Racism-what is it?

[elder999]

Main Entry: rac·ism
Pronunciation: 'rA-"si-z&m also -"shi-
Function: noun
1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race
2 : racial prejudice or discrimination



I stand by my "everyone is racist to a certain degree" comment. Frankly, I don't think all racism is inherently bad. Simply noting someone's race as a definitive point of description is "racist." That is not bad. It is simply a descriptive term based upon race - i.e., racist.

I have a few friends named "John." One of them is black. My wife asked me one day which "John" I was referring to in conversation. I said "the black John." My wife says I am racist because I correctly identified "John" as "the black guy." She is technically correct.

There is a huge difference between acknowledging differences between people and trying to say those differences make one superior or inferior to others. I do not believe Oprah was saying that. However, her comment does still appear to be harmlessly racist.


So, Jeff Cook’s post, originally seen
Here (http://www.budoseek.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=210647&postcount=42), got me to thinking-I went sailing for a week, and, other than fish and let the wife corner me in our berth, that’s what I do sailing, is think- and I’m not so sure I agree with him any more.

Frankly, Jeff, what you said-I italicized the part I disagree most strongly with, btw-isn’t at all racist in either the dictionary definition sense of the word, nor in the larger one applied to situations of “racial discrimination”-that is to say, the exercise of power over others because of race.

It was, of course, discriminatory in a sense, in that it directly pointed out which “John” you were talking about, and, as you said, acknowledging a difference in and of itself is not only sometimes necessary, but unavoidable-frankly, it’s no different than if you said “John the electrician,” or “the one with a limp,” or even just made a descriptive face at your wife or mimicked some familiar mannerism.

This got me wondering, of course, just what is racist? I think I have some idea, but I thought it was even more important to ask what everyone else here thinks-and, is what Jeff said elsewhere in the thread true-is “everyone racist to a certain degree?”

For myself, having grown up with racism, I have to say that I probably have been guilty of it on more than one occasion: every time I’ve been pulled over driving a really nice car and knew I hadn’t done anything, and not been cited for anything-just checked out and warned…..or, if you prefer, every time I’ve been pulled over and thought that was what was happening. Yes, it’s happened, and yes, while it’s been more than 6 years, I’ve also been pulled over for speeding (love to drive fast, and will take the hit now and then). If I think that I’m being hassled just because I’m “black”, well, that’s pretty racist of me, even when it turns out (as, of course it has) to be true.

When a woman-or anyone-pulls up to a traffic light in a major city, and sees me standing waiting to cross the street, and locks all their doors-no matter how I’m dressed-well, it may be racist, in fact, it probably is, but it’s also good sense. I look pretty fierce, even with a suit on-who knows why they’re being cautious, or scared? Should I care?

On the other hand, when we moved out of the city, when I was 8 years old, I had a teacher tell me that I had to be a janitor when I grew up. Mind you, this was in New York-and suburban New York at that, though it was thought of as “upstate” at the time, and still is by those south of Yonkers. Of course, I laughed at her silliness and told her I was going to college, just as my parents and all my grandparents had-and by the end of third grade, well, I was in fifth grade, which is what bothered her in the first place: that I was bright and brown. Someone with a little less self-esteem might not have had the nerve to stand up to her, though, and might even have believed her, even in 1968….even in New York.

I think so-called afrocentrists are racists-as well as being historically confused (remember the Comba-tai guy on e-budo, Jeff?)-as are just about anyone who has accused me of “wanting to be white” because I of the way I speak.

I’m most troubled, though, both by those who see racism everywhere they look, as well as those who would say that racism isn’t a problem in this country any more, especially-and this is probably racist of me, or at least, there are those who will say it is-those who are white and say it. No matter how much the lines that distinguish race are getting blurred in this country-and at times they are blurry-they are still, in my opinion, an issue-as well as an undercurrent in other issues, such as the drive for English as the official language, or immigration, or poverty.

What do you think?

[tcomea2]

I’m most troubled, though, both by those who see racism everywhere they look, as well as those who would say that racism isn’t a problem in this country any more, especially-and this is probably racist of me, or at least, there are those who will say it is-those who are white and say it. No matter how much the lines that distinguish race are getting blurred in this country-and at times they are blurry-they are still, in my opinion, an issue-as well as an undercurrent in other issues, such as the drive for English as the official language, or immigration, or poverty.


