Again, you are pretty much the ONLY one here (on 2+2) regularly talking about institutional racism when you say something along the lines of "that is racist."

99% of what I am seeing is,



which is a distraction from explaining what policies, cultural beliefs, etc. lead to maintaining white privilege.

this is a good post. it also got me thinking about how cheating partners often accuse their partner of cheating and get overly suspicious etc... its kinda funny because its like the racism thing when people are all "omg your racist" i think it says more about them than the person they're referring to.

This is so amazingly false and myopic it's beyond believe.

First, as I've mentioned, when we talk about South African Apartheid, when we read what MLK said about racism, when we see #BlackLivesMatter... all that is in the context of institutional racism. In fact, even having any 'serious conversation about race' already implies that we are talking about institutional racism. What isn't a 'serious conversation about race' is trying to claim racism is only just personal animus... as if that's the real issue anyways.

Second, you simply don't seem to even be able to even process what people of 'my ilk' are saying when they call another a racist. We aren't making any claims about their 'secret inner heart'. We're making claims about the predictability of the others actions... which is the others posts in the context of an interwebs forum. That's not 'name calling' at all.

If someone posts enough posts with statements that tend to support institutional racism... it's quite easy to successfully predict they'll continue to do so. That doesn't mean that that poster has a flawed 'secret inner heart'... or that they are being accussed of having a flawed 'secret inner heart' (aka 'name calling'). It's just claiming that they predictably make posts supporting institutional racism... it doesn't say anything about them doing so knowingly or maliciously, or that they are flawed in their 'secret inner heart', or anything else like that. It's not 'name-calling' not at all.

Take BruceZ for example. He got called out for posting a buncha racist derp. Instead of saying "my bad, I'll try to think harder about race issues in the future"... he doubled down on his derp, complained about the "sandy vagina PC Police", and literally tried to stop the whole conversation by threatening to abuse his mod position.

Well we've all seen this pattern of behavior before. I can confidently predict that someone who (a) posts racist derp, (b) doubles down on it, (c) complains about the PC police, and (d) desperately tries to derail conversations about race... well they are way more than odds-on to post more racist derp in the future.

Based on that pattern of behavior, I have no problem with labeling BruceZ a racist. Note: that doesn't mean I'm saying anything at all about his 'secret inner heart'. This isn't anything close to 'name calling'... it's only a prediction about his future behavior. If he had changed his pattern of behavior (instead of running away with his tail between his legs), then I'd happily stop calling him a 'racist'.

I'd disagree with that

You are misreading me. You (specifically you) care about having serious discussions about institutional racism. Full stop.

I'm not seeing much of that out of other posters on 2+2.

I am not lumping you in with other people on 2+2. "Your ilk" would, for the most part, include me.

I do disagree about your claims about what other people are doing. What they are doing is being idiots on the internet.

I disagree. "Racist" is not at all a value-neutral concept. "Racist" is a character trait. "You are racist" is a negative claim about someone's character.

That being said, I have absolutely no problem with people making negative claims about someone's character. I've on occasion called people pompous *******s, dumb as a brick, etc.

I'm not sure why you seem to think that name calling is bad other than that we have a weird and unnatural rule against it on 2+2.

My only problem with it is that is more than a small distraction - it becomes the entire conversation. It eliminates any possibility of having a 'serious discussion about race.' It might just be me, but gossiping about some dude on the internet that said something racist is a bit less important than discussing whether schools being locally funded propagates ethnic disparity.

As an aside, I'm confident that your idiosyncratic view that people label others only as an exercise in predicting future behavior and aren't making value-laden character judgments is incorrect for the vast majority of people.

I'll admit to a small amount of hyperbole.

Would you agree to a 1:50 ratio of serious discussion to derping/gossiping?

De-Individualizing people makes it easier to justify abusive behavior towards them and also contributes to justifying making category judgements about individuals based on racial attributes. We can have both systemic and individual- based approaches to ending racism and solving the problems racism causes. Systemic approaches do not need to discredit individual approaches to succeed.

So the question is can people like Shamer Trolly adjust away from the need to discredit individual-based approaches to support systemic-based approaches?

I don't. I'm just tired of hearing whining about name calling.

No, I don't think people aren't also making value judgements. In fact, I'm sure most people who don't care for a pattern of posting racist derp (even perhaps unknowingly and not maliciously) have, in general, poorer than average value judgements for those who they feel post so. The point here is that these two things aren't mutually exclusive.

