How To Tell People They Sound Racist

Run time: 03:00 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0Ti-gkJiXc   Posted on YouTube: July 21, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: July 21, 2008 By DU Member: jsmooth995 Views on DU: 5406

 
Why the most obvious approach may not be the best.

I liked the analogy to stealing wallets.

And they will always deny that what they said or did was racist. I'm tired of pampering racists and trying to speak to them so they'll "understand". They understand, all right, and they have to be told that they ARE racist, no matter how much they deny it. If they want to argue, just tell them again that they're racist, then walk away. I don't listen to their "explanations" anymore. Screw em'.

and will turn it against you by calling you a malcontent who blames all your failures on other people.

(That, btw, is why it's so important to reveal the good ole boy networks, because they really don't know that we know they exist and that we can see them functioning clearly as freshly melted glacier ice.)

Everything is getting turned upside down.

...that I was the only one noticing that trend. Someone says something racist? That's bad. Call them on it? Oh, that's even worse.

I've actually been on the receiving end of that. It's disgusting how people will suddenly turn on you if you dare to speak the truth about someone's racism.

Calling them a racist is letting them off easy. Attack like a bulldog on what they DID or SAID. That is demonstrable fact. Calling them a racist is an opinion. Like a bulldog, keep that death grip on the facts - you will soon have that bastard screaming in pain.

Go look at any of the deeply suspect "rap's not music" threads in the lounge and you'll find the silly defense he explains everywhere. But the correct answer is as he describes: racism is an action (and a social action), not an essence:

But there is no being behind doing, effecting, becoming; the doer is merely a fiction added to the deed - the deed is everything. - Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals

Indeed, I would go even further to say this: NOBODY is "a racist." Rather, racism works through people. People are conduits for systemic social effects. Racism isn't located in the individual, but between individuals; it emerges and hardens and replicates itself as a fundamental social phenomenon. Because our culture is so focused on the individual, we have difficulty seeing the way aggregate social effects work. We want to "blame" somebody, and it's easier to BLAME an individual than a fuzzy "aggregate social effect." But this is a deeply flawed response. Racism is not and never has been the quality of an individual, even if some individuals manage to serve as more intense conduits for racism. Indeed, thinking of racism as the quality of an individual is one of the ways racism is reproduced generation after generation, because it turns toward an evaluation of an individual's WHOLE life, rather than to a microanalysis of actions. We reproduce racism with ACTION: glances, fidgeting, looking down, speaking softly, speaking loudly, moving seats, slowing or speeding up our pace, a million micro-decisions and non-decisions that have nothing to do with YOU, your heart, or your WHOLE life, but rather with responses in the moment. The individual racist is a mythology.

I'm surprised at the number of comments agreeing with this lame video. Everyone is racist to some degree in that they belong a group of people that they identify with and feel is better than other groups. When this gets out of hand and becomes outward chauvinism instead of just an internal preference, THAT is when we call it racism.

You can hold any number of negative thoughts about another group of people. You can think their women are ugly, their music sounds like cats fucking, their cuisine is nauseating, their manners and customs are barbaric, but as long as you smile and hold it in and don't say anything, you will never be thought a racist. It's when you act on these feelings, to deny them their human rights and exclude them from their fair share of the earth that you become a racist. It is every individual's reaction to others that determines how much of a racist they are. If they are very tolerant and mix freely, learn the language and customs of the other and intermarry, then they aren't very racist at all. If they stick to their own and embellish their dislikes with all manner of fabrications, then they are as racist as any Nazi.

Racism is learned behavior. Toddlers are not racist and whether they play well with others has little to do with the personal racial qualities of the other toddler. But as they get older and learn more about their own group, racism can develop. Racism gets reinforced with every ethnic or cultural pride celebration of uniqueness and reduced by every multi-cultural interaction.

The only place where racism has any legitimate bias is in medicine. Some groups are lactose intolerant, other groups have predispositions to various types of cancer, and other groups have a natural immunity to some disease process. So for a doctor to inquire about race when taking a patient history is a legitimate question. Beyond that, race is really only incidental information. But everyone should be entitled to use that incidental information and say "no thanks, that's not the group I identify with, so if you don't mind, I'd rather not be included in whatever you have planned".

People perform racism. That's a completely different thing. Even in your post you say "Racism is learned behavior." Yes. It is BEHAVIOR. Actions, not qualities of a person, but qualities of their actions.

The video is exactly right about how to deal with that distinction.

