rolling "Is This Racist?" thread

you should avoid using the space to talk about ambiguous racial issues to talk about blatant, obvious racism as if the two were equal or as if you were confused about blatant, obvious racism, you big whining baby

New Question <-- this exists for a reason

I mean, we could actually go for the question that everyone seems to want to avoid or not really think about, which is "is it racist to flood the thread that's supposed to be a conversation about the ambiguity of racism with example after example after example of obvious, blatant racism" if you really want to take the "no topic should be forbidden!" martyr stance here

I was secretly trying perform racism by flooding this thread but also signal non-racism by posting a news story about racism

it was going to be...my greatest feat

I mean, we could actually go for the question that everyone seems to want to avoid or not really think about, which is "is it racist to flood the thread that's supposed to be a conversation about the ambiguity of racism with example after example after example of obvious, blatant racism" if you really want to take the "no topic should be forbidden!" martyr stance here

seems an interesting question, honestly. i'm not inclined to think of it as racist, precisely, at least wr2 how the thread has actually progressed, but i'd wanna have that discussion before passing judgement.

since this thread has gone back and forth over the past few months between conversation about things that might be racist and things that obviously are, both discussed constructively without much too much clusterfuck trouble (sorry dayo), i don't think it's "whining" to defend that use.

the weirdly aggro slam on white people who don't want to be "THAT white person" strikes me as way whinier than anything i've said, but maybe i'm missing something. wouldn't be the first time...

Speaking in very general terms, my reaction to recent posts on this thread have been "just what is being asked here? do they wonder if this [really obviously racist thing] is offensive? or are they moving into the 'this is racist' category, in which case what kind of discussion are they trying to provoke?"

And as I've stated earlier, some of these posts do appear to fall somewhere between smug and outright race fetish. I'm not going to look into the hearts and minds of the poster on the other side of the computer, but it is very hard for me to produce another reason for why we have this parade of racist bullshit trotted out here every other day.

Guys...I was trying to come up with a way to tell you all this...but

I am....THAT white person.

no offense to all the other white ppl ITT you guys do fine work but i think my record speaks for itself

I had no idea this one life was secretly a signaling game about how not racist you were

hey iatee, robin hanson'd that for u. no need to thank me.

just personally, i've found this thread to be quite useful, not least cuz i've said some stupid fucking shit here and been called on it. also because the last few years have been kind of eye-opening to me in terms of the amount of blatant, obvious racism that's crawled out from under a rock and into mainstream american politics. of course, my surprise is reflective of nothing but a privileged white guy's ignorance, but i figure that a late education is better than none at all.

i count on ILX for a lot of things, mostly cuz i don't spend a lot of time trawling around the internet. i would probably never have noticed many of the things discussed itt if they hadn't been posted here. so it's a useful resource for me. if there needs to be a separate thread for "obviously racist bullshit", then fine, so far this one seems to have comfortably accommodated both. i guess i have a lot of faith in the intentions and intelligence of ILXors. with a couple clear exceptions, i don't see much trolling, smugness or race fetishism itt. maybe i need a perspective adjustment, i dunno...

maybe we don't need a separate thread for obviously racist bullshit for the same reason we don't have a white history month
makes u think

because all the threads are for obviously racist bullshit?

what's the subtext here? that ppl posting racist things are doing it bc they're either titillated by the racist thing they posted, or titillated by the outrage they can work up over the racist thing they posted? to the first - ppl will always be interested in terrible taboo things and hopefully titillation and disapproval can exist simultaneously. to the second - is there real harm in ppl giving themselves props for not being as racist as the NY Post? on one hand, yes, it's superficial satisfaction at a time when more important structural issues are being ignored. at the same time, it is good to remember that racism in america is mainstream and outrage over obviously racist things can hopefully boil over into not obviously racist things. like maybe it's not a terrible idea to keep racist sensors tuned and conscious.

nb i'm sick and feeling like crap so if this makes no sense i apologize

can we change the title of this thread to "let's congratulate ourselves for not being THAT white person" since that's what this thread has turned into

― I'M THAT POSTA, AAAAAAAAAH (DJP), Friday, May 4, 2012 12:42 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

truth bomb

I am really not ready to deal w/ the complex moral responsibility of having posted a news story to the wrong thread

jfc the amount of bad faith on this site

truth bomb

― some dude, Friday, May 4, 2012 11:51 AM (1 minute ago)

smug bomb, but don't sweat it, lots of people confuse the two

next time, iatee, try posing your question on this thread.

lol

i agree w/ iatee that there seems to be a quickness to think the worst of ppl posting to ilx. it's better, tho, than the ilx culture when i first got to ilx and posters said and did really reprehensible things to one another.

IDK I think DJP is right, it's a little o_O to have a rolling museum of random internet racism thread

*wins Not-That-White-Guy game*

okay, how about this for "is it racist"

what if you're trying to point someone out of a crowd. can you say "he's that black guy" or "he's the asian guy over there". pointing out a guy by race feels wrong but it also feels like a dumb white guilt thing to intentionally avoid pointing out someone's race when you know it's the best way to explain who you're talking about

michaeljacksoneatingpopcorn.gif

"Which one is Colin Powell?"

IDK I think DJP is right, it's a little o_O to have a rolling museum of random internet racism thread

*wins Not-That-White-Guy game*

― Scott, bass player for Tenth Avenue North (Hurting 2), Friday, May 4, 2012 1:59 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

bullshit, I invoke sumai.

it's better, tho, than the ilx culture when i first got to ilx and posters said and did really reprehensible things to one another.

