One of these three is not like the others: oh, right, one of them is an entire fucking class of people who don’t get to choose their skin tone at birth. Shut the fuck up with that. Cops and politicos get to choose where they stand. The fuck, precisely, do you expect people to do about the color of their skin?
My issue isn’t with white people, my issue is everytime someone accurately identifies an issue, there is always someone in the comments with the “its not all X…” except 95% of the people are not saying its all of them. It’s a distraction.
Your comment proves exactly what im getting at you got so upset that I suggested white people have some issue that you didnt stop to question if you even understood what I was saying. Im not saying white people are inherently bad at birth. I never even said anything close to that.
We need to be able to say democrats have a genocide issue. Full stop.
Checking on your comment history, you seem like a reasonable person, with whom i probably agree on many issues. I agree with nearly everything you have said. However, since i know you’re american, just like me, allow me to try to give my perspective on why your statement on white people, writ-large, is problematic:
Every single person on earth is hardwired to discriminate against “the other”. You, me, Trump and <insert person you don’t find reprehensible here>. This instinct toward petty tribalism is the single greatest challenge we currently face as a species (aside, perhaps, from the fact that we’re allowing industrial capitalism to actively boil our planet).
Can you not see how the unmeasured response of saying “people with this color of skin have this problem” is, inherently, not just problematic, but actively defeats the purpose of what you’re trying to say? This isn’t the same thing as a positive statement like “black lives matter”. Yes, of course “all lives matter”, but clearly the fact that black lives matter needs to be explicitly pointed out. However, saying that “black lives matter” is not claiming anything negative about any person based on an immutable trait.
Consider the following statements common here in the US, each of which is something you should find reprehensible. In each case, consider the immutable trait, and what libelous problem is being inherently associated with that group of people:
“Mexicans/Colombians have a drug problem”
“The Chinese have a genocide problem”
“Black people have a crime problem”
For each of these, a portion of the people with that immutable trait definitively do have that problem. There are Mexican and Colombian cartels. The Chinese government is perpetrating a genocide against an ethnic minority. Some black people are criminals. However, when you paint with such a wide brush, you don’t just perpetrate discrimination against the whole group of people who don’t get to choose where they were born, or the style of their governance, let alone the color of their skin. You actively alienate any people in each group who might agree with the existence of a problem, and you also ignore any context which shows the greater, actual problem:
The systems of drug regulation have failed.
Dictatorial regimes perpetrate genocides as easily as signing a piece of paper.
Crime is a problem everywhere, regardless of skin tone, as are its underlying causes of poverty and lack of opportunity.
Obviously, each of those earlier statements (especially the one about black people. That one hurt to write) is deeply flawed, and utterly unproductive. Anyone painting an immutable trait as having a specific problem (aside from genetic problems) is inherently engaging in that same alienation, that same othering, as the people they find so reprehensible. Everyone has a moral duty to work toward ending the issues which plague our civilisation, but saying “you have a racism problem” not only misses the point entirely, but actively makes the problem worse.
I have no problem with calling out discrimination against a group of people, but making a statement like “men have a domestic abuse problem” is inherently unproductive and problematic, and sounds like nothing but picking a fight. “There is a serious problem with white people discriminating against people of different skin tones.” Vs. “White people have a racism problem. Full stop.”
In fact, I wouldn’t even take issue with the statement “We have a racism problem caused by white people”. Or “among white people”. That’s still painting with a wide brush, and is still problematic, but it isn’t directly implying that every single person with white skin is perpetrating racist acts.
Anyone engaging with the democratic party must contend with the fact that the leaders of the party are actively abetting genocide. But the fact that you were born with white skin does not imply that you need to engage with the problem of racism. EVERYONE needs to engage with the problem of racism, and bringing an immutable trait into it to call people out is inherently problematic.
White people and white culture are in positions of power. It is their foot on peoples’ necks, quite literally.
If every other time I turned on my TV there was a different ethnicity doing this i would call them out, but that isn’t what’s happening and to somehow act like racism within the black community is part of the reason the black community keeps suffering from white racism is just distasteful to me.
I don’t think that’s what you are trying to say but it is certainly adjacent to position and I’ve heard many white folks argue that, but don’t worry they have “black friends” TM.
“White” isn’t an ethnicity. Whiteness is a social construct manufactured (and manicured) as a means to enforce the very in-group privilege and out-group hatred you say (and I do believe you) that you despise and oppose. Whiteness is a nebulous and ever-shifting line that allows or disallows membership depending on what most benefits the core members (the ruling class) at any given time, under whatever given material circumstances. “White people have a racism problem. Full stop" is a 100% true statement because whiteness itself is an inherently racist construct. I am confident you mean well and are genuine in your desire to tear down racism, but doing so means recognizing the racism you still, perhaps unknowingly, believe and perpetuate.
But even if we set all of that aside, and go back to that little list you made as a frankly terrible comparison to other poster’s correct statement that white people have a racism problem:
“Mexicans/Colombians have a drug problem”
“The Chinese have a genocide problem”
“Black people have a crime problem”
And add to that list the statement you had a problem with. Again,
“White people have a racism problem."
