The Problem with Black Lives Matter

Bro, you got me wrong.

"ZealotX wrote: But I'm not talking about racially profiling future police. I just want them to get fired if shown to have racist views on the basis that the community should have a reasonable expectation that they will be policed equally and fairly, maintaining the presumption of innocence."

If you stop for a second you will see that you CANNOT "show" that someone has racist views without them doing an "action" that expresses those views. I'm not interested in changing how everyone thinks or feels. That's not possible. We have been down ALL roads before. So please understand this. I have personally been involved in black empowerment and all my (personal) solutions are about economics. I am personally not a fan of marches. However, there is only so much that can be done when you have an external force constantly on the neck of your community, constantly threatening your life. So I understand the protests and hearts of the protesters and I am actually surprised that people are finally responding and finally seeing what we've been saying was there the whole time. But it's like white society literally looked at us like we were crazy or liars; like we would ALL (millions) lie about how bad the police were in our community. Now you see, not only a man get murdered in broad daylight, but also even how elderly protesters are getting pushed. Come on... And if they do that to an elderly white man, just imagine what they would do to a young black man at night when they can all get together and tell the same story and its their word against his. Just imagine that. Because they lied and said the old man tripped. And clearly you can see he was pushed. Clearly, cops were aiming at reporters and hitting cameramen. So who's lying? Who?

I was emotional when a cop thought I was robbing my own church when my father and I went in response to the alarm going off because we lived close by. I was emotional when the cop put his knee on my back and handcuffed me on the pavement like I was some kind of animal. It hurt. And I definitely would have gotten arrested if my father hadn't shown up. But that was a long time ago. When I was more recently given home detention where I could have easily lost my job and income, even though I should have been out on bail, I was pissed, but not in the same way. I had already made up my mind that the answer was that we needed to build our own economy because we would not be equal until our money was.

I know that a lot of racists aren't going to change. I know that isolated white communities often produce racists because they never have real (regular) experiences with black people. Therefore, they can be a sort of fictional construct crafted by the media and their perception in pop culture. They don't like rap music. Hey, I don't like most of it either. I listen to reggae. I'm not stereotypical in any way. I now live in a predominantly white neighborhood but still have at least a few black families on my street. All my neighbors seem nice. America can be nice.

I over heard a drunk guy saying something racist, more than likely directed at me, but hey... that's his OPINION. You are entitled to that. If you secretly hate black people, seems like a waste of mental energy, but that's fine if that's your choice and its not infringing upon my rights, liberty, or my pursuit of happiness. Now when my kids get told to go back to the cotton fields and other overtly racist garbage at their school, yeah it upsets me that they have to go through that, but that's their parents speaking, and their more isolated community speaking.

(cont'd)

And yes some of those kids might grow up and apply to be police officers. I don't want them to be denied because of what they said when they were 14. But if they have to take some kind of bias test involving threat level detection from black people, if they fail, then no, I don't want them serving in a community where black people can be victimized by their representation of law and order. They're there to protect and serve. If they act like a gang then the gang needs to be policed. And it seems like there was a time in which officers were afraid of Internal Affairs. That no longer seems to be the case.

In that case you need non-combat trained civilians who are armed with psychology degrees and social worker, to respond to many if not most of the calls, paired with a regular police officer. That person should deal with the "talking" part of the job and decide if the threat level warrants the combat trained officer to get out of the car while they fall back and record.

At the same time police forces need to be de-militarized because guns are a form of power and when you give them tanks and assault rifles you're teaching them that this level of force is sometimes necessary. And if THAT (military) level of force is sometimes necessary (or why else would they be allowed to buy it) then lesser levels of force are more necessary in many other situations. You don't bring an assault rifle to a knife fight. It makes it into a gun fight. Giving cops certain weapons changes the mentality. The problem is that we think that because they have a badge and uniform that they are trustworthy. Black people know they're not, that they LIE, that they falsify reports, that they plant evidence, and we so often have to take bad plea deals to serve some time just so that we don't end up doing hard time for crimes we didn't commit but that society thinks we're guilty of. African Americans are also 50% more likely to be innocent than other convicted murderers and spend longer in prison.

https://research.msu.edu/innocent-african-americans-more-likely-to-be-wrongfully-convicted/

"In addition, the report, officially titled, “Race and Wrongful Convictions in the United States,” found innocent black people are about 12 times more likely to be convicted of drug crimes than innocent white people."

"“Of the many costs the war on drugs inflicts on the black community, the practice of deliberately charging innocent defendants with fabricated crimes may be the most shameful,” said University of Michigan Law Professor Samuel Gross, the author of “Race and Wrongful Convictions in the United States” and senior editor of the National Registry of Exonerations."

We're not, as a community, as criminal as people think because of how often charges are flat out fabricated to boost numbers and make more money off our community, keeping us in and out of court. We're not several times more likely to be innocent or killed accidentally. That's racism!

Police have to stop being treated like an endangered species made of porcelain. Police lives matter. So do black lives. But police are trained to protect themselves first and foremost. If they're scared they think that's cause enough to shoot. That isn't the same bar for the rest of us. So if they lie and say that they, even though they have guns, tasers, batons, handcuffs, and sometimes vests, and backup, that they were scared, that's all they need to commit and get away with murder. And juries act like their badge prevents them from lying or that the law is so sacred to police officers that they wouldn't ever commit perjury. If you're that scared then you're in the wrong line of work!

Romanticized duty or not, THEY ARE NORMAL PEOPLE.

However, many normal people in positions of power allow that power to go to their heads. I have a boss like that too. Many people do or have in the past. Power and authority get abused all the time. That's why we have multiple levels of power and authority. But when the higher level almost always uses their power, not as a check and balance, but like an OG protecting his corner boys, then the system doesn't work. You may see a cop disappear after one too many complaints but he is probably simply working in a different precinct now. And they can regularly clean up their own records of misconduct. This is not normal. If you work at McDonald's and get caught spitting in the food they don't move you to a different store. You get fired.

Workplace laws don't mean a d-mn if no one reports you or if the one person who might think for a second about reporting you realizes that other people will lie and say it didn't happen and that they will be picked on and bullied for ratting out their fellow cop. That's why the whole bad apples argument falls on deaf ears. Because everyone else around them enables it and allows it to continue. Again... it's all about improper behavior. If you listen to the Mark Fuhrman tapes this is not just idle talk from a racist, but rather how his racism informed his performance. Racists don't just muse about racist ideas intellectually when they have a badge. They look for opportunities. And if they're hostile towards whites because their normal disposition is already that bad? Then when a black person looks at him wrong on the wrong day, that's all it takes. And if we can prevent terrorist plots, why not this? Why not domestic terrorism against black and brown people?

