[Studlock]

Sorry of the double-post, just in response to Cause.

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice (this being science though their is a much longer one), so things like intention doesn't really matter because even if it didn't intend it that ad plays to a larger cultural and historical context that black people are basically animals and should be subservient to white people. I think people have to get it out of their head that being racist is basically being Hitler, they demonize it to the point where anything less than a lynching can't possible be racist (which where the dictionary definition fails because it usually portrays racism as one-on-one interactions, which can be racism of course, but doesn't explain the much more problematic aspects of that allow that one-on-one racism to happen without anyone doing anything about it.)

I don't think pointing out a problem is racist unless you go about in a racist way. Compare: "Fucking blacks are less educated than whites, obviously it starts at a young age' to 'Blacks in university level are often less educated than their white counter-parts because less funding is being provided to their early education as well as them having to write papers in English which is often a 2nd or 3rd language to them (Really though Cause? Is that a thing? I thought English was miniority language in South Africa), I think a reform should happen at an early level to help prepare for higher levels of education'.

[End of Disc One]

 Brujah, on 10 July 2014 - 02:45 AM, said:

The only racism that comes to mind springs from the fact that I delivered pizzas in college and my wife waited tables. From my personal experience, 9 out of 10 white people tip, and 1 out of 10 black folk did. Oddly, my wife noticed the exact same rate. So every time I went to a door I use to hate seeing black customers, and my wife feels the same way when seating her tables. When you're working for tips, this type of constant reinforcement defintely made me have negative thoughts. For the record its customary to tip here in both instances. Both jobs even pay less than minimum wage because the tip is almost guaranteed. So like Cause said, its not an opinion but a fact that a certain race felt extremely less inclined to do the right thing, over and over again.

But that's about the extent of any personal racism. As far as racism in general, I think we're all surrounded by it.

I'm sure everyone makes stereotypical assumptions based on race and other factors, but many people don't want to admit it. I don't think it's a bad thing; it's a survival trait. If I'm walking down the street and I see a group of black people in hoodies or gold chains, I'm going to step to the other side of the street. If I see a group of black people dressed like Tiger Woods, I would not. If I see a group of white people with shaved heads and covered in tattoos, I will also try to avoid them.

[Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai]

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:26 PM, said:

 Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai, on 10 July 2014 - 10:09 AM, said:

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 06:35 AM, said:

Well it's to good to see we still categorize people as 'useful' and 'not useful'.

What about paraplegics? Or poor people? Or people with mental illness? Or people with addictions? Should we just ship them 'away' (to here by the way? There homeland or simply just 'not here'?). Refugees? Define useful please? Because for me being a human should be as useful as one should be. Honestly can't believe people like you enjoy the Malazan series when the underlining theme is compassion, especially for those you so denounce as 'useless'. This kind of shit is barbaric and belongs in the empty empire where it came from. You're line of thing is hilarious see as Britain was one of the biggest 'immigration powers' the world has ever seen. Seems someone can't deal with the bed their forefathers had made for them. Sorry, calling a spade a spade.

Thats fine, a spade is a spade afterall.

I talk about the people that literally do fuck all, anybody that simply exists, anybody that has no job, no intention of finding a job and just exists to cause problems. Drinking yourself into a stupour is not a living and it certainly isn't useful to anybody. I think if you don't add anything to society or to the community then no, you aren't useful. I never mentioned any specific category of person, aka ill, poor, disabled etc. If you have a 'useful' skill like engineer, teacher, nurse, you are and should be welcomed by anybody, anywhere yes. And I never said anything about 'shipping away' people. If they are illegal immigrants they should absolutely be sent back to their home country. Refugees is another issue, but just flat out leaving them to disperse into the country and losing track of them, as we do, is just shocking. If you think everyone should live in a world of sunshine and lollipops you don't understand the real world, and I don't understand how somebody like you can enjoy the Malazan books, when they highlight just how unfair life can be. What you call barbaric I call being a realist, your right to disagree of course. And I never said that I agreed or disagreed with anything done in the past either, but lets not start a history lesson. If we shipped off hundreds of thousands of stella drinking idiots to all over the world, I would be the first to apologize for Britain, but that isn't the issue here. Sounds like you are upset with how things were done in the past?

