Let's talk about Racism

[ebola?]

Ack...computer crash in the midst of a giant reply...I'll try to reconstruct.
...
I am very glad that you replied, Jamshyd. . .

Chicken or egg: Are the stereotypes reified, or is it reality that precipitates said stereotypes? In my case, I am able to present a coherent structural analysis for my extreme criticisms of Thai society, and even quote sources to back me up*, hehe.

I think that both necessarily coexist. Any analysis, even valid, will necessarily involve reification. If we take the seat of reality to be processural, then any sort of conceptual interrogation of this process will distortedly transform it into a set of static, conceptual, 'things'. These things can be interrogated in terms of processes, but insofar as such processes fall subject to analysis, they become reified anew...perhaps with infinite regress.

However, I find myself satisfied, usually, when even the first layer of reification is subject to analysis...which occurs woefully rarely.

I have a chronic issue with the word "imminent". I think I just plain don't know what it means. It seems to occur in the most unlikely of places: The Iŝa Upanishad (Mascaro translation), Foucault...etc. Can you explain to me what you mean by it?

In this case, I simply mean "intrinsically" to mean "from within", in static conceptual opposition with "extrinsic", meaning "from without". Often times, I will otherwise invoke "intrinsic" in greater dynamic opposition to "transcendent", the latter meaning, "moving beyond".

So basically, the question is, must valid critique be leveled from within? If so, what does it mean to be within a particular culture?

I'll have to think a bit more deeply and rigorously about the place of alienated positionality in imminent critique. . .

I think the sad truth is that no matter how much Academic sterilization is dealt forth, it is simply human to tackle other-human by group.

If this indeed is the case (which appears likely), how may we mitigate or reauthor this most deplorable aspect of our 'nature'?

Absolutely. But "Ethnic Chauvinism" isn't always sufficient. Take the alienated critic (*cough*).

Indeed, hence my call for a neologism. Perhaps...'analytic/synthetic cultural criticism'? But that is at once too imprecise and too cumbersome. . .

I do support very much the idea that race is involuntary while culture is, and definitely agree that it really does usually end up being a political instrument of dominance and submission. Race is not something that one can escape. Look what happened to Michael Jackson. Nor is sexuality. Look what happened to Michael Jackson. Culture, on the other hand, can be actively rejected and even subverted. Look what happened to Michael Jackson.

This is both a funny and apt. illustration.

It isn't too muddy, really - just politic that can easily be circumvented by intelligence. I really don't wish to talk about Nazis because that's what we do all the time .

Maybe this example only gets muddy when people start arguing (most often fruitlessly) over whether Jews are 'White'?

ebola: The evidence suggests so (Ossorio and Duster 2005).
jamshyd: I'm interested. I can haz biblio ref?

"Race and Genetics: Controversies in Biomedical, Behavioral, and Forensic Science", American Psychologist (oh noes!!! ), January 2005.

It's a pretty up-to-date and easily comprehensible summary of what degree race is indeed genetic, along with some commentary on the racialized biopolitics of penal genetics in the US. Because race resolves to little other than those genes associated with the phenotypes we see and non-protein coding genes that correlate with them, race cannot genetically mark predisposition to become 'civilized'.

ebola

 

[dspade]

I think that jamshyd has a good point rationalizing "we" in our brains is the true face of racism. not only are we racist so is everyone else in the world. even though such is a natural response in the human brain to organize circumstances and other input into categories. that coupled with the social awkwardness of yearning to be accepted by those you care for or idolize creates discrimination. and that is racism the belief that you are somehow better or worse than someone else. thinking yourself different doesnt make racist unless you believe your way of life or thinking is superior. just accept your fellow man while simultaneously carving your own path and may you find true enlightenment.

 

[glitterbizkit]

Your naive to think that blacks are even slightly as smart as whites.

How ironic that you're supposedly smarter than me by virtue of your skin colour, yet you can't spell 'you're'.... *Ahem*, ok, sorry for nitpicking, I just thought it was a little funny...

I went to a school that was truly multiracial, with about 40% black kids, 30% Asian, 25% white and 5% mixed/other. We all came from similar socio-economic backgrounds and all had the same educational opportunities. And i can honestly say that race did not play a significant role in how well kids did at school... Apart from the Indian kids, who were always at the top of the class and seemed more intelligent than anyone else, but this also had a lot to do with their cultural background - their parents pushed them a lot harder to succeed. So, in my experience, race has nothing to do with accomplishment, but culture and opportunity sure as hell does.

Do you all think there is no genetic correlation, and not a cultural one, that blacks are just less civilized by nature? I mean if you look at tribes and shit in africa.. well to say the least they have some pretty uncivilized methods of life..

