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So you'd rather live somewhere where you couldn't shop for anything, couldn't receive life-saving care, etc, just to be "free"? That doesn't sound too free to me.
You're suggesting something that won't happen today. Far too many people don't accept racism and wouldn't patronize a business who practiced it. Outside of a few backwoods Southern rural areas, businesses like those would receive negative press and go out of business quickly.
Even in Jim Crow times there were black and white-owned businesses that served AA's. There were black doctors as well. What people don't realize is government-mandated discrimination hindered the free market from capitalizing on the ignorance of those times.
But, let's take your scenario at face value. If this ever happened, I'd simply leave as many of my ancestors did during slavery and the Great Migration 1 & 2. They went North, to the West Coast, or to Canada. Why would I want to live somewhere I'm not wanted? I'm a realist, and prefer to know who doesn't want me around instead of living where people are forced to deal with me. Ignorance is not bliss to me.
You're suggesting something that won't happen today. Far too many people don't accept racism and wouldn't patronize a business who practiced it. Outside of a few backwoods Southern rural areas, businesses like those would receive negative press and go out of business quickly.
Even in Jim Crow times there were black and white-owned businesses that served AA's. There were black doctors as well. What people don't realize is government-mandated discrimination hindered the free market from capitalizing on the ignorance of those times.
But, let's take your scenario at face value. If this ever happened, I'd simply leave as many of my ancestors did during slavery and the Great Migration 1 & 2. They went North, to the West Coast, or to Canada. Why would I want to live somewhere I'm not wanted? I'm a realist, and prefer to know who doesn't want me around instead of living where people are forced to deal with me. Ignorance is not bliss to me.
If you're not wanted anywhere, that doesn't leave you much of any place to BE, does it? You don't think there's racism in the north, on the west coast, or in Canada? Think again!
And the reason this doesn't happen today, to any great extent anyway, is BECAUSE it is illegal to discriminate b/c of race.
This nonsense from the Libertarians that Jim Crow was somehow government sponsored, w/o looking at who WAS the govt. at the time, is nuts! Who elected, and re-elected, and re-elected again these people who passed these Jim Crow laws? Who looked the other way in the north when certain businesses did not serve blacks? THE PEOPLE, that's who!
I don't believe the real, violent, historic Jim Crow would return. However, IF it did, I would leave the country.To be clear, I'm not calling topic of this thread Jim Crow where business owners can only exclude people. To me, Jim Crow is government sanctioned discrimination laws and no protection from violence.
I would flourish in a society where I am protected from violence and can capitalize on the idiocy of racists.
I would leave the country too if this nation reverted back to Jim Crow laws. African-American writer Richard Wright left the USA, lived in France until he died. He never returned. Some African-Americans left and went to live in the Soviet Union.
If you're not wanted anywhere, that doesn't leave you much of any place to BE, does it? You don't think there's racism in the north, on the west coast, or in Canada? Think again!
Hello Katiana,
I did not say there wouldn't be racism on an individual level in those places, I'm not naive. The difference is in places outside the South, during slavery and the 100 yrs after, I would have been a free person and generally left alone. I would have moved to the least racist place in the North, Canada, or the West, or would have left the country if racism was higher than my own tolerance as others did.
Here's the difference between you and I. I don't care if people practice individual racist choices in their business, and I don't want to force them to do business with me. I just want to be left alone in peace and allowed to conduct business with those who want to conduct it with me.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
And the reason this doesn't happen today, to any great extent anyway, is BECAUSE it is illegal to discriminate b/c of race.
Society was already trending in this direction when those laws were passed. You are the one who used the logic of who the government is in your post, remember? So, using your logic the people wanted this to happen and forced the politicians to react, not simply because the government made it so.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Katiana
This nonsense from the Libertarians that Jim Crow was somehow government sponsored, w/o looking at who WAS the govt. at the time, is nuts! Who elected, and re-elected, and re-elected again these people who passed these Jim Crow laws? Who looked the other way in the north when certain businesses did not serve blacks? THE PEOPLE, that's who!