Ok ill bite here.

I think you make a good point here going both directions. Last semester i took an american american studies class that is required with my major in school. My teacher in the first day of class stood up infront of a class of 150with was well over 90% black and proceeded to tell how bad the white man was, and how we wanted to do nothing but hold him back. and how many white students would fail his class cause they didnt see things his way. By the end of the semester with a c in the class i finaly realized this man didnt want equality, he wanted to beat down and tear down the white people in this country. ie. the theory of reverse racism.

Is racism real, no doubt in my mind. I am sure on some level i am guilty of it no matter how hard i try not to be. But when you say you have a problem with it when people see racism everywhere one looks, well i agree 100% with you. I despise when people like that teacher rant on about how everything is racism. All i want to tell him is to wake up and realize that life is tough. Junk happens, and it happens to us all. Yes racism happens, i know it does, i have seen it. But it is this attitude that everything bad thing that happens is racism. When someone gets that mentality they are setting themselves up for failure.

Forrest Gump said it best, **** happens.

But when it does, it doesnt make it racism, sometimes its just life.

[elder999]

Ok ill bite here.

By the end of the semester with a c in the class i finaly realized this man didnt want equality, he wanted to beat down and tear down the white people in this country. ie. the theory of reverse racism.


There's no such thing as "reverse racism."

It's just racism.

[tcomea2]

There's no such thing as "reverse racism."

It's just racism.


i agree

its just a book term, and an idea that sparked a huge debate on our campuss about 3 years ago. talking about people about ot rip peoples heads off type of debate.

[Eliz]

Do I think everyone is racist or sexist or a bigot in some way? Probably not, although I think people have a tendency to generalize or group individuals based on their actions.

To a degree, the subject can be overdone.

As I was told at a young age, If I worried less about what others thought and more about my own actions, I will do much better and go much further in life. I have to agree.

Elderly drivers? I am sure I won't share some of my thoughts when I see them "flying" on the highway at 40 mph. :laugh:

[Harlan]

The ability to discriminate is a part of what makes us a successful species...and is learned behaviour. We avoid food that smells 'bad'...knowing it will make us sick. We wait at the sidewalk for the cars to pass instead of walking into traffic. We make dozens of decisions every day on how to live our lives, and many are based on learned patterns, are never examined and have over time acquired an arbitrary 'value'.

But beyond thought and behaviour patterns...what IS a 'black' man or a 'white' woman? What is 'race'? Totally meaningless. Perceptual constructs of negotiated meaning and arbitrary value.

I recall the first time I met my soon-to-be stepfather. A big, strong man came to the yard and bent down to kindly ask me 'Is your mother home?' I nodded 'yes'...and just stared at the nice man. There was something...different...about about him. It was the first time I had seen a 'black' man...and I while I could see a difference...I could not understand it. To a child, 'color' simply didn't register and had no learned 'value'.

Then, I discovered that that viewpoint was supposedly as 'wrong' as the 'rascist' view; to discriminate on race, or color is 'rascist', but to NOT see color is to create the 'invisible' man. People want to be 'seen', and many have an internal map of 'who' they are that 'needs' to be validated.

[heretic888]

What do you think?

I think there is a difference between "unconscious" or "automatic" racism and "deliberate" or "conscious" racism.

Laterz.

[Jeff C.]

Man, why do you have to bring up the Comba-tai guy and ruin my lunch? :D

Aaron, I have to say that I agree with you. I misused the term. "Discrimination" is much more accurate, as you said. I am glad that my ignorance prompted such a well-thought-out post from you! However, I am NOT ignorant because I am a backwoods hood-wearing redneck! ;)

I still maintain that everyone is prejudiced to some extent. We all generalize, we all discriminate, and ocassionally a negative supposition about a group may creep into our thoughts. However, some of those generalities that are not so complimentary are based upon cultural differences, not necessarily racial differences. For instance, I have seen Mexican immigrants spit on the floor in public many times. I assumed they would not do that in their own homes, until I went to a migrant labor camp one time and saw them doing so. I am disgusted by that, and judgmental. But obviously it is o.k. in that cultural group to spit on the floor.

