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Originally Posted by ThePits
If race, as you state, is a hoax, therefore so is racism
Race being the prerequisite for racism
Therefore, logically, "affirmitive action" or whatever you want to dress it up as is unnecessary
And as you mentioned slavery, hmm, for some strange reason you dont see the English asking the Italian government for a public apology for the Romans invading and enslaving the British Isles, nor do you see the French asking the same of the German government for the enslavement of their people by the Teutonic tribes
Every nation on this earth has had some of its people enslaved, exploited, raped and murdered
Most just dont bang on about it
The problem with this whole subject is that common sense has gone out of the window
Treat everyone the same and give people jobs on the basis of merit
What could be simpler?
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tits, i never said that. i said that there is no biological basis for categorizing people in "races", but i didn't say exactly that race doesn't exist at all. a hoax is a hoax, but it's still something, and people can fall for it in troves.
the fact that there is no real basis for racism doesn't mean that peope cannot fall for such a fiction. there was no real reason for invading iraq either, and what happened?
the second part of my argument therefore (interrupted by a weekend of the board going to avalon) was going to be about the social construction of race. obviously, "race" is something that exists, we have a word for it, and think in those terms, and there is such a thing as racial discrimination. it's based on a fiction but it has real consequences-- like witch hunting, or the idea that AIDS was a "gay cancer".
you say:
" Every nation on this earth has had some of its people enslaved, exploited, raped and murdered
Most just dont bang on about it"
so, it's just "the darkies" that bang about it? is that what you mean? i wonder what you 're implying... please, clarify.
there is a big difference between your historical examples and affirmative action
in the usa--or in brazil for that matter.
first of all, the teutonic tribes are not modern germany, nor is italy the equivalent of the roman empire. that was almost 2000 years ago and your analogy is completely cracked.
there is a historical continuity in the united states between today and the origins of the republic. while slavery started under the english, it was carried on by a number of states. those states still exist as legal entities, they have a constitution and a territory and borders.
not only that. while slavery in the u.s. "ended" over 100 years ago with the civil war, the pre-war social order returned soon after reconstruction, with full support by the state. anti-discriminatory laws were not instituted until the late 1960s, and in many cases they haven't been properly enacted.
a better comparison than your historically myopic analogies would be cases like:
-germany paying reparations to holocaust victims and to israel
-the u.s. paying reparations to the japanese-american prisoners of concentration camp
-germany paying reparations after both world wars
it's been done, governments have apologized and forked out the money. the teutonic tribes unfortunately are not answering the phone calls.
the case for paying reparations to descendents of slaves is not a moot one, but it's controversial enough that it hasn't moved forward at this point except against certain corporations who indeed scammed people.
however, in a society that strives for democracy and equality, trying to compensate somehow for racial discrimination is a good thing. the fact is that there are still a lot of ignorant racists out there who continue trying to segregate and discriminate on the basis of
skin color, and while affirmative action is not the best possible solution, because it works statistically rather than individually (and that's gotta be imperfect by definition), it's good enough that it deserves support.
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Originally Posted by Diesel
amen. if you're dumb you're dumb. if you want to clean my shit up, you're an immigrant.
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ha ha. prick.