# Chris Rock: A good starting point for race discussion? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 18, 2011, 11:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864 "2011-02-18T23:12:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/41 "2011-02-21T12:55:33Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > The fact that young children don’t automatically identify people by race-based physical differences to the extent that adults do doesn’t mean that children are sinless little angels. > > It just means that they haven’t yet been conditioned to weight characteristics like skin color so much more heavily than other aspects of appearance in determining what somebody looks like. For kids, being the only kid in the room with dark skin is really not automatically more distinctive or noticeable than being the only kid in the room with a purple shirt. > > (That’s not to say that children are oblivious to racial differences in appearance or can’t detect them, just that they don’t automatically prioritize them in describing people.) Yes; racism has to be learned, as does the very concept of race. People are naturally prone to classifying people into groups and then taking an Us versus Them attitude towards those groups; but the grouping of people by the artificial category of “race” is an accident of history that has to be learned. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 1:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/42 "2011-02-21T13:41:26Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Yes; racism has to be learned, as does the very concept of race. People are naturally prone to classifying people into groups and then taking an Us versus Them attitude towards those groups; but the grouping of people by the artificial category of “race” is an accident of history that has to be learned. Yes it has to be learned but our genetics work against us here. Evolution taught us to be tribal and that is a heck of a burden to shift. We spent millennia looking out for “us” over “them”. When we were all dark skinned I’m sure we created markings, colours, signals, dialects to artificially create the distinctions and enable us to “properly” target our prejudices. I don’t think it is too different now. All bigotry hinges on the ability to point to “them” rather than “us” and ascribe particular stereotypes to “them”. Skin colour wouldn’t work in sub-Saharan Africa, however, it is perfectly visible and distinctive in modern multi-cultural western countries. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/43 "2011-02-21T13:48:30Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > When we were all dark skinned I’m sure we created markings, colours, signals, dialects to artificially create the distinctions and enable us to “properly” target our prejudices. Language would have served that function, no need for external markers. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/44 "2011-02-21T14:00:06Z")
> [@FinnAgain](#): > > _ **Language** _ would have served that function, no need for external markers. Errrr… > [@](#): > > When we were all dark skinned I’m sure we created markings, colours, signals, _ **dialects** _ to artificially create the distinctions and enable us to “properly” target our prejudices. 😉 But I agree, that may well have been enough of a distinction for most cases but I suspect that tribes would go out of their way to hammer home the differences by visible as well as audible means. ---
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/45 "2011-02-21T14:33:09Z")
Nah, you don’t need dialects. Language itself would suffice: -Accents are generally easily identifiable with instantaneous in-group, out-group recognition. -Shared jokes/stories/phrases within the same dialect but differentiated by different group experiences suffice as well. They may have used visible markers (now I’m curious), but I suspect that a shouted challenge would’ve been enough. “Hey, who is acknowledged to make the best stew in the village, you’re dead if you don’t know the answer!” would do. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/46 "2011-02-21T15:04:56Z")
I think I used the wrong word with “dialect”. I mean it to cover the full range of differences in languages, accents. words etc. etc. but perhaps that was a poor choice. Anyhow, lets just say that everyone is right…c’mon, group hug. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2011, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/47 "2011-02-21T20:04:28Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > The fact that young children don’t automatically identify people by race-based physical differences to the extent that adults do doesn’t mean that children are sinless little angels. > > It just means that they haven’t yet been conditioned to weight characteristics like skin color so much more heavily than other aspects of appearance in determining what somebody looks like. For kids, being the only kid in the room with dark skin is really not automatically more distinctive or noticeable than being the only kid in the room with a purple shirt. > > (That’s not to say that children are oblivious to racial differences in appearance or can’t detect them, just that they don’t automatically prioritize them in describing people.) Well said. ---
**Author:** ![Assi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/85e7bf/32.png) [@Assi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Assi)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2011, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/48 "2011-02-27T21:49:50Z")
I find videos of rednecks eating their own beards because another redneck made them after a dispute over a riding mower funny and pathetic. I also find a video of a big ol welfare queen having little kids makin it rain over her while she dances half naked in a trashed room funny and pathetic. The problem is that I am white, so if I post a video of the welfare queen I am just a racist. If I post a video of the rednecks it is ok. If a black posts a video of either it is ok. White guilt is pretty much accepted these days by whites. I don’t suffer from it. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2011, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/49 "2011-02-28T13:26:04Z")
The distinction of “black people vs. niggers” definitely isn’t original to Rock. Before he was born, the concept is referenced in a 1969 novel called _The Death Committee_ by Noah Gordon, in which a black medical intern recalls his own childhood and the lesson imparted by his self-made-millionaire stepfather on the distinction between lazy “niggers” and the gentrified educated “negroes”, though the stepfather doesn’t use these terms specifically. The intern has an image of a refined negro responding in terror when overhearing that a nigger was in the area. I don’t have the novel handy for exact quote, but I’ve little doubt this kind of distinction goes back a century or more in the various black communities, and indeed that variations of it exist in pretty much _all_ communities. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2011, 1:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864/50 "2011-02-28T13:36:36Z")
Huh, Rock’s older than I thought… still, he was just a little kid when Gordon published his novel. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chris-rock-a-good-starting-point-for-race-discussion/571864.md?page=2)