I don’t think it’s an either/or situation.
As a matter of past posting history there is little doubt that F-P is an argumentative pedant.
I’m trying to give him plenty of latitude (for now) on whether he actually holds racists views or simply doesn’t discriminate about whom he’ll crawl in bed with in order to try to win an argument.
I agree. I wasn’t thinking of religious aspects at that time. But for purposes of this discussion it makes no difference, since you’ve acknowledged that these religious beliefs are not the source of the insulting aspect of the term nigger. (I also don’t think they’ve been part of public consciousness in recent times.)
But those religious beliefs were not about “blackness alone”, which is your claim.
See post #142.
Most widespread beliefs make some sense once you accept certain premises.
Beyond that, there’s no reason to just assume that a widespread belief makes no logical sense if you can assume that it does have a logic to it (again, once you accept certain premises).
In addition, you can look at many racists of recent times and today, who were/are pretty vocal about their views, and they’re all some version of what I outlined in post #142.
Again, see post #142. (I would assume that Frederick Douglas’ racist contemporaries would fall into one of the categories described in that post, but I couldn’t give you the breakdown between them.)
The second paragraph doesn’t logically follow.
In our times, the notion that there’s enormous variation within ethnic groups and that these groups are not cohesive groups universally sharing common characteristics is pretty widely accepted (though not by all racists). But in the times you’re referring to this was far from the case, and there was no need at all to declare “blackness itself” to be the basis for the claimed inferiority (whatever that might mean). You would simply assume that all blacks were stupid, lazy, whatever. (It’s possible that “most” would also suffice for that purpose.)
Let’s just ask him directly, shall we?
F-P, do you believe black people as a group, are inferior?
A simple Yes/No/Undecided answer would suffice. You may explain your answer if you wish.
I think you personally are inferior. No idea whether you’re black or not, though.
You’re drawing a distinction here that maybe I don’t follow. Are you now arguing that racists of that time did think all blacks were inferior, and that they did categorize who was inferior based on who was black, but that they also filled in some particular stereotypical aspect of bad character into that view of inferiority?
If so, I don’t disagree, and I sort of doubt anyone does disagree. Obviously, racism was and is populated by stereotypes. The point was that the stereotypes were applied to all black people.
So you’ve avoided answering the question. Can’t say I’m surprised.
I assume many/most fit this category. There may have been many who thought there were rare exceptions that didn’t justify challenging the broader stereotype. Cite again to post #142.
Not sure if you’ve closely followed iiandyiiii’s posts on the subject, but he seems to be devoting considerable energy to disagreeing with this.
Sorry, I don’t play defense.
I don’t read him to be denying the existence of racial stereotypes. If you are, you might consider that you’re misreading him.
He’s not denying the existence of stereotypes. He’s denying that these were the basis for belief in black inferiority.
He’s saying people thought “all black people are inferior by virtue of being black”.
I’m saying they thought “all/almost all black people are inferior because all/almost all black people are lazy, stupid, thieving, etc. etc.”
Yes, this is a correct reading of my beliefs.
Here’s why I think you’re way, way off here:
Chattel slavery by race, for the long term, would demand much, much more than simply “most of them are inferior on average in character and level of civilized-ness”, since this would openly admit some black people are as good or better than some white people. Even “all of them are inferior in character and level of civilized-ness” would run headlong into personal experience quite quickly, since many white people would interact with black people and realize that some of them are, in fact, just as smart/peaceful/kind/etc. as white people. Those wouldn’t be enough to sustain slavery. The only beliefs that would be enough are beliefs that condemn every single black person based on nothing more than the quality of being black – it wouldn’t matter how smart they were, or how hard-working, or how peaceful – no behavior would be enough to change the perception, since it wasn’t about behavior. Religious teachings were used most commonly to reinforce this belief, and I’m sure beliefs about stereotypes had something to do with it, but even stereotypes would run headlong into obvious logical problems – why are black men considered such threats to white women when white rape of black slaves is/was so much more common than the reverse? Why are black people considered more violent or brutal when white brutality against black people was so much more common than the reverse? Sure, there would have been some rationalization (i.e. “we have to brutalize them to prevent them from brutalizing us”), but to really sustain the system long term, there needed to be widespread belief that the fact of being black, alone, was enough for them to be treated like livestock.