Moonyham, where exactly do you get your information from? You don't seem to know much about African history or culture apart from generalisations about "tribes and shit"... It's a massive continent, and in pre-colonial times African societies ranged from the highly sophisticated e.g. the kingdoms of Ghana or the Swahili civilisations, which were major centres of trade at the time, to the more primitive, e.g. the Khoisan hunter-gatherers, who nevertheless have/had a very interesting, evolved, and most of all, peaceful culture. So exactly which tribes and shit were you talking about? Names and dates please...

Civilisations all rise and fall, and there have been many African civilisations which have risen and fallen, the same as with civilisations in any other continent. You just don't hear so much about African civilisations because most of African history was written or re-written by colonialists... And so the continent took a huge, massive blow from colonialism. Does this mean that Africa as a whole has not been prosperous before, or that it will never be prosperous again? Nope, it doesn't.

Oh and I don't know where you get the idea from that Africans have adopted a loser's attitude and have decided to give up and just ask for handouts. While I can't speak for all African countries as i haven't been to many of them, my country at the moment is an exciting place to be.... There's a lot of hope and economic growth. People are buzzing with enthusiasm and ideas as to how they can improve their country. It's not a bad place to be at all, at the moment. I think you'd find yourself very surprised if you dropped your pre-conceived notions about Africa for a second and actually looked into the reality of things. Of course, I don't expect you'd be the kind who would be interested in broadening your horizons. Racists rarely are, and xenophobia thrives in comfort zones.

http://yun.complife.ru/100facts.htm

Whites > Blacks

I just glanced at this page and one of the first 'facts' was that black Africans have never been known to construct anything more complex than mud huts... when anyone who knows even a little about the history of African civilisation (and i am ashamed to say i don't know enough as I wish I did) knows about Great Zimbabwe, the impressive stone fortresses built almost a thousand years ago by black Africans, spanning an area large enough to house more than 10,000 people. So that huge error makes the whole page very unreliable and suspect in my opinion.

Of course, throughout the history of colonialism, white colonials tried their hardest to prove that Great Zimbabwe could not have been built by black people (when in fact it has since been proven that it was built by Bantu peoples)... Which maybe gives you an idea of why we don't hear a lot about accomplishments in African history...

And they claim Africans have never cultivated crops or domesticated animals? What utter crap - where do they get this nonsense from? Perhaps you shouldn't believe everything you read, asphyx...

 

[KStoner6tb]

^^I don't know why you'd take you time to argue Moonyham or asphyx with them making such outlandish statements...clearly just looking to start shit. I know you wasted at least 20 mins of your life typing that post glitterbiz

 

[glitterbizkit]

Yea I know, I don't really expect them to take the time to understand my arguments... but I enjoy defending my country/ continent.... Someone has to do it

edit: also, i know that other, more open-minded people have negative pre-conceived notions about Africa because they simply have not been exposed to anything else... So I wrote that as much for those people as for moonyham and asphyx.

 

[KStoner6tb]

edit: also, i know that other, more open-minded people have negative pre-conceived notions about Africa because they simply have not been exposed to anything else... So I wrote that as much for those people as for moonyham and asphyx.

True, good point. Ok you didn't waste that 20 mins, I've changed my mind

 

[glitterbizkit]

And just because I have nothing better to do... I wouldn't even bother with this page were it not that I remember seeing it in the past, linked from another forum as well... As well as the fact that I enjoy making fun of the ignorance of bigoted people :D

http://yun.complife.ru/100facts.htm

Whites > Blacks

Re: the "facts" about South Africa

White people have lived in South Africa much longer than Negroes. There have been White settlements in South Africa for over 300 years, about the same length of time Europeans have lived in North America. Even 150 years after the first colonies around Capetown, at the beginning of the 19th Century, there still were no Blacks within 500 miles. The Blacks wandered in from central Africa later on, possibly fleeing the slave trade or due to famine. In fact, most of South Africa’s Blacks were born in other countries.

The KhoiSan were the original inhabitants of SA, they were partially displaced by the Bantu who did emigrate from the north, but this was long before the white settlers arrived. When the white people arrived, the Bantu people had been there for over a thousand years. This falls in the category of "duh, everyone knows this!" information, so I can only conclude that whoever wrote the page is very uneducated. This is almost like saying that there were no native Americans when the Spanish first came to the Americas.

South Africa is by far the wealthiest and most advanced country in Africa,

Partly true, but when it comes to GDP per capita, SA lags after countries like Equatorial Guinea (which is no. 20 on the world list, according to World Bank), Mauritius, Botswana and Seychelles.

producing nearly 75 % of the continent’s Gross National Product.