And for the record, I am not trying to derail the thread from its original topic, I just think that if you can work for a living you should. Any country should be happy to accept somebody that does so too. That sums up everything I have tried to say, but may have said inadequately.

The good old 'realist' argument, mostly made by people who have been privileged to have a realist pov, in which they themselves never actually have to go through any of the shit they denounce. Should we send those away who are rich and don`t work or do they get pass? What about those who are top executives who do shit all but make gross amount money? But of course, their money is useful so we'll keep them. Those brown immigrants who drink themselves stupid though, fuck those guys, a leech on society. Fuck our common humanity, they need to useful or their very being as a fellow living creature is moot.

Good old realism, still manufacturing sociopaths after all these years.

lol how bitter are you? I mean really. You keep putting words in my mouth. I never said brown did i? I said assholes with cans of Stella in their hands. And FYI they are usually white guys in my local area. And if it matters, I have lived in shit areas and seen it all first hand guys got killed with scateboard at my local park, cars stolen and burnt out and crack dens literally doors away from my house. My Auntie is disabled, and can't work. And I see first hand how hard these 'executives' actually work now I have worked my ass off to get an awesome career, and its fucking loads. So whatever bullshit guilt trip or morally superior PoV you are trying to peddle can just fuck right off quite frankly. I tire of your aggressive taunts trying to trip me up into arguing or trying to make me look racist. So this is my last reply to you. I think you need to stop getting so angry at the internet and deal with your issues. Good day

This post has been edited by Tarthenal Theloman Toblakai: 10 July 2014 - 03:10 PM

[Dolmen 2.0]

*Jumps on Soap box.*

As I live in South Africa and have really been raised by South Africa I find the following things true:

All people are prejudiced or atleast aware of prejudicial institution.

All people choose to use that prejudice or ignore that prejudice at some point in their lives.

Repitition of prejudice will enforce it and ultimately resolves itself in Racial bias.

Most importantly racial prejudice is ingrained in culture and an innate part of social survival. I cannot be black or white, indian or coloured without identifying with how that places me in south african society, I will never get ahead being ignorant of racial undertones in almost every situation, of this I am sadly certain. I have caught myself disliking a person without a reason before. I know it is prejudice and I struggle to wrap my mind around it because I too like to believe myself not to be racist. I grew up with a circle of best friends from each racial group, I still hang with them today when I can.

When I question my own prejudice I source it back to my family, friends, wife, in-laws etc. All have placed their own opinions onto me. So it is when I go out my first impression of people reflects some of that wholesale prejudice. The Familial stories of racial situations leap out at me and inform my take on a group of people almost automatically. It takes a visible effort to set it aside and take a person on their own personal set of values.

For a White male right now in SA job hunting is indeed quite tough. Not many white men approach a Black business owner for work. They're making a prejudiced decision here, But white males have to read the undertone of racial relationships because this is the only way to get ahead in South Africa's current culture. You need to read the undertone. See the racial balance for what it is lest you make the wrong move. this leads to an over developed sensitivity to the issue country-wide

Now bringing this all back to the advert you linked up: It's effective. Would it be as effective if the child was white and the woman was black? No, because the hard truth is common prejudice in South Africa believes black women are rarely rich and White children are almost never that poor. Best believe the subtext would still have a racial element to it and it will be disliked. Some people might even react against a shift of roles just as vehemently as those initial roles.

In South Africa the culture has ingrained us to read the racial subtext first then read the rest of the story afterwards. This advert is not Racist in intention but racial in execution regardless. Yes, It brings in the contrast between white privilage and black poverty purely as a hard depiction of reality, all to make a strong point. Unfortunately it poorly undermines how that contrast is still a very sensitive part of the directed audiences national structure.

