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Racism
Scourge of the nation for centuries and centuries to come. But is the campaign to end racism just as racist?
Take Black History month. Isn't it racist to single out blacks and put them on a pedestal? shouldn't all the other races have a chunk of the year say a month for their heritage? Then we'd have to divide it, say 8 months white history, keep Feb. for black people, have the two other months divided by Hispanics and Asians, and every leap year, February twenty-ninth is devoted to Others. (according to this chart., which i don't believe, mainly because my house isn't 11.2% black (Frankly I'm pretty sure it's painted white with at least 90% wood)) But I digress. If I feel the need to say the "N" wordnigger (sorry!) I feel the need to look over both shoulders, or any other slur.
[For the sake of seeming racist, spic, cracker, chink, wetback]
If we made saying the N word illegal, we'd be racist not to make Cracker and all other slurs illegal, so we'd have to rename the food.
And isn't BET racist? Wheres WET? Or AET [asian]?? Frankly, I believe antiracism has gone too far.
But really, is eradicating racism necessary or should we leave the progress we've made?

As long as you don't get ridiculously pedantic about it, there's nothing wrong with trying to get rid of racism. At least, it's better than saying "Ah, forget it, let's just leave it how it is".

That's like trying to get rid of starvation in Africa, but thinking that since you're not feeding every other homeless person in the world, you should let the mass hunger problem continue.

demonz said exactly what i was going to say.

Geti wrote:demonz said exactly what i was going to say.

...then why did you need to post?

I agree for the most part. If I say something with the word black in it (say, talking about colour spectrums) and someone jumps at my throat for being racist, surely they have more racist motivation than I do?

It does annoy me when people demand to be treated differently because they are black or asian or whatever. I think its a phase we are going to have to put up with though, to get to the status quo.

Affirmative action is racist.

Agreed but isn't all affirmative action nowadays against white people?
it seems jesse jackson and whoever else attacks white people because they're the white devil

GTM wrote:If I say something with the word black in it (say, talking about colour spectrums) and someone jumps at my throat for being racist, surely they have more racist motivation than I do?

That sounds more like humour motivation.

Martyr wrote:Agreed but isn't all affirmative action nowadays against white people?

Hm?

That's not the issue.

The issue is that affirmative action says: "Hey, you're not very good at getting a job because you belong to this certain demographic." Whatever compensatory measures follow have in mind to correct a race which has been socially deemed too weak to do it themselves.



Anyway, on the initial point, Morgan Freeman doesn't care about black people.



The rest of the shit that was said, including the term "anti-racism", is humbug--the lot of it. I don't understand what anti-racism is intended to mean, but it's probably missed its mark even further than the term "racism" misses its mark these days.

Brocerius wrote:It does annoy me when people demand to be treated differently because they are black or asian or whatever. I think its a phase we are going to have to put up with though, to get to the status quo.

I've never encountered a person that has demanded to be treated in a certain way--rather, I've never seen the manner of treatment needed to be consistent in regards to a given race. People are diverse and you will act different around different people. Certainly, anyone who uses race as a tool, theirs or someone else's, is being a lil' racist.

Anyway, on the initial point, Morgan Freeman doesn't care about black people.

See, I was with Morgan Freeman the whole way there until he came to his last point.

"I am going to stop calling you a white man and I'm going to ask you to stop calling me a black man," Freeman says.

That kinda goes against what he says above that. I agree that "the only way to get rid of racism is to stop talking about it", but surely by assigning "black" and "white" these negative connotations you're giving people a way to be racist? The way I see it, if people simply didn't take offense to the labels (I don't see any need to take offense to them; but that whole argument is in a different thread) then there'd be nothing fuelling racism.

Eh, not nothing, but you get my point.

Tsukatu wrote:Affirmative action is racist.

Boom.

On the note of what Morgan Freeman said, I whole-heartedly agree about what he said about Black History Month. I don't see why we have it. Other than to make white children feel like shit whenever they go to school in February. I'm glad that doesn't affect me anymore. Besides, all you have to do to make the white children cry about being white is spend a good part of the term teaching kids about The Declaration of Independence and have the politically incorrect teacher say "All men equal, except women and blacks." For the ones who aren't shamed by that, they made Black History Month, so the school can talk about the Civil War and the civil rights movement. "That's not what February is about. It's about all of the great African-Americans that have graced the world."

Martyr wrote:And isn't BET racist? Wheres WET? Or AET [asian]??

