airshowpilot wrote:
Individuals become victims of an intolerance by any person who disrespects their cultural, racial sexual, identity, or what have you.. I don't care if it's white, black, hispanic, male, female or whatever..
Majority power has nothing to do with anything, otherwise I could work for an all black corporation where my boss was female and be the only white guy there. I could yelp and cry "racism" or even "sexism" when I become victim to intolerance. This is where your point lies short.
Intolerance is between the recipient and the abuser. Racism is an old dirty dated term which has no use for today. It starts with the individual where most sensible people look past obvious features that are markedly dissimilar to the other person. People of all shapes forms and colors are victims of intolerance..
..Let's not group people into the old stereotypical categories. I hope you don't look at people differently just because your "people" are in control and have the most power. I truly hope not?
I don't think our views are that divergent here. I just see things playing out on several different layers:
- Intolerance is when individuals don't like or judge others based on a certain characteristic. Intolerance happens where we live. It's what happened with Ben and Yasmin.
- Discrimination is when individuals use a limited position of power to oppress other individuals based on a certain characteristic. Discrimination happens in our institutions. It's what happens when people don't get job interviews because they have an ethnic sounding name or are denied housing because they're same-sex couples.
- Racism is dehumanizing and oppressing an entire race of people in order to maintain the privilege granted by majority status. Racism happens at the societal/cultural level, but trickles down to the institutional and community level. It leads to things like slavery and ethnic cleansing.
Racism, on the other hand, is treating a race of people as though they're less than human to gain or maintain your advantage over them. It isn't just institutional, like discrimination, it's cultural. It's passed down through generations. It's how organizations like the KKK spring up. And many racists believe their superiority is God-given, which is why people who are a part of these organizations are unable to see how wrong they are.
In the U.S., racism led to slavery and resulted in such discriminatory practices as segregation. The latter was experienced by people still living, and their experiences with these discriminatory practices have influenced their families and their communities. That's why I believe most white people are incapable of judging what is or isn't racism - they may have seen or experienced discrimination, but they've never directly felt the forces of societal oppression working against them. It's why certain words that may seem harmless to whites are explosive to African-Americans. Words like "boy," "you people," or "uppity," which were meant to remind slaves of their proper place within the pecking order and which reemerged during the civil rights movement. For people who have been victims of racism, these words are like weapons. In this context, words like "ghetto trash" could also be seen as trying to remind people of their proper place within the pecking order, which is probably why Yasmin and Jaison reacted the way they did. It's not that Ben was intolerant; it's that he - knowingly or not - evoked something that was bigger than an argument between two people on an island. Ben's unwillingness or inability to recognize the greater context means he is complacent with this societal inequity. That complacency, not his comments, is what makes him racist.
FUCKTARD
