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TiffToff88

Am i in the wrong? (Racism debate)

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20 minutes ago, MPH said:

 

 

That's a very brave statement to make. and, in my opinion, doesn't show a lot of knowledge on how the American  government system works.

 

 

I will admit however that it does depend in what context you determine the words 'government' and 'state. I'll try to nutshell it for you though

 

 

Americans are quite big on their  constitution and particularly the 'we the people' referring to the government and there is much more of an ephasis on the people being the government and the  government being there to serve the people.

 

 

Now that's not wrong and sounds all great but with such a huge country a lot of power and 'self determination' is handed down to each individual state and then from each state to each district and then in each district each county. On a county lvl there are many more elected officials /decision makers than in England .so, in short  there's a higher chance to shape your own policies and not so much direction and guidance/ advice  handed down the chain to local government towns/ agencies

 

Which again sounds great but on a local lvl that can be open to abuse- in some deep south states there's still pockets of racism and those people are electing locally people who support their views. A quick google search for ' ten most racist cities in Alabama' will tell you what i mean.

 

 

It would be hard to argue with any Hispanic/ African Americans living in those areas that Institutional racism does not exist...

9

The bolded is exactly what I mean, only better phrased.

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5 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

Amadou Diallo, Timothy Stansbury, Sean Bell. All murders that had a possible (if not probable) racial component but were not punished. There are a few others that I have read about, too.

 

Of course, you can't prove beyond a reasonable doubt that racism was a factor when the matter isn't investigated to that conclusion and the perpetrators not punished, but so it goes.

They were all fully investigated and went to court. The state sought to punish them and found no cause to do so. Would you prefer to live in a society where you're guilty until proven innocent? Is that your solution?

 

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1 minute ago, Benguin said:

They were all fully investigated and went to court. The state sought to punish them and found no cause to do so. Would you prefer to live in a society where you're guilty until proven innocent? Is that your solution?

 

 

Not at all.

 

I however continue to take issue with the assertion that the US is somehow living in a post-racial society from the point of view of the state when there are clearly a lot of situations where (probably, but not conclusively) state actors do discriminate and utilise the power of the state to do so. Being given the benefit of the doubt is the way the legal system works, but that's no excuse to dismiss the issue when it arises so often.

 

In any case the voter suppression incident was marked down by a court, showing proof of discrimination (in the eyes of that court anyway) by the state actor who ordered in in the first place.

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I went through a phase of calling everyone boy in my late teens / early twenties. Obnoxious as **** in hindsight but, eh, kids are stupid.

 

Anyway, I remember a mixed race friend of mine (raised by his Jamaican nan) having to point out, back at uni, that I should probably reign it in when talking to black people of older generations as it was used historically as a racially condescending put down and was still pretty offensive to a lot of people.

 

That doesn't make me a racist just as you aren't a racist, I personally didn't have a clue and the word itself isn't a slur out of context.

 

Now that you've been told, if you persisted with referring to people as 'boy' whom find it offensive purely because you didn't care or you wished to offend them, that's where you would be being racist.

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5 minutes ago, Benguin said:

They were all fully investigated and went to court. The state sought to punish them and found no cause to do so. Would you prefer to live in a society where you're guilty until proven innocent? Is that your solution?

 

 

 

and this brings us back to the point that there are many more elected officials in the U.S the district and county court. It's not impossible that some of the jury members are also of a prejudiced persuasion or at least more sympathetic to a certain mindset. especially in some areas.

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1 hour ago, Sharpe's Fox said:

Americans whole identity is based around race. It's a whole different mentality to how many of us would think of ourselves. Your not just white in America. Your Irish, or Italian, or Mexican, or a mix of lots of different ethnicities. It doesn't surprise me that anything construed as an insult over there would soon be extended to include race in it.

And we hide ours behind class, like many Asian /African even caste countries.

We are not the  pure meltingpot we like to believe we are...

I see more 1st-5th generations  nationals mixing and being accepted in USA than Europe, but like

Here in Europe , there are the hidden and dark corners, that are still rife.

At the top Consevative business clubs, golf clubs, right through to perspectives and expectations on the

Everyday life and streets, and within the various  new immigrants themselves.

Even people who mean no harm,including the various mixed ethinic groups can get burnt on trying to explain

a person on seen natural appearances...