The country hasn't forgotten what racism is. The problem might even be the reverse. We all just won't allow ourselves to let go of that internal prejudice magnifying everything into a racial decision. Even though we all like to think that we've moved on its not quite that easy.

The kids might do better I dunno. This ad didn't though.

This post has been edited by Dolmen Weeks: 10 July 2014 - 07:30 PM

[Tsundoku]

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice ...

Bullshit.

So what does it make that poor black guy who hates white people - xenophobic?
Or that Indian Untouchable who hates Pakistanis ... just as much as he hates Brahmins?
Chinese, Koreans and Japanese have hated each other's guts for centuries - what's that about?

You don't need power to have an opinion, to form a thought.

This post has been edited by Sombra: 11 July 2014 - 04:42 PM

[Macros]

The definition of racism is disliking/hating/looking down upon some people because they are of a different race. Power has fuck all to do with what it is.
where power comes into play is what you DO with your racism.
A homeless bum can be racist as hell, it wont affect many, when a world leader or a very influential public figure is racist...

This post has been edited by Macros: 11 July 2014 - 08:37 PM

[Studlock]

 Sombra, on 11 July 2014 - 04:40 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice ...

Bullshit.

So what does it make that poor black guy who hates white people - xenophobic?
Or that Indian Untouchable who hates Pakistanis ... just as much as he hates Brahmins?
Chinese, Koreans and Japanese have hated each other's guts for centuries - what's that about?

You don't need power to have an opinion, to form a thought.

To answer in short order: the black man is prejudice towards white, and that may affect that single fucking white person but will it be part or larger systemic form of discrimination? If you say yes you're simply fucking ignorant.

That Indian Untouchable will indeed conform to racist prejudices Indians as whole have and have normalized in there culture, and enforce in economic, institutional ways. Just because the individual doesn't have any power doesn't mean their prejudices aren't enforced with power of the state. That power doesn't fucking extend to Brahmins, because of wow, this is fucking amazing--no one could of guessed it really, untouchables have no power to base to discriminate against Brahmins, unlike how they have a power base to discriminate against Pakistanis.

And each of them discriminate each other in larger ways than simply one-on-one insults. Japanese people in Japan who have Japanese names, speak Japanese, but have Korean ancestor have to carry around identification that says so, which is of course enforced by the STATE. Obviously this was (re)started in WW2 in which the Japanese STATE invaded and colonized Korea, which they encouraged their people to dehumanize Korean people to make the fact that comfort women existed easier to bare. Again all of this wasn't because people shouted mean words at each, it has because it was acceptable behaviour that was enforced by a larger power. Do you think if the Japanese gov't gave a shit that it still would have happen on the scale it did?

What you don't seem to understand that it's not the power of an individual that doesn't overly matter, unless of course that individual has a lot of power, it's the society, on whole as in economically, socially, expresses their racial prejudices. If an ethnic group doesn't have any power (like say African-Americans) in that society they can't fucking enforce their prejudices thus there isn't any larger consequences of the Black Panther existing. It's the reason Stand Your Grounds laws are basically never enforced when it's a black person shooting a white person but almost always enforced when a white person shoots a black person. It's the reason a middle-class white person can call a rich, successful black man a thug(codeword: for the n word) and no one gives a shit.

But please go on feeling that a white person calling a black person the n-word is the exact same as a black person calling a white person a cracker. Because of course the history of slavery, Jim Crow, police brutality, state-enforced poverty, and general hatred on the state level is the exact same as calling someone a word that has little to no history of oppression attached to it.

Honestly please go look some of this shit up, unlike you, the scientific definition has you know actual science behind it, not just the moral feeling that it`s wrong, as well as a actual social scientist that debate and form a census what the word should mean. You are not right, you are wrong. You may think you're right but your not. Thousands of scientific paper written on the subject of racism say you are wrong, you can`t just believe you`re right and be right, it`s not how that works.

