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FlashFlood- Rep: 55
Re: Current Events Thread
FlashFlood wrote:It you honestly think people in the Ozarks have better opportunities than people in Compton, or comparing them to the advantages you or I have, I don't know what to tell you.
Cool quote. Think I’ve heard that one somewhere before.
To compare black people and white people apples to apples is to ignore centuries of history. I grew up poor and white and I believe work needs to be done to fix the situation.
Re: Current Events Thread
misterID wrote:It you honestly think people in the Ozarks have better opportunities than people in Compton, or comparing them to the advantages you or I have, I don't know what to tell you.
Cool quote. Think I’ve heard that one somewhere before.
To compare black people and white people apples to apples is to ignore centuries of history. I grew up poor and white and I believe work needs to be done to fix the situation.
You can't compare anyone apples to apples, it's about individuals and regional communities and so many varying circumstances, etc, etc, you just can't make blanket statements. It's as much about class as it is race.
- Randall Flagg
- Rep: 139
Re: Current Events Thread
Randall Flagg wrote:misterID wrote:I don't know how to explain it other than I was being sarcastic and Randall took me serious.
Nah, I knew you were sarcastic. I guess my sarcasm went over everyone’s head. This isn’t the first time you’ve made the argument poor whites aren’t inherently better off than poor blacks. But they won’t touch that with a ten foot pole. Hence my sarcasm of “enacting the labor”.
Sure, I’ll touch it. Poor white people are inherently better off than poor black people. Poor white people are afforded far more opportunity than poor black people. While both are most likely to remain poor, the fact is, white people in power are more likely to hire white people, and there are very few black people in power. It’s not apples to apples. It’s immensely different.
But you didn't touch it. You just made a declarative statement with no examples or criteria to judge on. You see a person of color, and inherently assume their upbringing was worse than yours, mine or any other random person with pink pigment. If you can't explain why and are angry someone is asking you to provide examples you don't have, that's textbook cognitive dissonance. In any other situation your actions would be called racist, as that's the text book definition of prejudicing against someone because of their skin color. But because it's been declared a noble position, all higher thought required of every other position is waived.
Poor white people are afforded far more opportunity than poor black people.
Proof? There are countless programs for poor minorities. It's called affirmative action. Who is more likely to get into Harvard, all things equal on the application, who gets in first? All things equal, who does corporate America hire? Who does the state and federal government hire? Unlike you, I know these things to be true because I've lived them or there is empirical evidence for their statement. I sit on a diversity hire board at work, I know that we're looking to hire "diverse" candidates. (Diverse is code for non-white in case you didn't get the memo). Affirmative action is a thing, and has been for over a generation. So who has more opportunity in 2021 if you're entering adult hood? I'll eagerly await your response with other examples, but you don't get to pretend the reality I just stated isn't part of the overall picture.
white people in power are more likely to hire white people, and there are very few black people in power.
Do you have anything to support this? Uber allows you to hire from black businesses, I don't know of any other ethnicity that is afforded that. Do you have any evidence that poor white people own businesses at a higher rated than blacks? Do you have any evidence they choose through race alone, more people of their own pigment? These are really bold statements that I haven't seen evidenced with any kind of empirical data. My own life experience has shown me that a substantial amount of black Americans are entrepreneurs. Far more relative to my white friends. I won't make a declarative statement without evidence, so I can't state this is true. But since we're just tossing out perceptions, mine if vastly different than yours and I've lived all over the US.
- FlashFlood
- Rep: 55
Re: Current Events Thread
FlashFlood wrote:You keep ignoring the centuries of oppression black people have experienced in America. You bring it back to economic opportunities but that scratches the surface. You blindly ask for proof while providing none of your own outside of your personal experience.
I claim black people have been oppressed in America. I use slavery and segregation as my basis. What’s your claim? They need to get over it?
Re: Current Events Thread
I claim black people have been oppressed in America. I use slavery and segregation as my basis. What’s your claim? They need to get over it?
Isn't this kind of obvious to most people? I thought it didn't need explanation. I guess I was wrong here.
- Randall Flagg
- Rep: 139
Re: Current Events Thread
You keep ignoring the centuries of oppression black people have experienced in America. You bring it back to economic opportunities but that scratches the surface. You blindly ask for proof while providing none of your own outside of your personal experience.
I claim black people have been oppressed in America. I use slavery and segregation as my basis. What’s your claim? They need to get over it?
I’m not ignoring it. That’s an absurd claim. I asked you pages ago to define systemic oppression and qualify who should receive some benefit, and to define what that benefit is. You’ve so far avoided providing anything specific and have remained entirely vague.
What connection do Barack Obama and Kamala Harris have to slavery and Jim Crow? What does (random black person) with them? How is a black kid born to a middle class family in Columbus, Ohio in 1995 connected to it? You see color, and don’t want to talk about the larger issue of poverty which is proven to be synonymous with all the social inequalities you can choose.
Ignoring injustices that legally ended 60+ years ago to people now in retirement, what systemic oppression is aimed towards black people in America, and what can we do to resolve it?
- Randall Flagg
- Rep: 139
Re: Current Events Thread
FlashFlood wrote:I claim black people have been oppressed in America. I use slavery and segregation as my basis. What’s your claim? They need to get over it?
Isn't this kind of obvious to most people? I thought it didn't need explanation. I guess I was wrong here.
Except that’s not what he’s saying. No one is arguing against a historic oppression of black people. I’ve repeatedly asked for what examples exist today, and no one has bothered to say anything that is demonstrably true or even on topic. His statement is that the systemic oppression exists today, not that slavery and segregation were coded into American law. Nor am I denying there are consequences in lost opportunity due to that historic injustice. No one is denying any of that.
What I’m asking is for examples of how racism is still systemic in 2021, and what can we do to solve it. Because I believe a lot of the examples people accept are true, don’t hold up to scrutiny. And that matters when you’re talking about reordering society, it’s not something that is just shrugged off as “obvious”.
Re: Current Events Thread
On this topic of privilege. I've always hated this term, not because it's incorrect. "White privilege", "Male privilege" etc. do exist. My issue with it is it's a term that was used in academia that spilled over into the mainstream and got banded around way too much.
Replace the word privilege with advantage, and I feel it's intent and meaning is better conveyed.
Corey Booker defo had a cushier life overall than some poor white kids living in a broken home, or whose jobs disappeared. He's likely still had times in his life where folk have called him something just because of the colour of his skin, been passed over for certain opportunities because of it and no doubt has had unwelcome looks from folk or worse. That's the advantage white people have. They don't have to put up with that BS.
Or hell, what about Quasi-disenfranchisment through gerrymandering. Living in states where your districts are gerrymandered to hell by Republican state legislators where they try to group as many black folk into one district and distribute those folk likelier to vote for them across many districts. If you're living in a situation where your vote ultimately means less and it's happening because of the colour of your skin how are you not disadvantaged?
Re: Current Events Thread
Or hell, what about Quasi-disenfranchisment through gerrymandering. Living in states where your districts are gerrymandered to hell by Republican state legislators where they try to group as many black folk into one district and distribute those folk likelier to vote for them across many districts. If you're living in a situation where your vote ultimately means less and it's happening because of the colour of your skin how are you not disadvantaged?
This is exactly what's happened in Wisconsin. Democrats consistently receive 55-60% of the vote but Republicans have super majorities in the assembly and state senate.
The state now has a Democratic governor and the only purpose the state legislature serves is to block everything the governor attempts to do and they hold the occasional vote on which power they'd like to take away from the governor which of course always succeeds.
It's a completely broken government and the people in control of the state legislature don't care if it's ever fixed again.