False

Martin Luther King frequently enjoyed prostitutes and paid for them with his church’s money.

Urban legend with no proof.

Although I haven't read all the rest, those glaring inaccuracies confirm that the page is written by someone with too little education/ intelligence and too much time, and that the rest of the 'facts' are probably just as made-up as the above ones.... Not to mention the important fact that it has been established beyond a doubt that the genetic difference between 'races' is nearly non-existent, hence there is no such thing as racial differences between people. Also, the anthropological references that guy has used are almost all 50 years old, the field has moved on since then...

 

[hexxx]

And just because I have nothing better to do... I wouldn't even bother with this page were it not that I remember seeing it in the past, linked from another forum as well... As well as the fact that I enjoy making fun of the ignorance of bigoted people :D

Re: the "facts" about South Africa

The KhoiSan were the original inhabitants of SA, they were partially displaced by the Bantu who did emigrate from the north, but this was long before the white settlers arrived. When the white people arrived, the Bantu people had been there for over a thousand years. This falls in the category of "duh, everyone knows this!" information, so I can only conclude that whoever wrote the page is very uneducated. This is almost like saying that there were no native Americans when the Spanish first came to the Americas.

Read the references. They made me lol. "Soldier of Fortune" mag is a trustworthy reference? And a bunch of hate speech books. The Khoi San are unfortunately not really around any more. Either assimilated into other races (such as the coloureds - a group of people who are of mixed European, Asian and African decent) or wiped out by the Dutch, Xhosa, English and Zulus. The whites were indeed on the tip of the continent before the Xhosa but by a few years. S Africa is far larger than the tip of the Cape.

[qutoe]Partly true, but when it comes to GDP per capita, SA lags after countries like Equatorial Guinea (which is no. 20 on the world list, according to World Bank), Mauritius, Botswana and Seychelles.[/quote]

There are almost no people in those countries. Two resort islands, a minute country with a few oil billionaires (mostly foreign companies getting that money). The only country with a tiny bit of influence is Botswana. But is a huge country with massive natural resources, also no people. It's like saying Luxembourg and Monaco pack the most economic clout in EU because of the GDP / capita. But you're right, we aren't 75%, no where near it. Here are the Wikipedia figures:

pos 2008 2009
1 South Africa 277,188 243,315
2 Nigeria 214,403 168,422
3 Egypt 162,164 188,059
T Africa 1,518,911 1,276,928

So it's around 20% of the continent. Still a large amount when you consider we only have 5% of the continents population and I'm estimating 80% (maybe more) of that wealth is in the hands of 20% of the population.

Although I haven't read all the rest, those glaring inaccuracies confirm that the page is written by someone with too little education/ intelligence and too much time, and that the rest of the 'facts' are probably just as made-up as the above ones.... Not to mention the important fact that it has been established beyond a doubt that the genetic difference between 'races' is nearly non-existent, hence there is no such thing as racial differences between people. Also, the anthropological references that guy has used are almost all 50 years old, the field has moved on since then...

Don't worry you didn't miss much. I read it for a laugh.

The truth about racism in the country.

As you'd assume, because of the past there is quite high racial tension in the country. For everything that goes wrong, the previous regime is blamed. Get caught stealing? No problem blame the previous regime. There is also the common belief that acts of racism is only something that can be committed by whites, no such thing as blacks being racist.

We have a policy called BEE (black economic empowerment). This is like a a supercharged gravy train on nitrous. It basically means that black owned businesses are given preference over white owned companies and to meet the score required to tender for contracts, people have to give away large portions of their companies that they struggled for years and years to build. Whites had no gravy train to ride during apartheid, work or die. Nothing was free like commonly believed.

Tenders are lost even if companies are much, much cheaper. It doesn't take an economics major to figure out what's wrong with this policy.

It is literally destroying the country. We had massive economic growth and then the burden of this policy started to be felt and the criteria was made more rigid. Firstly in the incumbent power company. Coal transport was being outsourced to BEE companies and they stopped delivering coal at one stage. Their excuse was that they didn't want the coal to get wet?!?!?!!? I don't know whether to laugh or cry. So we had rolling black outs, load-shedding, the mines were taken off line during certain periods. Eventually some heads rolled and it was found that the government had been warned and warned to increase capacity for the past 20 years and nothing was done. The morons involved with the coal transport were more like an early warning system than the sole cause. There were many suggestions that were to be implemented by the previous regime but all subsequent requests were ignored, the regulator was dragging it's heels and basically not doing it's job.