But it seems team #tskTsk (...let's be civil) always insist they are mutually exclusive... and it's always an unsupported negative value judgement. Then, for some reason, they feel justified... no compelled... to derail the conversation with their 'tone policing'.

The problem here stems from this fuzzy thinking about people's 'secret-inner-heart' that team #tskTsk uses. Team #tskTsk is doing what they whine about the others doing the most... they're claiming they can 'grok' the 'secret-inner-heart' of someone who posts "you're racist", and that they are only posting to maliciously name-call.

Yeah, we here this all the time. And it's just a buncha crap. Since we moved this conversation over from the 'bad posters thread', let me explain the nomenclature we were using...

Why do we keep hearing that the Cs can't have their 'serious discussion about race'? There is absolutely nothing stopping them. They can...

1. Ignore Bs comment.
2. Call B out, ask him to explain himself.
3. Explain to B how there is no racism in A's comment.
4. Derail the conversation by changing the subject from A's comment to B's behavior.

Even if it were true that very many of you who call out, chide, deride, gossip, declare it's okay to hate racists and so on are usually talking about institutional racism (and most are not, or the comments are way out of bounds and much more appropriate for someone who actually hates minorities), the fact is that there are very many instances of institutional racism which are debatable.

When you make a statement that capitalism itself is a form of institutional racism, because some minority races unfairly fall into a lower economic class, you've made a claim that a capitalist would often disagree with. You would claim he is a racist, and he would strongly disagree. When you claim the judicial system is racists in similar fashion, you might get an argument from some people as well who support the system as is being best. They may not see the institutional issues as problems the way you do, and not think they're being racist.

Rinse. Repeat. There are tons of things people disagree on and many people simply toss around the highly-debatable term racist as if it's fact, then proceed with the shame tactics instead of convincing. If it's true some of you really mean to change things, then you ought to plainly see how that method shuts down all constructive discussion.

Shame trolly is tired of purposeless human-on-human degradation being criticized, however we are not going to stop calling it out until everybody is free. So he's just gonna hafta be tired ( maybe eventually become too tired to whine about it himself) or stop supporting it; and either way, that is his choice.

Well having these kinda conversations about race is what a whole lotta peeps here claim is their goal. And lol like we chat with significant capitalists here... we chat with capitalist fan-boys. That aside, look at how you have this going...

My premise is that capitalism is a cause of institutional racism. But what our capitalist fan-boy is hearing is that I'm calling him a racist. And what the fan-boy believes 'racist' means is simply a despicable human being... a flaw in their 'secret inner heart'. So he's going to throw a fit about 'name calling', and try to derail the conversation.

This whole fixation about 'name calling' is an attempt to rule out any 'serious conversation about' race... because such can never be spoken about in 'civil society'.

And we got these two old canards. Not everyone is trying to change things, and there is no reason to prioritize 'trying to change things' on an interwebs forum.

But more LOLtastically is this constant empirical claim that there would be more 'change' if the B's would just behave differently. LOL wat? Citation needed... what a crock of crap.

The truth is that anyone who 'tone polices', anyone who whines about 'name calling', anyone who complains about the "sandy vagina PC Police", anyone who derps about "why race needs to be brought into everything", anyone who carries on about the "race hustlers"... all those people. None of them are going to engage in a 'serious conversation about race'. What they are doing is actively trying to derail the conversation into a discussion about someone else's behavior. Period.

The only way to actually have a 'serious conversation about race' with these folk is to first have a 'serious meta-conversation about tone-policing'. Any other approach is an obviously futile waste of time.

There is big distinction between name-calling and making accusations about a person's character that effects their reputation and social ability. People like shame trolly have always avoided talking about this and respond with dismissive mockery and, guess what? name-calling which is substance-less compared to the specific details of the topic they are responding.

You can see the self-serving feedback loop here.... Name calling is useful to avoid discussion of whether or not name calling is justified, not just to shun the racists. Name-calling is weak, useful to morons, and easy to justify and exploitable by people who just want to be mean. I don't help people be mean when I can avoid it and I love it when they use mockery to try to diminish meanness as a big whiny response to being called out for it because that is ultimately weak and also irrational. **** acting mean, it's been overplayed. Stick that in the 'tone police' pipe and smoke it.