This post has been edited by Studlock: 12 July 2014 - 12:31 AM

[Dolmen 2.0]

 Studlock, on 12 July 2014 - 12:30 AM, said:

 Sombra, on 11 July 2014 - 04:40 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice ...

Bullshit.

So what does it make that poor black guy who hates white people - xenophobic?
Or that Indian Untouchable who hates Pakistanis ... just as much as he hates Brahmins?
Chinese, Koreans and Japanese have hated each other's guts for centuries - what's that about?

You don't need power to have an opinion, to form a thought.

To answer in short order: the black man is prejudice towards white, and that may affect that single fucking white person but will it be part or larger systemic form of discrimination? If you say yes you're simply fucking ignorant.

That Indian Untouchable will indeed conform to racist prejudices Indians as whole have and have normalized in there culture, and enforce in economic, institutional ways. Just because the individual doesn't have any power doesn't mean their prejudices aren't enforced with power of the state. That power doesn't fucking extend to Brahmins, because of wow, this is fucking amazing--no one could of guessed it really, untouchables have no power to base to discriminate against Brahmins, unlike how they have a power base to discriminate against Pakistanis.

And each of them discriminate each other in larger ways than simply one-on-one insults. Japanese people in Japan who have Japanese names, speak Japanese, but have Korean ancestor have to carry around identification that says so, which is of course enforced by the STATE. Obviously this was (re)started in WW2 in which the Japanese STATE invaded and colonized Korea, which they encouraged their people to dehumanize Korean people to make the fact that comfort women existed easier to bare. Again all of this wasn't because people shouted mean words at each, it has because it was acceptable behaviour that was enforced by a larger power. Do you think if the Japanese gov't gave a shit that it still would have happen on the scale it did?

What you don't seem to understand that it's not the power of an individual that doesn't overly matter, unless of course that individual has a lot of power, it's the society, on whole as in economically, socially, expresses their racial prejudices. If an ethnic group doesn't have any power (like say African-Americans) in that society they can't fucking enforce their prejudices thus there isn't any larger consequences of the Black Panther existing. It's the reason Stand Your Grounds laws are basically never enforced when it's a black person shooting a white person but almost always enforced when a white person shoots a black person. It's the reason a middle-class white person can call a rich, successful black man a thug(codeword: for the n word) and no one gives a shit.

But please go on feeling that a white person calling a black person the n-word is the exact same as a black person calling a white person a cracker. Because of course the history of slavery, Jim Crow, police brutality, state-enforced poverty, and general hatred on the state level is the exact same as calling someone a word that has little to no history of oppression attached to it.

Honestly please go look some of this shit up, unlike you, the scientific definition has you know actual science behind it, not just the moral feeling that it`s wrong, as well as a actual social scientist that debate and form a census what the word should mean. You are not right, you are wrong. You may think you're right but your not. Thousands of scientific paper written on the subject of racism say you are wrong, you can`t just believe you`re right and be right, it`s not how that works.

Its in my power to throw a rock at you because you are {insert racial group here}. when I do, you go ahead and throw a bigger rock back at my head hoping to knock me out. we do this repeatedly each time we see each other. If we have equal power and ability at throwing rocks is it pure retaliation on your part or has it become reverse racism because you have the power to act to greater effect throwing bigger rocks and probably causing more damage? The prejudice has already been established on both sides. but I started the rock throwing.

Where does the classification of racism (power combined with prejudice) fall in this example? with me and my decision to act on my prejudice or with you with your decision to escalate the act that started with prejudice?

I don't want to overstep my bounds here so will just clarify: I do not dispute the scientific definition of racism. I feel it is inadequate or perhaps I just don't fully understand the depth of the definition and need to read up more. While your example holds true by scientific definition, the execution of "power" is a little vague IMO.

"Prejudice becomes racism if you apply to it to an action of power."

Ok, i'm on board to this point, but does it have to be an action from a position of superior power? Think you may be losing me here.

The South African government had to deal with a left wing extremist group recently.