Stories like this are the norm. We have freedom fighters in office responsible for things like communication and general deviants in miscellaneous offices. eg home affairs (who was our previous health minister - a woman with convictions for stealing patients wallets during operations in Botswana and Hepatitis requiring a liver transplant at age 65+ She was given one even though she is an alcoholic and was fighting the nurses for booze after surgery).

Jacob Zuma (our big boss now) was up for fraud (as well as rape etc). It could have been a political conspiracy. Unlikely but not impossible. His financial advisor was convicted. He spent 2 years in prison hospital and discharged under a medical parole for high blood pressure. People here don't get medical parole. Even when they are dying their requests are caught in red tape. The few that do get it die in a few days. He was given 72 hours to live. 5 months ago. Pretty obvious what's going on. I spoke to some of the guys at work about this who are well educated and come from quite good backgrounds. They are above the poverty line and would probably be considered well off in certain circles and live the life that a upper-lower to lower-middle income person would. The common response was, he is a leader, he knows what he is doing therefore it is alright. The same response I got regarding Mugabe.

Racism is rampant here, especially black vs black. Xenophobia attacks were carried out against any non SA blacks a couple months ago. People were burnt to death. There is an image in the newspaper of a man burning to death while a policeman stands watching with a huge smile on his face. Even among my friends one moment that sticks out was a bunch of Zulu friends who got hostile towards a Venda friend. They said, don't hang out with this guy he's Venda, he's a mampara (idiot). It is also prevalent among all the major racial categories (black, white, coloured and Indian) that made up our demographics. But the most severe examples can be found in black vs black racism. But I suppose you can't call it racism because only whites can be racist. 8)

 

[glitterbizkit]

The Khoi San are unfortunately not really around any more. Either assimilated into other races (such as the coloureds - a group of people who are of mixed European, Asian and African decent) or wiped out by the Dutch, Xhosa, English and Zulus.

I did a project on them when I was studying anthropology. I read a book written by a woman who spent some time traveling with the San in the Kalahari desert in the 60s or 70s, and I found their culture really fascinating. The particular group she stayed with lived the same way they had been living for hundreds of years, peace-loving and in tune with their environment, no mean feat considering the harshness of the desert climate.

She went back to visit them a few decades later and many of them had been forced to abandon their previous lifestyle and move to the cities where they suffered extreme culture shock and were mistreated and exploited. Many were now alcoholics, and quite a few had died of AIDS. It was really sad.

Re: SA's GDP and all that: I agree that it is the most advanced African country in many respects, just pointing out the errors that were stated as facts on that website.

But the most severe examples can be found in black vs black racism. But I suppose you can't call it racism because only whites can be racist. 8)

While I agree that people of all colours can be racist, I don't think xenophobia against black people by black people is technically racism, because it's not based on race, but on nationality.

But yes, black people can definitely be racist. I've had black people be racist towards me because I'm half white... and somehow this is assumed to be ok? Recently a friend (mixed race) was telling me about an incident when an Afrikaaner man was humiliated in some way, and my friend thought this was ok because the man was a Boer, and so must have deserved it by virtue of his nationality and race. i find it unacceptable, racism is wrong no matter what colour you are.

I've been hearing a bit about the things going on in South Africa, and I must say I was very disappointed when I heard that Zuma had been elected as president... Still, with South Africa's history, I'm not too surprised. The apartheid is all too recent for the resentment and hatred to die down so quickly... It's the story of human nature, holding grudges and seeking an eye for an eye. Especially in countries when there is still so much poverty, and where most of the poor people are black and white people lead more affluent lives. That's how Mugabe managed to do so much damage to Zimbabwe... We almost had a similar man come into power in Zambia in the last elections - Michael Sata - an uneducated populist who won a lot of support from the poor people for policies that were similar to Mugabe's. Thankfully, he didn't, although Rupiah Banda who is in power now is as corrupt as the rest of them.

 

[hexxx]

I agree with you 100%, but what surprises me is that the amount of hate towards blacks of other ethnicities pales in comparison to the amount of hate towards whites (or at least crime with race as the apparent main motivation). I've encountered very little of it directed at me first hand but I can take a joke though. Even the jokes are very mild and the worst I've personally encountered is someone trying to get me worked up (which is nothing). The hostility between black people doesn't necessarily even span over other countries, just slightly different areas. Even between so called classes, there is quite a bit of "racism" and I've heard racial slurs uttered against people of the same race. Mostly blame for "why people think we're xyz is because of abc's like you". And that is most definitely racism (using slurs), not just xenophobia, doesn't matter that it's between people of the same race (AND language / ancestry) hating themselves and / or own peeps. Xenophobia and racism are the same thing to me though - semantically and technically they are different, yes - but at the core, hate is hate. I classify Afrikaans vs English = Zulu vs Xhosa = black vs white = Nazi vs Jew, etc. They are all wrong. As wrong as each other. Stereotypes and racial profiling aren't as bad or bad at all IMO, even though they are considered racism. It is not necessarily hate. I can laugh at jokes about my own people as loud as I want but I won't laugh at the another racial group for fear of offending someone or fear of reprisal. If I know that I won't offend at all, I don't see what's wrong with humour. Certain people are malicious under the guise of humour but I definitely don't mean any malevolence over it, a lot of people differ in this regard.

