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[entremet]

It seems the dominant narrative is that not only racism doesn't exist, but bringing up and you're pejoratively labelled a race baiter or that you're playing race card, effectively shutting down the discussion and preserving the status quo.

It's now at the opposite end where the most common victims of racism are not only told that it doesn't exist, but that they perpetuate it against the dominant society!

LOL indeed.

 

[many places]

Its subtle isn't it.

It was like at my old job in a laboratory. We had 4 Indians join the team. One girl said to me "see they all know each other its wrong they are getting all the jobs" she failed to grasp that they were the Best in their field and a great bunch.

Makes me sick that people still see colour. If you act that way your going to miss out on what could be excellent friendships.

It happens in the reverse too though, although i totally agree with your point. I attend an extremely diverse university in the US and im white and trying to make friends with an already established clique of people who are of similar ethnicity(but different than me) is pretty hard. Everyone still sees color to an extent and it sucks but it happens for everyone regardless of race/ethnicity.

 

[akira28]

First time I've seen someone actively defending KKK and racism. There IS a GAF defense force for everything.

We've had actual stormfront bobbleheads recreating posts and threads from GAF for discussion on their site.


edit: on the bye, I just happened to google 'stormfront bobbleheads' and it linked me to a stormfront page where they're posting their skull measurements to help determine exactly what type of white person they are. Yes. A phrenology pissing contest.

 

[crozier]

First time I've seen someone actively defending KKK and racism. There IS a GAF defense force for everything.

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

 

[Arde5643]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

Has the KKK even done anything newsworthy in the past decade? I always thought of their modern organization as little more than a group of old, angry white people who get together and rant about minorities.

You do think before you write or at least read what you write, right?

 

[crozier]

You do think before you write or at least read what you write, right?

And how is that a defense of the KKK? The KKK might not by the violent terror group that were in the 60's, but members are still horrible people.

 

[The Adder]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

Get back to me when whites being robbed of their futures and rights as citizens en masse by courts, cops, and businesses due to the color of their skin.

 

[Arde5643]

And how is that a defense of the KKK? The KKK might not by the violent terror group that were in the 60's, but members are still horrible people.

Do you consider something to be racist only when's it violent or can be physically threatening?

 

[Blader]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

Talk about killing an honest and fruitful discussion!

 

[faridmon]

While Skin prosecution do exist on any level, this study is incredibly narrow and to be frank stupid.

 

[Enzom21]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

Strange because that's what this certainly seems like:

Has the KKK even done anything newsworthy in the past decade? I always thought of their modern organization as little more than a group of old, angry white people who get together and rant about minorities.

Also, who is saying that white people don't experience racism at all?

 

[crozier]

Talk about killing an honest and fruitful discussion!

Admittedly, my experiences with racism are probably skewed seeing as I live in Oregon. There are 300 million people in this country...your experience could easily vary from one town, city, or state to the next.

 

[Cyan]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything? Again, I honestly don't know and don't care which side gets it the worst. Maybe I simply know people who had a string of awful luck and most whites will never experience racism?

My only point is that dismissing anti-white racism with an LOL is a sure-fire way to kill honest and fruitful discussion.

This thread is explicitly about which "side" gets it the worst. As I outlined above, this is important inasmuch as we're unlikely to solve the right problems if we don't understand them.

I might be misunderstanding what you wrote above, but it sounds like this is a conversation you aren't interested in having. I would suggest that in general you probably shouldn't post in threads where you don't want to participate in discussion.

 

[Arde5643]

Admittedly, my experiences with racism are probably skewed seeing as I live in Oregon. There are 300 million people in this country...your experience could easily vary from one town, city, or state to the next.

Thanks for showing us textbook definition of white privilege, crozier.

 

[Liu Kang Baking A Pie]

How is pointing out that anti-white racism exists and is a real problem a defense of anything?

Think about it this way: were the attacks on your friends anti-white or anti-racism? Were they a result of those particular white people just existing, or were they a result of the attackers existing in the world as it is now?

It doesn't excuse what happened, but you're not looking deep enough at the many, many variables involved.

 

[Enzom21]

Admittedly, my experiences with racism are probably skewed seeing as I live in Oregon. There are 300 million people in this country...your experience could easily vary from one town, city, or state to the next.