They wanted to initiate a "revolution" to reinstate the "natural order" of things. Now I'm sure this is true the world over, there is always a resurgence of racialist radicals every once in a while. Radicals that take extreme measures to combat free and equal government.

Now the Government being the body in power arrested and prosecuted the men implicated in an open Trial. The men were acting on prejudice but in no way were they the dominant power. This terrorist act was condemned as Racism in the broader scope of things. Even if their bombing targets would have effected all races the overall intention was to assert white power over South African government by eliminating the president and a large representation of the ruling party.

Now I believe the men in question were given a fair trial and were found guilty on various charges. We have extremists all over the world targeting ministerial and parliamentary positions. it's not exceptional but its overall intention was a grand return to "white government". Would such terrorism not be classified as racist? Or is this by definition always just extreme prejudice? are the terms that exclusive?

I think I'd like your take on this more Studlock, you obviously have the research in hand. It sounds like an argument lynched on the very definition of "power". Something I think we envision differently.

[Tsundoku]

@Studlock

You need to read the definition of racism, and then the definition of racial discrimination - especially institutionalised racial discrimination.

Anyone can be a racist. What you are talking about is the power to enforce it. 2 different, yet often related concepts. But not always so.

Capisce?

"Honestly please go look some of this shit up, unlike you, the scientific definition has you know actual science behind it, not just the moral feeling that it`s wrong, as well as a actual social scientist that debate and form a census what the word should mean. You are not right, you are wrong. You may think you're right but your not. Thousands of scientific paper written on the subject of racism say you are wrong, you can`t just believe you`re right and be right, it`s not how that works."

Quote me some sources that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that powerless people can't be racist and you may have something. But I'll bet you that you can't. Why? Because there won't be any. Racism is just prejudice based on race, that's all. Hell, you don't even need to act on it. Because it's an attitude/belief/opinion etc. It could be that someone could go through life and noone else might ever know they were a racist because they never expressed it.

Because anyone can be a racist. Anyone who says differently is either ignorant, delusional, or lying.

This post has been edited by Sombra: 12 July 2014 - 03:48 AM

[amphibian]

There's a difference between individual prejudice and the evolution of it into racism and that's due to context and power.

Hundreds of years of white European and Christian colonialism left many places around the world profoundly screwed up. To borrow and extend Dolmen Week's analogy, that's hundreds of years and many millions of rocks being cast at people with the sporadic hundreds of rocks being cast back at the first group of throwers by their victims. After a while, the very landscape is rearranged by the rock throwing and it becomes something babies grow up with - that the land looks like this, that people act this way and eventually, the victims get accustomed to being assaulted by rocks, the throwers forget that the rocks they throw hurt people, they build automated throwing machines to continue the rock throwing and so on. It becomes institutionalized and accustomed to by all.

Other forms of colonialism, invasion and forced redistribution of people have occurred as well, but by and large, the dominant social, economic and political powers in the Western world are tilted to favor of Christian whites of European descent having easier lives in the aggregate. And that needs to change to something more equal for all.

It's sort of hard to tell a white farmer in South Africa that the astoundingly misguided and often cruel efforts of the black majority government to take away their property and give it to blacks who have a high likelihood of diminishing the economic bounty of the land that this whole thing isn't outright thievery. It is and it isn't, paradoxically. It's also hard to talk to someone with no experience with the pervasive influence of racism beyond the direct one on one confrontation of a person calling you an ethnic slur or something of the kind. It's been built into the banking systems of many countries, it's been built into the law enforcement agencies, it's been built into political considerations (gerrymandering etc.), it's been built into school systems, it's been built into so many so-omnipresent-they're-nearly-invisible institutions that people forget about this and have a hard time learning about it and reacting to it in any fashion other than "Well, I don't have that problem, so you probably don't either. Why complain so much?".

Well... there's a middle ground between these things and it's knowing that the people of yore, in their wisdom, greed, sociopathy and stupidity, set up various systems that really need to change for many reasons and we people living today don't quite know how to address that because these systems are so old, so big and so difficult to grasp without a metric fuckload of context, history and sensitivity that we can't just up and fix these things. There are massive growing pains with this process and unfortunately that almost always means violence, theft, displacement and fumbling in the dark towards a hoped for door to a better place.