Try in USA black/coloured/African American/non-white  ,

then put the simular to Africans, Indians, persians, South Americans, etc etc (sorry for the etc peoples:unsure:)

PC has an habit of chasing itself up its own Ass.

In the 70s in Leicester, around the discos like the Fusion, freewheeler, I saw + experienced more racial clashes

betweem Asians and West Indians than white clashes. Even mixed groups clashing with another.

In the north and across the Irish sea the secetarian clashes went deep into the homes, sometimes pops its Ugly  head up

In places like Chicago.

 

Two actions I found amusing in my youth....3-4 young whites tryed to have a go at Pakistan bus driver, they didnt reckon

they were about to mix it with an ex-paratrooper, it lasted 2 minutes, with every passenger congratulatinging their driver.

Another simular incident a countrybus Groby road run to markfield also with an Indian driver and conductor.

8-10 bumpkins started to Racially play up, and got heavy with the two Indians,.What they didnt realise New parks lads lasses,

Grannies Grandads, on A late night bus, after a goodnight out just want to get home , some who with no thought

Would easily use the term indi/paki/blacki, but those bumpkins had no chance, they got some rough treatment thrown off the bus,

the last bus, coincidently a local Police panda was On its round, a couple of us stayed with them while the bumpkins,

Were going to wait to be picked up, to spend a night back at the city nick....with a few brolly and stick bruises.

Yes we had a few Bullies and Placid/aggressive  Racists around New Parks, but at that time, few liked the idea of 

Ganging up on people, plus their was always the hard no angels but ' goodguys'  around,

like on many of Leicesters council Estates...Today  no idea..!!

More importantly who wanted their weekend ruined, there were sports days and anewed drinking sessions to

Get through before Early Monday morning beckons, and we needed to protect our new peoples, they had these

Great new restaurants, where we could take our friends and misses....oh and drink Late with Bombay duck,

and an onion bahji...

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1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

Not at all.

 

I however continue to take issue with the assertion that the US is somehow living in a post-racial society from the point of view of the state when there are clearly a lot of situations where (probably, but not conclusively) state actors do discriminate and utilise the power of the state to do so. Being given the benefit of the doubt is the way the legal system works, but that's no excuse to dismiss the issue when it arises so often.

 

In any case the voter suppression incident was marked down by a court, showing proof of discrimination (in the eyes of that court anyway) by the state actor who ordered in in the first place.

You are putting words in my mouth. I do not for a minute dispute racism exists and incidents occur but my point is the state is not actively discriminatory. The state punishes racists, the state promotes equal rights. It's like you were saying the other day, we shouldn't be critical of Islam when the odd radical kills someone, as Islam is peaceful for the most part.  

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3 minutes ago, MPH said:

 

 

and this brings us back to the point that there are many more elected officials in the U.S the district and county court. It's not impossible that some of the jury members are also of a prejudiced persuasion or at least more sympathetic to a certain mindset. especially in some areas.

You keep baffling on with out giving any evidence of all this institutional racism. Where is it?

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Just now, Benguin said:

You keep baffling on with out giving any evidence of all this institutional racism. Where is it?

im at work and social advocacy sites are blocked so im limited as to what i can quote and tell you about hence why i explained earlier about doing a simple google search.

 

 

 

You might need to also factor in that i live in the united states and have done for seven years now- i live in the South. Also consider that im a republican voter not a ' lefty liberal' 

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My son got into trouble for calling an over officious dinner lady a cow obviously wrong of him but it did make us laugh when we heard she'd responded by saying don't you call me a cow boy?

 

 

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3 minutes ago, TiffToff88 said:

Well, this has gone much deeper than the "Nah you're alright / yeah you're a racist ****" responses i was expecting!

 

Largely because racism and prejudice are rarely as straightforward as you either are or you're not.

 

It's possible to do or say something ignorant and offensive without being fundamentally racist but it's such an emotive trigger word that it tends to set people off being extremely touchy and defensive.

 

The pages of arguments over the Yuki Abe chanting are testament to that.

 

Sometimes all you're saying is "you probably shouldn't say that, it's actually pretty offensive and this is why" and people hear: "YOU ARE A MASSIVE RACIST, YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED, YOU DON'T DESERVE TO LIVE."

