The Race Relations/Diversity/Equality Thread

[Gravity Defier]

I'm not sure this is the correct thread, but oh well, I'm putting this here anyway.

My oldest brother is half-black, half-mex-am, and depending on who's looking and what they want to see, he either looks black, mex-am, or the mixture that he actually is.

Our black/African-American population is rather small here; I don't think it's much of a stretch to say most that do live here are here for military reasons (either stationed or decided to retire here). Mex-am population, well, that's a healthy size.

My brother has two friends, one black, one mex-am, who stop by on a fairly regular basis.

This morning, the mex-am one came to the door and my nephews screamed at me (I was washing dishes in the kitchen) that their uncle was here, meaning my brother, not using an affectionate term for this guy.

A month ago, the black friend came over and was talking to my brother. This got a response of, "Look! There are two Uncle [name]s!"

Anytime they see a black person who is bald, relatively thin and tall, they think it's their uncle. It doesn't seem to matter if the person is darker skinned than he is, though they've never mistaken a lighter skinned person for him. Whenever they see a moderate-heavily tattooed mex-am, they think it's their uncle.

I don't understand why they get so confused over him when they don't have that problem at all with my little brother or me (we are, if I don't get too technical, both mex-americans).

Anyway, I'm not sure there was a point to this, other than to state my confusion.

[Jayelle]

I don't know if that has to do that much with race. Kids think all adults look alike in some ways. My 3 year-old nephew got confused between Paul and his other uncle, Dylan because both have sandy hair and beards.

[neo-dragon]

There was an article that I saw a while back which I thought about discussing here but was too lazy at the time to bother. Basically, it was about the old "all [insert ethnic group here] look alike sterotype". The point was the article was that people naturally do have a harder time distinguishing facial features of people from different racial stock than themselves. I think it also gave some speculated evolutionary reasons for it, but I can't recall the details.

[Gravity Defier]

JL, true that it may not be race and that it may just be a 'confusing adults for each other' thing.

I just think it's odd that he's the only one they can't tell apart from strangers. They've never thought some other short, brown haired girl was me, and trust me when I say quite a few people here would fit/match my basic profile.

I don't know. It was mildly funny for me this morning to have them make another mistaken identification.

[Jayelle]

There was an article that I saw a while back which I thought about discussing here but was too lazy at the time to bother. Basically, it was about the old "all [insert ethnic group here] look alike sterotype". The point was the article was that people naturally do have a harder time distinguishing facial features of people from different racial stock than themselves. I think it also gave some speculated evolutionary reasons for it, but I can't recall the details.

It makes sense in a way- if you are surrounded by people you primarily identify by hair colour or eye colour (unconsciously, most likely) and then go to say... Japan and are like "He was a guy with black hair and dark eyes!"...

[neo-dragon]

Incidentally, for the first few of weeks after I started teaching at the school I'm currently at, one of my colleagues (a young Asian woman) frequently called me by the wrong name and looked mortified each time that she did. Anyone else within earshot always seemed quite amused by it, and I knew that I was obviously missing something. It was a couple of weeks before someone finally told me that she was calling me by the name of the last black guy who worked in the department. Ironically, while I'm the only black person currently in the department, this individual is one of three young Asian women, and I've never confused any of their names. Naturally, I relentlessly teased her about how her "racial profiling" offended me, which eventually lead to her retaliating by covering my chair with toilet paper, which I called a hate crime. We called a truce after that, and so ended the office race war.

[locke]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/20 ... /#comments

According to White House spokesman Robert Gibbs, no raccoons have been caught on the White House grounds since the band of intruders were first spotted roaming the premises earlier this month.

hardly a coincidence that wild 'coons just happened to take up residence at the white house this week (at least as I see it). the tone of the 'prank' is utterly clear, and it's pretty disgusting.

[buckshot]

I had a frustrating dealing with a customer friday . A little background, we have a couple of backward areas within a hundred or so miles of our farm and buiseness. I'ts kind a like deliverance but the river is a lot smaller! So this costomer comes by the feed plant to pick up his rather substantial feed order ( the kind I cant do without right now) and he starts going off about the new president and how the ------ -- ------- is going to make America into a pinko society and take all our guns and corrupt our children and on and on . Then in front of other customers he leads off on how he only deals with good old redneck dealers like me that share his comunity's beliefs, then he started ranting to his assistant about the blacks and the KKK and how they need to keep the damn Indians out of their town in the summer!! I'm not shure what part of the otherwise" good cash paying customer's" disturbing rant bothered me the most. I felt lucky that I was able to get him loaded and out first so I could explain to my other wide eyed costomers. Now the hardest part , I have to call or visit this customer and come to some agreement to keep him out of our sales office !

"The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything" - T. Roosevelt

[neo-dragon]

Well, if Obama's presidency does nothing else at least it'll flush out some closet racists. It's always good to know where they're hiding.