Jeff Cook

[starkjudo]

I think anywhere you have a class or race that is semented by wealth or education, you'll have a degree of racism. Growing up in the South (the Mississippi Delta at that), It was obvious there was a discrimination against blacks. In my parent's generation, it is stronger, to the point of automatically assuming a lack of intelligence and culture based on a majority lack of education and rampant poverty.

At the same time, it was completely incomprehensible to me that there was a discrimination against Jews. They looked like "us," spoke like "us," and acted like "us." And of course, there were maybe a grand total of 20 that I encountered on a regular basis.

In discussions i've had over the years on race with black people, we've pretty much decided that there are black (or colored, or African-American, whichever is your preference) people, and there are n*****s. To the exact same token, there are whites and white trash. We gauge the difference by the same criteria - crime, intelligence, class, character. That we use a different derogatory name based on color, well, that goes to history, is the only answer I can give.

For me now, Dennis Miller said it best, why judge someone on the color of their skin, when there are so many other good reasons to hate them?

[Harlan]

Personally, I see it as a struggle between 'the haves and the have nots'. A struggle for resources...and it is the uneducated who can only perceive this struggle as 'us vs them'.

[tcomea2]

Personally, I see it as a struggle between 'the haves and the have nots'. A struggle for resources...and it is the uneducated who can only perceive this struggle as 'us vs them'.


But its deaper than that. My teacher which i refered to in the first post is one of the most educated men i have ever met with PHD, and is the leading person in our state regarding aferican american studies, and he see it as us vs them. Its not a matter of have vs have nots, its a mind set. Some people learn it, some people are born into it. And that goes both with any race.

[Harlan]

There are different kinds of education. I wanted to avoid using the more judgemental term of 'ignorant'.

[ezzthetic]

Personally, I see it as a struggle between 'the haves and the have nots'. A struggle for resources...and it is the uneducated who can only perceive this struggle as 'us vs them'.

I assume you mean "uneducated" in a certain way, rather than the uneducated in general?

EDIT: OK, you've addressed this now I see :)

[Abbax8]

See

http://www.avenueqthemusical.co.uk/the-show/audio-clips.php

click on everyones a little bit racist.

Peace

Dennis

[Maro]

It's always enlightening to be on the recieving end of it. I lived in North Wales from the ages of 13-18 and attended a purely Welsh speaking school.

To say they hate the English is a mild understatement - their word for English is "Saeson" which is quite literally "Saxon" :eek:

It was rough but I got through it - I use this experience to remind me that we are all the same at the end of the day.

[Jason Delaney]

the only way for true equality is to be colorblind, or hate all people equally, either way you are completly somthing otherwise you have only half truths

[aplonis]

...backwoods, hood-wearing redneck...

As the direct decendent of two separate lines of share-croppers (white trash, pre-trailer park era), I'd grown up (in the city) on stories of feeding chickens, milking cows, hiding blasting caps in the firewood for a neighbor to steal (strangely, the church caught fire), moonshining, and the like.

In these family heritage sessions, I'd always been given to believe that the term redneck derived from ignorant field hands who wore long sleeves, gloves and hats to tend crops in the hot sun...but on account of being stooped over much of the day, got the backs of their necks burnt red by the sun.

Would not residing in the shady backwoods, and wearing a hood, serve as double-protection against this syndrome?

Interesting how derogatives tend to devolve over time, yes?

Gan Uesli Starling
Kalamazoo MI

[Alonzo M. Jones]

Everyone is a little racist.
Racism is not everywhere.


Race is taken from the Greek word ethnos that can translate nation. If we move away from using the term race and replace it with ethnicity, I think we can see the honest truth. Humans are fierce competitors and because of their proclivity to compete, we usually like to categorize ourselves into teams.

It is true that racism is “commonly defined as a belief or doctrine where inherent biological differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, with a corollary that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.” But we find this behavior among people of the same race all throughout history. It was true of various peoples and tribes in Mesoamerica, China, Africa, India and Europe.