I probably read the statement a little differently than what you intended. If by "serious discussion" you mean whether or not people want to patiently explain from the beginning their understanding of institutional racism, it's clear that the majority aren't interested in that. But I read "talking about institutional racism" to be referring to whether or not some consideration of it motivates the people who call stuff racist. And I think the answer is clearly yes.

And I think "serious discussion" of the topic is interesting, but I also get why someone might not want to have to start from the very beginning every time a new poster drops by to say something vaguely racist sounding. (I also understand that not every time someone says something vaguely racist sounding are they actually as racist as might be inferred).

Maybe what the forum needs is the FINEST MINDS to put together a stickied FAQ on institutional racism and then when you call something racist you can link to the appropriate answer for further enlightenment.

(note: that suggestion is only 65% tongue in cheek)

I have such a hard time believing you actually buy this. I'm pretty sure we had this talk before, about how you would talk about controversial topics like racism IRL, like with an acquaintance at a bar. I thought you admitted that you would take a different approach, one based on both sides understanding each other and common civility. You then admitted you just come on here to laugh at racists. Correct me if I'm thinking of another Trolly.

Why would you expect people to discuss things the same way with people they know IRL as they do in a crowded forum with hundreds of posters who are relative strangers? They're completely different situations.

capitalism might not be perfect but its what america is about one upping your neighbor. its greedy and we are a greedy people, all races of americans are born into a greedy society and grow up with those values ON AVERAGE COMPARED TO THE REST OF THE WORLD. i capitalized that so people dont go "well im not greedy so that disproves that ha!" socialism can work wonders for a country but only if everyone is on the same team and with all the ******ed bickering in this country about racism it wont happen. ever read the book "the secret"? theres a part about how whether you like something or not if you think about it it will manifest. bickering about racism from that point of view seems to empower racism and keep it alive at this point in time instead of just letting it die out and not making it something thats the goto thing when there are problems. maybe hard to understand for some people that think incessant bickering about subtleties will help it die out without realizing that approach is fundamentally flawed.

At some point Mr. Wookie said that it gets tiring to explain for the gazillionth time why voter id laws are inherently racist.

I am sympathetic, but only in the way I am sympathetic that it is annoying to have to brush your teeth every day and how I am sympathetic that tech support people have to answer the same questions over and over again.

It is unwise to tell a German person that you don't like asparagus.

It wouldn't be 2+2 if we didn't rehash everything over and over.

Did you read the Voter ID thread and come up with questions that haven't been asked or statements that haven't already been refuted? Might be a start. People have jobs and if you care to learn it's up to you to read the stuff that has already happened. I don't know why you would expect people to hold your hand through it if it's already been brought up and discussed. There are people who constantly bring up stuff already discussed and arent' worth engaging. See: negs in Obamacare thread.

I expect people to realize that, just like IRL, when they intentionally insult others it ends up ruining most conversations, because in most cases afterwards neither party is as interested in carrying on a constructive discussion as they are in getting back at the other person. This is a universal truth in human communication whether you're in a bar, a meeting, a web forum, the space station or in 7th dimensional hyperspace. I'm sorry, but the way I've seen "racist" tossed at posters here is 99/100 meant as an intentional insult, and that's proven by the jeering, gossip and general trolling that goes along with it.

It's not an insult to call racist things racist. Trolling about racism? Team SMP is the LOGIC team who couldn't even decide amongst yourselves if Bruce's schtick was him playacting a racist, or not even racist. I"m not sure which you are going with today.

It would be awesome if people bothered to educate themselves about things, but they don't.

I don't see much of a solution* other than cutting and pasting the same old arguments over and over again.

*the problem seeking a solution is educating people, not worrying about whether a particular poster is an idiot.

Did I miss the part where someone was talking about Bruce?

He is irrelevant.

Examples?

Constructive criticism?

Of course I believe it. If saying "you're racist" delivered measurably different results than "that's racist", or "Excuse me fine sir... blah, blah, blah... perhaps a racial dimension" we'd see that in the historical record. Like I said, those that whine about 'name calling' or the 'PC Police' aren't going to engage in 'a serious conversation about race' regardless of how they are approached.

But maybe I'm wrong.

It's your self-mod thread... you can censor all the meanies. Here is ih8ustfu spewing some pretty strong racist derp ITT. Why don't you show us all how you would try to engage ih8ustfu in a 'serious conversation about race' by using 'common civility' ??