The older they get, the more people get set in their ways and act out behaviors that they are familiar with. If called on it repeatedly, they can learn to change their behaviors, but the older they are, the more difficult it gets. That's how stereotyping happens. If you see a disheveled man walking into a convenience store at 9am to buy a case of beer, you can pretty easily conclude that he is an alcoholic, also a learned behavior which gets reinforced every day he drinks. After years of drinking, his alcoholism is not just an action, it is a quality of his personality. In the same way, repeating racist statements until they become normal makes one a racist person.

Nobody IS a behavior. It's a self-destructive and conservative way to regard the world.

It's just stating a reality, and reality has a liberal bias. :evilgrin:

If people keep repeating the same behaviors over and over and over, your argument that they are different from their behaviors gets weaker and weaker. If we are talking about self-destructive addictive behaviors, the first step in getting people help is to get them to decide that they are more important than the behaviors they keep repeating.

Example with the alcoholic thing.

If a person can stay sober for one day, then for that day ONLY by your status of judgment they are a recovering person.

You say the choices they make, make them who they are. So if you stay in the here and now and work on today's behaviors and don't extrapolate all the way back to the hit they took in kindergarten, it's easier to be a part of the solution instead of one more person beating them over the head with their failure.

We all have baggage we bring into this. In that way you are right. But often times when people start making new choices it's literally making new wrinkles in the thought centers of the brain that relate to that issue. The more often the positive choices are made the deeper the rut and the easier it is to stay in that mode.

Still if someone slips out of that mode due to a crises, say the guy you mentioned in the convenience store had 15 years sobriety but just saw his mother and young child burn up in his house and he came home too late to save them.

He's not JUST a drunk and he's not JUST a recovering person. He's both. Going back to a stupid choice during a weak moment doesn't mean he has to stay there forever, if the other choices have been made before the person can get back there.

I guess what I'm saying is that when people make new choices it isn't always 100% change of direction and the past doesn't matter any more. But change can still happen even when shit keeps hitting the fan. It's more of a process of unlearning the old and relearning new ways to relate without the old familiars.

Some days it's one step forward and two steps back, but if the goal in the heart and the direction being faced remain steadfast, eventually the day will come when there is a lot of forward motion and lots of progress is made.

you can really compare alcoholism and racism. One is an illness and the other is a choice.

And actually I'm beginning to see racism as more of a weapon that we pick up and use and less of something that is "inside" a person.

It explains to me why people who work very hard to "not" be racist and who have love for every kind of person even those who display every trait of an "enemy" can still make racist blunders.

This is the type of person who without education doesn't realize WHY saying "RAP isn't music" is a racist statement. They pick up something they don't realize is a weapon, but that others can clearly see is a weapon of racism.

It explains why people who are backed into a corner or beaten down to a level of almost non-existence will pick up racism as instinctively as a person would grab a club if they were being attacked.

What they don't see clearly is THE PEOPLE PULLING THE STRINGS WANT that response; ARE MANIPULATING SOCIETY TO CREATE that response and AGAIN I think education is the key. It enables a different choice, to be mad at the real perpetrators and take steps together with all races that will bring the perps to justice, NOT the PERCEIVED perps that the manipulators are pushing in front of us as straw men.

Certainly those who choose daily to pick up these types of weapons and have been trained since early childhood become one with the weapon as any master of martial arts might become one with their weapon. This is the type of person who we think of when we think of racists persons, and assign anyone who utters the same words at any time the fullness of their commitment.

But even in that scenario there is hope. Amazing Grace was written by a former slaver who turned away from past bit by bit and eventually was walking on a totally different road.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazing_Grace


I DON'T say these things to EXCUSE EVER USING RACIST COMMENTS, however I think a clearer understanding of how insidious and multi-layered the problem is provides a better way to eliminate the problem that doesn't include labeling people as racist and leaving it at that.

The point of this video I believe is simply that addressing the racist comment or action and HOLDING the person accountable for WHAT they said without putting on a GOD robe and having to be self righteous and label them a racist is a BETTER way to solve the problem.

Question is:

Do people want to solve the problem of racism?

or

Is it good enough to point fingers of blame and feel self righteous?

and say that it is clear to me that our opinions shape our behavior and, therefore, our behavior makes us who we are.

Do you tend to see the world as good and evil with nothing in between?

Do you think that if someone does something once or 1000 times they can never change?

Do you believe in movie villains who have no redeeming qualities no depth of character that shows how they got that way?

Probably NOT.


