Well, I’m white, and male, and I’m so stealth-gay that people I first met in a gay bar were surprised to learn that I was gay. So I’ve got first-hand experience of what it’s like to by white, male, and perceived straight in American society. And I’ve never experienced any kind of systemic discrimination because of those factors. Nor have I ever met anyone who’s suffered systemic discrimination because of those factors. Nor have I ever heard of anyone who’s claimed discrimination on those factors whose claims weren’t, ultimately, sour grapes over a loss of privilege.
No, I’m saying that, having experienced actual discrimination, I’m more able to differentiate between that, and hallucinatory discrimination, like what you’re complaining about in this thread. I am very much opposed to actual discrimination against straights, whites, and males. Should the matter ever arise, I’m also opposed to the oppression of same. But I’m not losing a lot of sleep over that ever happening.
What is it that I’m supposed to claim that I never said?
Yes, that is a correct summary. The first is, theoretically, a claim about facts based in science, and refutable by science. The second is just a slur word.
84 is closing in on 90, at least from my perspective (at 41). It’s certainly a better target for him than 84 1/2.
I guess I must’ve somehow turned black the time I got falsely accused of shoplifting, because clearly straight white males are never treated that way… Oh, and the time my buddy and me got pulled over by the cops for no reason. Guess we turned black that day too… Guess I can’t have anything to say about anything because once the incidents were over back to white we were!
The United States is a default culture. The default value is what’s normal. If it’s not the default, you need to put in a qualifier. Male is the default state. White is the default state. Straight is the default state. There are many others. Christian, born in America, English-speaking, middle class.
Default states are like water to fish. If you’re part of the default you never even notice that it’s all around you. If you’re not… It’s amazing how obvious it is. There are reminders everywhere, all the time. They might be deliberate oppression, they might be taking the default for granted without any intent to offend, but they are everywhere. You can never escape them.
The quickest way to realize what the equivalent of water is for human culture is to go to a culture where you don’t speak the language, or even recognize the alphabet. Even the simplest, most basic tasks are immediately filled with obstacles. You are not being oppressed, but everything is harder, many people won’t have any sympathy for you, and those who do can never fully put themselves in your place since everything that is hard for you is default easy for them.
There’s an old joke that comes to mind while reading some of the posts here. A child asks a parent, “If there is a Mother’s Day and a Father’s Day, then why isn’t there a Children’s Day?” And the parent answers, “Because every day is Children’s Day.”
Since you won’t get the point unless I spell it out for you: you’re acting like children. And we’re pointing it out. If you don’t like it, then try acting grown up.
From your use of scare quotes, I take it you don’t actually think his claims that certain races are inferior are “racist”?
The irony is that a lot of what could be learned from Watson is how to earn legendary status for work that was, at least in large part, done by other, largely forgotten people.
Do you have any beloved elderly relatives who, after around age 80, start listening to a lot of AM talk radio and blithely start dropping a lot of less-than-progressive sentiments into their conversation? I tend to attribute this more to dementia than to hatred. I sure don’t think it comes from the same place as when my generational peers say the same things. YMMV.
Having read his comments, I believe his point is “The numbers don’t support what your liberal ideals wish they supported.” I don’t believe his point was “Negroes are irretrievably stupid.” There is a world of difference between those two positions. But congratulations on jumping on the trendy new meme of “scare quotes,” even if I don’t think you applied it correctly.
He said as much in the introduction to his book. Ultimately, all scientists are standing on the shoulders of giants. Not many of them write a book as good as The Double Helix, though.
I had a discussion about this with a co-worker once. To set the stage: we’re both about the same age, we have the same job with the same firm, we dress the same (we both shop at Brooks Brothers), we both have graduate degrees, we both have professional qualifications, we both earn high incomes, we live in similar income-level neighborhoods, we drive similar (in price) cars, we both passed the same background check for our jobs. One difference: I’m white, he’s black.
He gets pulled over a half-dozen times a year. I have never been pulled over (and I’m not even a particularly good driver; I speed, I do the rolling stop thing, I cut people off, etc.).
I can’t imagine living in a world where I got treated like that. I’m a relatively easy-going person in real life, but if I got shit-on my whole life for the color of my skin I can’t imagine the rage I would feel. I would be annoyed if I got pulled over even once. If I got pulled over again and again and again and again and again, even though I was a law-abiding, productive member of society, I would start to resent the hell out of that society.
And then if I came here to complain about it and had a nasty little shit like **NDD **call me a savage… Or had some ignorant white person whine about the one time that he got pulled over so it must not be a black thing…
I agree the opinion you are attributing to me is fucking ridiculous, largely because it in no way matches what I posted and I’m not sure it was even supposed to. This is getting tiresome, Myrnalene, so consider this a formal instruction: get a new hobby. We don’t allow recreational complaining here. I am unable to think of a better description for your posts since most of them are either complaining about the rules in this forum or attacking other posters in ATMB or the Pit. You need to start posting about some other topics and posting a lot less about your current pet peeves.
Yes it does. Maybe you’re splitting hairs over the definition of “actively,” but I don’t care to go down that road. The effects of both are harmful.
Where did I say that? Words can hurt people, but we don’t have a rule against saying things that hurt people. It’s not even against the rules to intentionally hurt people, although that is against the rules in many circumstances.
I’m getting tired of this hysteria. I think that if your interpretation of my post was ‘Marley23 doesn’t think words can hurt people and doesn’t support the jerk rule,’ you probably should have stopped and considered if maybe I was saying something else. I am saying this: I don’t think we can treat racism differently from other beliefs on that basis.
You said “Being a racist hurts other people,” as if the belief hurts other people. It doesn’t. Once the belief is put into action it often hurts other people. However New Deal Democrat didn’t do that very often. He sometimes advocated eliminating particular social programs - he seemed to dislike No Child Left Behind the most - but other people have done the same for non-racist reasons, and his posts on this board didn’t move the country much closer to eliminating those programs. He was an idiot and a bigot himself but I can’t remember him arguing in favor of Jim Crow type policies or other racial discrimination. He was warned several times for doing something similar to ‘hurting other people’ (injecting his beliefs into topics where it wasn’t relevant, which often offended people) but the only time I can think of where he attacked someone for racial reasons was that post to MrDibble, and that post was a big part of the reason we banned him.
Racism can certainly hurt people, but it’s far from the only belief with that can do that. Saying something like ‘Racism affects other people and being a Creationist doesn’t’ is ridiculous. Creationists have spent decades trying to undermine the teaching of science, and I think they’ve been pretty successful. Our beliefs don’t affect other people when they’re in our minds, but almost all of us put our beliefs into action one way or another.
You and the other mods have spent this whole thread and several others explaining why racist speech can’t be moderated, and then turn around and moderate me because I complain about the board too much for your liking, and because I like to tell people off in the forum for telling people off.
There aren’t enough “whatevers” in the entire world to describe my opinion of your priorities.
We don’t allow recreational complaining about the moderation of the board, no. I notice you linked to the Pit, where complaining about moderating and the rules isn’t allowed, so I think you take my meaning. We don’t allow people to post here just so they can complain about the board.
At no time have we said we cannot moderate racist speech. We do moderate racist speech.
Good. Now you won’t have to waste so much energy saying “whatever” over and over and can start posting about some other topics.