Can you spot the glaring difference? Why one of the 4 items of that list does not belong among the rest? If not, let me spell it out: Mexicans and Colombians (LATAM people in general) are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. Chinese people are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. Black people are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. White people are a group who all benefit from the historic and current suppression of others and white supremacist global hegemony. White privilege is real, and whether one is opposed to it or not, every white person benefits from it.
You mention “tribalism” as being this foundational problem, but looking at it that way misses the most important aspect of the vast majority of conflicts of this world. Tribalism implies groups of more or less equal standing both otherizing their outgroup, but that’s not really an issue in the world in which we live, but it does benefit the ruling class when people mistakenly think it is. We don’t live in a world of tribes with equivalent power, coming into conflict starting from roughly equal footing. We live in a world of oppressors and oppressed. A world of tremendous asymmetry of conflict. The oppressor perpetrating violence upon those they oppress will never be justified, but the violence of the oppressed against its oppressors in its struggle to free itself from that oppression nearly always will be.
Finally, it is tangential to everything else in my comment, but there is actually one of the three items you listed that also stands out in the list and doesn’t quite fit, but for reasons that are… peripheral to the everything else being discussed, but still deserves to be pointed out.
“Mexicans/Colombians have a drug problem”
“The Chinese have a genocide problem”
“Black people have a crime problem”
The nations of Mexico and Columbia do have a problem with drugs being produced in and distributed from their countries, not inherently because of their people but because of the nature of US imperialism in those countries. Despite the sick joke we all know the “war on drugs” to be, it is literally because of the US enforcing drug production in these countries that they have this “problem.” It is a problem of US imperialism. Likewise “black people have a crime problem” is also true in that US white supremacy has strictly imposed and enforced poverty on black people, with “crime” (in the problematic traditional sense of the word) is always an issue where there is poverty. So those two list items are problems, but they are themselves rooted in the fact that white people have a racism problem. That middle item in your list though? It is wholly fabrication. The Chinese do not have a genocide problem. I suppose we can still say that item exists because of racism, but where items 1 and 3 do exist in some real sense (but are rooted in the material effects of white supremacy), item 2 is just a grotesque fantasy without any material basis.
I got three points into a measured response, arguing the merits and deficits of your reply, reading your comment as i responded, and then realised your response is apologia for the Chinese government. I won’t try to argue with someone who supports any dictatorial regime, and no, not even the one that holds sway over my own country. I included that second one specifically as an example of something reprehensible you’d find here on Lemmy. I just found it. I hope you have a good day.
The Uyghur genocide is an American fantasy. People like you who push it are directly hurting Uyghur interests as they struggled with real abuses which gets covered in mud when people like you keep pushing your atrocity propaganda. Also we have better and more democratic involvement than you. You really should study a topic before you speak so arrogantly on it.
One of these three is not like the others: oh, right, one of them is an entire fucking class of people who don’t get to choose their skin tone at birth. Shut the fuck up with that. Cops and politicos get to choose where they stand. The fuck, precisely, do you expect people to do about the color of their skin?
My issue isn’t with white people, my issue is everytime someone accurately identifies an issue, there is always someone in the comments with the “its not all X…” except 95% of the people are not saying its all of them. It’s a distraction.
Your comment proves exactly what im getting at you got so upset that I suggested white people have some issue that you didnt stop to question if you even understood what I was saying. Im not saying white people are inherently bad at birth. I never even said anything close to that.
We need to be able to say democrats have a genocide issue. Full stop.
White people have a racism problem. Full stop.
Cops have an accountability problem. Full stop.
Politicians have a lobbying issue. Full stop.
Checking on your comment history, you seem like a reasonable person, with whom i probably agree on many issues. I agree with nearly everything you have said. However, since i know you’re american, just like me, allow me to try to give my perspective on why your statement on white people, writ-large, is problematic:
Every single person on earth is hardwired to discriminate against “the other”. You, me, Trump and <insert person you don’t find reprehensible here>. This instinct toward petty tribalism is the single greatest challenge we currently face as a species (aside, perhaps, from the fact that we’re allowing industrial capitalism to actively boil our planet).
Can you not see how the unmeasured response of saying “people with this color of skin have this problem” is, inherently, not just problematic, but actively defeats the purpose of what you’re trying to say? This isn’t the same thing as a positive statement like “black lives matter”. Yes, of course “all lives matter”, but clearly the fact that black lives matter needs to be explicitly pointed out. However, saying that “black lives matter” is not claiming anything negative about any person based on an immutable trait.
Consider the following statements common here in the US, each of which is something you should find reprehensible. In each case, consider the immutable trait, and what libelous problem is being inherently associated with that group of people:
For each of these, a portion of the people with that immutable trait definitively do have that problem. There are Mexican and Colombian cartels. The Chinese government is perpetrating a genocide against an ethnic minority. Some black people are criminals. However, when you paint with such a wide brush, you don’t just perpetrate discrimination against the whole group of people who don’t get to choose where they were born, or the style of their governance, let alone the color of their skin. You actively alienate any people in each group who might agree with the existence of a problem, and you also ignore any context which shows the greater, actual problem:
Obviously, each of those earlier statements (especially the one about black people. That one hurt to write) is deeply flawed, and utterly unproductive. Anyone painting an immutable trait as having a specific problem (aside from genetic problems) is inherently engaging in that same alienation, that same othering, as the people they find so reprehensible. Everyone has a moral duty to work toward ending the issues which plague our civilisation, but saying “you have a racism problem” not only misses the point entirely, but actively makes the problem worse.