So yes, racism as most people talk about it these days requires a disproportionate wielding of power in favor of one group due to racial prejudices. A racist act can be done on the individual level, but racism as a whole is a phenomenon that takes in account societal, political, economic and other considerations.

[Tsundoku]

 amphibian, on 12 July 2014 - 04:10 AM, said:

There's a difference between individual prejudice and the evolution of it into racism and that's due to context and power.

I'd argue that racism is merely a more specific form of prejudice. A sub-definition, if you will, of prejudice based on race.

Quote

Hundreds of years of white European and Christian colonialism left many places around the world profoundly screwed up. To borrow and extend Dolmen Week's analogy, that's hundreds of years and many millions of rocks being cast at people with the sporadic hundreds of rocks being cast back at the first group of throwers by their victims. After a while, the very landscape is rearranged by the rock throwing and it becomes something babies grow up with - that the land looks like this, that people act this way and eventually, the victims get accustomed to being assaulted by rocks, the throwers forget that the rocks they throw hurt people, they build automated throwing machines to continue the rock throwing and so on. It becomes institutionalized and accustomed to by all.

Other forms of colonialism, invasion and forced redistribution of people have occurred as well, but by and large, the dominant social, economic and political powers in the Western world are tilted to favor of Christian whites of European descent having easier lives in the aggregate. And that needs to change to something more equal for all.

It's sort of hard to tell a white farmer in South Africa that the astoundingly misguided and often cruel efforts of the black majority government to take away their property and give it to blacks who have a high likelihood of diminishing the economic bounty of the land that this whole thing isn't outright thievery. It is and it isn't, paradoxically. It's also hard to talk to someone with no experience with the pervasive influence of racism beyond the direct one on one confrontation of a person calling you an ethnic slur or something of the kind. It's been built into the banking systems of many countries, it's been built into the law enforcement agencies, it's been built into political considerations (gerrymandering etc.), it's been built into school systems, it's been built into so many so-omnipresent-they're-nearly-invisible institutions that people forget about this and have a hard time learning about it and reacting to it in any fashion other than "Well, I don't have that problem, so you probably don't either. Why complain so much?".

Well... there's a middle ground between these things and it's knowing that the people of yore, in their wisdom, greed, sociopathy and stupidity, set up various systems that really need to change for many reasons and we people living today don't quite know how to address that because these systems are so old, so big and so difficult to grasp without a metric fuckload of context, history and sensitivity that we can't just up and fix these things. There are massive growing pains with this process and unfortunately that almost always means violence, theft, displacement and fumbling in the dark towards a hoped for door to a better place.

No arguments there, bloody well put.

Quote

So yes, racism as most people talk about it these days requires a disproportionate wielding of power in favor of one group due to racial prejudices. A racist act can be done on the individual level, but racism as a whole is a phenomenon that takes in account societal, political, economic and other considerations.

I tend to disagree purely because racism is an attitude possessed by individuals or teeming millions and power has nothing to do with it. Call it semantics if you will. Differing between the attitude and the ability to express that attitude or enforce it upon others. Doesn't make my poor, shat-upon individual above any less racist, it's just that he has fuck all ability to do anything about it.

Quick version: (race)-ism is the thought, (racial) discrimination (of whatever degree of offence: from polite sneering to the evils of genocide) is the thought plus the act. And power - plus the will to do so - is the difference between the two. How's that?

This post has been edited by Sombra: 12 July 2014 - 04:57 AM

[amphibian]

No, this may be somewhat semantics, but I prefer to think of it as a person has racist thoughts or engages in a racist act. Racism itself is something much larger.

We as individuals aren't defined by any -ism, but in the aggregate, yes, they coalesce around us.

[Tsundoku]

OK true, -ist is an individual, -ism is a group. Poor suffix use by me.

