Merged The Roy Moore Batcrap Crazy Remark Thread/Roy Moore Is Done

[Regnad Kcin]

luchog, I am sorry for whatever societal difficulties you've experienced as well as continue to.

And thank you for your always-worthwhile contributions to the forum.

 

[Strawberry]

"I don't see it, therefore it doesn't exist/isn't a problem," is probably the quintessential expression of privilege and mainstream obliviousness.

For my part, when I was younger I tended to believe that racism was a minor curiosity, the realm of backwoods hicks and fringe nutcases; but more or less gone from mainstream society. Then I started reading and listening to minority voices, to black people, hispanic people, First Nations people, and so on. And when I really paid attention to their experiences, it became much more obvious how thoroughly ingrained racism still is in mainstream American culture. The violent racism is far less common than it was in the '50s and '60s (but seems to be having a resurgence of popularity), but subtle, sneering, patronizing racism is still endemic.

I think what really clinched it for me was finally coming to terms with, and coming out as, a transgendered person. Once I did that, I became more acutely aware of how pervasive transphobia is in American culture, not just mainstream culture, but so many different subcultures and under-cultures. Constantly being the butt of jokes, being snidely acknowledged as this sort of person who is protected by certain socio-political conventions, but is not worthy of any consideration or courtesy or respect beyond the minimum mandated responsibility to pretend that such a person as myself is an equal member of a society that underneath that pretense would prefer that I did not exist.

That was an "a ha" moment, that enabled me to more easily understand what other groups endured, and made me become more skeptical regarding claims of living in a "post-racial" society, and more skeptical of the white mainstream portrayal of minority experiences.

That's an interesting perspective, I hadn't considered it that way before despite having a recent "a ha moment" myself for different reasons.

Thanks for sharing.

 

[jimbob]

Maybe I'm not one of "these people", but I often ask the origin of last names with which I am unfamiliar. I think you go too far when you suggest that such questions are suspect.

Disclosure - of the 21 people in my small office area, 10 are immigrants to the UK (of whom a couple are EU nationals) and there is a similar ratio in my larger organisation.

I see nothing wrong in asking someone where they come from, or the origin of their names. I suspect you probably don't ask someone what kind of name they have, but more along the lines of where the name came from..

When I read Giordano's post I read it as "what [the hell] kind of name [do you think] is that" with the bits in square brackets being barely unsaid.

Does that make sense? I suppose there are ways I might think of saying what kind of name is that, and be polite, but mostly that particular choice of words sounds rude to my ears.

 

[phiwum]

Disclosure - of the 21 people in my small office area, 10 are immigrants to the UK (of whom a couple are EU nationals) and there is a similar ratio in my larger organisation.

I see nothing wrong in asking someone where they come from, or the origin of their names. I suspect you probably don't ask someone what kind of name they have, but more along the lines of where the name came from..

When I read Giordano's post I read it as "what [the hell] kind of name [do you think] is that" with the bits in square brackets being barely unsaid.

Does that make sense? I suppose there are ways I might think of saying what kind of name is that, and be polite, but mostly that particular choice of words sounds rude to my ears.

That choice of words sounds awkward to me, but I wouldn't presume the bracketed bits and I wouldn't think of it as particularly rude, personally.

But, no, I wouldn't ask such an oddly worded question.

 

[Mumbles]

To add to what Giordano has pointed out - have you read the DoJ report into Ferguson PD?

Amongst the petty corruption, there was plenty of racial prejudice (literally pre-judice - as it included the court officials). Yet Ferguson had a lower disparity ration for its vehicle stops than the Missouri average.

It's utterly implausible that Ferguson was a uniquely bad apple, as opposed to fairly representative of similar police departments. That alone is sufficient to say that institutional racism is still a problem in parts of the US.

Maybe you are lucky and it isn't visible where you are. Maybe it is hard for a member of the majority to see it.

It's also worth noting that every reporter who went to the area and interviewed locals said that white residents said that there were "no racial problems" in Ferguson at all, and the entire matter was a fiction - even as black people pointed out that the police had outright attacked them while they were grieving, and before there had been any riots, and as they widely posted video of police bringing in military surplus even before removing Brown's body from the street.

Make no mistake - they wanted to use what they had acquired - the dogs, the sniper rifles, the mine-resistant vehicles - and whether justified or not, Brown's death was seen as a good excuse to do so. Otherwise, they wouldn't have even considered such a wildly improper show of force, because every decent police force has known for a long time that such displays are recognized as nothing more than a threat, and the residents and protesters respond to the with anger, and sometimes with outright violence. And yet, as I pointed out here, when actual looting broke out, the police were nowhere to be found, and it was the local residents and protestors who protected the stores.

And yet, some people still whine when I refer to Ferguson's systematic looting of the black residents as "white supremacist".

Frankly, as an afro-latino, I've learned to somewhat appreciate the people who say "this is kind of racist, but...", in comparison to "I'm not racist, but...", or even worse, "Did you ever think that it was just..." after I describe something that is very obviously racist.. At least that first person is aware of what they're doing, while the latter two are bigots who lack even that basic level of introspection.