 

Then next thing you know it's all "oh typical lefties" vs "ur so racist omg!" when all it probably really needed was "oh, I didn't realise, fair enough."

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1 minute ago, MPH said:

im at work and social advocacy sites are blocked so im limited as to what i can quote and tell you about hence why i explained earlier about doing a simple google search.

 

 

 

You might need to also factor in that i live in the united states and have done for seven years now- i live in the South. Also consider that im a republican voter not a ' lefty liberal' 

I'm not looking for news articles, quotes off websites or "google searches." That's not evidence, There are people on the internet who believe and write about how the earth is flat. Evidence is statistics, research and reports performed by scholars of a particular field.

 

There are English people who don't know who the current Prime Minister is, so the fact that you live there means nothing.

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11 minutes ago, Benguin said:

You are putting words in my mouth. I do not for a minute dispute racism exists and incidents occur but my point is the state is not actively discriminatory. The state punishes racists, the state promotes equal rights. It's like you were saying the other day, we shouldn't be critical of Islam when the odd radical kills someone, as Islam is peaceful for the most part.  

 

Yeah, I think we agree on that point, though my point is there is still a fair bit of work to do. MPH puts it better than I do and I'm in broad agreement with him.

 

2 minutes ago, Benguin said:

I'm not looking for news articles, quotes off websites or "google searches." That's not evidence, There are people on the internet who believe and write about how the earth is flat. Evidence is statistics, research and reports performed by scholars of a particular field.

 

There are English people who don't know who the current Prime Minister is, so the fact that you live there means nothing.

 

I'm not sure you're debating in good faith there, TBH. Most evidence for this kind of thing is going to be anecdotal by its very nature - you're asking for a burden of proof higher than can feasibly be delivered by almost anyone.

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1 minute ago, Finnegan said:

 

Yeah, this terrible era where people give a shit about offending others.

 

Shambles.

My apologies, I somehow forgot that addressing a Hispanic male as 'boy' is racist. Surprised there's not been even more news coverage.

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1 minute ago, leicsmac said:

Yeah, I think we agree on that point, though my point is there is still a fair bit of work to do. MPH puts it better than I do and I'm in broad agreement with him.

 

I'm not sure you're debating in good faith there, TBH. Most evidence for this kind of thing is going to be anecdotal by its very nature - you're asking for a burden of proof higher than can feasibly be delivered by almost anyone.

I don't actually agree, I was just being cheap and using your argument against you. I think we should be critical of the state and Religions such as Islam, it's just in this case, after being critical, I do not see institutional racism as a prevalent issue and thus it is not useful in the fight against racism to target the state, on the grounds of anecdotal evidence. Most people aren't racist, the state is mostly not racist, conflating the meaning of racism is not helpful. To stop racism, we need to stop putting stock into words like "boy" we need to stop being divisive by blaming "white privilege" and we need to stop talking about it. We also need to accept that racism will never truly disappear, it's evidenced in the earliest history books and is human nature.  

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14 minutes ago, Benguin said:

I don't actually agree, I was just being cheap and using your argument against you. I think we should be critical of the state and Religions such as Islam, it's just in this case, after being critical, I do not see institutional racism as a prevalent issue and thus it is not useful in the fight against racism to target the state, on the grounds of anecdotal evidence. Most people aren't racist, the state is mostly not racist, conflating the meaning of racism is not helpful. To stop racism, we need to stop putting stock into words like "boy" we need to stop being divisive by blaming "white privilege" and we need to stop talking about it. We also need to accept that racism will never truly disappear, it's evidenced in the earliest history books and is human nature.  

 

Ha, fair enough. I see things a bit differently but I guess we're going to have to agree to disagree.

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This reminds me a lot of when Vardy referred to the man at the casino as "Jap," and many people here didn't think/believe that it's considered a racist term. Though I agree with TiffToff88's main point that an older person referring to a younger person as "boy" isn't necessarily racist, I understand the racial connotations that could be construed from using the word "boy" in the context to speaking to an ethnic minority.

 

But the point brought up by Tiff has kind of been buried by the same bullshit that always comes up as it pertains to political correctness. I think both extreme ends of the spectrum are in the wrong here.

1) People shouldn't be trying to construe everything as racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. They should not take offense to everything, and play the victim card to further their political agenda. They should not enforce their beliefs on others, and push the use of their own preferred pronouns and all that. 

