I mentioned it because here I am being accused of being racist against black people when I'm actually the complete opposite.
I have absolutely nothing against black people but that doesn't mean that I have to find their women attractive.
People are so quick to throw around labels without considering the implications of the words they're using.
Would I be meeting up with my black friend tomorrow if I was racist? Would I be going on holiday next week with a different black guy if I was racist?
When I say I have black friends, I mean it. I'm not referring to some stranger at the gym who I nod at as people are implying.
Fucking hell. People are trying to hard to be politically correct and losing sight of reality.
Your correction is fine. Your initial statement was not. When you use a blanket statement about an entire race - that statement is racist.
When almost everyone jumped on that initial comment, instead of bunkering down and proving you're not a racist I swear, you should look back and reflect on why everyone had such a reaction.
Is it KKK racism? No. But when people freely say stuff like that, it perpetuates an idea that saying it is fine and socially acceptable. It is absolutely casual/diet racism. Reflect on that rather than using 'being called racist is worse than racism' - that's a defence racists use, btw, so don't go there.
If you merely mentioned a preference for olive skin, no one would have bat an eyelid. What was the point of saying 'I don't find [all] black women attractive [regardless of a wide spectrum of skin tone, or vastly differing facial features]'?
You can argue it's semantics, but that's exactly how diet racism is perpetuated; people who don't identify as racist that think it's ok to make blanket statements about race.