So yes, profiling no, but testing, yes. Testing, retraining, bringing in civilian leadership, defunding (doesn't mean taking all money away), changing the rules of engagement, banning choke holds and pressure that cuts off circulation, etc. Why did they think they were allowed to pepper spray protesters because of something the protester said that wasn't a threat? In other words, legal use of first amendment rights. And once they grab you... that's when they can then claim you're "resisting arrest". Everyone saw that, right?

cont'd

But think about this. You're a black person minding your own business. Cops get a tip about a "tall black man" in the area. You happen to be a tall black man too. As soon as they see you walking they jump out, one pulls a gun and the other starts yelling commands at you. Before you can figure out what's going on (because they feel no obligation to tell you) they're grabbing you and roughing you up (if they haven't already shot you).

Your body's natural reaction is to protect itself. So guess what happens when your hands or arms move to intercept what you think might be a blow? And again, you don't know what they're responding to or what level of force they already think is needed. So your little hand or arm movement is instantly taken as provocation; as resisting. And then they immediate feel like they have to subdue you because that's what they're trained to do. Every human being has a natural in-born fight or flight response. Guess which one you're allowed to do with the police? Neither. And even if you have no weapon at all, they can still say you kept resisting and they were scared because omg, like you have the strength of 10 men, so it's like they had to kill you. It was either you or them... and their families. (not yours. just theirs)

Encounters like this happen all the time and even police cameras have funny ways of malfunctioning or being turned off right before the police so something wrong. This should be considered premeditation. The law needs to have different standards to allow police to do their jobs but the law cannot grant blanket immunity for every cop who has dreamed of being James Bond and having a license to kill.

I can and want to talk about solutions all day, but the biggest hurdle, again, isn't the solutions. It's getting people to recognize that solutions are needed. It's getting people to stop blaming black people for the way that they are policed. You have to appeal to people's morality and their humanity in order for that to happen. Some people are members of the choir and don't need that and I'm sure that's where you are. But others aren't there. They're not in the choir. They're not even in the congregation because they have mildly racist ideas about black people and think that the crime stats confirm those ideas and that police are just doing their jobs, putting down violent black people.

Some of these people you wont convince because they's just plain racist to the point of hatred. But others have racist ideas out of misunderstanding, false information, propaganda, right wing pundits and talking heads. "The System" as we call it, doesn't just work against black people, but also white society too. It's constantly playing a cultural war, trying to make the majority less tolerant towards the minority. When they tell you George Floyd had a criminal record, it's not an accident. It's so you wont feel sorry for him. It's so you will see him as more of an animal that was put down. White supremacy always has a non-physical lynching that goes along with the physical lynching so that the people doing the physical lynching feel like they're doing the right thing. THIS IS THE SAME mindset, empowering the mechanisms, that were used against women in Salem during the Salem witch trials.

Think about it.

What is it that allows society to look on while an innocent woman is murdered right in front of them? You have to convince people, or at least raise enough doubt about her innocence. Establish her guilt first as an assumption and them make her prove her own innocence. But if you don't like what she is... there's really nothing she can say to convince you and it's "oh if you survive the drowning then we know you are indeed a witch". How backwards... how do you intellectually justify murder by saying, if we can kill you (as a test) then you might have been innocent? For the black man, if we're chocking you and you survive, doesn't it prove how dangerous you were that so many officers had to hold you down and one actually had to put his knee on your neck?

It's the same. You can say "I can't breathe" but there is really nothing you can say that is good enough when it's not about who you are, but "what" you are. And women were expected to support their men, calling women JUST LIKE THEM witches and lying about them being in league with Satan. Similarly black people were treated as though if we didn't support society's lynching of us that it was because we are "in league" with the criminal element; that we're all "bad apples". Funny... 40 million black people and only the police get to have a few bad apples. For racists... all 41.4 million... are bad. This is bigger than the police and yet... you will only hear me advocating against racists in positions of power. But... this can including people who get to make hiring decisions at a public company, prosecutors, judges, loan officers, landlords, etc. Against some of these, my solution is economic because we shouldn't have to depend on people in these positions. But for "public servants", elected or appointed... there has to be a standard.

We are mostly in agreement, but where I think we probably differ is that from my perspective you have to root out racism from the higher offices down to the lowest, because it can be hard to detect and prove. So you have to have sufficient processes and reporting and transparency to remove the "hood", so to speak, from white supremacy. Until you do that the racists, like hackers, will keep finding different doors and opportunities to inflict damage against the black community to keep us from equality and the American dream. But if every AMERICAN can't have that dream why should they get to have it? Meanwhile, the black community would greatly appreciate your support and if you can't support us, please, at least don't fall victim to white supremacy programmed propaganda, and attack us and our organizations trying to fight this, on their behalf. Please and thank you.

Yea, which is why I've kept explaining that ensuring the narrative shifts away from race and to discriminatory action (in this case 'Police brutality') will have a greater reach and leverage and greater change. It's not so much about education, as racist folk are not ignorant about it they are just bigoted about it... so making the narrative more relevant to more people means the bigotry looses its foundation in those who have it and can more easily be dislodged and die out within the bigot.

Adder wrote: Yea, which is why I've kept explaining that ensuring the narrative shifts away from race and to discriminatory action (in this case 'Police brutality') will have a greater reach and leverage and greater change. It's not so much about education, as racist folk are not ignorant about it they are just bigoted about it... so making the narrative more relevant to more people means the bigotry looses its foundation in those who have it and can more easily be dislodged and die out within the bigot.

Unfortunately, I have to disagree. There is a bounty of evidence online that shows a deep ignorance of history with regards to race, precisely because the only ones talking about it are racists and those impacted by them. We talk to people all the time who don't think the Civil war was about slavery, don't know about when the racists switched from Democrat to Republican, think Lincoln was always in favor of freeing the slaves, etc. People think they know about racism because they heard of MLK and George Washington Carver and because they hear random things during black history month. This ignorance is so reinforced by our system of education that black students have to go looking for information about their own history because its not taught in schools. People are finally, right now, not turning away from race. And THAT is why changes are happening

You cannot fairly expect people to be subject matter experts in your particular type of suffering... it's impractical for everyone to give it the same attention you consider it deserves. If it is more about the nature of action then the reasons for the action, then you'll find that it becomes more relevant to more people because more people can relate to it from their own life and lived experiences. And no I'm not arguing for ignorance. Basically, IMO, it's also easier to normalize worldviews around common positive values then force a particular worldview to make an example of bad values.

Adder wrote: You cannot fairly expect people to be subject matter experts in your particular type of suffering... it's impractical for everyone to give it the same attention you consider it deserves. If it is more about the nature of action then the reasons for the action, then you'll find that it becomes more relevant to more people because more people can relate to it from their own life and lived experiences. And no I'm not arguing for ignorance. Basically, IMO, it's also easier to normalize worldviews around common positive values then force a particular worldview to make an example of bad values.

Okay let's use Jews as an example. Jews were hated and oppressed. Did you see Schindler's List? I was moved watching that movie. I don't know about you. I definitely wasn't a subject matter expert (not sure why you think anyone is requesting that. seems odd). But I could empathize with what they were going through; because of what was happening to them. And honestly, I know TOTJO is not synonymous with Star Wars and don't want it to be but at least everyone should be familiar with the mythology and familiar with the likenesses and history the underlying story and cultures are based on. Because obviously, the nazis are woven into the fabric of Star Wars.

