What we mean when we talk about racism

[xjx388]

I think racism is thinking of people or treating people differently based solely on their race. Simple as that.

Jill thinks all Jewish people are greedy.
D’Vonne thinks Asians are super smart.
Pedro won’t hire black people.
Louis thinks black people should be separate from white people.

These people are all clearly racist.

Luigi doesn’t think Italy should take in more Syrian refugees because the country’s limited resources are better spent on the needs of Italians.
Jedediah did not hire a Hispanic applicant for a cashier job because she could not communicate effectively in English.
Patrick, an Irish-American, is opening an Asian restaurant.
Wilma is afraid to walk through certain neighborhoods because there is more violent crime in those neighborhoods.

These people are not necessarily racists.

 

[dann]

Luigi appears to be a nationalist, but it's sometimes hard to tell based on what they say they are thinking. Would Luigi say the same thing about (at this point imaginary) refugees from France, Austria or Norway? Or is it an argument that he reserves for people from what corresponds to Trump's "******** countries"?

 

[Minoosh]

Except that it isn't any type of newcomer, is it? Trump wants fewer immigrants from “◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ countries” and more from places like Norway (Vox, Jan. 11, 2018)

Well, Trump. Body of work. I meant someone could say the same thing about anyone new or different. Plus, race itself is a pretty elastic concept. "Jewish race, Irish race" etc. Hutu vs. Tutsi, and I'd still call the genocide racist. I mean, genocide itself is the ultimate racism, isn't it?

I've read that Belgians played up the distinction to set the population of Rwanda against itself, and ID cards that specified ethnic affiliation were a fairly recent innovation. Trevor Noah said the same thing about South Africa, which was obsessed with assigning people to categories. His mother used to have to pretend he wasn't with her because that would brand her a criminal and get her son taken away. Within the black population, there was further division, often based on language rather than skin color.

 

[BobTheCoward]

Can you provide an example?

One specious variation of this is a white person to claim that black people are smarter than white people as demonstrated by their voting behavior and that they want white people to get smarter and vote like that.

 

[BobTheCoward]

I think racism is thinking of people or treating people differently based solely on their race. Simple as that.

Jill thinks all Jewish people are greedy.
D’Vonne thinks Asians are super smart.
Pedro won’t hire black people.
Louis thinks black people should be separate from white people.

These people are all clearly racist.

Luigi doesn’t think Italy should take in more Syrian refugees because the country’s limited resources are better spent on the needs of Italians.
Jedediah did not hire a Hispanic applicant for a cashier job because she could not communicate effectively in English.
Patrick, an Irish-American, is opening an Asian restaurant.
Wilma is afraid to walk through certain neighborhoods because there is more violent crime in those neighborhoods.

These people are not necessarily racists.

Wilma is likely engaged in cognitive dissonance and motivated reasoning. It isn't simply a matter of being bad at probability. She is almost certainly engaging in activity far more dangerous. The reason she rejects those numbers and inflates the risk associated with race is likely a bias to think her race is superior.

 

[dann]

His mother used to have to pretend he wasn't with her because that would brand her a criminal and get her son taken away. Within the black population, there was further division, often based on language rather than skin color.

That's not exactly how it was. Trevor Noah and his mother would walk on one side of the road, his white (Swiss) father on the other side. He describes how he gets out of a fight because he can also speak Zulu. His family is Xhosi, I think, but I may not remember it correctly.
On the upside: His grandmother doesn't spank him because he's the white child!
Great book! Trevor Noah: Born a Crime (GoodReads)

 

[Puppycow]

If literally everyone is racist, then the word loses meaning.

I.e., Obama noting that "racism" doesn't explain everything.

It lets true racists off the hook, because then if even Obama is racist, for not seeing that every single problem is the direct result of racism, then well, the word is basically stripped of meaning.

It's an academic "theory of everything" position. The real world is more complicated. Not everything is best explained through the lens of racism.

 

[Brainster]

Here is the definition of racism that I use exclusively

"prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior."

I don't see that the highlighted is entirely necessary. If someone hates Asians "because they are so good at math," they are not racist? I would just say, "based on that person's race alone." Covers those doggone brainy Chinese.

 

[Minoosh]

That's not exactly how it was. Trevor Noah and his mother would walk on one side of the road, his white (Swiss) father on the other side. He describes how he gets out of a fight because he can also speak Zulu. His family is Xhosi, I think, but I may not remember it correctly.
On the upside: His grandmother doesn't spank him because he's the white child!
Great book! Trevor Noah: Born a Crime (GoodReads)

Because she was afraid of all the terrifying colors white skin turns when bruises are heeling.

He describes some incident with his mother as well. He later joked that she would have to "pretend I wasn't hers, like a bag of weed." He also talks about Zulus wanting to kill them when they find out his mother's Xhosa - and one with a mixed child to boot. So is that racism?

That's not exactly how it was. Trevor Noah and his mother would walk on one side of the road, his white (Swiss) father on the other side. He describes how he gets out of a fight because he can also speak Zulu. His family is Xhosi, I think, but I may not remember it correctly.
On the upside: His grandmother doesn't spank him because he's the white child!
Great book! Trevor Noah: Born a Crime (GoodReads)

She was afraid of all the terrifying colors bruises turn on white people. Green, purple, yellow, the whole range.

He describes some apartheid incidents with his mother as well. He later joked that she would have to "pretend I wasn't hers, like a bag of weed."

