Time to END racism

[Eric the Green]

In the USA and other places, we ended absolute rule of tyrants and gave white people the right to a fair trial. We should extend that right to black people!

Racism is ridiculous. Just because some people evolved in one kind of environment, and another in another, they should not have the same rights anywhere? Slavery has mostly ended. Now it's time for racism to end too.

[David Horn]

(06-21-2020, 04:53 PM)Eric the Green Wrote: In the USA and other places, we ended absolute rule of tyrants and gave white people the right to a fair trial. We should extend that right to black people!

Racism is ridiculous. Just because some people evolved in one kind of environment, and another in another, they should not have the same rights anywhere? Slavery has mostly ended. Now it's time for racism to end too.

Logic is fully in your camp, but, unfortunately, emotion is still too afraid.  I hope that is permanently waning, but it's not yet far enough along to make the world totally color, gender, and ethnically blind.  Would that it was. 

[Bob Butler 54]

I am with you.  I fear that tribal thinking is still too common in the culture.  Perhaps another major crisis level protest may not be required in the future, but I would not assume a single cultural reboot addressing the problem will make racism totally go away.

[TnT]

Despair. That's all I have. As an old, white dude, who has listened to overt, covert, whispered, chuckling, sneering white people display their racism all my life ... despair. That's all.

As a white dude, I have walked through my life spending perhaps 1% or less of my mental energy thinking about the fact that I'm white. Folks of color, in our society spend, according to what I read, much of their time being aware of their status. And for good reason.

[User3451]

You can legislate fair treatment but you cannot police people's inner biases.

Humans evolved to discriminate based on physical cues, so education is important in order to create a more just society.

Humans are jealous, so it's important to make sure everyone has economic dignity.

We are making progress, but it's also important to note how anyone can be susceptible to racism (or if you subscribe to socjus, then you could say prejudice for racism).

We've all got a lot more in common than in difference. We're all in this together and we won't have a just society until we see that the enemy is not our neighbor

[Isoko]

That is fine. You want to end racism. I'm up for that. But I think now it is time for other races to take up the anti-racism mantle as I think personally white people have been doing too much in this department. I see very little progress in the other races doing anything and are in fact becoming more racist, not less so. 

I think it is time now for white people to put their feet up, have a cup of tea and relax. Let the others worry about racism for a change.

[Eric the Green]

(06-26-2020, 02:52 PM)Isoko Wrote: That is fine. You want to end racism. I'm up for that. But I think now it is time for other races to take up the anti-racism mantle as I think personally white people have been doing too much in this department. I see very little progress in the other races doing anything and are in fact becoming more racist, not less so. 

I think it is time now for white people to put their feet up, have a cup of tea and relax. Let the others worry about racism for a change.

Quite incorrect, and quite the reverse.

[Isoko]

Eric,

I respect what you are trying to get at here but most of the time I see it being white people who are constantly worrying about racism and no one else. Even in the case of reverse racism, I have yet to see major non-white groups campaign for an end to racism against white people. They mainly focus it on them.

Like I said before, I'm all up for ending racism but the other groups need to make a stronger commitment to it. White people need to relax and let the others take the lead for a change.

[Eric the Green]

(06-26-2020, 04:05 PM)Isoko Wrote: Eric,

I respect what you are trying to get at here but most of the time I see it being white people who are constantly worrying about racism and no one else. Even in the case of reverse racism, I have yet to see major non-white groups campaign for an end to racism against white people. They mainly focus it on them.

Like I said before, I'm all up for ending racism but the other groups need to make a stronger commitment to it. White people need to relax and let the others take the lead for a change.

Worry and concern about racism, is obviously not racism. Blacks are campaigning against the racism against them. White people do not need to have non-white people focus on racism against them. It is white people who have been racist against others for some centuries now, enslaving them and discriminating against them. I think more reading of USA and European history would help you get an idea of what has happened.