That being said, why did we feel for the rebels? Why didn't we side with the empire? Were we subject matter experts? Or did we just FEEL? Did we just connect with Luke and Leia and gasp at the morality or lack thereof that allowed the Empire to destroy an entire planet, looking for the rebel alliance? You didn't have to be a wookie to care about Chewbacca. You didn't have to be a robot or an ewok.

So close your eyes and pretend that you see storm troopers kneeling on the necks of cute fuzzy brown ewoks. And whatever you feel, that's what we're asking for. And like V said, in V for Vendetta,

"If you feel as I feel"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0IyuK069I-w

I loved this speech; especially as it casts blame fairly upon everyone, including the citizens that have allowed the government to commit these acts of injustice. This is part of the reason African Americans often don't have closer relationships to whites. Why does it have to happen to you in order to feel it? But when a person's dog is injured or threatened... well... sometimes its easier for people to feel empathy and compassion.

V: if you are looking for the guilty you need only look into a mirror

V: People should not be afraid of their governments. Governments should be afraid of their people.

Jewish people were fought for, received reparations, received their own state. The allies fought for them. And trust, when anything even smells antisemitic Jews are all over it and people start passing out denunciations and condemnations left and right and you know it. We've all seen it. And it's important because as much as the allies fought to help right the wrongs of the nazis, the hatred of the nazis remains and if you let that go unchecked and unabated... history may repeat itself.

The hatred against black people is important because unlike Jews, African Americans are not wealthy and not in a position to protect themselves the way that Jews are able to protect themselves from Nazis today (The KKK hates them too). If the criminal justice system even dreamed of oppressing Jewish people, with all the Jewish people who are in positions of wealth and power, the world would stop spinning that day until the threat was taken out. In many ways, oppression against black people has never stopped and often people must be shamed into hiding their racism and at least pretend to get along. But then they put on badges and met after dark wearing white hoods so you couldn't see that they were cops and judges.

Racism has continued to this day because of the efforts to LIMIT the scope and view to just "infractions" that can be explained away by numbers and statistics. But it hasn't died because racists have power and the ability to get away with it. You have to take that power away and how do you know who to take it away from?

Someone shouldn't have to become Hitler and give the extermination order before someone lifts a finger to stop them.

Sorry, I'm not sure how that is in reply to my point, but you did quote me so..... it's not limiting the scope, its expanding the scope by including all groups suffering the same type of discrimination.

And to me Star Wars is a deep metaphorical structure, but Rebels didn't destroy the Deathstar because it was an Empire installation, they destroyed it because it had, and was attacking them. That logic might not stand up within the wider fiction, but I don't view the fiction as gospel so it needn't.

But I can play I guess.... I guess your suggesting the extent of feeling for different people was only proportionate to the awareness of that groups existence. Which I think is what your trying to say about being aware of the victim to feel for the victim. OK, but how much, and does that counter a manifest threatening action they might undertake? Being different, or part of a victimized group, or even an enemy group, does not mean all action against it is discriminatory. Lawful conduct should be proportional, distinct and necessary and race, gender, sex, ability etc really shouldn't come into it much at all if at all.....

Sure yes, when I said subject matter expert it was an exaggeration but how many times has a 'awareness of the history of black slavery' been thrown around to cite 'white ignorance' on this matter! I'm on the other side of the world and I've seen footage of it quite a bit. Knowledge is relative to experience and prior knowledge, which is more often then not going to be higher on both counts for African Americans then the rest. But there'd be levels of awareness; starting from the most simple of knowing African Americans exist, moving up to does one know they were victims of slavery, and then increasing in complexity through the historical details and contemporary manifestations of it among them and the rest of the community as a result. It really should require very much awareness at all to know enough to know racism is wrong, so the problem of racists seems to be not in the awareness but in the personification of the suffering, hence my point..... for IMO you don't achieve that by making other people suffer.

This is part of the reason African Americans often don't have closer relationships to whites. Why does it have to happen to you in order to feel it?

Huh? I don't quite get what you mean.... 'whites' don't need to experience something to feel something. That would be a bizarrely racist thought to have let alone say, so feel free to clarify if you like. I could presume that its part of your apparent point about what I'm calling 'awareness', but then it would seem that you might be arguing for making 'white' people suffer discrimination to end discrimination from 'white' people.

To be honest I'm sort of tired of the whole labels, people are not white or black. You can always find people who are mostly more of one then the other, but its all mixed. Racists make a point of it, because it serves their bigotry, but for everyone else its just people. If a community has a culture which they associate to a 'race', then that is fine... but it serves no purpose to think everyone else thinks that way. I'd rather just judge people on their actions, not their appearance... and no that does not mean I don't see color.

Oh, did I forget the Jews.... to me I identified with the human suffering of them, not the Jew suffering. Same way I identify with the suffering of black people etc. Doesn't take much subject matter knowledge at all, basically none for me since I (and most people I know) extend my empathy beyond humans.

Adder:

And to me Star Wars is a deep metaphorical structure, but Rebels didn't destroy the Deathstar because it was an Empire installation, they destroyed it because it had, and was attacking them. That logic might not stand up within the wider fiction, but I don't view the fiction as gospel so it needn't.

Um... sorry. Can't agree there. According to one of my favorite movies we saw how the plans for the Death Star got to the rebellion in the first place and how people fought and died just so that Luke knew where to fire those two proton torpedoes. Of course this is not about Star Wars trivia. The point is that the Death Star was recognized as a threat because of what it was and represented and whose hands that power was in. As soon as the empire was established all the power that used to be represented by the PEOPLE (we the people) was usurped and coopted by authoritarianism. And this often takes the form of making people so afraid that they believe that whatever you are doing to protect them is justified. The rebels; however, knew what was happening and what it was turning into. That's why they started as the resistance and later became the rebels. Similarly, we as a society, should always resist the slide into authoritarianism and fear and hate, before we all find ourselves on the other side; getting tear gassed while asserting our first amendment rights.

If you wait until after the death star shoots you, it's too late. You can't then prosecute them for destroying a planet because they'll just be like "where is the rebel base" until they've destroyed every threat and then they'll say "we have brought peace to the galaxy".

So the point is, that if we know racists are in positions of power we need to get them out. If they want to be a gas station attendant, I'm 100% cool with that. A judge? No. I don't even mind if they make a ton of money making parts for airplanes because at least the airplanes they're working on will be used by everyone and they wouldn't have a means of targeting a racial group through that job.

Sometimes I feel like Mace Windu. It's like if you see what's happening, and that thing that's happening is not going to hesitate to destroy you and use whatever power they can not just for personal corruption but for corrupting the whole social order, why not try and stop it? In the case of Palpatine it really was too late to go through regular government channels because he had already taken them over.