The nonsense that the government IS the people is nuts. Our entire framework of government is supposed to be based on individual, inalienable rights NOT what "the people" decide are rights. Your mentality of what government is brought us slavery Jim Crow in the first place. The people are only covered in the Tenth Amendment, the rest of the Constitution and Amendments are in place to keep "the people" and the government from violating the rights of others. I do agree in part, the failure of "the people" and the government was their inability to enforce existing inalienable rights for my ancestors.
By the way, you're using arguments of the past to argue a current policy debate. Do you really believe everything will revert back to the Jim Crow days if one section of the Civil Rights Act was removed? My arguments are based on present-day society, which was trending in this direction regardless of the public accommodations section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
It doesn't matter who the government was or who they were elected by, the Constitution wasn't being followed. Following the Constitution is a requirement of the protection that I seek. I obviously have stipulations on my agreement with allowing businesses to serve whomever they want. If you don't understand that, I don't know what to tell you.
Last edited by Freedom123; 09-27-2011 at 12:59 PM..
I would leave the country too if this nation reverted back to Jim Crow laws. African-American writer Richard Wright left the USA, lived in France until he died. He never returned. Some African-Americans left and went to live in the Soviet Union.
Thanks for the links, I'll check them out. I was familiar with Richard Wright among others moving out of the country. I am quite proud of my ancestors who voted with their feet, whether it was within or outside of the country.
I did not say there wouldn't be racism on an individual level in those places, I'm not naive. The difference is in places outside the South, during slavery and the 100 yrs after, I would have been a free person and generally left alone. I would have moved to the least racist place in the North, Canada, or the West, or would have left the country if racism was higher than my own tolerance as others did.
Here's the difference between you and I. I don't care if people practice individual racist choices in their business, and I don't want to force them to do business with me. I just want to be left alone in peace and allowed to conduct business with those who want to conduct it with me.
Society was already trending in this direction when those laws were passed. You are the one who used the logic of who the government is in your post, remember? So, using your logic the people wanted this to happen and forced the politicians to react, not simply because the government made it so.
The nonsense that the government IS the people is nuts. Our entire framework of government is supposed to be based on individual, inalienable rights NOT what "the people" decide are rights. Your mentality of what government is brought us slavery Jim Crow in the first place. The people are only covered in the Tenth Amendment, the rest of the Constitution and Amendments are in place to keep "the people" and the government from violating the rights of others. I do agree in part, the failure of "the people" and the government was their inability to enforce existing inalienable rights for my ancestors.
By the way, you're using arguments of the past to argue a current policy debate. Do you really believe everything will revert back to the Jim Crow days if one section of the Civil Rights Act was removed? My arguments are based on present-day society, which was trending in this direction regardless of the public accommodations section of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
It doesn't matter who the government was or who they were elected by, the Constitution wasn't being followed. Following the Constitution is a requirement of the protection that I seek. I obviously have stipulations on my agreement with allowing businesses to serve whomever they want. If you don't understand that, I don't know what to tell you.
Something tells me you are very young. Something also tells me that just as some young women these days say they have no use for the feminists who fought for women's rights (see Sally Ride as one example) b/c they don't know what things were like before, you don't really know what it was like, even in the north, before the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
Society may have been "trending" towards less racism, but those "trends" were sure taking their time. Brown v Board of Education was in 1954, but many schools remained segregated for decades afterwards. "White Flight" also happend, something you might read about some time.
What brought us Jim Crow is not my mentality, but "How a bill becomes a law". Research this topic as well. H***, even in my own state of Colorado, Ku Klux Klan members dominated the state legislature in the 1920s.
In his book, “A Colorado History,” historian Marshall Sprague noted that Klansmen mainly agitated against immigrants, and encouraged Denverites to only patronize the stores of “real” Americans — and avoid going to restaurants bearing “foreign names, like Pagliacci or Benito or Ciancio or Wong or Torino.”