So are you agreeing with the belief that white Americans experience more racism than black Americans?

 

[Blader]

Admittedly, my experiences with racism are probably skewed seeing as I live in Oregon. There are 300 million people in this country...your experience could easily vary from one town, city, or state to the next.

You have a working Internet connection, you could very easily and quickly educate yourself beyond anecdotal experiences. Just because you don't see as much anti-black racism in your daily life as much as others doesn't mean it isn't a tremendously widespread problem.

 

[crozier]

This thread is explicitly about which "side" gets it the worst. As I outlined above, this is important inasmuch as we're unlikely to solve the right problems if we don't understand them.

I might be misunderstanding what you wrote above, but it sounds like this is a conversation you aren't interested in having. I would suggest that in general you probably shouldn't post in threads where you don't want to participate in discussion.

Ok. You could have said this immediately after I said that doing such comparisons is foolhardy, rather than asking me the extent to which I thought anti-white racism is a problem. It's pretty clear now that your question wasn't sincere.

 

[akira28]

you know we're all coming at you now because you dared speak out against anti-white racism, right?

 

[bishoptl]

Ok. You could have said this immediately after I said that doing such comparisons is foolhardy, rather than asking me the extent to which I thought anti-white racism is a problem. It's pretty clear now that your question wasn't sincere.

Next time, read the title and OP before blaming others for your ignorance.

 

[PogiJones]

This thread is explicitly about which "side" gets it the worst. As I outlined above, this is important inasmuch as we're unlikely to solve the right problems if we don't understand them.

I might be misunderstanding what you wrote above, but it sounds like this is a conversation you aren't interested in having. I would suggest that in general you probably shouldn't post in threads where you don't want to participate in discussion.

I mostly agree with you. But I understand crozier's viewpoint as well. I think it's valuable to enlighten people as to the plights of others so as to get the public on board with fixing it. The hesitance it seems crozier has is that the fact that whites don't have it as bad as blacks is very, very often cited to dismiss that the racism whites face is worth fixing at all.

In this thread it's obviously the topic. But it seems to me that crozier is worried that this topic and this thread are going to perpetuate the notion that until whites experience racism on the same level blacks have, such racism should not only be ignored, but laughed at. It's akin to a doctor laughing at and dismisses a patient who comes in with a headache because there's another patient with a broken leg. It's undoubtedly foolish for the patient to think their headache is a bigger problem than a broken leg, but perpetuating the idea that the patient can't complain and ask for medication is problematic.

And I think crozier believes this thread might be contributing to that sort of attitude. Personally, I think this thread (or rather, select posts herein) is merely a manifestation of that attitude, rather than a perpetuation of it, so I don't have a problem with it. But I at least understand crozier's sentiment.


EDIT: Huh. Well, now that he's gone and can't clarify, I can make more assumptions about his beliefs without repercussion. He thinks that pizza is gross, and he hates riding waverunners.

 

[charlequin]

So its pretty much impossible for anyone to be racist towards whites?
Is that what I am hearing?

That is correct. Racial prejudice against white people is possible, albeit basically non-existent in most contexts. Racism against white people is impossible.

Basically (this might be an over-broad conclusion, but what the hell), this suggests that as a minority gains equality, the group in power will experience it as a losing of their own rights, or of the minority now having more rights than them.

Right, I mean, this is a pretty natural (albeit terrible and undesirable) result of the human tendency to turn comparisons of local rates of change into mental models about overall relative status. In that study, boys become so accustomed to receiving almost 100% of attention that when that number is decreased, they internalize it as "now someone else is getting more attention than me" when the reality is "now someone else is getting more attention than they used to."

The hesitance it seems crozier has is that the fact that whites don't have it as bad as blacks is very, very often cited to dismiss that the racism whites face is worth fixing at all.

That's because racial prejudice against white people is so minor and insignificant as to not be worth basically any attention.

 

[Dali]

I'm not really surprised by the results. It's evident by a lot of responses to certain threads that there are a fair amount of white people that feel things done to even out centuries of crippling and handicapping one race means the deck is unfairly stacked against them. Of course when you look at institutional racism specifically in the judicial system with a disproportionate amount of black people locked up and given on average longer harsher sentences than their white counterparts excuse me and many others for not exactly crying a river when a minority gets a job they may have never even been in the running for just a few decades ago or if someone calls you an epithet without half the loaded connotations and history as the one used for black people.

