The point is, truethat doesn't even understand what we typically label as black culture. His argument is "I don't know anything that black people do outside of hip-hop, therefore that is all they do."
I think you're misrepresenting him here.
No, my argument boils down to "don't assign characteristics to ethnicities instead of their actual causes." Please see my diagram in the other thread. It's a specific point about how our phrasing is wrong, and that phrasing can create bad ideas and wrong actions.
Which sounds more like you are just trying to make a general point about stereotypes. I actually think your phrasing is wrong here. You seem to be ignoring all the nuances that go into talking about cultures and ethnicities. Black culture is a way of summing up a very general, shared experience of a group of people. Within it is the shared history of slavery, the Civil Rights Movement, as well as forms of music and art. Skin color is actually the smallest part of this culture, IMO. I think it's possible for non-blacks to actually become part of black culture and vice versa. I think it's superficial to get obsessive about the labels we use for all of this.
Well, there's a difference between a nationality and an ethnicity. Nations have common laws, cultural symbols and so on that you can actually assign to people of that nationality. Ethnicities do not. It's accurate to say that Americans sing the Star-Spangled Banner as their national anthem. It's not accurate to say that "White People" do anything specific.
Ethnicities actually DO identify along similar cultural lines (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnicity). And a nationality is not really what I was talking about. When I say Japanese culture, I'm not talking about their national anthem or their laws, that would be Japanese nationality. Japanese culture has to do with social norms and general rules regarding acceptable behavior as well as trends in the arts. If I say the Japanese have a very respectful culture, I'm not saying all Japanese people act respectful towards each other.
I think economics is different, because in a free-market each person looks out for their own interests, so economic decisions aren't going to be as dangerous as lawmaking decisions.
Whether or not something is dangerous doesn't really enter into the picture just yet. And I don't think the economics example is any different, to be honest. Just as I could run a statistical regression on what kinds of jobs women have a tendency to take on average, I can run a statistical regression on what time of music a white person is likely to listen to on average.
If you incorrectly conclude that Hispanic people don't read, so you don't market novels to Hispanic people, the worst that can happen is that you miss out on sales and some potential fans of a book may never see it.
But if you incorrectly conclude that Hispanic people don't read, so you bar Hispanic people from schools, you're effecting people's lives and preventing the individual Hispanic person from achieving something.
That doesn't make any sense. If we were to run a regression and find that a person who self-identifies as Hispanic is, on average, a certain percentage less likely to, say, read a book in a given year, we don't ban all Hispanic people from schools. The statistical and economic reasoning that you're afraid the government will use to pass laws and make decisions is ALL READY in use and has been for quite some time. That's how they figure out where, when and how to target particular legislation. If the government were to run the regression and find that Hispanic people, on average, are less literate than other groups, they would probably launch some kind of reading initiative in densely populated Hispanic areas. They don't just do it with racial groupings either. They look at education backgrounds, class, age, gender, etc.
There's nothing insulting about someone assuming you like something. I wouldn't get angry at a harmless mistake. I do listen to hip-hop music like lots of other types of music, but I don't buy into that ridiculous culture.
Here is a very important distinction that I'm glad you made. You can listen to hip hop without buying into that culture. There is a hip hop culture that is separate from people who just happen to listen to hip hop. But what can we say about the hip hop culture? What makes it a culture if not the fact that a person happens to listen to it? My guess would be that most people think of the hip hop culture as baggy pants, bandanas, extravagant jewelry, etc. Would I be right about that? We have generalized an idea about hip hop, however there plenty of hip hoppers that don't always fit the mold of what we think makes a person part of that culture. Are we therefore wrong to talk about a hip hop culture? Do you see where I'm going with this? We can eventually subdivide every "culture" down to its individuals and point out that really none of them are the same. Is that to say that there's no such thing as culture then?
So someone walking up to me assuming I heard the latest 50 Cent album doesn't bother me. But, if someone says something BAD about me or a group of which I am a member, then I'm going to be irritated like anyone else. Even moreso if the insult is wrong and ignorant.
That sounds like cherry picking to me. You don't mind if someone generalizes you into a culture as long as it's not a "bad" culture.
Would it make it more clear if I said that I also have a very extensive DVD collection, but I think Hollywood "celebrity" culture is ridiculous and shallow?
No. Instead, let me ask if you think there's anything besides skin color that goes into "whiteness" and "blackness"?