If you disagree, what part of this do you disagree with?
I think there’s some disconnect in what you mean by “because” and “basis for.”
A racist white person coming across a black person would need no other information than their blackness to deem them inferior, and would not change that belief based on information about the individual. And, indeed, this was the whole point of this version of racism. It had to operate that way in order to serve its social function. That’s what it means to believe someone is inferior by virtue of being black. Hence the Frederick Douglass hypothetical.
If the exceptions are rare enough I don’t think they would undermine the rationale. Societal rules are generally imposed based on generalities which have exceptions. (E.g. there are legal minors who are more mature than legal adults, and so on.)
Again, I’m not saying that there weren’t people who believed that all blacks were inferior, but I don’t think it follows that you had to believe this in order to justify chattel slavery or Jim Crow.
IMO it’s a lot easier for people to justify slavery by judging every black you meet as having inferior traits than it is by something as clearly nonsensical as “blackness itself is inferior”. And if you look around at racists all over the world, you’ll find that that’s generally what they do. There’s infinite room for bogus negative assessments of people’s personality and character (and they’re not just reserved for ideological opponents :)). A strongly held societal belief that such-and-such is always true would suffice, especially if also accompanied by the impetus of cognitive dissonance and self-justification.
I agree that this is true in many or most cases. But this is not the point in dispute.
I don’t think that’s what’s meant, in this discussion.
No, not everyone had to believe this, but I think it’s logical that the slavery-justifiers needed some backstop to defend their argument when it would inevitably come under attack by real-world experience. Most people undoubtedly just got along to go along, and didn’t think too much about the possible injustice of slavery, but at some point some would, and some would write articles and give sermons and such, and those in power needed some convincing way to shut them up. Thus the curse/mark of god ideas that never really took off until American slavery.
But what’s the ultimate justification, especially at the time? God. If God deemed that slavery was acceptable, then good for the slavers. If God deemed that black people were fundamentally marked as inferior, and thus must be enslaved and otherwise mistreated, even better.
To me, that makes it much, much easier – far easier than juggling the dissonance of personal experiences that would show that black people are pretty obviously fully human with beliefs about stereotypes and behavior/character-based inferiority.
I’ll note that racism needed more of an oomph to justify the brutal American chattel slavery than Jim Crow, segregation, colonialism, or other more “typical” forms of racism of the last few hundred years. Thus the justification was different – we weren’t spreading civilization to the natives, or separating the races as God intended, or maintaining traditions, we were treating humans as livestock, openly, including open rape, torture, and other forms of brutality. It needed something different. And those differences, very unfortunately, have supremely ugly ramifications even today on many Americans’ beliefs about race and racism.
Richard Parker does actually correctly describe my beliefs here.
In your most recent post you seem to recognize that some/many racists actually did/would believe that Douglass being black was enough to conclude he was inferior, and his behavior would be irrelevant. This is different than the two options in #142.
Your views on this seem so wild to me because I’ve personally known people who have said, directly, that black people were made inferior by god (or alternately black people are less evolved than white people), and this applies to every single one – even the ones who ‘behave better’. Some of them actually said they don’t think black people have souls, and that the smartest were just figuring out patterns and responses like a very smart chimp or parrot.
That’s just anecdotal, so I’m sure it’s not convincing to you, but that’s why your views on this seem so unbelievable to me. I’ve just known so many (not all the racists I’ve ever spoken too, but a significant portion) that really feel that blackness is inherently ugly and inherently inferior, due to god or (pseudo)science or whatever, regardless of any personal qualities of an individual black person.