 

[Cyan]

In this thread it's obviously the topic. But it seems to me that crozier is worried that this topic and this thread are going to perpetuate the notion that until whites experience racism on the same level blacks have, such racism should not only be ignored, but laughed at.

Just to be clear, it's generally ok to disagree with the premise of a thread, assuming you put in the thought and effort to explain why you disagree. What I was getting at, and hedging it a bit because I wasn't sure if it was intended or not, is that we don't want people trying to stifle discussion because they don't know or care about the subject and think other people shouldn't either.

 

[PogiJones]

That's because racial prejudice against white people is so minor and insignificant as to not be worth basically any attention.

I think this is an entirely unproductive attitude. This is the sort of dismissal that makes those who experience the prejudice first hand think that the prejudice is bigger than it really is. It's the attitude that leads to this sort of poll result. Adding to whatever discrimination these people feel is the feeling that they're being ignored and dismissed because they're white. Being heard is very psychologically significant to humans.

Statistically? Yes, I agree with you. But that dismissive attitude perpetuates the notion that they're oppressed, rather than being informative.

Just to be clear, it's generally ok to disagree with the premise of a thread, assuming you put in the thought and effort to explain why you disagree. What I was getting at, and hedging it a bit because I wasn't sure if it was intended or not, is that we don't want people trying to stifle discussion because they don't know or care about the subject and think other people shouldn't either.

That's fair. I certainly think he shouldn't have gone the route that the difference doesn't matter, because as you said, public attention does matter.

 

[HolyBaikal]

And this is why people say "check your privilege".

Because, due to privilege, many people don't realize that they are in a position of privilege. Sadly, due to how upsetting being told of the concept of privilege, and how common the phrase "check your privilege" has become on various websites, "check your privilege" and the concept of privilege, has become somewhat of a "joke", among many sites which are predominantly white, cisgender, heterosexual, and male.

It seems very common in this circles to make fun of, and deride anyone who uses the word "privilege" as a "social justice warrior". :/

In most Western nations, predominantly white ones, people of colour suffer systematic racism. Which is very different from the racism that black people, for instance, sometimes express against white people. People also get caught up in terms like "reverse racism" or mean that an oppressed class cannot be racist or sexist or so forth against a privileged class. I don't think that's true. Racism and sexism mean more than one thing. Though it's true that racism against white people, such as in a country like America, isn't systematically harmful to them. Something that many white Americans don't recognize when they label people of colour as "racist".

It's definitely true that there is racial strife that is harmful in a different way. For instance, people being expected to reflect expectations of a group. People are even misusing terms like "cultural appropriation", in order to separate and essentialize people. People saying things like that people are "acting like x group" and to "stop".

I think that hostility to white people in America. Or white people in Western countries where white people are privileged. Or hostility to Asian people in Asia, where they are privileged. Or black people in Africa, is helpful. It is racist, even though it isn't systematic. And there is a lot of racial strife in multiracial societies. And it's very harmful and hurtful to many people. The lack of racial harmony in this world is painful.

The same applies to Asia. In many East Asian countries, many white people are equally as bitter as many people of colour in America. When trying to read of communities about Asian cultures like South Korea, Japan, China, and so forth, I'm faced with, often, bitter white people, becoming hateful towards Asians and the countries they've living in, because of the systematic racism they are also facing because they are white. And I don't think they're helping anything, either.

I'm honestly so tired of the fact that viciousness is still so common.
I can understand why people who are discriminated against are becoming very upset, sometimes bitter. But bitterness doesn't solve anything. Neither does becoming defensive about being a privileged class and bitter towards those who are suffering actual oppression. I think that the state of oppression is very sad. And so, also, is the strife between many "races", nationalities, ethnicities, and so forth.

 

[FStop7]

Hilariously, Gallup did a poll the year before the Civil Rights Act was inacted over 40+ years ago and 2/3rds of white people in 1964 thought that blacks had just as much opportunity to get ahead in life as whites.

1964!!!

Duck Dynasty guy must have been a respondent.

That is correct. Racial prejudice against white people is possible, albeit basically non-existent in most contexts. Racism against white people is impossible.

In the United States and most of Europe. I wouldn't say this to white farmers in Zimbabwe, though.