― Mordy, Friday, May 4, 2012 2:58 PM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

well

okay, how about this for "is it racist"

what if you're trying to point someone out of a crowd. can you say "he's that black guy" or "he's the asian guy over there". pointing out a guy by race feels wrong but it also feels like a dumb white guilt thing to intentionally avoid pointing out someone's race when you know it's the best way to explain who you're talking about

I am not gonna lie, watching people bend over backwards to avoid describing someone by their race in wholly innocuous conversations is one of the funniest things to me

i have been called "the guy with the guyabera" in a crowd of black dudes which prompted another guy in the crowd to say "you mean white boy?"
i'll take either

smug bomb, but don't sweat it, lots of people confuse the two

― 10. “Pour Some Sugar On Me” – Tom Cruise (contenderizer), Friday, May 4, 2012 2:54 PM (26 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i don't think you get that what DJP is talking about is in part the inherent smugness of constantly pointing out people who are less enlightened than you on the subject of race

yes, that's the beautiful irony of it

"i am more enlightened than people who feel the need to point out how much more enlightened they are. checkmate!"

in seriousness, I would probably get kind of grossed out after a while if the "is this anti-semitism" thread was always on the new answers page with obvious anti-semitism links.

contendo it's not about continuing the cycle of superiority, it's about acknowledging how this thread being kept on New Answers with new awful links every day for a fucking year straight is not making us better or more enlightened or even more entertained people

ny post dude responded to the backlash

Such obvious, wishful and ignorant mischaracterizations of what I write are common. I don't call black men the N-word; I don't regard young women as bitches and whores; I don't glorify the use of assault weapons and drugs. Jay-Z, on the other hand.....Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?

Jay-Z profits from the worst and most sustaining self-enslaving stereotypes of black-American culture and I'M the racist? Some truths, I guess, are just hard to read, let alone think about.

Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?
Is he the only NBA owner allowed to call black men N---ers?

actually it's more like "I'm tired of watching people on this board use actual racist incidents that they likely will never be subjected to as playing pieces in an escalating game of moral one-upsmanship against people who aren't even playing with them, particularly when a twist of fate is all that separated me from the people who are the actual targets of this bullshit and I've experienced shit like this in the past"

like, try thinking for a second that there's at least one black person around here that you guys haven't chased off yet before you post this shit

chased off? whoa!

as to frogbs question: yeah, it's weird. i remember when i was a kid, early teens somewhere, reading constantly, getting annoyed by the fact that non-white people in the novels i read (most of them written by white americans) were always described in terms of their race, while white characters were just, well, people. the implied normalcy of whiteness started to really bug me once i'd noticed it.

but what do you do in response? describing everyone in terms of their race is just as weird as never using race as a descriptor. at best you calibrate it to the situation and treat everyone equally. but it's hard in a race-conscious culture not to feel weird or get it wrong sometimes no matter how good your intentions might be, especially if you're inexperienced and/or prone to self-doubt.

don't ny post dude is long for that paper

yeah i mean i don't mean to hijack your point to make a somewhat tangential point or misrepresent what you were saying, there's definitely that too (xpost)

like, try thinking for a second that there's at least one black person around here that you guys haven't chased off yet before you post this shit

who do you imagine you're speaking for, or to?

let's just lock this thread and be done w/it

Is the Post guy revealing the word one letter at a time, Wheel of Fortune style?

that "escalating game of moral one-upsmanship" is in your head. you may imagine that it's what motivates others, but ultimately you have no way of knowing. i see the posting of racist shit in this thread as reportorial, and yes, not without a moral component, but there's nothing wrong with that, imo.

deadspin wants everyone to know that this is in fact racist
http://deadspin.com/5907754/oh-look-phil-mushnick-wrote-something-racist

Don't lock the thread just because people can't figure out what there's a question mark in the original question and that repeating racism ad hoc to get "get a load of this!" reaction is nagl.

so like, on a pitchfork scale of 0.0 to 10.0, where 10.0 is a lynching, and 0.0 is Martin Luther King Jr. enjoying a cup of coffee while making breakfast, in his pajamas, humming a soft song to himself, where would the MacBook Pro thing fall? where does this comment fall?

I think this thread, while started with the noblest of intentions, has been a failure. And the reason I believe it has failed is that we (as a society) are so resigned to simply declaring something racist or not, as if it's binary, instead of attempting to quantify exactly how racist something really is, using numerical scales.

― del griffith, Tuesday, September 21, 2010 2:23 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah i mean i don't mean to hijack your point to make a somewhat tangential point or misrepresent what you were saying, there's definitely that too (xpost)

no, your point is valid and part of where I'm coming from; the reason it's being expressed is because of my self-quote expressing a breaking point in tolerance for this shit

that "escalating game of moral one-upsmanship" is in your head. you may imagine that it's what motivates others, but ultimately you have no way of knowing. i see the posting of racist shit in this thread as reportorial, and yes, not without a moral component, but there's nothing wrong with that, imo.

okay lol, thank you socialist daughter from Native Son for explaining to me how I, as a black person, should respond to a thread that started out as a conversation about ambiguity in racism and quickly turned into "Hey, this is racist! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this! And so is this!" etc etc etc

"this is how I feel about this"
"oh no, you're confused; THIS is how you should feel about this"
"thank you! finally a white person explains to me how I should engage with racism *sets down heavy load*"

yeah i mean it'd be one thing if we were talking about one or two things worthy of discussion every couple weeks, but this thread has just become a daily fountain of garbage. i picture people browing comments sections and excitedly pulling up the bookmark to this thread to cut-and-paste.

*jumps out of thread*
*deploys parachute*