2) But at the same time, there should not always be this backlash against political correctness. Some terms have a long history of racism, and they should have no place in a civilized society. It's not too much to ask people to self-moderate their use of language and not use a term they know is generally considered offensive. For example, you might not think "Jap" is racist, but you probably know now people think it's racist, so why use it unless you want to appear racist. 

 

It just seems like common sense to me, which in 2017, is not very common. It's like we've lost the moderate political stances because the fringe minority on each side is the loudest. 

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2 minutes ago, Detroit Blues said:

This reminds me a lot of when Vardy referred to the man at the casino as "Jap," and many people here didn't think/believe that it's considered a racist term. Though I agree with TiffToff88's main point that an older person referring to a younger person as "boy" isn't necessarily racist, I understand the racial connotations that could be construed from using the word "boy" in the context to speaking to an ethnic minority.

 

But the point brought up by Tiff has kind of been buried by the same bullshit that always comes up as it pertains to political correctness. I think both extreme ends of the spectrum are in the wrong here.

1) People shouldn't be trying to construe everything as racist, sexist, homophobic, etc. They should not take offense to everything, and play the victim card to further their political agenda. They should not enforce their beliefs on others, and push the use of their own preferred pronouns and all that. 

2) But at the same time, there should not always be this backlash against political correctness. Some terms have a long history of racism, and they should have no place in a civilized society. It's not too much to ask people to self-moderate their use of language and not use a term they know is generally considered offensive. For example, you might not think "Jap" is racist, but you probably know now people think it's racist, so why use it unless you want to appear racist. 

 

It just seems like common sense to me, which in 2017, is not very common. It's like we've lost the moderate political stances because the fringe minority on each side is the loudest. 

Do you believe that it's right that the initial incident i brought up has become viral and been brought to the attention of the public? It's a difficult one to call in my opinion. On one hand, its a Mayor known for having racist views, calling a hispanic man "boy", but on the other hand it may well just be an old self entitled bloke attempting to assert his dominance on a younger man in a purely non-racial generally dickish move, in which case there's no reason why this sort of behaviour needs to become known to the public.

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Another big problem for me is this whole notion of offensive words. It's just silly. It's a word who cares. What does being offended do? Does it cause some horrible painful condition or something? If what you're being called is true i.e "you're a fatty", it's hardly as if you didn't know you're fatty, if you keep eating and don't actively try to lose weight then clearly you're content with it, if you want to lose weight, then the insult might be the kick up the arse you needed. If what you're being called is subjective I.e "you're an ugly ****" then seek revenge by picking a fault with them, you can choose anything, it's subjective! If you have been told by someone or taught by your teacher or parents that what you're being called has negative connotations, then choose not to derive said negative connotations from it! It's you who interprets language, not someone else.

 

Actual racism, i.e oppressing a race in law or with violence is what people should care about and fight not whether the word "boy" or "jap" is racist.

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1 hour ago, Benguin said:

Another big problem for me is this whole notion of offensive words. It's just silly. It's a word who cares. What does being offended do? Does it cause some horrible painful condition or something? If what you're being called is true i.e "you're a fatty", it's hardly as if you didn't know you're fatty, if you keep eating and don't actively try to lose weight then clearly you're content with it, if you want to lose weight, then the insult might be the kick up the arse you needed. If what you're being called is subjective I.e "you're an ugly ****" then seek revenge by picking a fault with them, you can choose anything, it's subjective! If you have been told by someone or taught by your teacher or parents that what you're being called has negative connotations, then choose not to derive said negative connotations from it! It's you who interprets language, not someone else.

 

Actual racism, i.e oppressing a race in law or with violence is what people should care about and fight not whether the word "boy" or "jap" is racist.

Strange logic. Are you saying that nobody should be offended by anything because it's up to them how they choose to interpret the insults?

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Just now, Voll Blau said:

Strange logic. Are you saying that nobody should be offended by anything because it's up to them how they choose to interpret the insults?

More that I don't really understand why people get offended and furthermore why offence is a problem. I also think that when something stops being offensive, it doesn't get said anymore. I have never been offended in my life but I'd be prepared to bet everything I own that if I gave no reaction to someone's comment they'd eventually stop using it and if I reacted heavily, they'd never stop using it.

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