Adder:

It really should require very much awareness at all to know enough to know racism is wrong, so the problem of racists seems to be not in the awareness but in the personification of the suffering, hence my point..... for IMO you don't achieve that by making other people suffer.

You may be confusing me for Jane Elliot here. In no way have I ever stated, at any time, in any location, that I wanted other people to suffer. What I want is the end of racism and white supremacy and the fair and equitable restoration of justice upon those impacted. If you rob a bank for 5 million dollars, and a court finds you guilty, can you really get upset when the money is taken back? If you're suffering as a result of being "robbed" of this money you stole... is that the same thing as the suffering of those you stole the money from?

I don't want anyone to suffer. But there has to be consequences for hurting people. Otherwise, if there are incentives to hurt people and no consequences for hurting people then people will simply continue to hurt people. Even with consequences, people hurt people. So why would they stop when there are no consequences? I don't know. Maybe you mean something different by "making people suffer". Maybe I'm taking this in the wrong context. If so, please elaborate.

me:

"This is part of the reason African Americans often don't have closer relationships to whites. Why does it have to happen to you in order to feel it?"

Adder:

Huh? I don't quite get what you mean.... 'whites' don't need to experience something to feel something. That would be a bizarrely racist thought to have let alone say, so feel free to clarify if you like.

*sigh* I hope Webster changes the definition of racism very soon. Everyone wants to use this word as if it means the same thing. Anyway... different subject.

Obviously, I'm not saying white people, as a race, lack empathy. I'm talking about the PERCEPTION that African Americans have, that is proliferated by certain comments, which, if needed, I can point out to you, that indicate that a seeming majority of whites can better empathize with their pets than black people when it comes to actual systematic racism and its effects. This perception that whites don't care is not true of all whites but comes from the fact that what we are saying now is NO DIFFERENT... than what we've been saying for over a hundred years; way before you were born. And we inherit the impact and the effects of RACISM while people commonly confuse this with slavery and think we are simply trying to justify why haven't been able to thrive based on slavery when in reality our particular brand of slavery was caused by RACISM and white supremacy.

Slavery is gone, but the underlying racism and white supremacy still exist. Do you see the problem with that?

After slavery ended, it wasn't like everything was fine because black people were free. No, we had segregation and Jim Crow. We were still oppressed and when the normal oppression wasn't enough then unions were created to protect white workers. Racism isn't limited to one form of self-expression. It comes out in whatever avenue or platform you allow it to have.

Even on this site I've had to argue that black lives matter isn't racist, but rather a response to racism. It's ridiculous that should have been a debate in the first place but it always is, because people will find any reason to go against our attempts to fight and protest for equality. It's almost like that impulse to attack is programmed into people by white supremacy in order to maintain it. How many times did I have to post the statistics for people to show that this was in fact happening and that it was based on race?

People would rather think its all about poverty in order to provide excuses for the police that they believe are protecting them. But it's not true and even some ex-police officers are starting to say it too. One even called himself a pig. I know that I cannot say that because if I do I'll lose credibility on the subject. But he called himself that because of all the things, not only he's done personally, but all the things he helped others do and all the things he didn't report. They really truly do act like a gang. It's hard to believe this. I understand. But this officer recounts how he when he did try to do the right thing it was made perfectly clear that ratting his fellow cops out was never the right thing. That's why there isn't equal justice.

Adder:

To be honest I'm sort of tired of the whole labels, people are not white or black.

Bro, all black people know that "black" is a racial construct create by "whites". But whether it is a positive or negative thing... that's up to society and so this becomes part of the "culture war". I used to argue with gay people about homosexuality because I was WRONG. My Christianity caused me to be arrogant and blind. I would ask why they would label themselves by something they like to do. Never thought about how I will call myself a "Gamer" even though I don't do it professionally.

There's nothing wrong with labels!

Wrong only comes in when you force people to have a label they don't want and you use it against them as an attack or to assist in some sort of prejudicial or discriminatory treatment. So don't use black with the intention of any sort of negative meaning.

The LGBTQ community took the words "gay" and "queer" and took control of these labels so that they could redefine them as something no longer negative. Because whether you say "gay" or not, you're still going to have a thought (positive or negative) that comes to mind when you think of that community.

Avoiding labels is actually very meaningless because those communities still exist and they are allowed to turn a negative stereotype into a positive one. Especially when they've been mistreated for so long, it is their choice... not up to society, to take the label away only after it now means something positive to them. I don't share their experience but being black and still occasionally hearing the n-word but knowing how we've taken our own version of that word and made it positive? I'm proud. I'm proud of black people for being able to do that. And I'm proud of gay people who have been able to do that and take the stigma from that word.

My girlfriend (another useful label) and I were watching a show called "white people sh*t". And the black host smoked weed with one of the white people he was doing these experiences with and he was like "I don't normally say this, but 'my nigga'." and the white guy, who carves wood with a chainsaw, took it as a high compliment because he understood the usage of the word (and that he shouldn't use it himself). It was all love. And that's what we need. Not trying to pretend not to see the labels that have been excepted, but seeing it in the same positive sense that THAT group sees it in. That's healing. To me, the other is simply practicing ignorance.

All words are symbols. They represent something. Obviously black people are human. If anyone has trouble understanding that, then they're deeply racist. But humans come in different shapes and sizes. And that's okay. If we ignore the adjectives of all the things that make us special or different or unique then that, to me, would be a sad colorless world. And some things you just can't put the genie back in the box on. It's too late. You can't go back. You have to go forward. If it doesn't bother us it shouldn't bother you.

Imagine if people started saying they weren't going to say Jews anymore because of Hitler. Jews would say that was antisemitic. Are all Jews religious? Absolutely not. Think about that. All Jews are not practitioners of Judaism. So why not take that label away? Because it's not your call about what to call them. They had an experience, as "JEWS", so this word means something more than just a religion to them. So maybe white doesn't mean anything to you. That's understandable. If you don't want to be called that it's fine. But I want you to understand that for black people it is the same as "Jew". Who cares whether it is accurate or not?

When I think of black people I don't think of color swatches at Sherwin Williams. I think of the culture and heritage that is REPRESENTED SYMBOLICALLY by that word. And I get defensive about anyone trying to take that away. ESPECIALLY while others are still hating on it, targeting it, and while I'm still being oppressed by those who want to use it against me. And YOU not seeing color doesn't help me with that. Sorry, if I sound a bit more passionate than usual. It isn't an indictment on you as much as it is the potential of others who share that thinking.

ZealotX wrote: Adder:

And to me Star Wars is a deep metaphorical structure, but Rebels didn't destroy the Deathstar because it was an Empire installation, they destroyed it because it had, and was attacking them. That logic might not stand up within the wider fiction, but I don't view the fiction as gospel so it needn't.