In Europe, of course, there was white against white racism that wiped out millions in WWII, but other races were also victims, such as gypsies.

White people need to make a stronger commitment to ending racism. They are the perpetrators of it, especially through racial profiling and discrimination.

Saying that the USA and other countries should keep immigrants out that might debase the intelligence of the country was a racism statement you made, as I remember it, that might bear looking at.

[Isoko]

Eric,

Your heart is ultimately in the right place. However, you are framing this as what I could term, and I apologise for having to borrow an alt right term for this, an anti-white narrative without realising that America has done more to help black people then any country on the Earth.

For starters, let's look at the civil war itself. Hundreds of thousands of men shed their blood to end the practice of slavery. Many were permanently maimed as a result of the conflict. Tell me, how many countries actually fought a large scale civil war to end slavery? In other words, white people gave their lives to end it.

During the segregation era, hundreds of thousands of white people marched for black people to be free. Many more of those people got involved with aid to Africa programmes. They got behind political correctness and honestly have been trying to improve the situation for black people for over five decades now.

The amount of time and resources that have been pumped into helping black people get an education, get access to good quality healthcare, to help them in general has been a lot. 

In other words, I cannot think of another group of people who have tried to do so much for another. Just how much more can white people give? 

You know, the other day, I saw shocking videos of BLM activists, black people, actually violently hurting white people "because they deserve it." In England, a black woman pushed an 80 something year old man off the bus. He later died from his injuries. Another black young man attacked a 60 something year old man who has diabetes and just had surgery. In America, a black man deliberately and violently attacked a white salesman. Had the man begging for his life. Another white old lady got pushed out of a bus by a black person. 

I could go on. But where are these people's marches? This is now racism, pure and simple and the BLM movement is ignoring these people, focusing on one man who died at the hands of the police. 

When the day comes and I see black people marching in their thousands to end black racism on white people, that will be the day. You are right, it is time to end racism but it's also time for the other side to contribute to it. It can't just be white people all the time. They've done more than enough.

As for my statement I made a while back, I am a strong critic of mass immigration because it ultimately leads to merely bringing the old country people left into the new country, creating the same conditions that originally was left behind.

If immigration was strongly regulated, only the best were getting in, then the new arrivals would adapt, assimilate into the mainstream community and become fully settled. 

You know, there is a Russian view point when it comes to immigration. It is as follows. "Why should we accept large amounts of people into our country when they should be building up their own land? We had to build ours up, they should do the same."

I agree fundamentally with this statement. Rather then mass migrating elsewhere and creating the same conditions, build up your own countries. I think it is only fair. Hey, you want some aid, we can help but don't bring your problems to our door.

I don't see anything racist in what I am saying. Just basic common sense.

[Eric the Green]

Slavery was greater and lasted longer in the USA than elsewhere. Great white people including my great-grandfather fought for their freedom, and continue to do so, and the black people fought and demonstrated beside them and more-recently led the way. Meanwhile, white people rebelled against ethics and morality and fought to keep their slaves, causing the most bloody conflict in our history, and continued to oppress and lynch black people. Comparing non-authorities who were black who committed crimes against whites to many cops (not one) who disobeyed the law and murdered unarmed, innocent black people, shows lack of sympathy for those who continue to be oppressed in our country. White cops who commit crimes against blacks and latinos get away with it, while blacks who commit crimes (mostly against other blacks) are punished, and should be, but many blacks are picked up and harassed just because they are black. This rarely happens to white people in the USA, though it does sometimes.

This earth belongs to all of us. If people want to move here, they should be treated fairly. Perhaps indeed we can't take them all, all at once. Regulated borders are fair. However, our statue at our greatest port proclaims the truth that the USA is a nation of immigrants, even though it has always been non-whites who have often been excluded. Immigrants face oppression in their countries greater than what happens here, and those seeking asylum should have it granted and be given prompt attention and good treatment, not the torture and injustice inflicted on them by our white supremacist fake president. Immigrants to the USA contribute to our economic well-being.