The statement that everyone is a little racist is true, but a little racism is still all wrong. The statement that Racism is not everywhere, is false, but just knowing that I have a propensity towards racism prevents me from being racist. As a Comba-Tai practitioner this is important.

“When racism, a belief, is applied in practice, it takes forms such as prejudice, discrimination, segregation or subordination. Racism can more narrowly refer to a system of oppression, such as institutional racism.” Racism exists here in America, not only for my white students but it applies to my Asian, Latino and Indian students as well.

The challenges of those groups that have racism/classicism perpetuated against them, is developing social and economic capital and leave an inheritance of the same. I say this because the strong (those with economic and social capital) in America are not at all concerned with racism.

Are Comba-Tai people racist Afrocentrics?

I would not say that Afrocentrism is racist but I will say that its approach to fact finding has been an inappropriate desperate response to pseudo-scientific racism. Often what is referred to as Afrocentrism—as it relates to Comba-Tai--is actually a view of monogenesis…we stole this view from Plato: "Every king springs from a race of slaves, and every slave has had kings among his ancestors.” Eurocentrism is not necessarily racist either, but sometimes it is mere misinformation, but other times the information is true. To Paraphrase Plato: “There is something bad about all of us and something awesome about all of us as well.”

Alonzo M. Jones

[aplonis]

I find that racism has a two-way effect. Avowed racists not only expect that other groups not their own ethnicity all have certain traits and can be expected to always act in a certain way...but that the same is true for their own group.

A racist will expect...and require...that persons of their own ethnicity must conform to narrowly defined expectations. A white racist manifesto/handbook posing as a novel and titled "The Turner Diaries" is riddled with examples of how to deal with "race traitors" who do not so conform.

So as a test that one might pose to oneself on whether one is a racist, simply ask: Do you expect and require members of your own race to conform to your own private tastes, social demeanor, political philosophy, religion, etc? Do you feel betrayed when another of your own race does not? If so, you might be a racist.

With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy,

Gan Starling
Kalamazoo MI

[ajnsantafe]

As I refer to myeslf as a child of the world, I mean that there is no seperation between myself anyone else on the planet(I won't mention the lineage or connecton into after life as well). But in this moment I know that I am 99.99999% similar to everyone else on the planet. Or you can look at how everything in this planet expanse and then contracts on itself when death is about to and does happen, trees, animals, cells, atoms (which make up everything). I wanted to post these truths because (I wanted there to be lists of similarities as well as differencesess posted) I always chose to look at the similarities of myself and anyone or anything else.
I didn't know I was Native American until I was 14 because my father and mother raised me in a religion (mormonism in Redmond WA) that regularly practiced (and taught) sexism, 'race issues' as they put it, and other forms of ignorance. Even my Jodo teacher, at age 10, being Hawaiin' was a issue to the church and my family. So for me to appear white use to be an issue to me.
After my parents divorced and I moved to San Diego, my father told me that I am 20% Apache, and then that became important to me. Today after doing my family geneology, I find so many nationalities that I don't care anymore, not only for myself or for anyone else. This is more valueable and something I practice relentlessly today because as I posted before all the similarities completely and totally outweigh any form 'seperation' thinking or logic.
Through Zen and philosophy of many wise men of the past and present as well as science and simple commen sense, I choose to never express my ignorance or anger (and I have in the past) through skin color or heritage or political standing, economical standing, etc. etc. etc. and that is how the end of all this ignorance is going to come about(speaking from experiance), much the same 'Peace is not the absence of war...' The end of all this ignorance can come about in your life and mind and most importantly, heart, if you want it to. And that moves peace into your life and to those others around you as well.
Mother Theresa always spoke about Peace but never Anti-War. When she was alive she was invited to a Anti-War ralley in D.C. she declined saying that if people would like to gather for peace and promote that she would come. That is why I will not comment directly and toatly on racism or the many forms it takes (like cancer) it grows and is difficult to detach from when it is in the for front of the mind. :bow:


PS If you are Mormon on this formate I am happy to say that that branch of the LDS church was reformed (out of Salt Lake and Provo) in 1989, because of my fathers history in the church and with his personal history with President Benson.