Um... sorry. Can't agree there. According to one of my favorite movies we saw how the plans for the Death Star got to the rebellion in the first place and how people fought and died just so that Luke knew where to fire those two proton torpedoes. Of course this is not about Star Wars trivia. The point is that the Death Star was recognized as a threat because of what it was and represented and whose hands that power was in. As soon as the empire was established all the power that used to be represented by the PEOPLE (we the people) was usurped and coopted by authoritarianism. And this often takes the form of making people so afraid that they believe that whatever you are doing to protect them is justified. The rebels; however, knew what was happening and what it was turning into. That's why they started as the resistance and later became the rebels. Similarly, we as a society, should always resist the slide into authoritarianism and fear and hate, before we all find ourselves on the other side; getting tear gassed while asserting our first amendment rights.

If you wait until after the death star shoots you, it's too late. You can't then prosecute them for destroying a planet because they'll just be like "where is the rebel base" until they've destroyed every threat and then they'll say "we have brought peace to the galaxy".

So the point is, that if we know racists are in positions of power we need to get them out. If they want to be a gas station attendant, I'm 100% cool with that. A judge? No. I don't even mind if they make a ton of money making parts for airplanes because at least the airplanes they're working on will be used by everyone and they wouldn't have a means of targeting a racial group through that job.

Sometimes I feel like Mace Windu. It's like if you see what's happening, and that thing that's happening is not going to hesitate to destroy you and use whatever power they can not just for personal corruption but for corrupting the whole social order, why not try and stop it? In the case of Palpatine it really was too late to go through regular government channels because he had already taken them over.

Nah, there is the intelligence collection phase which is ongoing against threats... and which is distinct from attacking something. Then the that is no Moon needed to maneuver into firing position, and have its systems ready to fire, all as part of the attack... so my point didn't require anyone to take a hit before deciding they are being attacked.

But yes, some threats are so dangerous that it's not really safe to have them floating around in anyone's hands. The 'weapons of mass destruction' such as in the real world are a nasty thing, and proliferation of them tends to be constrained as much as possible to the countries already with them, sometimes by Force. But I'd suggest if the Rebel's had a better way to take it down, they would have, but they were sorta cutting it close there.

But again with the racism; to your point I'd ask what makes someone a racist in your example... is it discriminatory action based on race because if someone is acting racist in the conduct of their duty, then its illegal AFAIK and they should already be in trouble for it. Or is it racist thoughts or beliefs? I feel like we're going around in circles because last time we were here, in this thread, it seemed like your suggestion was knowing (of thinking you know) what people believe ie thought Police. If the penalties are too light for discriminatory behaviour then the only way to deal with that is probably to get into politics, law, or join the effort to achieve organizational reform by joining the organization in a capacity to make those changes. But these things can only be in response to actual discriminatory behaviour, not discriminatory thought.... I don't think society limits thoughts, not yet.

ZealotX wrote: me:

"This is part of the reason African Americans often don't have closer relationships to whites. Why does it have to happen to you in order to feel it?"

Adder:

Huh? I don't quite get what you mean.... 'whites' don't need to experience something to feel something. That would be a bizarrely racist thought to have let alone say, so feel free to clarify if you like.

*sigh* I hope Webster changes the definition of racism very soon. Everyone wants to use this word as if it means the same thing. Anyway... different subject.

Obviously, I'm not saying white people, as a race, lack empathy.

Arrr it might be obvious to you, but your use of the labels make it at the least less obvious... and at the worst technically racist from the point of view I mentioned. Which is the opposite of how you say you meant it.... which goes to my point, that group identity politics is so wound up in racial issues in the US that often goes against its actual anti-discrimination mission.

ZealotX wrote: I'm talking about the PERCEPTION that African Americans have, that is proliferated by certain comments, which, if needed, I can point out to you, that indicate that a seeming majority of whites can better empathize with their pets than black people when it comes to actual systematic racism and its effects. This perception that whites don't care is not true of all whites but comes from the fact that what we are saying now is NO DIFFERENT... than what we've been saying for over a hundred years; way before you were born. And we inherit the impact and the effects of RACISM while people commonly confuse this with slavery and think we are simply trying to justify why haven't been able to thrive based on slavery when in reality our particular brand of slavery was caused by RACISM and white supremacy.

People can get all sorts of perceptions from all sorts of information... there is plenty to choose from. The problem with defining your struggle by your suffering is that it tends to color ones perception by the suffering such that things can be misinterpreted, or as above made unclear.

ZealotX wrote: Adder:

To be honest I'm sort of tired of the whole labels, people are not white or black.

Bro, all black people know that "black" is a racial construct create by "whites". But whether it is a positive or negative thing... that's up to society and so this becomes part of the "culture war". I used to argue with gay people about homosexuality because I was WRONG. My Christianity caused me to be arrogant and blind. I would ask why they would label themselves by something they like to do. Never thought about how I will call myself a "Gamer" even though I don't do it professionally.

Huh? Created by 'whites'....... people of different appearance have been interacting throughout human history and I assume they each have their own labels etc for each other. I think you mean the broader culture you exist within had and has racial categories in popular use... and that broader culture was mostly created by 'whites'. But 'mostly' is such a broad stroke, I'm sure someone can look up the person who first created these things and then you can put a name on it instead of a whole race. But yea, science tends to label things as a mission. As I said, people are more then white or black.... not only are they generally mixed, but they are way more then the racial designation, or their gender, or their sexual preference etc etc. Anyone can use any label, but labels can be overused and misused as much as they can be underused. They seem to be over-used in the US when it comes to discrimination, and not just racism. I think there'd be more progress over there on these issues if people focused more on the discriminatory action then the type. I wouldn't have this opinion if it wasn't such a problem there.

ZealotX wrote: There's nothing wrong with labels!

Wrong only comes in when you force people to have a label they don't want and you use it against them as an attack or to assist in some sort of prejudicial or discriminatory treatment. So don't use black with the intention of any sort of negative meaning.

They can be unproductive if used inappropriately or unnecessarily, as they can add context which is not required or actively unhelpful to the process... so I'd disagree that there is nothing wrong with labels. I would suggest labels have a purpose, and there use can be good and useful, or bad and counter-productive. If someone says a label is not useful, it doesn't mean they are saying labels are useless.

ZealotX wrote: My girlfriend (another useful label) and I were watching a show called "white people sh*t". And the black host smoked weed with one of the white people he was doing these experiences with and he was like "I don't normally say this, but 'my nigga'." and the white guy, who carves wood with a chainsaw, took it as a high compliment because he understood the usage of the word (and that he shouldn't use it himself). It was all love. And that's what we need. Not trying to pretend not to see the labels that have been excepted, but seeing it in the same positive sense that THAT group sees it in. That's healing. To me, the other is simply practicing ignorance.

Yea, weed does that I guess, but it could have been taken many ways in theory... I'm presuming it was taken in the spirit it was given.

ZealotX wrote: All words are symbols. They represent something. Obviously black people are human. If anyone has trouble understanding that, then they're deeply racist.