They are in no way inferior to those already here. If they can improve their own countries, more power to them. But you ignore the level of oppression and murder that happens in their home countries, which have suffered at the hands of USA imperialism and exploitation and failure to provide aid.

I sympathize with people who are oppressed or murdered by tyrants in other countries. This has gotten worse in recent years, whether in China/Hong Kong, North Korea, Syria, Saudi Arabia/Yemen, Turkey, Hungary and Poland, Brazil, Philippines, Venezuela, Central America, the USA; so many places have gone backward in recent years. Russians who speak out and seek greater expression and distribution of prosperity are murdered by their leader, who seeks to extend his oppression beyond his current borders and disrupt democracy in The West. It's too bad that the Russians have not been able to see this, and to rise up and throw out their cruel new tsar, when there seemed so much promise there after the Cold War ended such a short time ago. Russia is just a very horrible and sad story, lasting centuries. It will last decades more. It is a cold place, with leadership that has almost always been cold-hearted. Even in spite of that, it has some great traditions and arts, and has made scientific and tech advances. It is a great country in spite of everything. I wish it were free.

[Eric the Green]

EXECUTED BY COPS FOR BEING BLACK AND "SUSPICIOUS"

Colorado reopens case of Black man who died after being put in chokehold by police

Elijah McClain suffered cardiac arrest on the way to hospital and died
The Associated Press · Posted: Jun 25, 2020 5:41 PM ET | Last Updated: June 25
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/mcclain-de...-1.5627521

Colorado's governor appointed a special prosecutor Thursday to investigate the death of Elijah McClain, a 23-year-old Black man who was put in a chokehold by police who stopped him on the street in suburban Denver last year because he was "being suspicious."

Gov. Jared Polis signed an executive order directing state Attorney General Phil Weiser to investigate and possibly prosecute the three white officers previously cleared in McClain's death. McClain's name has become a rallying cry during the national reckoning over racism and police brutality following the deaths of George Floyd and others.

"Elijah McClain should be alive today, and we owe it to his family to take this step and elevate the pursuit of justice in his name to a statewide concern," Polis said in a statement.

He said he has spoken with McClain's mother and was moved by her description of her son as a "responsible and curious child … who could inspire the darkest soul."

Police in suburban Aurora received a call about a suspicious person wearing a ski mask and waving his arms as he walked down a street on Aug. 24, 2019. Police body-camera video shows an officer getting out of his car, approaching McClain and saying, "Stop right there. Stop. Stop. … I have a right to stop you because you're being suspicious." Police say McClain refused to stop walking and fought back when officers confronted him and tried to take him into custody.



Lawyer Mari Newman, right, hugs Sheneen McClain, mother of Elijah, on Nov. 23, 2019. On Thursday, Colorado's governor appointed a special prosecutor to re-examine the circumstances of the young man's death. (Philip B. Poston/Sentinel Colorado via The Associated Press)


In the video, the officer turns McClain around and repeats, "Stop tensing up." As McClain tries to escape the officer's grip, the officer says, "Relax, or I'm going to have to change this situation."

As other officers join to restrain McClain, he begs them to let go and says, "You guys started to arrest me, and I was stopping my music to listen."

One of the officers put McClain in a chokehold that cuts off blood to the brain, something that has been banned in several jurisdictions in the wake of Floyd's death on May 25 under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer and the global protests that followed.

The police video shows McClain telling officers: "Let go of me. I am an introvert. Please respect the boundaries that I am speaking." Those words have appeared on scores of social media posts demanding justice for McClain.

McClain was kept on the ground for 15 minutes, then paramedics gave him 500 milligrams of a sedative to calm him down. McClain suffered cardiac arrest on the way to the hospital and was declared brain dead on Aug. 27. He was taken off life support three days later.

A forensic pathologist working for the coroner could not determine what exactly led to his death but said physical exertion during the confrontation likely contributed.