Once in control of the statehouse, KKK-controlled legislators introduced proposals such as firing all Catholics and Jews on the University of Colorado faculty, and outlawing the use of sacramental wine (which was still allowed under Prohibition).
But that’s not to say violence against blacks did not also occur.
(Several examples follow)
ETA: If you need any "proof" that racism still exists today, look no further than the front page of P&OC on CD:
I assure you that I am not very young. Either way, counter my viewpoints, not my age. I could say "Katiana, something tells me you're not African-American" to try and discredit your viewpoints on these matters, but wouldn't that sound just as ridiculous?
Being older does not make one more intelligent or insightful than another. My viewpoints come from research and speaking with friends and family members who actually lived during Jim Crow, including older ones who are children of slaves. My great-grandmother is still alive and her father was a slave. She, I and my grandmother have had many conversations about this and they agree with my point of view.
In case you skipped these points, I will post them again:
1. My arguments are based on present-day society's attitudes towards racism.
2. My stipulations on supporting the premise of this thread is being protected from violence and government-mandated discrimination. If those two things are violated, then I do not support it.
In regards to your Colorado example, it is duly noted and I will read your link. That does not change the fact that I would moved to the least racist place at the time. That doesn't necessarily mean it would be Colorado. It might have been Detroit, Europe, Africa or who knows where. I do not want to live among racists and I want to know who they are so I know if I need to get away. I'll leave it to people like you to change society after I've moved away.
It also doesn't change the fact that Colorado was violating the Constitution with these discriminatory practices. You can give me every racism example in the world and I'll continue to point out how the laws on the books weren't being enforced and these additional business limitations weren't needed.
To answer the rest of your points:
1. Desegregation post Brown v. Board: I don't believe in forced integration, I believe in allowing individuals to go to whatever school they choose, and the govt protecting them from violence when making that choice. Since you generally take liberal positions, I wonder if you support the status quo of forced school zones and are against school choice, which is defacto segregation in today's society.
2. White flight: I don't know why people care where white people are moving. African-Americans don't need whites around to have a flourishing neighborhood. If they don't want to live around me, that's just fine. Once again, I want to associate with those who want to associate with me. If people want to move away when I move into the neighborhood, so be it. I would capitalize on it by obtaining their houses at a discount and reselling it to people who want to live in the neighborhood. If anything, white flight helps African-Americans obtain houses at discount prices.
3. Mentality and Jim Crow: Your mentality is that the government creates extra rights to remedy wrongs in society. If a government is powerful enough to create extra rights for some people by taking rights away from others (your ideology), then it is also powerful enough to take those rights away (Jim Crow). That removes the concept of inalienable rights, which is supposed to be universal and equal.
In relation to businesses, customers do not have a right to that business, but an owner does. Mandating who businesses accept is taking property rights away from the owner and assigning property rights to a customer that does not own that company. As a caveat: If states mandate anti-discrimination as a condition of govt protection aka incorporation, I'm fine with that, but not for sole proprietorships that did not ask the state for liability protection.
4. Societal trends taking too much time: This is my biggest gripe with the liberal ideology. Your goals are noble, but if you're allowed to trump rights and laws in the cause of "justice" because it's "taking too long", that negates the whole idea of rights in the first place. We have a method in place to meet your goals, it's called amending the Constitution or using the laws on the books. Either could have been used to effectively remedy the racism discussed in this thread. Today this law-trumping ideology is evident in liberal support of illegal immigrants who break the law to come here.
In the end, our debate is mostly state vs. federal. Throwing libertarianism and property rights to the side, states are allowed under our Constitution to pass Civil Rights laws that require businesses not to exclude anyone by race. So, if you want some common ground this is what I can give you.
Where did I say that racism doesn't exist today? You're misinterpreting my position.
My position is: I don't care if people don't want to hang out with, do business with, and make statements about people who look like me, AS LONG AS I am protected from violence and government-mandated discrimination laws. I want colorblind, equal laws and free speech for everyone, including the racists. That way they can't hurt me and I know who they are.
My position does not equal denial of racism in today's society.
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