I think some people are saying some silly things in this thread, particularly on the question of whether “nigger” has connotations other than just “being black”.
Thought experiment:
There’s a restaurant in small mostly-white town in Alabama. A bunch of customers are hanging out there eating their Alabaman food, chatting with the waitstaff, as they do most days.
Then in walks a black couple. They are wearing nice, tidy, clothing. Their hair is neatly trimmed. One of them is wearing glasses. They sit at a table, politely chat with the waitstaff, using “proper” English, eat their food, leave a nice tip, don’t make a mess, and depart.
The next morning, another black couple walks in. They are covered in tatoos and have “grills” and cornrows or dreds. They are wearing gangsta rap shirts and very low-slung jeans and Air Jordans. They are loud and disruptive, using lots of slang and vernacular, and then get in a big and very vocal argument with the waitress accusing her of trying to rip them off, and then storm off in a cloud of profanity, having underpaid their bill.
Are those two couples equally likely to be described as “niggers” after they depart?
Because while the probably is not zero for the first couple, I’m quite sure that it’s vastly higher for the second couple. And in fact, if I had constructed this thought experiment slightly different, describing the first couple, and then asking for characteristics the second couple could have that would increase the probability that they would be called “nigger”, it’s not like people would just be like “umm, blacker skin?”.
My point being, it’s possible that both:
(a) “nigger” is a word that has historically been used to describe and dehumanize people purely based on their skin color
AND
(b) “nigger” is associated with a set of stereotypical traits stereotypically associated with blackness. (I started out saying “negative traits”, but while some of them are clearly negative, some are value-neutral.)
And it follows from (b) that, given that there are millions of black people in America, some of them, purely by chance, presumably fit the traits mentioned in (b).
Now, I think it is was odd (and, given the reaction she received, clearly a bad idea) for Annie to publicly describe, on the SDMB, her private thoughts on two particular individuals. But I think it’s a bit silly for people to act as if what she was saying was literally without meaning.
I’m half Jewish, and many of my friends and half my family is Jewish. If I met a Jew who happened, purely by chance, to be an incredibly cheap asshole, constantly trying to rip people off and going way out of his way to save every last penny, and if that individual also had a huge nose, and was named “Shlomo”, I might think to myself “wow, it’s incredible how much Shlomo fits all the worst Jewish stereotypes”. And I can imagine a SDMB thread entitled something like “guilty thoughts you’ve had” in which I might conceivably post that anecdote. Although there is no anti-Jewish slur word that has either the historical weight or the negative implications of “nigger”.
Well someone is misunderstanding someone, along the way, and I don’t know who it is.
The context of this discussion is your post #48, in which you declared that “the slur has always been about the characteristic of being black, not any other characteristic”.
If all you’re saying is that “at some point many people believed that all blacks had all sorts of negative characteristics and no evidence would make them change their minds” (which is how I understand RP), then the above statement doesn’t follow.
Once you accept that the blackness was an identifier of the holders of all the other negative traits, however rigidly that identifier was adhered to, then we’re back to the notion that the term can (technically) be used to describe holders of those traits even by someone who does not accept that all (or even many) blacks have them. Which is what I think the subject of this thread was thinking.
No, it’s not. The two (numbered) options in post #142 were:
[ol]
[li]They didn’t believe the person was really “educated, erudite, peaceful, and intelligent” despite whatever evidence to the contrary, or [/li][li]They thought there were other qualities beyond “educated, erudite, peaceful, and intelligent” which made the person inferior despite possessing these particular qualities.[/li][/ol]
Either of these, applied to Douglas, would lead such people to conclude that he was inferior despite his behavior.