McClain was a massage therapist who planned to go to college, his younger sister, Samara McClain, told The Denver Post shortly after his death. She said her brother was walking to a corner store to get tea for a cousin and often wore masks when he was outside because he had a blood condition that caused him to get cold easily.

In the video, Elijah McClain sobs as he repeatedly tells officers, "I'm just different."

Officers back at work

The police department put the three officers on leave, but they returned to the force when District Attorney Dave Young said there was insufficient evidence to support charging them.

"Ultimately, while I may share the vast public opinion that Elijah McClain's death could have been avoided, it is not my role to file criminal charges based on opinion, but rather, on the evidence revealed from the investigation and applicable Colorado law," Young said shortly before Polis ordered the investigation reopened.

Mari Newman, the McClain family's attorney, said she was pleased with the governor's decision.

"Clearly, Aurora has no intention of taking responsibility for murdering an innocent young man," she said. "Its entire effort is to defend its brutality at all costs, and to lie to the public it is supposed to serve. It is time for a responsible adult to step in."

The attorney general said in a statement that the investigation will be thorough and "worthy of public trust and confidence in the criminal justice system."

[Tim Randal Walker]

Regarding the efforts to end racism.... The experiment has been done.

What is obvious with hind sight is that you don't truly end racism. Even in a city like Minneapolis, which is deemed liberal/progressive, race relations are very fragile.

After enormous efforts, what you get is a brittle truce between the races-just below a seemingly calm, political correct surface. This is as good as it gets.

[Eric the Green]

(07-03-2020, 02:50 PM)Tim Randal Walker Wrote: Regarding the efforts to end racism....  The experiment has been done.  

What is obvious with hind sight is that you don't truly end racism.  Even in a city like Minneapolis, which is deemed liberal/progressive, race relations are very fragile.

After enormous efforts, what you get is a brittle truce between the races-just below a seemingly calm, political correct surface.  This is as good as it gets.

What is obvious is that racism is a declining ideology that cannot survive the increasingly globalized world we live in.

We live in a global society now. We have been, ever since the soldiers of world war one died for the new league of nations. Racism cannot survive in a world that is connected tightly by world commerce, technology, science, culture, and communication media. It cannot survive as more and more immigration breaches through all walls erected by the reactionaries and xenophobes. Race mixing is so inevitable, and happening so fast, that soon, according to one scientist who spoke in a PBS documentary, it will not be possible to trace our genetics and say who was where in the past.

[Tim Randal Walker]

Post pandemic, I won't be surprised if there should be a surge of white flight from the cities.

[Eric the Green]

One thing has been made clear to me over the years. We humans are still an extremely primitive and undeveloped race.

Cruel, insensitive, mean, fearful doesn't begin to cover it.

As for white flight, that has been over for some time. The trend now is for gentrification, which is the opposite. Why should there be white flight now? Unless you are just ignorant of what is going on these days, swept up in the ignorant right-wing propaganda of the kind Trump puts out and Classic Xer eats up.

One spiritual teacher I read said that of all the lives we souls go through in our journey of discovery and development, life on Earth is the toughest assignment.

Whether you look at life from that perspective or not, it's not a bad assessment. But what makes it so tough? Is it the physical drudgery, the burdens, the hard work for little reward?

No. It is the people. The other people. As Jean Paul Sartre said, "hell is other people."

100 million years ago, most smaller creatures had to look out for the big bad dinosaurs who might eat them up. Staying clear of them was the biggest challenge. And later, there were all the lions and tigers and bears.

Today though, for most species on Earth today, it is the humans. We have wiped out so many creatures that it makes the dinosaurs tame by comparison.

I have to admit though, humans are amazing. We can do so many things. I myself can hardly aspire to accomplish all the great things humans do. The inventions, the athletic feats, the monuments we have built using crude tools, the success some people have in a world of human dinosaurs and predators, is all pretty amazing.