That's how I feel. That's also how I feel about Black History Month. Isn't it racist? And if it isn't, then why isn't there a White History Month? There have been plenty of great white people, that weren't great because they helped black people. A black person didn't harness electricity, right? Actually, I should leave that to Middle Eastern History Month. But America is too busy bombing that place to learn enough about them to dedicate an entire month to them. Not to mention that black people are the only race that gets an entire month in America. Because they were our slaves. Well, if we give months to different races as a way of saying sorry, then why isn't there Asian History Month? More specifically, Japanese History Month. Granted, we only abused them during WWII, but they at least deserve a "Japanese Heritage Week."
And all of this stuff about stereotypes. Don't get me wrong, I know they're bad, but sometimes it's not effective to teach how bad they are to kids. Since kids are our future, they can't be racist. So every school across at least America, is taught about "The atrocities of the Civil War and slavery.", the civil rights movement, and all of this shit on stereotypes. Especially black stereotypes. I'm not saying that teaching kids stereotypes is racist, but it's stupid. My school has over one thousand students. Only twice have I not seen a black person who didn't fit the black stereotype exactly. Black kids down here are like that. Which is why this kind of "Anti-racist, white shame" stuff is crap. Instead, everyone should be reminded how racism in general is bad. It's just a coincidence that throughout history, white people have been the racist ones.

Y'know, many African Americans also have a culture which is actually different from white culture. A channel like BET highlights that difference. I think forcing yourself to ignore cultural differences doesn't solve racism, either. Race exists, and it brings with it actual differences in culture and lifestyle.

If you think BET is racist against black people by acknowledging that black culture actually exists and is different from pop culture en masse, then you may be a tad short-sighted. You don't fight racism by ignoring race. Being ignorant of race doesn't help.

Racism Checklist:

-Am I stereotyping?
-Did I try and say that our two cultures are similar?
-Did I try and say that our two cultures are different?
-Did I apply "labels"?
-Did I forget to apply "labels"?
-Did I disagree with Jesse Jackson, Morgan Freeman, or the crazy President of Venezuala?
-Does the letter "b" have any significance to me?

If you answered yes to any of the above, congratulations! You are a racist!

EDIT: Tunco123 has a swastika in his signature. Is that okay?

blue_tetris wrote:Y'know, many African Americans also have a culture which is actually different from white culture. A channel like BET highlights that difference. I think forcing yourself to ignore cultural differences doesn't solve racism, either. Race exists, and it brings with it actual differences in culture and lifestyle.

If you think BET is racist against black people by acknowledging that black culture actually exists and is different from pop culture en masse, then you may be a tad short-sighted. You don't fight racism by ignoring race. Being ignorant of race doesn't help.

Well hey, wait, while I like to think I'm not meaningfully racist, I tend to judge subcultures like these because of the way their culture is, not the races of the people in it. I despise young black men who idealize violence and talk like retards exactly as much as I hate wiggers who do the same.

Like most, I don't like it when people--black or white--speak in the manner of Muppets.

I think racism comes from our human nature, no doubt: people fear things they don't understand, and then try to face these fears in a brutish way. I'm not sure if this applies to the white people who went over to Africa to capture the future slaves, but when the Vikings came to Canada and saw the Aboriginals, they didn't settle permanently because they were scared of the Aboriginals' appearance. Every race of people looks a certain way because of the climate they live in. So I guess we can blame racism on the environment then and start insulting it. No we can't, because that would be discrimination towards a force of nature that spurred a human insecurity.

I have encountered racism too. There was once this fat-ass (emphasis on ASS) native kid that was in my grade 8 class. Whenever I said something to him, he would respond "JUST CUZ I'M NATIVE, HUH?!" and it annoyed the crap out of me. In the same class was another native kid, who whenever I spoke to him, he would scoff "YOU WANNA FIGHT BITCH?" and I nearly did fight him once, cuz his racism towards me was pissing me off. The point of my reminiscing is that, like many other things like hate and evil, racism begets racism. And so anti-racism begets anti-racism. As Axonn pointed out, an anti-rascist group of Japanese people would want "Japanese Heritage Week" in an attempt to promote their culture's oppression (by other races, generally whities are the culprits) in response to "Black History Month" attempting to introduce the same purpose. (bad grammar, sorry; am I getting to a point? sorry if I'm not).

As blue tetris/someone said, you can't fight racism by ignoring race. Accepting different cultures and races, and eventually racism, can lead to not being extermely sensitive to racism. I have some indian friends (as in, from India, DAMN YOU CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS!!!) who make white jokes all the time when I'm around; like "hey did you notice [my name] is the only white guy in this row? *snicker*". I usually repond with something like "what does BFI stand for? Breakfast For Indians". They laugh at my rascist jokes and I laugh at their rascist jokes, and we're not tearing at each others throats because we've put behind us any oppresion/harm/bad stuff that occured between our cultures.

So I guess racism and anti-recism balance out. And so does discrimination and anti-discrimination. No one is perfect, and no one can be non-rascist or non-anti-rascist all the time. If a kid says his favourite colour is orange, then another kid could exclaim that the first kid is discriminatory to all the other colours and objects/things/fruits/people/poops that associate with that colour. What I'm trying to say is don't overreact to every little thing anyone says and interpret it as racism or discrimination. In the end, it's futile. Just accept someone doesn't like you or your culture and move on. I try to see it from their perspective and figure out their racism actions or words towards me, and then I can understand mor about the person's culture and mine too.

I think that was a ramble, sorry bout that