So, although our thoughts lead to beliefs and opinions
AND opinions and beliefs lead to actions
AND repeated actions become behavior
AND behavior describes a large part of who we are
our BEHAVIOR is NOT WHO we are

....as long as we continue to breathe and can choose

to think different thoughts leading to different beliefs and opinions
AND different actions
AND different behaviors
AND real change re-describing who we are
BUT even so the behavior is still NOT WHO WE ARE
cause it's too easy to screw it up after making a lot of good progress.

A person is NOT the path they walk.
That way is trodden in the world not upon their person.

BUT much can be discerned from a person by knowing what path they walk.

Question is:

Do we know if they chose that path with full knowledge or are simply lost?


That is the hard part of this type of communication.

WHAT IS DIFFERENT about the REAL WORLD and DU:

RW: IF you see someone in real life who really has made the racist path their life's work, you have a multitude of other clues and even then you might look into the eyes of a predator and only see what they want you to see if they are skilled at deception.

DU: Here we only have a person's words to judge them by and many here judge quickly, almost automatically.

I'm not better than anyone else here, I've been on both sides of that equation. It's why I keep looking for better ways to get to solving the problems we came here together to solve.

The hardest part of coming to this board is seeing how much time is wasted arguing with each other about the definition of "IS".

Still, if the Greeks hadn't done the same, if our forefathers hadn't argued in taverns, parlors, conventions and back rooms we'd be even further behind and even farther away from the real solutions that seem to allude us.


I want to make racism a thing of the past. A path of antiquity no longer traveled.

I would see racism as a quaint thing and the Geneva Convention respected.

I would see our civil liberties returned and available for ALL people without exceptions.

AH, but that IS the longest road. Isn't it?

AND WHO has the time to study ALL of history?

So ALL of us are bound to make some historical mistep at some point.


:dunce:
Some days it's my turn.
Some days it's yours.
Some days someone else takes the heat.


There's a little bit of bad in the best of us.
There's a little bit of good in the least of us.
So it hardly behooves ANY of US to talk about the REST of us.

(Sampler my mamma had to remind us not to gossip or judge others)

error--self delete.

If we grew up around white people, then we are pre-disposed to being more comfortable around white people. So we have a built-in tendency to be less comfortable with people with a different skin color.

That's why it is overly simplistic for white people like Ronald Reagan to pretend that they are "color blind" and somehow immune from racism and that discrimination is something done by other people.

Very rarely will you hear someone admit to discriminating on the basis of race, but minorities know from their everyday lives that discrimination is all around.

I'll admit, I haven't seen that in the lounge, so I don't exactly grasp what has been said. I dislike rap, but I still have a broad collection of Stax Volt and Motown records. In otherwords, you can still like music from artists who are black, but still hate rap. I guess I'm needing to understand what those in the lounge were saying about their dislike.

I don't "like" contemporary country or thrash metal, but I understand them as musical forms. Denying hip hop music that definition is a little different from "disliking" it. So, maybe it's just a definition issue and not tied in any way to race? Perhaps, for some, but that the problem clusters around obvious cultural differences pf value between harmony/melody, on the one hand, and rhythm, on the other, says a lot about how these "likes" are parceled out in the first place. The vehemence with which some deny this specific cultural form even the DEFINITION of music is clearly tied to cultural definitions, rather than some personally developed system. What we "like" and "dislike" is also a social effect, for the most part, and not some secret possession of our inmost subjectivity. And that's why the people yelling that rap is not music aren't racists, though their opinions and perceptions are obviously inflected by racial and cultural values (i.e., that work THROUGH people).

No taste is developed in isolation.

Huge canvas with 6 blobs of paint. Wow. He got how much for it? Suckers. That ain't art, it's a scam. It's 2 guys selling the emperor invisible silk pajamas.


I actually like the music and movement that go with rap, just don't like to hear those same words over and over and over again.

Tupac had some stuff I could listen to without cringing.

I used to dislike rap, until my son introduced me to this music. Powerful stuff.

http://www.immortal-technique.com/

My son, of course got me past the initial to listen to Tupac.

Is that because for over 100 years whites made references to blacks as not really being "people" but property, animals or savages without the basic capacity for independent thought or ability to learn. And used this as justification for all means of abuse.

So when someone says "jungle bunny" and means a person who was happy to take a trip to the Amazon, it gets construed as implying they are calling that person a dumb black animal of no human capacity or importance.

In anthropology using tools is the thing that makes us more advanced than chimps, well until they started using tools, BUT... by saying a form of music created in the black community is not music it implies an underlying belief or subconscious opinion that black people are incapable of creating something as advanced as a new genre of music.

