We can’t? We really don’t have any convincing reason to think that members of a socially dominant racial group are extremely unlikely to be psychologically prejudiced or “implicitly biased” against that same group? Really?
Sure, we can retreat into claiming that we can’t know for sure about the implicit bias of any given individual, unless we give them a psychological test. But ISTM that it’s perfectly fair to say that such implicit bias is so unlikely that it’s statistically insignificant.
I don’t see how comparing Sontag to Hitler has anything to do with the question of whether white people are likely to feel any significant implicit bias against whites.
And it seems to me that making dogmatic statements on the basis of personal impression rather than statistically valid research greatly increases the possibility of error.
I did not compare Sontag to Hitler. I asked a question about ideology overlapping with prejudice and whether there were historical examples. If Hitler is the only such example you can come up with, you need a more complete understanding of history.
Nope. You asked if I could think of examples of “any ideologues in history who have confidently asserted that a particular ethnic or racial group has had an evil impact on society”. You didn’t specify that they had to be examples of “ideology overlapping with prejudice”.
But we don’t even know whether Hitler was an example of “ideology overlapping with prejudice”. We definitely know what his racial ideology was, but AFAIK nobody ever gave him a psychological test for implicit bias or prejudice.
And frankly, I’m still pretty confused as to why you’re asking for “historical examples” of racial ideologues. Could you please explain?
My first inclination is to link to your oft-used “waaah, poor white man, you’re so abused”, anytime someone points out an obvious racial remark towards whites. My dictrionary doesn’t say anywhere that racism has to be directed to non-whites to be racism. And those like you then go on to say that it may be racism, “but it’s not as bad as doing the same against blacks”. Who gives a fuck. It is still racism. And it is racist to say it doesn’t matter if it is directed at whites because of history. *rac·ism; Discrimination or prejudice based on race. *
You don’t have to hate a race, or wish them less opportunity to be racist. You just have to discriminate based on only color of skin.
More fascination with Hitler (is he really your only point of historic reference when it comes to political leaders exploiting racial/ethnic prejudice?), plus linguistic game-playing in an attempt to derail discussion.
Regrettable, but I suppose there are few other options when one’s arguments are grounded solely in “ISTM”.
I meant “stupid” as in ridiculously easy to not make mistakes. Also, I suspect that whichever side they put up first was the quickest response time for me. I had to “unthink” the association I had made earlier when they switched sides, which made it much harder to do the second phase. I don’t buy this methodology.
Huh??? I was responding to your own comment about Hitler allegedly being “an example” of “ideology overlapping with prejudice”. Yes, I was the first one to mention Hitler’s name, but I didn’t realize I wasn’t supposed to continue the conversation about him when you responded.
Dude, you said that you said one thing, and I simply pointed out that in fact you said something different. Sorry if I embarrassed you.
:dubious: Says the guy whose arguments are grounded solely in “I don’t think we can know”. Yes, we’re debating opinions here; so what?
But your hypothesis overlooks the 1% of Americans who are most racist against whites. Who do you think they voted for in the last election? Caucasians don’t have a monopoly on irrational hatred. The study may be superficially correct, but it’s telling less-than-half of the story, race-wise, about race relations in the USA and their impact on politics, and instead just jumps on the “Let’s Bash Whitey!” bandwagon.
To me, it proves nothing beyond the fact that in a two-party system, a lot of people who otherwise wouldn’t vote for either of the bums tossed up by Our Two Parties just hold their nose and pick the lesser of two evils (from their POV) come election day.
That means both parties get tarnished with the flotsam and jetsam of radical politics, be it religion, abortion, gun control, or racism.
“Your data suggest a strong automatic preference for African American compared to European American.”
I’ve taken a similar test before and gotten this same result. It’s a little weird, considering that I do consider myself slightly racist. For example, I’ll become more nervous if I’m alone in, say, an elevator with a black man than a white man. It’s not a lot of nervousness, but I can feel it. Of course, some of my nervousness is an attempt not to look nervous, so I overcompensate and probably terrify average black persons who are so unlucky as to be trapped in an elevator with me.
Can that sort of overcompensation become so ingrained that I manage to turn it into a strong automatic preference when completing an online test?
Sounds like an artifact of their definition of “racism” (whites prejudiced against blacks count; blacks prejudiced against whites don’t) combined with the well-known strong tendency of blacks to align with the Democrats.
It is interesting that the study focused only on Whites. They didn’t solicit Blacks to see if they were less likely to associate possitive words with White faces than with Black faces.
You started out questioning the validity of a survey that purports to show that Republican voters are more likely to be racist, though you indicate that the underlying assumption is likely to be correct.
However, when it comes to a notorious racist comment made by a well-known leftist author directed against whites, suddenly you think it’s “perfectly fair” to dismiss the possibility that a statistically significant number of white liberals/radicals share that viewpoint, based only on “it seems to me”.
Whatever happened to your concern for rigorous standards in social science research? :dubious:
Careful; I said that the assumption seems plausible to me (specifically because of the residual effect of a deliberate policy by Republican leadership several decades ago to attract ex-Democrat anti-civil-rights voters, not because I think Republicans are intrinsically racist). I didn’t make any factual claims about the correctness of the assumption.
I certainly don’t dismiss the possibility that a statistically significant number of white liberals/radicals would “share that viewpoint” in the sense of stating similar ideological opinions denigrating white people.
What I think is extremely implausible is that a statistically significant number of white liberals/radicals would display psychological prejudice or implicit bias against white people on the sort of psychological test described in the OP.
AFAICT, the whole point of the study under discussion is precisely to distinguish between “ideology” and “prejudice” in this way. The goal is to try to assess respondents’ implicit bias, irrespective of what they say they think about whites or blacks.
It ain’t about your stated opinions that white people are evil oppressors or black people are lazy thugs or vice versa or whatever. It’s about whether your brain inadvertently associates good words with pictures of white faces and bad words with pictures of black faces, or vice versa or whatever.
And my point is that it seems extremely unlikely to me that any statistically significant group of white people in this white-dominated society, no matter how liberal/radical they may be, would develop that kind of implicit bias or psychological prejudice against white people. I simply don’t see how white people would be able to develop that kind of inadvertent, unconscious fear/hostility towards their own group.
Which is what I figured Lonesome Polecat was talking about when he suggested that “these researchers” ought to study anti-white racism among white liberals and radicals. I seriously doubt that such racism exists in significant amounts—not of the instinctive, implicit-bias kind, that is. And I said so.
If that’s not what LP meant—if he simply meant, as you seem to mean, that there are numerous white liberals/radicals who are ideologically critical of white people, like Sontag when she calls them a “cancer of human history”—well, duh. Of course there are. Here’s another one: Michael Moore. And maybe Howard Zinn. And plenty others, I’m sure.
But that’s not the kind of “anti-white racism” that I was talking about.
Sheesh, what with all this frenzied nit-picking one would think you are in need of Lice-Rid.
Yes, we realize your thoughts and impressions are what count, not actual evidence.
And if we cut through the clouds of jargon, what your impressions boil down to is that racism is a construct that may well apply to your political adversaries, but those on your side of the political fence are excused on the grounds that any racist views they espouse are actually ideology.
Am I an anti-white racist, based on my test scores?
If we would judge a white person an implicit racist for demonstrating strong preference for the European American faces, then I am an implicit racist for demonstrating strong preference for the African American faces.
As it stands, I think I’m the only person who has posted scores in this thread, so I can’t say how prevalent my racism is, even amongst those here. But it appears to exist. How, I can’t say. I don’t think I’m anti-white. I could be wrong.
The test is measuring your response time. It’s not a pass-fail situation.