I heard about that Michael Sata guy briefly, most people like that are after votes but I'm sure when the people of Zambia saw Zimbabwe and it's famine, cholera and economically meltdown, they decided that maybe the fleeing Zimbabweans were fleeing more than just the results of the propaganda. Off topic but what's with the licking of salt off peoples hands during a barbecue among your fellow countrymen? Assuming you are Zambian that is. We were at a house a while back and people were doing this, I'm sure the custom wouldn't have really been imposed on anyone but one of the only other S African's in the group (besides me and my inviter) was a girl who I brought and she made me hide with her while this was going on (she didn't want to hurt their feelings by declining). I found it quite amusing... She didn't though, lol, so I didn't ask our hosts what was up with it or find out if it was even a Zambian tradition. She wouldn't let me fearing that it would have been noticed that we hadn't had our turn yet!

 

[glitterbizkit]

I must say i haven't really encountered much xenophobia between black people of different ethnicities... One of the good things our first president, Kaunda did was to unite the nation. "One Zambia one nation" was his party's motto, so there's not much hatred at all between different tribes. I haven't really noticed any hatred towards black foreigners either. Maybe it's a historical/cultural thing? I mean we have about 72 different tribes, so if Kaunda hadn't been so thorough in this there would probably be a lot of conflict...

Yea, i'm (half) Zambian, lived there for 18 years... and I must say I have never heard about this licking salt thing! Sounds as weird to me as it does to you! Maybe it's the *insert random tribe name*, I've heard they are really skanky bastards.

 

[vegan]

no time to read more than fragments of the thread
and no time to give my opinion
but since i see that jamshyd talked about thailand, and imagining what he said (didn't read the actual post); i would like to remind people of 2 points :

- there are several veeeeery different kinds of racism
the way is which thais are racist is extremelly different from the racism that most posters here probably have in mind

- if someone's not able to really communicate with the locals in a country, spending even (tens of) years there is not enough to understand them
you may make true observations
and rightly compare them to other cultures that you know
but that doesn't necessarily mean that you understood what you observed

 

[KStoner6tb]

^blatant racist. The best kind. Dont spread your hate propoganda around here Vegan.

 

[vegan]

^^ you forgot to add "420xtc" at the end of your moniker

 

[ebola?]

wrong subcultural slur, lol.
(masterful prediction of this thread's content though! )

 

[TwisteTexan]

Whew, racism is def alive... Blacks in urban places won't even give most whites a chance to seem fair. They are set on some fear that is being passed down. The media that feeds off the shit...how bout this van jones racist ass on Obama's panel... He resigned, but he advised my countries president. I think it's the african american's that have a racist agenda, havent been here in a while, I fell off the earth like many bluelighters do from time to time.. but there is something us simple folk can understand... lots of this has gotten over my head, it's not so complicated, racism is natural... but humans have made it much worse... P.S. fuck a racist.

 

[KStoner6tb]

Quick question..Do yall think this is a racist(or stereotypical) comment:

"If you're driving around the ghetto late and night, trying to cop, and you are white, most likely you'll be pulled over by the police without any other reason than they know you're up to no good"

 

[jackie jones]

Most likely the reason for such an act to occur is because the police are bored and they hope someone is carrying, regardless of race.

So no, I do not find the statement racist (even if you were to say black instead of white), just inaccurate.

 

[TwisteTexan]

Quick question..Do yall think this is a racist(or stereotypical) comment:

"If you're driving around the ghetto late and night, trying to cop, and you are white, most likely you'll be pulled over by the police without any other reason than they know you're up to no good"

it's not racist to say, but the cops are being racist...and shall continue to be as crime is much more enticing to the "oppressed black man" ha ha ha.... that sounds racist...

 

[moonyham]

Well to the 'my school was mixed race and it didnt make much difference in classes etc'.

Well, i went to a mixed race highschool too, about i dunno atleast half of the students were pacific islanders and about a third white and the rest asians and stuff, and all of the stupid classes had disproportionately high amounts of black/brown people, is all im saying.