. In fact, said a 2018 article in Scientific American, there is a “broad scientific consensus that when it comes to genes there is just as much diversity within racial and ethnic groups as there is across them.” And the Human Genome Project has confirmed that the genomes found around the globe are 99.9 percent identical in every person. Hence, the very idea of different “races” is nonsense.
A second problem, as cognitive scientist George Lakoff has shown, is that simply using the word “race,” even when criticizing racism, actually reinforces the false belief that human beings belong to fundamentally different groups. That’s because the more a word is used, the more that certain brain circuits are activated and the stronger that metaphor becomes.
The use of colors to describe ethnic groups also supports racism. That’s why it is not acceptable anymore to refer to Asians as “yellow,” to Latin Americans as “brown,” or to Native Americans as “red.” However, many people, including academics and journalists, still use “black” to describe people of primarily recent African origin.
Of course, there are minor differences between various ethnic groups: behavioral, physical, linguistic and so on, and most of those differences are due to one’s culture and experiences. As Einstein observed, “the personality that finally emerges is largely formed by the environment” that people experience during development, by the structure of the society in which they grow up, “by the tradition of that society, and by its appraisal of particular types of behavior.”
More at https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/the-concept-of-race-is-a-lie/
Racial bias is certainly quite common all over the world and the US is no exception. It probably is more correct to see it as cultural bias but that implies that all cultural bias is bad. It you just happe4n to not like Italian food, that does not make you bad. If you not like Italians, thats another story. When I asked my black friend why he chose a black neighborhood to buy a house, he said his family was just more comfortable there. I cant view that as bad.
There is a tendency to see any signs of bias as bad and in need of repair. I disagree.
Violence is unacceptable and violence stemming from racial or cultural bias cannot be tolerated.
Bias is a rather typical human trait and there is no making it go away completely. Not what some would like to hear but its just human nature. I think things like festivals celebrating culture can help change minds. What does not help is hyperbole and attempts at shaming. That behavior simply reinforces the bias.
The best first step I can think of is to recognize the difference between racism and bias and apply the terms correctly.
There is a tendency to see any signs of bias as bad and in need of repair. I disagree.
Violence is unacceptable and violence stemming from racial or cultural bias cannot be tolerated.
Bias is a rather typical human trait and there is no making it go away completely. Not what some would like to hear but its just human nature. I think things like festivals celebrating culture can help change minds. What does not help is hyperbole and attempts at shaming. That behavior simply reinforces the bias.
The best first step I can think of is to recognize the difference between racism and bias and apply the terms correctly.
AProudLefty
He cries for attention. :)
Thank you. That is very well said.
wasnt sure what you were going for with the thread so I just took open to mean "open" and offer up some thoughts from my 67 years of observation here in a rather diverse university town in the south.
AProudLefty
He cries for attention. :)
Well I am not allowed to discuss it in this thread: https://www.justplainpolitics.com/showthread.php?184102-Let-s-talk-about-race-Open-thread
So it isn't really a open thread. I am not a troll. I am just here for a serious discussion.
BTW I like what you said: "The best first step I can think of is to recognize the difference between racism and bias and apply the terms correctly."
There is nothing wrong with biases. It's like how families stick together.
Racism is relatively rare especially as commonly applied. Most of that is simple bias.
Oddly enough Asians are far more likely to be racists. I think this may have more to do with them having a more closed society than much of the rest of the world. And it didnt help that Europeans saw them as inferior and didnt mind telling them that in colonial times. They clearly didnt care for that as one noted to a european (paraphrasing as I'm not 100% sure of the actual quote) 'we had invented language were doing math while your people were painting yourselves blue and running naked and worshiping oak trees'.
PostmodernProphet
fully immersed in faith..
there are several of them.......that pretty much covers the extent of it......
AProudLefty
He cries for attention. :)
"Closed society". EXACTLY.
Fun fact: The Japanese and the Korean are racist towards China.
Another fun fact: The Japanese never trusted China so they have always wore face masks.
Another fun fact: I am not the one who made those fun facts.
"Closed society". EXACTLY.
Fun fact: The Japanese and the Korean are racist towards China.
Another fun fact: The Japanese never trusted China so they have always wore face masks.
Another fun fact: I am not the one who made those fun facts.
I know that the various cultures in the far east are not fond of one another but do they actually see themselves as separate races and the other guys being inferior ? They hate them, no question about that and its pretty understandable given how they treated the ones being occupied. I was looking in google and the references I found did not suggest racism (although they called it that (incorrectly)).
But certainly closed societies seem prone to this.
??????
Yeah I kind of agree. Examples: the blues, jumping the broom.
Obviously things were not exactly like they were on the Dark Continent but many cultural aspects carried forward.
thats not what I meantat all.
ok. still applies.
no it doesnt.
well I gave examples and you dont. Hard to take that seriously.
it wasnt "MOSTLY TAKEN" it WAS.taken
evince
Truthmatters
Oh yes shaming helps
Putin and others massaged this racism to make it feel more acceptable to people
Exactly what fox did
So shaming people for believing racist lies does work
Yes there will always be idiot racists
But they need to face they will be outcast by decent society
THAT HAS WORKED
And will work
evince
Truthmatters
I’m Irish heavy Northern European mutt
I have very dark brown long straight hair, dark brown eyes and olive skin
I can stand in a crowd of Latinos and blend right in
Latinos often expect me to understand Spanish
I have been refused service in a restaurant due to my looks
By a black restaurant employee in a black owned restuant
For a white lady I understand racism better than most
It’s pure evil and pure stupidity
It’s a handle for evil, want to be dictators to rule
Racism ranks very high on the evil scale