For hundreds of years blacks have been fighting against being labeled as property, animals, subhuman savages incapable of higher learning or feeling.

Jungle Bunny may conjure up an animal in the Amazon evading pythons in your mind, but from the other end of our social layers to a black person it implies that person has only capacity to reproduce and live off other people's resources.

Anthropology defines the difference between us and lower life forms in the utilization of tools, until chimps started using them. Then they looked at things like burial rituals, music and dance, spiritual awareness and higher aspirations such as art, poetry theoretical math and scientific method.

When blacks were slaves everything was done to keep them out of the category where whites would have to admit they were enslaving human beings who ought to have as much rights as the slave owners by dint of their humanity.

So saying rap isn't music implies those who created it, aren't really civilized human beings expressing themselves primaly in response to base treatment, but primal beings incapable of expressing "real" music. Animals aping musicians, not musicians making an angry musical statement of rage against the machine and the man putting their people through more hell.

Is this a CONSCIOUS statement by people who don't look at themselves as racist? I don't think so, but even subconscious layers we take for granted need to be examined and put to the test. Whether we mean it or not if it is used as a weapon to demean by a segment of society that won't let this whole thing go.

In respect once we are aware then those of us who want to put those ghosts to rest need to toss things like this out and just not go there.

"Racism isn't located in the individual, but between individuals; it emerges and hardens and replicates itself as a fundamental social phenomenon."


It's like racism is a weapon we pick up to hurt one another or use to defend ourselves if that is the mind set, but it isn't inherently "inside" us.

It's a choice we have to make and keep having to make to remain ignorant and hateful.

If people could think that way, then it would be easier to behave like the guy in the video said, in fact like talking someone out of using a weapon.

A person who doesn't want to be racist will look at what is being described and drop it like a burning bag of crap. Which is a good thing for both sides. Step away from the burning bag of crap.

Someone who has been trained to see that burning bag of crap as their way of life will hold it closer. Their problem. Step away from the fool holding the burning bag of crap.

But using the approach stated will help make the difference with people who really don't want to be part of that social phenomenon.

Sometimes I just don't know what to say to people who say the typical racist crap. They always start out by saying, "Now, I'm not a racist, but...".


BTW, welcome to DU! :toast:

When I was a teen I challenged my father for his bigotry and racism. He denied it. I got the dictionary and read the definition of each without telling him what words I was defining. I said, "Do you agree that this matches your point of view." He said, "Yes, but I ain't no racist and I ain't no bigot." He was both, but he thought he was just smarter and more insightful than most people. Calling names never works, but I'm not sure anything else does either in the face of intractable racism.

Edit for K&R! :kick:

Basically asserting that Jews were inherently selfish and had never contributed anything of value to society, but that we were all in his views parasites on the world. I told him that he was a bigoted anti-semite and of course the response was "Whoa hey, I love You People, I have lots of Jewish friends (yeah right) and I've got nothing agains You People, I just know what's going on is all."

:eyes:

It's always the same "Hey oh I'm not a racist but those polka dot people are universally sacks of shit, I'm not a racist that's just the way it is."

I don't think they can be turned around, either, except through experience and dad wasn't open to new experiences. I once unintentionally offended a friend from Oklahoma who was staying with us on his first visit to the East Coast. He was jumping up and down with excitement about being in NYC and walking down Broadway! I chimed in with, "Isn't it great? It's The Great White Way!" and that phrase unfortunately wiped that happy grin right off his face. I said, "That refers to the lights! The lights on Broadway!" but the mood was broken. I felt terrible because I don't think he trusted me after that. We need more give and take and lots more love, but we also need less prejudice and hatefulness. :hug:

I gave him about 30 examples off the top of my head about Jews who had made significant contributions to society, told him about community service/projects I'd done, and that my family members had done, and he just kept on saying that "there must have been something in it for you... or that's not the norm." Some people just have to believe that all other races/cultures are inferior to their own. I think it's all that some losers have - they see themselves as relative failures and so want to be part of the "winning team" or something.

Bleh. Fuck em says I.

It's not worth it to your peace of mind to sweat some ignorant as***ole's prejudice. My coping mechanism with my family was to move the hell away forever. So, yeah...bleh.

I don't think you should have felt terrible about that. Sometimes white is just a color. But I sure agree with your last statement. :hi:

That's what I felt bad about. I was up around your city last month for some "Superior Donuts". Awesome play! (speaking of white just being a color) :hi:

Huge K&R


:kick: :kick: :kick: :kick:


:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

It's an important distinction.