 

[charlequin]

I think this is an entirely unproductive attitude.

Conversely, I find sheltering the feelings of people who have invented persecutions that don't really exist to be quite unproductive. The actual reality is that anti-white prejudice is largely non-existent, and that those systemic biases which do exist to limit the benefits that accrue to white people (all the oft-mentioned "affirmative action") exist in areas where whites still have an immense cultural and economic advantage by default.

I don't think coddling people by pretending that insignificant problems are actually quite serious is a good use of time, and I definitely don't think so when it's combined with downplaying the much more significant problems of others (as it is in the attitudes of the people surveyed in the OP.)

 

[HolyBaikal]

That is correct. Racial prejudice against white people is possible, albeit basically non-existent in most contexts. Racism against white people is impossible.

I disagree. But this is a mostly semantic argument. I don't see the point of defining racism as privilege, when privilege is already a term adequate to describe privilege.

Racism towards white people in places like the United States is certainly minimal. In many cultures, it is systematic. Such as in East Asia, places like South Korea and Japan.

Of course, we're talking about the United States. So racism in East Asia is a different matter. But I think that a lot of bitter racial strife and meanness is harmful to any group. And is done by every group.

I would define some of the behavior towards white people, by people of colour in the United States as "racist". Just as I would define some of the behavior towards Asian people, in countries like South Korea, by white people, as racist.

 

[Laieon]

Black Americans definitely have it worse, much worse, but I don't think that means we should just brush off any other racism to the side and say "welp, that's not as important, suck it up!".

Eliminating racism is all about tearing down walls and looking at each other as equals. If for whatever reason a white person feels like they're experiencing racism, that should be looked at the same as anyone would look at any other forms of racism. If we just look at one race's side and tell the other race that any racism they may experience isn't as important because it's not as common, that's not equality, and that's a problem.

 

[PogiJones]

Conversely, I find sheltering the feelings of people who have invented persecutions that don't really exist to be quite unproductive. The actual reality is that anti-white prejudice is largely non-existent, and that those systemic biases which do exist to limit the benefits that accrue to white people (all the oft-mentioned "affirmative action") exist in areas where whites still have an immense cultural and economic advantage by default.

I don't think coddling people by pretending that insignificant problems are actually quite serious is a good use of time, and I definitely don't think so when it's combined with downplaying the much more significant problems of others (as it is in the attitudes of the people surveyed in the OP.)

I agree that we shouldn't pretend small problems are actually big problems. But pretending small problems are not problems at all is very common, and is unproductive. In instances where I complain about my arguments being dismissed solely because I'm white, I don't expect people to think it's a problem anywhere close to on par with a black person's experience with institutionalized racism. I don't expect people to think it's something that needs legislation, or corrective measures. All I'm doing in those instances is pointing out problematic behavior that individuals can avoid participating in. The cultural conversation can create small, microscopic changes like that. Yet, when I bring up that fact, and people dismiss not only my first arguments, but also dismiss my appeal for better behavior in that regard, I feel slighted not once, but twice. It just exacerbates the problem. More productive than, "You think you've got problems, listen to this," is "Yeah, that dismissal wasn't fair." That's it. That's all. The LOLing of the problem just makes the situation worse.

 

[Mumei]

I agree with quinkles.

Get back to me when whites being robbed of their futures and rights as citizens en masse by courts, cops, and businesses due to the color of their skin.

Indeed.

Anti-white hate crimes happen. And I hope everyone agrees that hate crimes are bad no matter who they happen to.

But as you point out, "White people experience hate crimes at less than half the rate of black people," really doesn't rank when compared to, "Black people experience systemic institutional racism in almost every area of life you could imagine." And that framing - of discussing racism as "people getting beat up" - is part of imagining that 'racism' is primarily about those individual acts of racial motivated violence or intimidation, and not thinking about racism as a system of advantage based on race.

 

[charlequin]

But pretending small problems are not problems at all is very common, and is unproductive.

An individual instance of prejudice might be a problem. "Anti-white prejudice," as a category, is not "a problem," and certainly not one that is worth dedicating any amount of time to remedying.

The cultural conversation can create small, microscopic changes like that. Yet, when I bring up that fact, and people dismiss not only my first arguments, but also dismiss my appeal for better behavior in that regard, I feel slighted not once, but twice.