I’ve encountered people along these lines as well (not the religious part, though). But this is in line with what I’ve said. They think they’re not really smart despite evidence to the contrary (e.g. a kid in my daughter’s HS class who insisted that Obama was “dumb” and - per my daughter, anyway - meant it literally) and/or that even if they’re smart they’re still violent (possibly latent) or lazy or some other dreamed up negative characteristic. So I suspect that the people you’ve met believe something along the same lines, if you press them about it. I’ve never encountered - or heard of - anyone who says that blackness itself makes them inferior in any substantive way (other than attractiveness, as you note).
No, it’s more like “at some point many people believed that all blacks were fundamentally inferior and no evidence (including any evidence about behavior) would make them change their minds”. Behavior and stereotypes are sidelines to this, for those who believe this. That’s how I understand RP, and that’s my argument as well.
This sidesteps the other most recent post I made – such beliefs weren’t enough to justify long-term mass brutality, and thus extra-extra-racism (in the form of “God says black people are fundamentally inferior” regardless of actual behavior of black people, or similar) was required.
The belief that “God says black people are fundamentally inferior”, regardless of behavior or any quality aside from being black, would also lead to this conclusion. So I think you’re leaving out a very significant option.
Is the religious belief beyond the realm of possibility in your mind? Do you not think anyone might have taken that belief to heart when the Curse/Mark of Ham/Cain was in vogue?
I’ve met racists whose fundamental religion was, in essence, racism – World Church of the Creator types (in which the “Creator” is the white race), for example. Do you not believe these folks exist, or do you not believe that it’s possible for any human to have a fundamental belief in the inferiority of black people (or all non-white people) due to the mere fact of being black (or not being white), regardless of any other characteristic?
No, you’re sidestepping the meaning of the term “fundamentally inferior”. In what way are they fundamentally inferior? If you’re saying “by being black”, then we’re back to square one. God saying they’re fundamentally inferior is just the source of that knowledge. But in what way did God say they’re inferior?
ISTM that we’re just going back and forth on this.
Again, the curse was about being cursed to be slaves. Not about being “fundamentally inferior”, whatever that means.
I don’t see any evidence that this religion posits that blacks are inferior simply by virtue of being black. From your link it appears that they ascribe a tendency to criminal behavior to blacks and various finer characteristics to whites.
Let us postulate for a moment, just a moment, that black folks actually were inferior by a factor of, say, 5% or 10% by whatever yardstick you wish to use, say intellectually. Now in practice this would mean that you’d have 5% white Stephen Hawkings at one end and 5% black Forrest Gumps at the other, with a central core of both races being, for all intents and purposes equal. Does any racist actually believe that? No, they believe that, in some undefinable way, all black people are inferior to all white people. That, my friends, is the distilled essence of racism. That if a white person does something despicable, it’s because he’s despicable. But if a black person does something despicable, it’s because he’s black.
In their fundamental humanity: their souls (even whether or not they have souls), their moral status and moral worth, etc. – the fundamental human-ness that separates people from the animals. In the minds of those with this belief, black people are closer to animals (or indeed even are animals themselves) than to white people. Not because of any logical reason – just because of religious faith (or a secular philosophical analogue).
This really doesn’t seem that hard to me. I’m pretty sure we’ve been in other threads, related to racism but not specifically about this aspect of racism, in which the concept of a belief in fundamental inferiority has come up again and again without any of this confusion.
Do you honestly not understand what I mean when I say “fundamentally inferior”? That kind of seems hard for me to believe.
That was part of the curse, but not the only part – it’s been interpreted in multiple different ways, some of which, according to my reading, in ways mandating that black people be seen as fundamentally inferior to white people, regardless of behavior.
Try googling some variation of “black people [or a slur] are fundamentlaly inferior”. I can’t from where I’m at right now.
Again, do you not believe that it’s possible for any human to have a fundamental belief in the inferiority of black people (or all non-white people) due to the mere fact of being black (or not being white), regardless of any other characteristic? You don’t think any human has ever believed this?
Even more, do you not agree that such a belief/teaching would be very useful to slavery-justifiers?