This is the problem, it's not that racists don't see their target group as inhuman, they see them as less human. Is it deeply racist, yes, it's deep racism, and it's the root of the problem that needs to be addressed - hence why its important to find ways to lift them out of it because it doesn't serve them to do it themselves, that is part of what makes them bigots. Yelling at them and burning stuff just makes their bigotry worse.

ZealotX wrote: Imagine if people started saying they weren't going to say Jews anymore because of Hitler. Jews would say that was antisemitic. Are all Jews religious? Absolutely not. Think about that. All Jews are not practitioners of Judaism. So why not take that label away? Because it's not your call about what to call them. They had an experience, as "JEWS", so this word means something more than just a religion to them. So maybe white doesn't mean anything to you. That's understandable. If you don't want to be called that it's fine. But I want you to understand that for black people it is the same as "Jew". Who cares whether it is accurate or not?

Labels have meaning in so far as they are required to differentiate attributes, but if those attributes don't need to be differentiated then it's unnecessary group identity politics which may not serve the actual problem. Like I said earlier its not a black and white thing, there is no absolute labels must be applied to all people that can have them versus no labels can be used at all. It's just sometimes they serve the issue and sometimes they don't.... and when trying to alter the way people might think it usually easier to minimize their use where they don't serve to help fix the problem.

If you choose to use a label which might continue a problem because it helps you identify with the problem, then to me that is perpetuating a victim mentality at the cost of the real struggle. I'm not sure you can have it both ways unfortunately. But again, it's not an argument for removing anyones identity, its about the best use to achieve progress, real progress.

ZealotX wrote: When I think of black people I don't think of color swatches at Sherwin Williams. I think of the culture and heritage that is REPRESENTED SYMBOLICALLY by that word. And I get defensive about anyone trying to take that away. ESPECIALLY while others are still hating on it, targeting it, and while I'm still being oppressed by those who want to use it against me. And YOU not seeing color doesn't help me with that. Sorry, if I sound a bit more passionate than usual. It isn't an indictment on you as much as it is the potential of others who share that thinking.

But I said it's not that I don't see color, it's just that I see a human before I see color. I've said this many times and you seem to either ignore it because you like repeating this point, or disagree with what I'm saying. Can you be more specific as to which it is so I can understand?

I apologize. We talk about racism in my community so often that it's easy to forget that many people don't experience it as we do and scarcely even know what it is. The dictionary definition is inadequate. The definition we widely use comes by way of Dr. Frances cress Welsing.

quote:
As a black behavioral scientist and practicing psychiatrist, my own functional definition of racism (white supremacy) is as follows: “Racism (white supremacy) is the local and global power system and dynamic, structure, maintained by persons who classify themselves as white, whether consciously or subconsciously determined; which consists of patterns of perception, logic, symbol formation, thought, speech, action, and emotional response, as conducted, simultaneously in all areas of people activity (economics, education, entertainment, labor, law, politics, religion, sex, and war); for the ultimate purpose of white genetic survival and to prevent white genetic annihilation on planet Earth – a planet upon which the vast and overwhelming majority of people are classified as non-white (black, brown, red and yellow) by white-skinned people, and all of the non-white people are genetically dominant (in terms of skin coloration) compared to the genetic recessive white-skinned people.”

simplified translation (mine):
It is a power dynamic designed to empower the dominant race to the detriment of other races.

As you see, she does include thought but thought cannot be policed, nor should it. If this bothers you, consider that almost every crime is preceded by the idea/thought to perform that crime. That doesn't mean that crime should be fought like in the movie Minority Report. It simply means that the people who tend to think that their race is superior tend to be the ones to act on that belief. You can't act on a belief without having the belief. If you were a Christian in Salem maybe you believed that witchcraft was satanic. This belief could be utilized by others who believed it and by more still who wanted to use that belief against women they didn't like.

In my opinion it is important to understand why those women were tortured and murdered by their local society. It was because the beliefs of the people were mobilized into action. If men had underlying biases against women and wanted women to "stay in their place" and not venture outside a certain ROLE that they had prescribed for them, then they might be motivated to call them a witch. Depending on the severity of their hatred this motivated thought might actually become speech, causing that thought, LIKE A VIRUS, to spread to others. Once it hits a critical mass then they could murder that woman while the townsfolk sat back and watched and maybe even participated.

Make no mistake. This is a lynching and shows the mentality behind how it becomes possible for a society to abdicate their morals once hatred takes over.

Now substitute the woman for black people in general, but even more so the black man. Racists take the place of Christian extremists, also wanting their target to "stay in their place" and not venture out of the ROLE (permanent servile underclass) prescribed by their racist ideology. They become motivated to call them the N-word and denigrate them with stereotypes designed to paint them as lazy criminal minded people lacking inherent value. By reducing them to cattle, this enables them to be treated as such; treated as 3/5 human.

Many people have this idea but do not act on it. They are simply law abiding citizens. Yet they help form the masses that sit back and watch black people suffer. Like the officer who stood there facing the crowd while the crowd kept telling him that George Floyd wasn't breathing and to check his pulse, much of the US population has a certain level of racist bias because they have been infected with some racist ideology. It is only those who develop a more burning/passionate hatred, that tend to do the worst crimes (like lynching or other acts of terrorism). As individuals they usually don't act at all. In small groups however, their ideas are reinforced and they feel powerful enough to act. But as a society, individuals, even without the passionate hate, can also act because they believe it is acceptable to the greater social contract they have with other white folk who also believe as they do. So then you might have a judge that treats black men unfairly in relation to whites. And statistics (in the US) bear this out. Then you also have those carrying biases informed by the stereotypes. They are not actively racist. They're passively racist. They're not going to get to know you, invite you over for dinner, etc. And for most of these things you don't care because it doesn't affect your life. But then the same people will think that someone else would be better for the job, someone else is more deserving of a promotion, someone else should become the new manager, etc. Part of this is that in their imagination they can't see that black person performing as good a job as the white.

If it is hard for you to fathom all this, understand that this is not part of the "White experience". These views are not nature. They are nurtured. Where you live matters a lot. Where you live often determines your religion, your politics, the echo chambers in which your mentality and behavior patterns evolve and adapt. Kids may start out hearing racist jokes. They laugh because they don't yet have any connection to the subject. Over time, what starts out as being funny can become more serious; especially when they are faced with survival and need jobs. That's when they start talking about Affirmative Action and think black people are getting jobs they should be getting. This can build resentment because they think black people have some kind of privilege. In reality, a bare minimum was done to help protect black people from ongoing racism and a system of white supremacy that impacted people's ability to survive based on the color of their skin.