It is some kind of miracle that we are here at all. Some higher power, or the will to life and the struggle itself, made it possible.

Just to be conscious, to be self-aware, to be friendly, to be courageous, even sometimes to love, or at least to appreciate Nature and art, is amazing to behold.

It made me think once that we could create any kind of utopia we want, if we just believe it's possible. Woodstock proved it.

But all along, my experience with real people has left a whole lot to be desired, I must admit too. And it hasn't gotten any better, despite some good times back then when it seemed like it was getting better.

Which made me think even back then, and still think today, that humans are a work in progress. Only a future ideal society is acceptable, not the established and conventional ways. And the established ways--- the horrible way we treat and disrespect people, the oppressive social and economic structures we have, the crude kinds of amusements and entertainment we settle for, the useless things we produce, the money we prioritize, the kind of ugly cities we build, the way we destroy Nature, the way we kill ourselves in wars, the silly condition of most of our religions, our ridiculously narrow worldviews and fantasies; all these mean that the only ethical, moral or rational course of life in this society to support and help create the new alternatives, and to thumb our nose at conventional values.

Just supporting, participating, being a part of straight "normal" society is just perpetuating our primitive condition, when the only way to sanctify or justify our lives is to do whatever little we can to build the new and the alternative way. To work on ourselves, to change ourselves, to release ourselves, to discover ourselves, to emerge as we really are, and to create a new just society and alternative and beautiful ways of living, that is the only meaningful activity.

Racism is one of the ways we are still so primitive, and so ignorant. Sorry to say, but to think that the way we are now is the way things have to be forever, or even for the foreseeable future, is incredibly naive. We have only comparatively recently emerged from the caves! Nazi concentration camps are only 75 years ago! We tolerate incredible monsters in power even today around the world, like Assad and dozens more! THAT'S PRIMITIVE! That indicates just how much we have to learn, how far we have yet to go.

And look who is in the White House!!

Of course, being incredibly naive, being incredibly ignorant, is just part of our normal condition. That's the main part, perhaps, that we need to work on, and to move beyond. And no doubt it all will take a while. And ignorant, afraid and cruel as we are, who knows just how many centuries that could be. But considering our primitive and youthful condition, it could in the long run be seen as a comparatively short time compared to the history of all life on the planet. We may even look back on this youth of ours, as even today we sometimes have nostalgia for our still-short history, and think, wasn't it a great game? Wouldn't it be great to go back and do it again? What a wonderful adventure!

[Bob Butler 54]

I tend to see things from a more materialistic perspective, but arrive at pretty much the same place.  I can approve of what your essay attempts to say.

From my perspective, man has two sets of conflicting drives bred into his mind and spirit.  One is to treat members of his tribe well.  The other is to treat a competing tribe absurdly poorly.  The goal ought to be to treat more people well, fewer to no people poorly.  There is no real need for the other tribes not to be a null set.

For most of human existence, violence and treating the other poorly were survival traits.  Doing horrible things well increased the chance of passing on one’s gene pool.  If your culture was not good at making war, at securing a territory and resources, one lost out to another culture that was better at these things.  At the same time, helping one’s own tribe cooperate, grow and love was also a survival trait.  Thus, Man in a contradictory beast, quite able to love and hate, and not yet able to outgrow the hate.

What to do about it?  Once in a life time one is apt to live through a crisis heart.  It is a chance to get rid of a few more cultural traits left from the bad old days intent to harm the other guy, to keep him other rather than one of us.

This is one of those times.

[TnT]

(07-05-2020, 12:33 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: It made me think once that we could create any kind of utopia we want, if we just believe it's possible. Woodstock proved it.

