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Racism is contextual

ahhell said:
I can't disagree too much with that. I just think the small amount of opposition to Idris Elba as Heimdall was worthy of note and you would probably draw the line at some higher level of outrage.

It is absolutely true that you can find some one who's outrage about just about anything and started a facebook group on account of it.
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True and none of this is a 100% exact science.

Anonymous online complaining actually does provide some information we can use and in most cases there probably is some... meaning or context to take from how what expression people express and how they express them in a totally anonymous environment.

If tomorrow they announce they are going to reboot.... er Captain Kangaroo as a black wheelchair-bound transgender otherkin I'm sure the backlash would be massive. Separating the the wheat from the chaff as to who was yelling because who was just kneejerk not liking change and those who thought the change was stupid would not exactly be fun, but there would still be a meaningful message in all that noise somewhere, or at least their could be.

In some cases the internet's (and broader society's) Outrage Machine does suffer from the "Go look for things to be offended about" syndrome. In some cases the loudest and most hateful parts of a group drown out the reasonable ones.

And yeah the idea that in some cases a cultural idea is so ingrained that you can't safely argue them without risking at best mockery.... listen I know that horrible, horrible people cling to this idea like a safety blanket ("Oh can't I say that Jews and Blacks are subhuman without getting attack by the PC POLICE!" nonsense) but that doesn't mean it's never true in any context. Some opinions just... suck to try to argue these days.
 
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Mycroft said:
I would posit that any definition of racism that only includes unverifiable thoughts and feelings while excluding actions and institutions that systematically disadvantage members of a race (gender or whatever) is incomplete at best.
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Okay, I see your point, if we're talking about institutional racism as well. My not so hypothetical landlord certainly contributed to institutional racism, a very bad thing to do, but I call a person racist primarily based on his attitudes and beliefs.

You're right as well that we can only imperfectly suss attitudes and beliefs.
 
Belz... said:
No, the goal is to define racism as being anything that disadvantages minorities, regardless of whether it's intentional or not, natural or man-made, and as something that can only be done by white people.
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I haven't seen anyone here explicitly invoke power+prejudice, so I don't think your last criticism is apt.
 
Belz... said:
Some cases?
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Yes, some.

There's a fine line between "looking for stuff to be offended about" and "bringing stuff that's been swept under the rug to attention." And no not every unpleasant group is just being ruined by the loudest people. There are no huge groups of moderate Nazis that the loud ones are drowning out.
 
phiwum said:
Okay, I see your point, if we're talking about institutional racism as well. My not so hypothetical landlord certainly contributed to institutional racism, a very bad thing to do, but I call a person racist primarily based on his attitudes and beliefs.

You're right as well that we can only imperfectly suss attitudes and beliefs.
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Exactly there is no reason to call someone a racist for killing a black person in the same situtation they wouldn't kill a white person because that says nothing about their beliefs in racial superiority of one race over the other. I just results in someone dead for being black in a totally not racist way. Equality of opportunity not to get kill not equality of outcome of not killing more blacks. They had every opportunity not to be in their back yard with a cell phone to scare the police.
 
To me at least the difference between institutional racism and situational racism is so different using the generic term "racism" is almost pointless and I think confusing (or deliberately misconstruing) the two concepts is leading to a lot of the drama on a societal level.
 
Belz... said:
Not yet, but I'm covering my bases. Besides, I was addressing a nonsensical strawman, so the accuracy of my own post wasn't exactly important.
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Sorry, Belz..., I disagree. We doubt get a free pass at making straw men on the grounds someone else did it first.
 
JoeMorgue said:
To me at least the difference between institutional racism and situational racism is so different using the generic term "racism" is almost pointless and I think confusing (or deliberately misconstruing) the two concepts is leading to a lot of the drama on a societal level.
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Could be, though I'm not sure situational racism is quite what I mean. I'm talking about the difference between contributing to institutional racism and being motivated by racist beliefs. The latter I might call personal racism, though there's surely a term already for what I mean.

Aside from that quibble, I agree with your point.
 
phiwum said:
Could be, though I'm not sure situational racism is quite what I mean. I'm talking about the difference between contributing to institutional racism and being motivated by racist beliefs. The latter I might call personal racism, though there's surely a term already for what I mean.

Aside from that quibble, I agree with your point.
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Without going too deep and hard into pure semantics (this being the internet where discussion without nuance always degrade into semantics and discussion with any actual meaningful nuance are always destroyed by semantics) and without getting bogged down in the terminology too much...

- Yes it is absolutely possible for on a one-on-one bases for a member of a disenfranchised group/minority/whatever to be racist against a member of the group in power/majority/whatever and on a person to person level that action is just as wrong, hateful, and personally damaging.

- Yes when on a societal level when such individual biases and bigotry start to influence institutional functions and societal rules this does become a different thing and has to be addressed as such.
 
JoeMorgue said:
Without going too deep and hard into pure semantics (this being the internet where discussion without nuance always degrade into semantics and discussion with any actual meaningful nuance are always destroyed by semantics) and without getting bogged down in the terminology too much...

- Yes it is absolutely possible for on a one-on-one bases for a member of a disenfranchised group/minority/whatever to be racist against a member of the group in power/majority/whatever and on a person to person level that action is just as wrong, hateful, and personally damaging.

- Yes when on a societal level when such individual biases and bigotry start to influence institutional functions and societal rules this does become a different thing and has to be addressed as such.
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No disagreement. Not quite the point I was addressing, but sure, I agree.
 
phiwum said:
No disagreement. Not quite the point I was addressing, but sure, I agree.
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Sorry I was bouncing off your point, not directly refuting it.

(I know I'm bad about that, my brain is missing the "excuse me I'm about the change the subject and/or direction of the discussion" subroutine.)
 
JoeMorgue said:
Sorry I was bouncing off your point, not directly refuting it.

(I know I'm bad about that, my brain is missing the "excuse me I'm about the change the subject and/or direction of the discussion" subroutine.)
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No problem, I didn't think you were refuting me. I just thought I'd point out that I agree on this matter.
 
ponderingturtle said:
You have to remember that the primary goal is to define racism as the act of Racists who are of course swastika waving Nazis only.
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The goal of whom? People who want to continue to perpetuate racism? I want to be more charitable than that and assume that people have legitimate blind spots and don't always see racism.

ponderingturtle said:
And certainly to keep it away from any actions the person involved in the discussion might have done. This is most easily done by keeping racism as a binary state instead of a spectrum that everyone is on.
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I think you're right. There is a spectrum and everybody is on it somewhere. By that same token we need to take the stigma out of racism so we can talk about it and address it without blame and condemnation.
 
Belz... said:
I'm sure it's shocking to you that the majority turns up more often than the minority.
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Yeah, but the issue is that they turn up even more than their representation in the overall population.

More importantly, it doesn't need to be that way. White people are capable of seeing and understanding the experiences and perspectives of non-white people, so it's not necessary to default to white in casting just to appeal to that majority.
 
Mycroft said:
White people are capable of seeing and understanding the experiences and perspectives of non-white people, so it's not necessary to default to white in casting just to appeal to that majority.
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1. There's plenty of people who will absolutely tell that's not true, that white people can never hope to understand the plight or perspective of non-whites. That's literally the point of the entire "Check your privilege" movement.

2. Why does this work only one way? If white people are capable of understanding the perspective and experiences of non-white people, why do non-white people need representatives of their own demographics?
 
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