A perfect example of the mob mentality is what happened in Tulsa, OK; which is why it is such a slap in the face that Trump wanted to have a rally their on Juneteenth. Remember, most white people were perfectly happy being segregated from black people. This isolated state allowed the echo chamber to turn into a room full of megaphones. Any little thing a black man did, could end in his death. If you looked at a white woman, that was sometimes all it took. White women had tons of power because at any moment they could scream and a black man's life would be over as he was turned into a witch. Young black man trips walking into an elevator one day. To try and stop himself from injury he reached out and committed the unpardonable sin of touching a white woman. Just like some modern encounters with the police, lies were told. The store manager reported it as an assault possibly rape attempt. Once the news got out, some of the white folk sought to apprehend the young man but the black community believed him when he said he was innocent and they protected him. And because they did that, white folks rioted and burned down their entire business community; probably the richest and most thriving black community in the US. The black community there even had their own airplanes which the whites stole and used to bomb them from the air. It was the only such bombing in US history.

As some whites acted, MANY others did not. They didn't say "hey maybe he didn't do it". Or... "let's wait until after she presses charges". They didn't stop it from happening. They just let it happen because it wasn't their problem.

This is why Jane Elliot is important to the conversation because she experimented with this, and she, a white educator, concluded that all whites (at least in America) are some level of racist. I don't know if I fully believe this as I like giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, but... again... every racist isn't a homicidal lunatic or a liar or willing to actively work against the survival of black people. Many people could have caught this virus, by nurture, to some small extent but then their life experiences acted like a vaccine. And some kids, based on their life experiences and where they grew up, were "vaccinated" against racism from a young age. That's my theory.

But again, I'm not interested in policing thought. This is not what black people are after. And I don't mean to speak as though we're a monolith. It's just that I've been part of thousands of conversations with black people from different groups and different walks of life. I've been an organizer and, to a much lesser degree, a "leader" of sorts. I grew up on black forums especially, but I've always had white friends and have tried to see things from both sides. And like people on drugs, I understand that it isn't always useful to blame the addict. Therefore it isn't useful to blame the racist necessarily. The ones I blame are the ones that openly display overt hatred and disdain. I also blame the ones who use their positions of power do commit acts of racism in ways they cannot be caught or proven to be racist. But the masses are victims too; they're victims of propaganda against black people that's put out there by racists in order to maintain and boost their numbers. They're always trying to recruit and change opinion. They are fighting a culture war. THEY SAY THIS. Not me. When we try to oppose racists working in numbers, as individuals, it's like a pawn trying to defeat the entire chess board. So when we see one person get killed, we understand its not just one person who's being killed by just one racist cop. That racist cop is part of a system and is supported by other racists. It's not a singular effort. It's a group effort. Sometimes groups work together in an organized way. Other times groups simply do similar things and work individually towards the same goal. Racism has a mix of both. But the propaganda constantly pumps negative images of black people in order to provoke a certain response. And that response is either fear or hate.

If a white person doesn't hate a black person but is afraid of them... that can accomplish the same goal because when she screams or calls the cops, then racists with guns and badges can shoot that black person and then use the law to protect them from prosecution. And even though it happens often the masses think they're heroes. Racists whites do understand the mechanics of this. When the white woman in the park with her dog off the leash, was confronted by a black man there to watch birds, she threatened him with calling the cops because she knew there was a possibility they would execute him on the spot. Please watch this video and note how her voice changes when she calls the police. And then I want you to ask yourself if you think this is the only time in history this has ever happened. Is she the only woman who ever thought to lie on a black man in order bring the wrath of white society down upon him. I don't want you to answer. I want everyone who might see this video to ask themselves the same question.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKk_TBumdCw
(note: this was also my first time seeing this video)

This video is why understanding racism is so important. Fear, envy, and hate. These negative emotions are nurtured by racists so that they can act as triggers for racist action. This woman understood what she was doing. She could have gotten the man killed for having the nerve to tell her what to do. Not everyone is so cavalier with human life. In my opinion, what she did was attempted murder. Because if you can do suicide by cop then you can do murder by cop. Not everyone is even conscious of their biases. And not everyone announces, on camera, their evil intentions. She was being stupid. There are far more people who aren't. So when you think about what racism is and what it looks like, please understand that the idea of simple "discrimination" is just one symptom of a much larger construct, maintained by belief systems that penetrates all areas of life. It starts with seeds planted in the mind but the harvest is how those beliefs impact the lives of black people. And does it happen enough to significantly oppress an entire race? Many people doubt this but the fact that people do is simply a testament to how effective it is. It wouldn't be effective if everyone knew about it which is why we protest and say

BLACK LIVES MATTER

Adder:

They can be unproductive if used inappropriately or unnecessarily, as they can add context which is not required or actively unhelpful to the process... so I'd disagree that there is nothing wrong with labels.

No, you're actually not disagreeing. I said there's nothing wrong with labels. I immediately followed by talking about how they can be used inappropriately so on this we technically should be in agreement. I will further reiterate what I said before because if a person chooses a label to represent them because that label, to them, is positive and part of their culture, then why not support that and use the label THEY want to be called? I include transgender in this because if someone wants be identified by the male or female pronoun then why not call them by that pronoun? It's not hurting anyone to do it. And the important thing should be what it means to them. The wrong word being used doesn't represent them so by using it they feel misrepresented. And no, no one wants to drop the "he" and "she" labels. So why demonize labels and not simply their usage? Even the N-word... The word itself isn't wrong. It means ignorant. But when applied to black people... THEN it's wrong. If whites people would like to call each other the N-word I'm fine with that. But they don't use it that way; therefore it's wrong.

The B word, same thing. Because it's used in difference contexts and ways it doesn't have to be taken out of the lexicon as something negative that no one should be saying anymore. Are people referring to a female dog in heat? Probably not. But what's important is how people, especially women, are using the word. Since it was a word that was used to harm them, it is up to them to determine acceptable use cases. Do you see what I'm saying?

Adder:

This is the problem, it's not that racists don't see their target group as inhuman, they see them as less human. Is it deeply racist, yes, it's deep racism, and it's the root of the problem that needs to be addressed - hence why its important to find ways to lift them out of it because it doesn't serve them to do it themselves, that is part of what makes them bigots. Yelling at them and burning stuff just makes their bigotry worse.

Who's yelling at racists? A lot of the burning has been done by whites during the riots. Peaceful black protesters have been catching them on video and confronting them. Racists have attended protest events and yelled racists slurs at black protesters.

One of the problems I've always had with marches is that they don't really change the minds of the people you're marching against. But that's not their purpose. We're not worried about changing them. If they don't change when they have a black grand daughter there's probably nothing you can do to change them. It has to come from their own circle; family and friends that love them.

What the protests have to do is to get everyone who isn't a seething racist, to kindly wake up and see what's going on so that they can stop giving it their quiet consent. And it's not our job, as the ones receiving the pointy end of racism, to fix/cure/etc. the racists. Is a woman responsible for rehabilitating her rapist? No. All she wants is stop that person from being able to do it again, either to her or someone else. I don't think that's too much to ask. But if we start worrying about how the rapist is going to feel if she starts crying and cursing him out in court, then what we're doing is protecting the perpetrator. And you lost me there because I can't. I just can't. I'm on the side of justice. When KKK members burn crosses on the lawns of black people I really don't give a *(crap)* how they feel. Most would agree that if someone breaks into your house you could actually kill them in self defense. So why would I worry about their feelings? Does anyone every truly care about rehabilitation when black people get locked up for crimes they committed? Do they wrestle with how they feel or what would make them stop committing crimes? No... they do things like bring up George Floyd's arrest record post mortem as if he deserved it. This is what we deal with.