I still believe in the difference between the thought and the act though. Otherwise we'd all be Catholics and going straight to Hell.

This post has been edited by Sombra: 12 July 2014 - 05:08 AM

[Macros]

I still disagree.
racism doesn't have to be institutionalised and massive.
Racism, along with any form of bigotry can exist on any level.
Just as Racists can be anyone at any time in any position in life.

a white man who hates black people is a racist
a black man who hates white people is a racist

the difference being the white man is (generally) in a better position to make his racism affect a black person.

Its super fun time this weekend in Northern Ireland for mindless bigotry (although I often wonder, what is mindfull bigotry?)

[Cause]

 Studlock, on 12 July 2014 - 12:30 AM, said:

 Sombra, on 11 July 2014 - 04:40 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice ...

Bullshit.

So what does it make that poor black guy who hates white people - xenophobic?
Or that Indian Untouchable who hates Pakistanis ... just as much as he hates Brahmins?
Chinese, Koreans and Japanese have hated each other's guts for centuries - what's that about?

You don't need power to have an opinion, to form a thought.

To answer in short order: the black man is prejudice towards white, and that may affect that single fucking white person but will it be part or larger systemic form of discrimination? If you say yes you're simply fucking ignorant.

Or you could be a white person in South Africa in which affirmative action favours the 90% black majority. Your being ignorant now, to believe white people always have or always will have the power. In fact it's a kind of 'racism' in itself to claim that only white people can be racist.

This post has been edited by Cause: 12 July 2014 - 12:49 PM

[amphibian]

Some form of affirmative action to favor the black population is necessary in South Africa.

Do you disagree with that, Cause?

[Cause]

If you are asking me whether something needs to be done to address the injustices of apartheid then of course I will answer yes.

if you asking me whether employment quotas must match National demographics exactly I will answer no and state that its a form of discrimination that mirrors apartheid. For simplicities sake lets just say that South Africa is 80% black, 10% white and 10% coloured. The government wants hiring to reflect these percentages exactly at the local level and yet anybody who understands statistics will understand that the global identity wont match the local. The city of cape town for example has a population demographic of 50% coloured. Must 40% of them leave the city for work? My national airline carrier has been sued several times because they have not hired a white pilot in years. They once literally had a ban on hiring white candidates, it was found to be unlawful and discarded but I will argue its even worse to let white people apply for a job and waste their time when their is a silent agreement in place to block their employment. Their stated goal is to increase the percentage of black pilots. The outcome though is that as I have said for several years no white person has got through the candidate programme irrespective of skill and won't for several years. Naturally because of apartheid any pilot who has worked for the airline for roughly 20 years is almost guaranteed to bewhite, to correct this imbalance by saying whites cant be pilots I think they have failed to live up to the ideal of a country that does not discriminate on race. Affirmative action that favours a minority can be absorbed, when it favours the majority it becomes reverse discrimination (that is to say just a discriminatory hiring practice).

Now of course some say 'boo hoo' the shoes on the other foot and you can't handle it. Still how can you fight discrimination with discrimination.

I could speak at length how my countries affirmative action and black economic employment laws are ineffectual, corrupt, and discriminatory but it would be beyond the scope of this thread

This post has been edited by Cause: 13 July 2014 - 02:01 PM

[Studlock]

 Cause, on 12 July 2014 - 12:42 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 12 July 2014 - 12:30 AM, said:

 Sombra, on 11 July 2014 - 04:40 PM, said:

 Studlock, on 10 July 2014 - 01:43 PM, said:

The clearest scientific definition of racism is power plus prejudice ...

Bullshit.

So what does it make that poor black guy who hates white people - xenophobic?
Or that Indian Untouchable who hates Pakistanis ... just as much as he hates Brahmins?
Chinese, Koreans and Japanese have hated each other's guts for centuries - what's that about?

You don't need power to have an opinion, to form a thought.