[Syphon the Sun]

hardly a coincidence that wild 'coons just happened to take up residence at the white house this week (at least as I see it). the tone of the 'prank' is utterly clear, and it's pretty disgusting.

Oh, please. This isn't the first -- nor will it be the last -- time wild animals have made their way onto White House property. Anyone who has ever lived in the D.C. metropolitan area can attest to the raccoon problem in the entire area (it's significantly worse than my home state, which sports a pretty significant wildlife population). It's always been bad and apparently this year is particularly bad because their food sources yielded less.

I think it's pretty disgusting to pretend racism drives anything and everything, from political, religious, and economic beliefs to nature. Believe it or not, racism isn't at the heart of every event.

[elfprince13]

I think it's pretty disgusting to pretend racism drives anything and everything, from political, religious, and economic beliefs to nature. Believe it or not, racism isn't at the heart of every event.

On that note, I just saw the new Pink Panther movie, and Ms. Berenger definitely reminded me how much of political correctness is just hypersensitivity and an assumption that everyone is prejudiced against you.

[neo-dragon]

So Say We All!

[Wil]

I don't think race is particularly important, and I wish people thought about it a lot less, but saying there's no such thing as race is like saying there's no such thing as hair color. Granted, sometimes it's hard to tell if someone has black hair, brown hair, or somewhere in between. But the hair still has a color.

I've heard this argument a number of times, and it just always feels like someone is attempting to define away their problems. Race is blurry, race is largely irrelevant, but race exists. Different racial groups have different medical issues they need to be concerned with. We can't pretend this doesn't exist.

^ Essentially what me and a good friend talked about when we saw the video.

[zeroguy]

I'm a little confused... I assume this is a guy from Battlestar Galactica, but, this is at the UN? Or... what?

Edit: Okay, perhaps for a bit of relevance: Yahtzee Croshaw had some race-related comments last week (around 0:48 to 1:19, after the unskippable ad thing at the beginning)

[neo-dragon]

I don't think race is particularly important, and I wish people thought about it a lot less, but saying there's no such thing as race is like saying there's no such thing as hair color. Granted, sometimes it's hard to tell if someone has black hair, brown hair, or somewhere in between. But the hair still has a color.

I've heard this argument a number of times, and it just always feels like someone is attempting to define away their problems. Race is blurry, race is largely irrelevant, but race exists. Different racial groups have different medical issues they need to be concerned with. We can't pretend this doesn't exist.

^ Essentially what me and a good friend talked about when we saw the video.

The idea is supposed to be that there's such a thing as "ethnicity", but the term "race" in a biological context has a meaning much closer to "species" or at least "subspecies". I've often heard it said that there's more genetic variation within any given ethnic group than there is between them, so the term "race" implies far more difference between us than there really is biologically and genetically.

Is it splitting hairs? Yes. But it is a nice sentiment, and you can't help but be inspired when Admiral Adama (er... I mean, Edward Olmos) gives a speech.

And yes, Zero, it's the cast of Battlestar Galactica at the U.N.

[zeroguy]

And yes, Zero, it's the cast of Battlestar Galactica at the U.N.

Sorry if this is getting too off topic, but, um, why?

[neo-dragon]

Because BSG is just that awesome and is taken seriously be people even outside of the sci-fi community.

Again and again, the writers and producers of BSG have put a civilization in immediate peril and asked how far its leaders ought to go to protect it. Tonight, the story comes to an end with the critically acclaimed series' final episode.

To mark the show's finale, its fans at the United Nations — people whose nonfictional jobs involve wrestling with similar issues day in and day out — invited the cast and producers to visit the U.N. for a two-hour panel discussion and talk-back.

Source

[neo-dragon]

This sort of thing annoys the hell out of me...

The classic literary novel To Kill a Mockingbird is being pulled from the Grade 10 English course at a Brampton high school after a parent complained about the use of a racial epithet in the book.

Full Story

Another lovely example of an ignorant person attacking racism in exactly the wrong way. Yeah, lets ban a book about tolerance and judging men based on their character because it has the word "nigger" in it. That's a great idea!

One stupid parent complains and instead of having that one kid read something else they take the book out of the curriculum for everyone. Hell, why doesn't this one dumb parent stick their kid in one of those "afro-centric" schools? I'm sure there's no scary white supremacist literature there, because, you know, that's clearly what "To Kill a Mockingbird" is. If I was a member of the english department at that school the parent and the administration would get a piece of my mind.

[Luet]

Hope that parent never reads Roots.

[CezeN]

Seems like some people are still butthurt over the election :/

Blatant racism in the Townhall?
Because she really deserved to get escorted out and painted as the bad guy...

[buckshot]

I'm sick to death of racism ! Now most are guilty of it , the worst are the ones that cry racism the most ! what about the president's reflex comment on the arrest? When I stand back and look, I see all the whiners out there giving racism a safe place to hide.

[locke]

Seems like some people are still butthurt over the election :/

Blatant racism in the Townhall?
Because she really deserved to get escorted out and painted as the bad guy...

f****** sake...