If you want to solve the belief system problem of racism, then you have to look no further than our system of education. You have to tell the truth in schools. If the history books paint a rosy picture of slavery or the plight of the native Americans, throw it out! The United States hides its own history. We've talked about how racism is obviously linked to ignorance FOREVER. So why would the system that is supposed to protect white children from ignorance, allowing the one type of ignorance that enables racism? Why can't it be taught in schools how bad racism is? Why can't schools teach an accurate rendering of slavery, segregation, and Jim Crow? Just tell the truth!

It's like whites in the US (no offense intended) are afraid that if they tell the truth then they're gonna feel guilty and they're gonna feel bad. Do you know why my mother beat me with a belt as a child? So that when I grew up I wouldn't be confused about right and wrong. She wasn't protecting my feelings. She was protecting my life and future by making sure that I wasn't ignorant of morality. White children are being lied to and misled so that they think their history is this great and benevolent past and so when you say "make America great again" THEY DON'T GET IT! Many even think slavery was a good time and it benefited black people and that black people are stupid. Schools don't correct or challenge these opinions unless the teacher, reading he material or lack thereof, chooses to say something different. And I applaud any and all teachers who do but we really need the truth to come from the pages of the history books so they can be OUR history instead of us needing separate basic level BLACK history. If it wasn't for Black History month a lot of white kids would never hear the names of important African Americans because all these people busy not seeing color, also aren't busy seeing important "humans" that have been left out of the history books.

And this is not a difficult fix. Someone petitioned Merriam Webster to change the definition of racism. Imagine if a large number of whites rallied against the education system and demanded they change the history books because they recognized their children are being mis-educated. But without raising awareness... without someone trying to make that idea go viral... who is going to do it? Baby Yoda? And this is my point... because many white people (and some black) attack BLM as if it was designed to end racism. It wasn't. People attack BLM for anything they think is wrong and meanwhile they aren't doing ANYTHING themselves to solve or address the problem. I am not blaming anyone here. This is a widespread issue. And I think it's because a lot of people are conservative and don't actually like change. Want to organize white people to petition the education system in the US to change its curriculum? Let's do it. I'll help you. But if we're just talking hypotheticals about what might work to stop racism and using logical if, thens, and maybes to discourage organizations that are out there on the ground doing the work.... then what's the point? Are you an ally? Or not?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MEPxwmfRig

So, I have followed this thread from the start, as I have the movement from when I was present at the protests in Furgeson, MO (I lived 2 blocks from the neighborhood at the time), and I have some questions. Please don't take these out of context or that there is offence meant because there isn't any I just need to understand if my view point of the current evolving situation is somewhat on track.

1. As the movement in its form right now as it's evolving, has the name been hijacked by people more interested in their own self interest instead of the betterment of racial inequities?

I ask this because I see a lot of white upper class kids role-playing revolution and calling for things that make no sense to me at all. I say this because, most the people I see in these protests have most likely never lived in a ghetto, never been homeless, convicts or addicts.

I.E (neo-segregation), yes this has happened and we have already seen what seperate but equal really means.

2. What is the relevance of identitarianism(the idea, not the euro-centric definition) now? Is it reasonable to try and reject the absorption of these into a movement for equality? Do you Zealot as a black man see any of these ideas pushing themselves to the forefront?

3. What's the end game, how does this all play out?

4. What are your (everyone) thoughts on Critical Race Theory?

I think most of you know me well enough through my history of post to know I ask these questions with love.

Much Respect, Love, Peace,
Kobos

Don't have time to reply all the replies to me above.... and not meaning to step on Kobos post , but my thoughts in reply to ZealotX about my point;

If a group identifies itself by its race, it can't expect to go around classifying everyone else by their race.... it's just silly. I know many groups identify themselves in various ways, and that is normal, but its not a convention in identification and communication. A convention which would work so much better IMO, is to use the most accurate information that is appropriate for whom is being discussed not at the least so it minimizes the chance of accidentally being discriminatory. If black people like to be called black, that shouldn't mean its kewl to go around calling Chinese yellow, or whites white etc. Even though at times it might be the most appropriate classification in the absence of any other information, but that is rare. Assuming that risks causing suffering to those who already are suffering discrimination.... which is probably my point about avoiding increasing risk of suffering.

Perhaps another way to explain what I've been saying is to consider a characteristic as someones appearance, while someones nature is their identity, and a connection to ones essence is their spirituality. Someones 'character' then as the individuals particular custom stereotype used by others to serve in their absence as a guide to approximate identity of the individual. By this I don't mean 'popular stereotypes' but the 'stereo' (solid/enduring/repeated) 'typical' (often) model... that is after all what stereotype is meant to mean. Just because the term has been nicked to represent offensive categorizations is hardly relevant to my point.

As such, and anyway back to it, using someones appearance as their identity is therefore discrimination, by those above definitions. That is not to say a person's nature need not include or be wholly about their characteristics... afterall correlation does not equate causation, or relevance. So it's about using the most accurate information as possible, and avoiding the least accurate as much as possible. Then if someones superficial physical appearance like race or gender is the only useful piece of information to identify them, then its not discriminatory to use that information until more accurate information is available. But for example if your siblings new partner is a different race then it would be discriminatory to go around identifying them in terms of only race, regardless of what the reason might be, it's derogatry and basically just inhumane to ignore a persons own identity in forming an opinion of their character, when it is accessible and usable.

These are like techniques to standardize conduct specifically to avoid discrimination, be it accidental, casual, targetted etc. My point is that this is because you cannot pretend to be able to equally weigh a type of discrimination by the experience of the victim as a measure of if someone is discriminatory. That is not in the slightest to say these things are being avoided or ignored in understanding the discrimination but that is not what I'm talking about, nor how a group might choose to identify itself by its experience or perception of suffering.

I don't mean to suck the air out of the room for others though, so I'm detaching to some extent from this conversation unless I feel my point is addressed rather then the languages I'm using to try and make it, no offense intended, just a time management issue.

Interesting questions Kobos, I only have thoughts on one of 'em.

Kobos wrote: 4. What are your (everyone) thoughts on Critical Race Theory?

It seems very US-centric. Discrimination is a function of power, not race. Where we are in the evolution of societies is that nations hold power, and nations were formed usually of a single race. But IMO to associate race to power universally would be wrong, and instead it would be more useful to associate power to power :silly: So in defining power you generally have the question of how most accurately to define the group which holds the tools of power. It need not be race. In some countries it's by birth (families), in some it's religion, in some it's ethnicity, in some it's class.

That said, the focus on it promises some insight to the mechanisms of discrimination more widely, so I'm interested in that regard about hearing more about it.