To answer in short order: the black man is prejudice towards white, and that may affect that single fucking white person but will it be part or larger systemic form of discrimination? If you say yes you're simply fucking ignorant.

Or you could be a white person in South Africa in which affirmative action favours the 90% black majority. Your being ignorant now, to believe white people always have or always will have the power. In fact it's a kind of 'racism' in itself to claim that only white people can be racist.

Oh the good old 'reverse racism' argument. I was waiting for this, because eventually, no matter what, a white person will moan about how bad they got it when compared to the POC around them. I don't believe white people have always been in power. In fact 500 years ago my ancestors were in power, things weren't perfect but at least they weren't put on reservations to wallow in poverty only to either drink themselves to death or put a noose around their neck. Nor do I believe they will always be (hopefully we can invent another way to debase people in the future), but as things are right now, colonialism set white people up pretty nice for at least the next couple hundred years. But please keep complaining about how bad the white people in South Africa have it compared to the black majority (which according to this report by BBC: http://www.bbc.com/n...africa-20138322 is in fact the direct opposite of what your claiming). You don't address discrimination by looking at those who benefit the most from it and say "wow we got to do something about that white discrimination because maybe in the future their might actually be some statistical fact to it". I understand your sentiment, I agree with underlining morality of it (that of we shouldn't achieve basic equality by debasing the oppressor) but at the end of the day the thing your railing against, according to SA's 2011 census at least (and the Canadian one, and I would bet other settlers states too), isn't actually as big as a problem you make it out to be.

[Macros]

Studlock.
you seem to have a massive chip on your shoulder.

do white people (generally) have a much easier time of it because of where and when they were born? Yes.
should they be punished for it? Do we live in some Greek tragedy where the sins of our forefathers come back to punish the descendants. Does action need tk be taken? Yes, is the situation that cause described above the answer? Most certainly not. You need to take your blinkers off and acknowledge that minorities can be racist as well. Its nit my fault I was born into a white landowning family, should I suddenly be denied a job I'm more qualified than any other candidate for because of this? Hell no. But I also realise the nature if a vicious circle in this situation, I think a part of the solution would be to help promote equal education, over handing jobs to people out of their depth to tuck a quota box (again, see causes problems with as in sa)

yes say "woe is me" and mock if you want, the fact remains that whilst I have undoubtedly benefitted from my heritage, its not my fucking fault.

[Studlock]

Yeah the chip is called racism, and you know actually experiencing every single day of my life unlike you know not, but still complaining that you do despite every single measurement that society has to measure such things says you don't. I never denied POC can't be prejudices bastards but being a prejudice bastard does not mean you contribute to racist system. You seem to be equating having rude things said about you to have a system that destroy lives on a value judgement of skin-colour/ethnicity. Let me ask has your, or anyone else you know, life been side-line because people literally refused to employ them because of their skin colour? Because that shit happens daily on reserve. Have you been pulled over because of your skin colour? It happens at least once a month to me. Have you had the cops called on you while playing basketball in a 'white neighborhood' because you might be 'dangerous'? I have. Have people called you slurs as you walk down the street simply because you fucking exist? My grandparents lived through that. Have you experienced any of that? If the answer is no then shut the fuck up with your reverse racism bullshit. And just as a kicker, everything I just said can literally be backed up state collected statistics. Your complaining about a non-existent problem as if it's an equal problem to actual racism. If you can provide me with statistical proof that white are discriminated in anyway to the benefit of people of colour I'll gladly agree with you but I highly doubt you'll find any such stat.

Also we don't live a Greek tragedy we will in real life where my people are punished for white peoples past sins while you benefit from it. And then try to equate the systemic suffering of POC to being called a cracker, and then also try to pretend you live in a meritocracy where only those who are the most qualified get hired for jobs to continuing to justify your own privilege (haha so fucking disingenuous). I agree it's not your fault just like it's not my fault I was born into a settler state that thinks my skin colour makes me a savage but of course to you both of those are pretty much on the level. I apologize Great White Sir, let my get your coat and suck your dick while I'm at it.