And I'm not giving excuses.

Racism is prejudice plus power. That is to say, systematic historical power over folks w/ a different racial background. A lot of people miss that distinction today, unfortunately, and reflexively say something's racist when it's actually prejudice (the whole "reverse racism" crock is the biggest example).

Edited to add: The video is great and spot on.

Killing the messenger, character assassination, and labeling derails the discussion about the issues themselves--which are about ACTIONS TAKEN.



:applause:

K&R

...for comments, actions, view points, etc. I guess it depends on how vested one is in the relationship.

I used to spend a lot of time trying to "educate" and "hold people accountable" on this board, for example. I don't anymore. Because one thing this guy fails to get into is "not everyone is open."

One has to be open to having such aspects of their behaviour pointed out to them, and a willingness to look at themselves, their attitudes, beliefs--where it comes from, where they learned this, why they think and feel as they do, etc. Without that willingness, such a person generally digs heels in deeper and continues to defend their words, acts, etc. No amount of education or attempt to separate the words from the person is going to be helpful in such instances.

peace~

It also works for a lot of other conversations. "John - that gorilla joke you told was just wrong. Let me explain why." works better than John - you are nothing but a sexist pig, why did you tell that gorilla joke." That allows John to deflect attention from the fact that he told a joke about a woman being raped and beaten. Instead, he gets to bring up examples of why he is "not a sexist pig." By the time he is finished, everyone has forgotten about the offensive joke.

If it is racism on the TV though that needs our biggest scorn that is the source. We'll address teh blatant racists in every day life after november until then switch their conversation to the economy.

Brilliant. Just effin' brilliant. This should be shown in every school in America, but what do you want to bet the same people who make offensive jokes/comments about others would scream about the language he uses to get the point across?

and accompanying hip-hop beat appeal to the youth of today.

"Yo, dudes, ya'll gotta get your taxes in order, yo." - not what you'd want your tax attorney to say.

However, being in black-and-white is a tacit nod to the serious subject matter....... coding.... get me my morphine drip, nurse!!

It's not that I disagree with what this guy is saying (though I do to some extent), but I would really like to have serious discussions on matters such as racism not subjected to fashion. It makes it seem flippant. I'm smart enough to pay attention to someone speaking for two minutes without requiring dope beats. Anyone who isn't, isn't someone who I would care to engage in a dialogue with.

"I'm smart enough to pay attention to someone speaking for two minutes without requiring dope beats. Anyone who isn't, isn't someone who I would care to engage in a dialogue with."

Wouldn't you agree though, that this video then is not likely aimed at you, but the people who need to pay attention? You don't have to have that dialogue with them, but someone does.

What I'm afraid of is that this sort of thing, by using elements of popular entertainment, makes serious problems seem to be related to style/taste/opinion, etc. The media has greased the wheels for this, by giving up journalism and making reporting consist of only "he said, she said" statements, of course. Martin Luther king didn't move the civil rights movement along by trying to appeal to the youth with anything other than reason, and truth to power. I think a sober approach may be the best approach for sober subjects. Maybe I'm just being an old man or something (and I'm not that old) here. I guess my criticism isn't so much about this video in particular as much as it's about being frustrated with how it's so quickly become acceptable to get so much of our information for youtube video clips, short articles, tv sound bites, etc, and how the producers of content (like this gentleman) now cater to that.

I've spent a whole post with people telling me what my son said makes him a racist.

I asked for help on educating him to a better way and to disprove some smear he took as fact. I was busy holding him accountable for what he said, but it became all about them thinking they know who he is.

ALL of us have stupid things we say that can be considered racist or elitist or whatever depending on who is listening.

But getting people to focus on the facts and the what they did not who they are is the best thing I have heard on this board for a long time.

Well that and Straight Story's mad props to people being good to one another.

Peace.

thanks for posting that!

I'm glad I saw this in time to recommend. Thanks for posting...

:yourock:


peace~

Very Nice.

not just to racism. Confronting behavior in a timely manner is often a better approach than saying for example "You're a jerk.".

You won't win any arguments, or persuade anyone to change their ways, by labeling the person's entire being. It's a general concept that works in many situations.

Same as when dealing with kids. Maybe the kid did something stupid. So don't say "you're stupid!". Tell the kid it was a stupid thing to do. Maybe they'll surprise you and do something smart tomorrow.

Edited to remove K&R! I saw this too late! Sorry!