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I think it's a stupid exercise given by the professor, assuming it's true, but hardly makes it racist.
What would be the educational content of that exercise? I can understand going over the history and noting the injustices - but to write a letter? That exercise is to purposely have the whites FOCUS on the injustice and make it their own.
What would be the educational content of that exercise? I can understand going over the history and noting the injustices - but to write a letter? That exercise is to purposely have the whites FOCUS on the injustice and make it their own.
Further...even on this forum we see comments about how white people are the problem, white people are stupid, white people are ruining the world, etc. etc. etc. If the same was mentioned of african american or hispanics the thread would be shut down or the poster would be yelled at by every subsequent poster.
I have been posting on this forum since 2008 and I have never read any threads remotely close to what you describe here. The mods are very good at shutting down racist threads.
Everyone has their own definition of racism. So there is no use defining it.
As a black, do you feel that the OP referring to "crime on whites" by blacks and Hispanics is "racism"? I responded to another comment today that was a self-described "white guy" saying he had experienced "racism" from blacks and Hispanics in Arizona and California (evidently more than one occasion). No response yet to my query of what the specifics were, but there is some core principle that we need to agree upon for a definition of what it is.
I am black. Son of miilitary parents. Mom's side of the family lives in S.E Wash. DC. So I spent a lot of time there my whole life - that is the ghetto. Went ito public school there in 7th and 8th grade before going to private school in 9th grade. I've been in the fights. You don't know me.
I am a white bread child of middle class privilege and neither my parents nor I could afford to send kids to private school. If that's where you actually stood up and announced that poor kids should just get a good education and pull themselves up by their bootstraps ... No wonder that teacher ripped into you. Really, being given the extraordinary and loving gift of third base by your parents does not mean you hit a triple, nor does it mean that everyone else should be expected to magically arrive there, either.
Because they terrorized, tormented and separated people, caused wars and did many horrible things for years and now since others are getting a chance whites are getting more vocal, scared is a better word.
Maybe becoming more vocal is a culture shift - speaking up for yourself when you didn't have to do it before.
As a black, do you feel that the OP referring to "crime on whites" by blacks and Hispanics is "racism"? I responded to another comment today that was a self-described "white guy" saying he had experienced "racism" from blacks and Hispanics in Arizona and California (evidently more than one occasion). No response yet to my query of what the specifics were, but there is some core principle that we need to agree upon for a definition of what it is.
Just a white guy here but I think we can agree on a few things. In my experience, there are a lot of blacks who have had ugly experiences where police officers were quite blatantly singling them out and assuming they were up to no good just because they were black. The most recent story I can recall: When the guy was about 12, his dad left him in their car (I think it was a Jaguar) while he went into the bank. For whatever reason he moves over to the driver's side seat. Within minutes, a cop was knocking on the car window demanding to know what he was doing. A few minutes later, he was in handcuffs being walked into the bank where his dad was. Cop explains that he found this kid trying to steal his car, etc. The amazing thing to me is that when his dad said, "take the handcuffs off of my son!" the cop actually tried to argue the point for several more minutes.
Things of that severity definitely qualify as blatant racism.
I think it's the small stuff where it gets kinda fuzzy.
I am a white bread child of middle class privilege and neither my parents nor I could afford to send kids to private school. If that's where you actually stood up and announced that poor kids should just get a good education and pull themselves up by their bootstraps ... No wonder that teacher ripped into you. Really, being given the gift of third base does not mean you hit a triple, nor does it mean that everyone else should be expected to magically arrive there, either.
Hey - you are the one who judged me inaccurately.
So now you are going to continue make these ridiculous comments about my background which you know nothing except what I just told you.
Let me explain something to you. I am blessed to have parents who took the risk on their savings and some loans to send me to the school. None of my siblings went to private school. My older brother graduated from Ballou H.S. in DC.
Whatever their part was - I had to do the work and the studying. I had to endure the environment in middle school where you were a target if you did well - and I got in fights for that. This is black on black fights. No racism here - just trying to knock down a brother who was different and didn't play the whole "ghetto mindset" game. So it could have been expedient for me to dumb myself down and play it safe. But then I'd have to answer to mom and dad. No way.
No one magically appears there - so you are totally wrong. It's all work, study, and you have to put your time in - rich, poor, whatever. The problem is much of the black family structure is screwed up - so the parents don't care to push their kids. There are 24 hours in a day - what are we doing with the time?
Racism is a terrible thing regardless of who gives it. I think this is something most of us can agree upon. However, we rarely hear of condemnation against those who target whites explicitly. Black and Hispanic on white crime occurs in greater numbers than the opposite, yet we rarely see public outcry. Further...even on this forum we see comments about how white people are the problem, white people are stupid, white people are ruining the world, etc. etc. etc. If the same was mentioned of african american or hispanics the thread would be shut down or the poster would be yelled at by every subsequent poster.
So my question....why does it seem that prejudice against White people is tolerated...or even encouraged to some degree? Further...why are white people encouraged to be apologetic (see below).
I want to qualify the apology thing with something that happened in my "Intro to Sociology" class in college. My Soci professor was in the racial relations section of our textbook and she was talking about the injustices that have happened over the years against minorities in the South. She then proceeded to ask all of the white Americans in the classroom to write a "proxy" apology letter to the slaves for the injusticies of our ancestors. Now...I did this because it was for the class and I had no interest in getting on my professors bad side...but I felt uncomfortable doing this. I have done nothing to the slaves...I, to my knowledge, have never hurt anyone. This felt unfair to me and my classmates. It was clearly racially motivated and unacceptable...yet she does this every year. Is it fair?
As a black man, racism against anyone shouldn't be tolerated. I find it interesting that your Soc professor thought it was necessary for all of the white students in her class to write a letter of apology. What were you guys apologizing for? That makes absolutely no sense. I guess everytime a black male rapes, kills, and robs innoncent white people, I should be apologizing to their families? When is all of this madness going to stop, and we just move forward as a nation? Last time I checked, we did re-elect a black man for president. Enough said!
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