Things we wont say about Race that are true!!

[Damocles]

Have they mentioned that race is entirely a social construct and has no significant genetic differential thus pretty much something we invented as a form of social control yet?

Or are they still dispelling the myth that black men have bigger dicks?

Who is "we"?

Europeans?

Iron Age Man?

Mankind in general?

Mankind. Specifically the river delta civilisations in and around what is now the Middle East.

 

[Barcon]

Black is beautiful?

 

[Gaylord du Bois]

We need Diane Abbot to offer some balance.

 

[Damocles]

Has anybody heard from the Society of Black Lawyers yet?

 

[Tanzeylee]

For all intents and purposes that program was a party political broadcast for ukip...

 

[stony]

Has anybody heard from the Society of Black Lawyers yet?

They're too busy suing the Society of White Scrotes.

 

[Summerbuzz]

Have they mentioned that race is entirely a social construct and has no significant genetic differential thus pretty much something we invented as a form of social control yet?

Or are they still dispelling the myth that black men have bigger dicks?

eh, race as instrument of social control is an interesting notion, when the problem with race is the ease with which we identify ourselves as part of a group with similar traits (in the biological sense), and have a natural tendancy to react with (often subliminal) disgust towards those who appear different?

Anyway, didn't see the show. I read his bit in the times, thought it was quite mild. The one thing I took from it, and agreed wholeheartedly with, was his anger that the government had handed too much money and status to self-appointed 'representatives' of minorites - the effect being that these groups are incentivised to further entrench their community's 'separate' identity, and discourage direct contact between the state and individuals.

 

[Damocles]

Have they mentioned that race is entirely a social construct and has no significant genetic differential thus pretty much something we invented as a form of social control yet?

Or are they still dispelling the myth that black men have bigger dicks?

eh, race as instrument of social control is an interesting notion, when the problem with race is the ease with which we identify ourselves as part of a group with similar traits (in the biological sense), and have a natural tendancy to react with (often subliminal) disgust towards those who appear different?

Anyway, didn't see the show. I read his bit in the times, thought it was quite mild. The one thing I took from it, and agreed wholeheartedly with, was his anger that the government had handed too much money and status to self-appointed 'representatives' of minorites - the effect being that these groups are incentivised to further entrench their community's 'separate' identity, and discourage direct contact between the state and individuals.

Agreed. I think we're all racist to differing degrees; I know that I certainly am.

Part of this though is that racism is entirely a learnt behaviour through either society or direct influence. We identify ourselves in the groups that are socially acceptable to do. We don't for example recoil in horror at somebody with green eyes because you happen to have brown eyes, and the notion of such is silly. But it's no more silly than separation based on the colour of one's skin if you think about it. Really the only differences that we react to as different from us are things that we don't usually see. Differences scare us and the human mind is conditioned to focus on differences rather than similarities.

That's probably the hardest thing to get your head around in the entire debate - we're racist because we live in a society that is unconsciously racist even if we ourselves don't consider ourselves to be racist.

 

[hkbluey]

I was sat in the back early this morning, 06.50. A pair of Magpies are trying to build a nest in a tall Sycamore tree. About 12ft below were a couple of Wood Pigeons roosting on a branch of the same tree. The birds seemed oblivious to each other. Fast forward 1/2 hour 2 Collard Doves foraging on the lawn. Magpies swoop down and the Doves are gone. Meanwhile the rotund Wood Pigeons are still roosting. It's the same with us Humans, tolerant to a certain extent.

 

[Summerbuzz]

That's probably the hardest thing to get your head around in the entire debate - we're racist because we live in a society that is unconsciously racist even if we ourselves don't consider ourselves to be racist.

I've come across this view a few times now, and I did an online test from some academic institution that framed it's 'answers' (results? methodology? conclusions? assumptions?) in those terms - so I guess it's social science orthodoxy. I strongly disagree, however. I know evolutionary anthropology is a minefield, but for me, there is every reason to believe this is a hardwired response to phsyical traits, beyond the usual 'perception of otherness'.

Not that whites are programmed to be uneasy with black people, but that people subconciously recognise the physical traits that they share with family (1st) and social contacts (2nd) - and that we unconciously recognise physical traits shared by 'others'. Those physical traits, like it or not, do go beyond skin colour. For me, society's role is in deciding what socio-cultural traits we ascribe to these other groups. But the grouping by physical traits, and the disgust response to visual cues of same traits - it'd take a hell of an argument to convince me that wasn't a product of our descent.

In other words, I'm of the old school, Bertrand Russell and the other post-war crew - mankind has many unpleasant traits of his own without society's influence - to think we can perfect man through society is unrealistic and like all unrealistic goals that promise transcendance of inate undesirable human traits, unethical, the very starting point for totalitarianism and license for inhuman treatment. So I suppose that's my problem with the focus on society's role. Racism will always be a tendency - even if people were educated, there are many for whom it wouldn't make any difference. Society's only realistic role is in not pandering to that, and reaffirming the equivalency of citizens through absolutely equal rights and treatment. Change beyond that, or beyond simple education and appeal to our better nature, is not within the scope or reach of the state, as the root of the problem is within individual human personalities.