"you stay classy, Missouri."

[Syphon the Sun]

*rolls eyes* The video of the guy actually ripping up the poster shows that he didn't even look to see what was on it. Give me a f****** break, guys.

It's more likely than not that it was just an overreaction to the whole "no signs allowed" policy that was enforced against everybody else.

[neo-dragon]

What does Rosa Parks have to do with health care reform anyway?

[CezeN]

*rolls eyes* The video of the guy actually ripping up the poster shows that he didn't even look to see what was on it. Give me a f****** break, guys.

It's more likely than not that it was just an overreaction to the whole "no signs allowed" policy that was enforced against everybody else.

Hmmm
the video doesn't show what happens before she takes her seat.

http://www.pamshouseblend.com/diary/124 ... -town-hall
Says:

What happened was the women walked in with signs, the crowd booed and yelled at the women. The women rolled up their posters and put them down.

So, she might have had it open before what the video shows, and he might have seen it.

Or you might just be right.
Didn't know they had a "no signs" policy...

[Syphon the Sun]

Well, the only people I've heard insisting it was race-related are the typical leftist crackpot bloggers. Even the Senator herself noted that the people were upset that these ladies came in near the end with signs after everybody else had been forced to leave their own signs outside and didn't think race had anything to do with it, as few people could even make out what was on the sign. It seems a lot more likely that he was pissed that a woman was getting media attention for her sign after security had made sure people like him didn't bring signs into the townhall.

At any rate, I certainly wouldn't call it the "blatant racism" you declared it was in your first post, as the only evidence that it was even related to race was the fact that it had Rosa Parks on it, which reports tend to confirm was not clearly visible.

[CezeN]

I'll edit.

The typical leftist crackpot bloggers had me convinced. :/

[CezeN]

Seems like some people are still butthurt over the election :/

EDIT:nevermind

[Syphon the Sun]

Just like they have you convinced the town hall protests are a result of hurt feelings over the election results, no?

Let's just ignore the fact that, as of a few days ago, only 41% of Americans trust the Democrats on healthcare reform, trusting Republicans more on healthcare reform for the first time in two years (two months ago, Democrats had a 10-point lead over Republicans on this issue). And let's ignore the fact that more and more Democrats (and more importantly: Independents) are jumping ship on the issue. There's a reason these townhalls are so popular and it isn't because everyone's a racist or a Republican (the two evil "R" words).

But hey, whatever it takes to distract from the real issue that Americans don't want the kind of healthcare reform the Democrats are peddling.

[locke]

or perhaps polls are all over the map on what people think of health care/insurance reform and the town halls are perpetuating misinformation?

not that the media has done anything but fan the flames of misinformation, in their pursuit of 'balance' they can't let the facts get in the way.

[Syphon the Sun]

I guess if you're defining "misinformation" as anything that disagrees with the standard Obama talking points (you know, the ones that are patently false), you've probably got a point.

As far as pretending the mainstream media is even close to balanced: you're funny. You're right that they've been flaming the fans of misinformation, though; they just keep repeating the left's wildly untrue claims as fact.

As far as polling goes, everything I've seen points to the same conclusion: increasing distrust of the Democrats on the issue.

[locke]

that's funny I'd say the media has been flaming the fans of misinformation; they just keep repeating the right's wildly untrue claims as fact.

[Syphon the Sun]

(Can we split this thread, Adam? ETA: No rush, I'll be out of town until the 23rd.)

I'm genuinely interested in what 'conservative misinformation' the media is presenting, because I've only really seen ObamaCare lovefests from CBS, NBC, ABC, MSNBC, CNN, etc.

[mr_thebrain]

i didn't see fox in your list syphon....

i can't be listened to, generally the only television news i'll watch is daily show and colbert report. and while i don't take them at all seriously (that'd be dangerous) i do enjoy that they make everyone else seem batshit insane. mostly cuz THAT sounds about right to me.

anyway, i think those two news programs are the ones that really fan the flames on the death panel crap at the town hall meetings and other programs. creative editing and all, but they have to get their source material from somewhere. so there are enough people who are f****** gonzo enough to make the news on whatever channels they're getting their info from.

perhaps it's all about what time of day you view the channels, what programs you watch on the channels.

anyway, syphon you seem awfully defensive on the matter. what's the deal?

[Syphon the Sun]

I'm not sure I understand your point, brain. I didn't include Fox News because they (for the most part) don't repeat whatever Obama says in a press release. But I'd hardly call Fox News "the media." Sure, they're a member of the group, but one outlet doing something contrasting with what the other ten networks and hundreds of print publications are doing isn't quite the same thing as "the media" (as a whole) doing it.

As far as the death panels bit goes, maybe Obama himself shouldn't have started the whole nonsense back in April. (ETA: Not that I'm saying the particular section in question authorizes such; it's just that the idea isn't completely fabricated and that the particular section isn't as innocuous as it appears to the HuffPo).