I have no problem with calling out discrimination against a group of people, but making a statement like “men have a domestic abuse problem” is inherently unproductive and problematic, and sounds like nothing but picking a fight. “There is a serious problem with white people discriminating against people of different skin tones.” Vs. “White people have a racism problem. Full stop.”
In fact, I wouldn’t even take issue with the statement “We have a racism problem caused by white people”. Or “among white people”. That’s still painting with a wide brush, and is still problematic, but it isn’t directly implying that every single person with white skin is perpetrating racist acts.
Anyone engaging with the democratic party must contend with the fact that the leaders of the party are actively abetting genocide. But the fact that you were born with white skin does not imply that you need to engage with the problem of racism. EVERYONE needs to engage with the problem of racism, and bringing an immutable trait into it to call people out is inherently problematic.
White people and white culture are in positions of power. It is their foot on peoples’ necks, quite literally.
If every other time I turned on my TV there was a different ethnicity doing this i would call them out, but that isn’t what’s happening and to somehow act like racism within the black community is part of the reason the black community keeps suffering from white racism is just distasteful to me.
I don’t think that’s what you are trying to say but it is certainly adjacent to position and I’ve heard many white folks argue that, but don’t worry they have “black friends” TM.
Just call a spade a spade.
“White” isn’t an ethnicity. Whiteness is a social construct manufactured (and manicured) as a means to enforce the very in-group privilege and out-group hatred you say (and I do believe you) that you despise and oppose. Whiteness is a nebulous and ever-shifting line that allows or disallows membership depending on what most benefits the core members (the ruling class) at any given time, under whatever given material circumstances. “White people have a racism problem. Full stop" is a 100% true statement because whiteness itself is an inherently racist construct. I am confident you mean well and are genuine in your desire to tear down racism, but doing so means recognizing the racism you still, perhaps unknowingly, believe and perpetuate.
But even if we set all of that aside, and go back to that little list you made as a frankly terrible comparison to other poster’s correct statement that white people have a racism problem:
And add to that list the statement you had a problem with. Again,
Can you spot the glaring difference? Why one of the 4 items of that list does not belong among the rest? If not, let me spell it out: Mexicans and Colombians (LATAM people in general) are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. Chinese people are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. Black people are a group suppressed by white people and white supremacist global hegemony. White people are a group who all benefit from the historic and current suppression of others and white supremacist global hegemony. White privilege is real, and whether one is opposed to it or not, every white person benefits from it.
You mention “tribalism” as being this foundational problem, but looking at it that way misses the most important aspect of the vast majority of conflicts of this world. Tribalism implies groups of more or less equal standing both otherizing their outgroup, but that’s not really an issue in the world in which we live, but it does benefit the ruling class when people mistakenly think it is. We don’t live in a world of tribes with equivalent power, coming into conflict starting from roughly equal footing. We live in a world of oppressors and oppressed. A world of tremendous asymmetry of conflict. The oppressor perpetrating violence upon those they oppress will never be justified, but the violence of the oppressed against its oppressors in its struggle to free itself from that oppression nearly always will be.
Finally, it is tangential to everything else in my comment, but there is actually one of the three items you listed that also stands out in the list and doesn’t quite fit, but for reasons that are… peripheral to the everything else being discussed, but still deserves to be pointed out.
The nations of Mexico and Columbia do have a problem with drugs being produced in and distributed from their countries, not inherently because of their people but because of the nature of US imperialism in those countries. Despite the sick joke we all know the “war on drugs” to be, it is literally because of the US enforcing drug production in these countries that they have this “problem.” It is a problem of US imperialism. Likewise “black people have a crime problem” is also true in that US white supremacy has strictly imposed and enforced poverty on black people, with “crime” (in the problematic traditional sense of the word) is always an issue where there is poverty. So those two list items are problems, but they are themselves rooted in the fact that white people have a racism problem. That middle item in your list though? It is wholly fabrication. The Chinese do not have a genocide problem. I suppose we can still say that item exists because of racism, but where items 1 and 3 do exist in some real sense (but are rooted in the material effects of white supremacy), item 2 is just a grotesque fantasy without any material basis.
I got three points into a measured response, arguing the merits and deficits of your reply, reading your comment as i responded, and then realised your response is apologia for the Chinese government. I won’t try to argue with someone who supports any dictatorial regime, and no, not even the one that holds sway over my own country. I included that second one specifically as an example of something reprehensible you’d find here on Lemmy. I just found it. I hope you have a good day.
The Uyghur genocide is an American fantasy. People like you who push it are directly hurting Uyghur interests as they struggled with real abuses which gets covered in mud when people like you keep pushing your atrocity propaganda. Also we have better and more democratic involvement than you. You really should study a topic before you speak so arrogantly on it.