As you may notice if you follow discussions on this topic, here or elsewhere on the internet, the almost immediate response to any topic involving racial inequality by PoC is a huge wave of individuals eager to downplay, underestimate, explain away, or otherwise dismiss the experience being discussed and to attack the character of those people who originally brought it up. That's the reality of discussing legitimate issues of systemic or interpersonal racism: immediate knee-jerk defensive reactions from people who are threatened by the idea that these problems still exist.

It's because of that trend that the feelings of white people are dismissed in some conversations. As long as the issues raised by PoC aren't addressed seriously, there isn't space to address the minor hurt feelings of white people who expect to be treated as a natural authority even on issues they are not personally familiar with. If that makes you feel slighted, it's understandable, but it's also the result of living in a culture where the opinions of white people are overvalued by default on a number of issues.

 

[Enzom21]

Black Americans definitely have it worse, much worse, but I don't think that means we should just brush off any other racism to the side and say "welp, that's not as important, suck it up!".

Eliminating racism is all about tearing down walls and looking at each other as equals. If for whatever reason a white person feels like they're experiencing racism, that should be looked at the same as anyone would look at any other forms of racism. If we just look at one race's side and tell the other race that any racism they may experience isn't as important because it's not as common, that's not equality, and that's a problem.

Yes but is it real racism some of these people are experiencing? Or is it something along the lines of: There are more minorities being hired for positions that used to be held by whites only. "This Affirmative Action is taking away jobs from more qualified whites, they are discriminating against whites!"

"Why is there a BET?! That's racist against whites!"
"Why is there a black history month, why is there no white history month"

I have no doubt that some white people experience actual genuine racism but I am willing to bet that the people who believe that whites experience more racism than blacks in the US also believe and/or have said some of the ridiculous examples I posted.

 

[PogiJones]

An individual instance of prejudice might be a problem. "Anti-white prejudice," as a category, is not "a problem," and certainly not one that is worth dedicating any amount of time to remedying.



As you may notice if you follow discussions on this topic, here or elsewhere on the internet, the almost immediate response to any topic involving racial inequality by PoC is a huge wave of individuals eager to downplay, underestimate, explain away, or otherwise dismiss the experience being discussed and to attack the character of those people who originally brought it up. That's the reality of discussing legitimate issues of systemic or interpersonal racism: immediate knee-jerk defensive reactions from people who are threatened by the idea that these problems still exist.

It's because of that trend that the feelings of white people are dismissed in some conversations. As long as the issues raised by PoC aren't addressed seriously, there isn't space to address the minor hurt feelings of white people who expect to be treated as a natural authority even on issues they are not personally familiar with. If that makes you feel slighted, it's understandable, but it's also the result of living in a culture where the opinions of white people are overvalued by default on a number of issues.

I agree with you and found no incompatibilities with what I said up until the last few sentences. I don't ask to be a "natural authority." An authority is someone you trust to have more expertise than you in an area, so for efficiency's sake or due to impossibility, you trust their expertise without doing your own investigation. When I make a statement that has a value function to it, such as an opinion, or when I make a statement that has an implicit "trust me" attached (such as when I assert how the law works), then an ad hominem attack on my material credentials is valid. But when I present data and/or reasoning that has no need for people to "just trust me," and they can do their own evaluation and see if my reasoning is sound or unsound, a racial dismissal is a problem that divides.

An assertion that all cats are mammals, but not all mammals are cats is logically sound regardless of my race, and there is no need to "trust me" as an authority; you can reason it out yourself. If that type of assertion is dismissed based on my race, it's wrong, and I can point out that it's wrong. The fact that black people have been wrongly dismissed far more often for the same types of things is both true and awful, and certainly deserves rectification. But that grave fact doesn't somehow make performing the same logical fallacy against someone else okay, and telling that person the slight they felt was unjustified because someone else has it worse, that's a double-dismissal with no logical foundation, and exacerbates that person's feeling of being unheard. Again, being heard is very, very important psychologically. Being dismissed for unfounded reasons is harmful, regardless of who you are.

 

[Kettch]

I could see anti-white racism having increased in the last 60 years, sure, but that would be a miniscule amount still.

Would be interesting to see a breakdown of the poll based on which cable news network is viewed.