"Woodstock proved it?"  Eric, what in the world does THAT mean?  Woodstock?  A "utopia?"
Back in the old days on 4T you and I used to get into it pretty good.  I just couldn't pass this comment up.
Let's drill into that.  What all happened at Woodstock?  A whole bunch of folks got high on a grassy hillside for some days and listened to music.  Toilets were non-existent.  Food was scarce.  And then it was over and everyone went away.  Oh, and have you ever seen pictures of the muddy grounds with tons and tons of garbage that had to be cleaned up?
Perhaps you've got some features and characteristics of the event that make this into a sustainable society for some kind of long-haul?  My goodness, but there have been "utopian" communities that have done much better than this, and sustained for many years.
I read somewhere that Utopians are the most dangerous people in the world.  The reason is that groups of people invariably disagree on the details of how the society is being run and eventually, for it to be a "success," it has to become authoritarian.  The leader always says that the authoritarian part is just a transitional stage, but as we know, power is a hard thing to give up.
So, Eric, I don't want to put words in your mouth.  What DID you mean?

[Eric the Green]

(07-05-2020, 08:44 PM)TnT Wrote:

(07-05-2020, 12:33 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: It made me think once that we could create any kind of utopia we want, if we just believe it's possible. Woodstock proved it.

"Woodstock proved it?"  Eric, what in the world does THAT mean?  Woodstock?  A "utopia?"
Back in the old days on 4T you and I used to get into it pretty good.  I just couldn't pass this comment up.
Let's drill into that.  What all happened at Woodstock?  A whole bunch of folks got high on a grassy hillside for some days and listened to music.  Toilets were non-existent.  Food was scarce.  And then it was over and everyone went away.  Oh, and have you ever seen pictures of the muddy grounds with tons and tons of garbage that had to be cleaned up?
Perhaps you've got some features and characteristics of the event that make this into a sustainable society for some kind of long-haul?  My goodness, but there have been "utopian" communities that have done much better than this, and sustained for many years.

I read somewhere that Utopians are the most dangerous people in the world.  The reason is that groups of people invariably disagree on the details of how the society is being run and eventually, for it to be a "success," it has to become authoritarian.  The leader always says that the authoritarian part is just a transitional stage, but as we know, power is a hard thing to give up.
So, Eric, I don't want to put words in your mouth.  What DID you mean?

[/quote]

Don't be too distracted by my bit of hyperbole. It "proved it" to many people at the time, but all I meant to say was that this is how I felt at the time. But even then, as I said, I knew that human fallibility was great and much change and growth was needed before Woodstock would spread and grow into something lasting and substantial. It was an overly-optimistic idea, for sure, and utopia is a less-appealing idea to me now. I just meant to contrast my idea back then to my feelings now in my essay. It was a great event, and the people felt that it created a new consciousness, like a new garden of Eden as Joannie Mitchell sang. The physical problems didn't get in the way of how people helped each other and loved each other, with no need for law enforcement. But I don't disagree that it was a false hope, or at least just a beacon for the future, who knows how far away, and certainly it was not an authoritarian power play or "the authoritarian part is just a transitional stage" like many utopian Marxists used to talk about. My favorite song came along two years later and poured a bit of cold water on that kind of idea. 





But my favorite line and the peak moment in the song is "and the parting on the left, is now parting on the right, and the beards have all grown longer overnight." It just means to me that the process of progress continues through all the failures. The new boss becomes the old boss to overthrow in turn. What was left later becomes right, and culture can change overnight.

And the reverberations from those times of awakening when we glimpse the future we could create, remain and hang in the air, which Pete's synthesizer riff represents.
http://generational-theory.com/forum/thr...l#pid50881

[Bob Butler 54]

(07-05-2020, 12:33 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: It made me think once that we could create any kind of utopia we want, if we just believe it's possible. Woodstock proved it.

It is one thing to create a spirit, another to make it sustainable. One of the next rock concerts after Woodstock hired the Hells Angels as security, and for some reason the movement of Woodstock, as wonderful as it was, died. The Summer of Love was also the Summer of Charles Manson.

Alas, utopias have to exist in the real world, and the real world has this way of infringing.