Mitt gets booed at the NAACP convention.

[Clodfobble]

Helping people is oppression?

Does that mean helping people to any degree at all, or only helping a lot instead of a little?

[Ibby]

it depends on how you help.
if you help by giving them financial or economic support, it probably isnt oppression.
if you "help" by taking them from their homelands, enslaving them, forcibly converting them... it probably is.

[Sheldonrs]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHKIMOgoJoU

[infinite monkey]

What if you don't take them from their homelands, but have them live in a certain area, and allow them to have casinos?

[wolf]

Been busy at the rehab, so I'm coming in late on this ...

Yes, Mitt got booed over the Obamacare comments, but he got applause (and not polite golf-clap applause) to other parts of his message to the NAACP.

[classicman]

But ROMNEY is the one who made this about race, by saying that the black NAACP crowd "wants free stuff".

BZZZZZZT!!! Never said those words.

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by Ibby

it depends on how you help.
if you help by giving them financial or economic support, it probably isnt oppression.
if you "help" by taking them from their homelands, enslaving them, forcibly converting them... it probably is.

You can be racist and have perfectly good intentions of helping the people you are racist against. It happens all the time.


Since I'm a pyro...lets throw some gasoline back on this fire.

When it comes to arguing about what is 'racist' or not, it largely comes down to semantics, but this is how I understand it.

Prejudice: When you stereotype a group of people.

Example: PH45 is prejudice against Italians because he thinks they are lazy.


Discrimination: Acting out on a prejudice belief.

Example: PH45 discriminates against Italians by not hiring them. He thinks they are lazy.


Racism: An institutionalized prejudice by a society.
Racist: A person who attempts to institutionalize prejudice or acts out on an institutionalized prejudice.

Example 1: PH45 wrote a racist editorial in the newspaper by urging businesses to not hire Italians because they are lazy.

Example 2: PH45 did not hire an Italian for a job, even though he as qualified, because of a newspaper article.



Obviously racism is very fluid, complex, and the complete opposite of black and white but from my understanding, racism (sexism as well) must be somehow associated with a group of people.

I would agree with Ibby that racism results from people in a position of power. You have to have power in order to institutionalize a prejudice belief. Although, I strongly disagree that racism solely stems from white people, even in the United States. There are a lot of racist beliefs about white people in minority groups and while those racist beliefs may not be able to oppress whites very much, they are still racist since they have power within their own group.

[Griff]

What if Biff truly believes that "free stuff" has the outcome of enslaving the recipient? Bread and Circuses were put in place to reduce rioting not lift people up.

[piercehawkeye45]

Then I would agree with you Griff. Just because someone makes a statement that can perceived as racist doesn't mean it is.

[Cyber Wolf]

I wonder how this discussion applies to the apparent prejudice/auto-distrust/vilification of true red-headed people, especially kids. They're fair-skinned but seem to get it from other Caucasians as well as everyone else. Or is that Okay because, "hey, we're all white here!"?

Stuff like this...

[BigV]

I believe this would represent a good turning point in the discussion from "what is racism?" to "what is race?".

I expect the same amount of agreement.

[Clodfobble]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

What if someone else said, in all sincerity and with deep compassion, "we have to care for our black citizens because they simply do not have the mental capacity to raise themselves to our level"?

Originally Posted by Ibram

...thats still oppression.

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Helping people is oppression?

Originally Posted by Ibby

it depends on how you help. if you help by giving them financial or economic support, it probably isnt oppression.

Giving financial/economic support is exactly what this hypothetical guy said he was going to do. Is it oppression, or isn't it?

[piercehawkeye45]

Originally Posted by BigV

I believe this would represent a good turning point in the discussion from "what is racism?" to "what is race?".

To be serious for a bit. I think the term 'racism' is outdated because our idea of 'race' has progressed significantly. A fundamental assumption behind 'race' is that humans are split up into distinct subgroups (white, black, red, yellow, jews, and gingers) but with human migration, it turns out human phenotype is just a very complicated gray scale.

Yes, an Scandinavian blonde looks very different than a Somali but if you go from Somalia to Ethiopia to Egypt to Turkey to Greece to Italy to Germany to Norway there isn't really a good dividing line. It is a gradient.

Saying that, I think constraining the term 'racism' to institutionalized prejudice against outdated racial groups is stupid. Racism should be applied to any group whether they be blacks, Muslims, or gingers.



Cyberwolf, I am showing that second picture to all my ginger friends. That is amazing.

[Spexxvet]

Originally Posted by Griff

Free stuff for everyone is a problem.

Very very few get anything "for free". You truly have to be incapacitated to get a substantial amount of stuff for free, and I think we can all agree that those who are incapacitated probably should get stuff for free. There's this pervasive idea started by the "welfare queen" comment that people live lives of luxury when they are on the dole, anecdotes of people on welfare driving Cadillacs. That's not a case of poor people who can afford expensive things, it's a case of wealthy people criminally getting welfare payments. The way to fix it is to monitor the system more closely, but that would cost more money and increase the size of government, so we can't do that.

Then there's the issue of people getting help when they can afford it. I am offended that millionaires get social security payments and access to medicare. I am appalled that people who can afford multi-million dollar beachfront homes get their flood insurance subsidized.

Originally Posted by Griff

We are dependent on a program.

If there's not a program to be dependent on, folks would be dependent on a company - a retirement fund instead of social security, a health insurance company instead of medicare/medicaid. The difference? There's no incentive for a government program to screw you to make a few extra dollars. If the folks choose not to use a company for those services, and there's no program, then our fellow citizens would suffer, or they would be helped by charity, or by family or other individuals. It WILL happen, and the cost WILL be expended. It doesn't make a big difference to my wallet if my money goes to a government program, a company, a charity, or I give it directly to a person in need. The cost is there, and it will be paid.

Originally Posted by Griff

The USSR fell, obviously too dependent.

I don't think the cause of the downfall of the USSR is obvious or because it was too dependent.

[tw]

Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45

A fundamental assumption behind 'race' is that humans are split up into distinct subgroups (white, black, red, yellow, Jews, and gingers) but with human migration, it turns out human phenotype is just a very complicated gray scale.

Racism was never about race. It was always about judging people on first impressions. They looked different, so they must be a different 'race'.

Racism is about hate. One benchmark racist was Nixon who would openly disparage other races sometimes right to their face. He was particularly harsh with Jews and Blacks (which were still called Negros back then). But ironically, his actions were often to use (promote) those same people (ie Kissinger). He was responsible for pushing school integration, affirmative action (the Philadelphia Plan), and other social improvements one would not expect from a racist.

More than a racist, Nixon was driven more by his own legacy. Everything he did was first for Nixon. So yes, a racist would also promote concepts he was opposed to but that would make him look good in history.

So how do we define a racist? We know Nixon did have openly racist biases. But then he also suppressed those biases when necessary for his reputation. So extreme so that we had to invent a term - “expletive deleted“.

His logical actions do not change his emotions. Racism is about emotions. Nixon was good at separating his emotions from logical thinking. Others who cannot will let their emotions inspire their racist actions.