He also talks about Zulus wanting to kill them when they find out his mother's Xhosa - and one with a mixed child to boot. So is that racism?

 

[dann]

Yes, that's racism.

 

[TofuFighter]

In SA it's referred to as tribalism rather than racism.

Naturally all things race-related in SA are complicated. We've been having a non-stop conversation about race since the early 90's, and I think that's a good thing because we were made to think about it all the time, made to consider each example of racism as they arose, all the time. It's something I personally think about every day, so I am also glad you started this thread.

To go back to your question, the Zulu and Xhosa people, as an example, have a somewhat fraught relationship, having been historically warring tribes, and that was not helped when the governments of Mandela and Mbeki, our first two real presidents, who were both Xhosa, were perceived to have favoured the Xhosa in the new dispensation. There's naturally a lot more to that story, which probably doesn't really fit into this thread. Tribalism, like racism, became part of our national conversation.

 

[dann]

In some respects, tribalism is probably very similar to nationalism ('nationalism without borders'?), probably more so when you don't share a language. I know next to nothing about tribalism in SA. And I only know about the Xhosas from Trevor Noah's book and an article about the mass suicide in 1857.

 

[JoeMorgue]

My other issue with the broad "racism" is discussion is I've never actually figured out what supposed to happen after we identify racists.

It's always "Well they are racist and *wipes hands.*" as if that's a solution to something.

 

[wareyin]

Aboriginal AFL player Adam Goode had a way of doing outrageous things on the football field such as doing a "war" dance and pretending to throw spears at the crowd when he kicked a goal. In one infamous incident, he singled out a 13 year old female spectator for yelling out "monkey" (an offensive term for Aboriginals) when his team ran out on to the field.

Needless to say, these actions didn't make him very popular with the spectators who booed him every time he touched the football. Ultimately this hostility from the crowds saw him retire from AFL football.

In the ensuing public discussions, Goode was never described as "racist" (though many had other nasty words to describe him). However, the acts of booing saw the crowds constantly labeled as "racist".

I'm not at all familiar with AFL. Do you perhaps mean Adam Goodes, known for his community work and anti-racism advocacy, Australian of the Year 2014?

If so, that certainly explains why people did not call him racist, while people in the crowd yelling racist terms at him would correctly be called racist. This does not seem a good example of people being called racist for simply disagreeing with someone of a different color. Perhaps I'm not understanding something?

 

[JoeMorgue]

We have a common term "racism" because toxic tribalism based on skin coloration is a sadly common one throughout history, so it's just handy to have a word to refer to it.

But that doesn't make it functionally all that different from other forms of tribalism.

This is why I bristle at discussion in which one side is obviously trying to set up a "gotcha" via claiming something isn't "technically racism" but some other form of bigotry as if that matters.

 

[dann]

My other issue with the broad "racism" is discussion is I've never actually figured out what supposed to happen after we identify racists.

It's always "Well they are racist and *wipes hands.*" as if that's a solution to something.

There was a time when racism was frowned upon. Much like fascism, for instance, or cultism. That the label doesn't constitute an argument is obvious. Mussolini wouldn't have objected to being called a fascist.

 

[pgwenthold]

Except that it isn't any type of newcomer, is it? Trump wants fewer immigrants from “◊◊◊◊◊◊◊◊ countries” and more from places like Norway (Vox, Jan. 11, 2018)

"Go back to where you came from" is such a racist trope that it is given as a textbook example of racial bigotry in government employment harassment tutorials. This was established long before trump became president, so it is not pointed at him. He just illustrates the reality of it.

In principle, go back to where you came from doesn't have to be racist, but in practice, that's how it is used.

 

[dann]

We have a common term "racism" because toxic tribalism based on skin coloration is a sadly common one throughout history, so it's just handy to have a word to refer to it.

But that doesn't make it functionally all that different from other forms of tribalism.

I think it does. There was also a time in history when white people didn't seem to think of Africans as an inferior race. The Vikings, for instance, fought against Africans, "blåmænd" (blue men) and enslaved them, but it doesn't appear to have been any different from when they robbed and enslaved people from other parts of the world.
When people begin to think that all men are created equal, they begin to look at the people that they want to consider inferior in a very different way. That makes white supremacism different from historical versions of racism.

 

[dann]

"Go back to where you came from" is such a racist trope that it is given as a textbook example of racial bigotry in government employment harassment tutorials. This was established long before trump became president, so it is not pointed at him. He just illustrates the reality of it.

In principle, go back to where you came from doesn't have to be racist, but in practice, that's how it is used.

As long as I can still use it against Norwegians!

 

[ponderingturtle]

Here is the definition of racism that I use exclusively

"prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior."

This keeps things very simple. It means that...

- a black person calling another black person the n-word is not racist
- a white person calling another white person a redneck is not racist
- criticizing a person who is a different race or skin colour from you is not necessarily racist unless that criticism is based on their race or skin colour

Of course this means that unconscious bias and discrimination is not racism. As well as people who are racist against their own race are not racist. It means there are all kinds of bias and discrimination based on race that are by definition not racist.

So killing someone who is black when in the same situation you would not kill a white person is often not at all racist. Just like as long as it is not conscious racial profiling is totally not racist.

How should we talk about these totally not racist and they will get angry for insinuating they are racist, racial bigotry and bias? Even suggesting it exists will of course create calls that you are calling them racist when they are clearly not.