Why Black people are afraid of ‘crazy’ White people

I assume that you are talking about Affirmative Action which I feel does more harm than good to POC because regardless of how well qualified a Black doctor, air traffic controller or clerk is there will always be the stigma that the individual received the position because of the color of his skin, not the level his competency.

Additionally, past wrongs were done by people who have been dead for quite a long time. Demanding that today's working generations pay for wrongs committed by others is an injustice by any measure and only serves to fuel racial tensions..

Earlier, you mentioned concerns in the Black community about White Supremacists. It is precisely the enactment of injustices such as AA that helps to validate their strident rhetoric and increase their membership numbers.

That is something that neither of us wants to see.

Thanks,

 

You don't right past wrongs to one person by endorsing future wrongs to benefit a different person. Not even if they happen to have the same skin tone.

 

The people who were originally responsible for the shabby treatment of Blacks are as untouchable as the dead.

Those members of the Colonial Powers who transported Blacks from Africa to America certainly did not venture into the jungle and capture Blacks themselves.

The people who benefited most from the slave trade were the original Black African slave sellers about whom the Al Sharptons of the world are careful not to whisper a word.

Thanks,


"Confronting Africa's Role in the Slave Trade"
https://www.cfr.org/blog/confronting-africas-role-slave-trade

EXCERPT "Africans were deeply involved in the slave trade. Africans raided for slaves often in connivance with local chiefs and then acted as middlemen with European and Arab purchasers." CONTINUED

 

It implies nothing of the kind.

We are talking about past wrongs by institutions, like universities, banks, government programs that had discriminated because of color leaving a segment of the population unfavorably behind through no fault of their own.

 

I'm interested to hear your response concerning my answer to your question (Post #101) when you have the time.

Thanks,

 

Partially answered in # 104....do you need examples? Whites have a mean wealth of $170,000 and Blacks $17,000 (old numbers but easy to remember). The way most people accumulate wealth is through home ownership but because of red lining, bank loan discrimination, and not honoring the GI Bill, Blacks couldn't get homes even when they could afford it. Government farm subsidies to whites only. Universities refusing admissions....
Anyway, trying to rectify any of that drives racists nuts.

 

Then explain yourself. All i said was people should stop being racist, and you spun that into pondering if I had said not to question racism in the system.

Yes. And...

The people forming the segment of society you speak of are not the same people as people today who happen to have the same skin colour. Injustice done today on behalf of the latter does not help the former.

 

It is racist to think you are rectifying anything by seeing the black poor and then helping the black instead of the poor.

Pssst.. If you simply help the poor and don't be racist about that, you will be helping more black individuals anyways, since more of them are poor.

You are never going to get fix racism if your answers are always more racism. You are only going to feed into it. Racism isn't a race. It isn't "whiteness". It is a mindset that anyone or any race can fall into. Stop being racist about your anti-racism, push for cooperation instead of division between people of different races and you will see better results.

 

I hope that you noticed that in my Post # 101 I did not dispute that Blacks and other POC have received shabby treatment in the past but I still don't see how enacting racist policies like Affirmative Action is going to correct injustices of the past and not worsen racial relations of the present..

If you are going to have heart surgery and your life is literally in the hands of the doctor, wouldn't you want to know that the doctor performing the operation is there because he is the best qualified and not there simply because he or she is a minority / POC?

I know for a fact that would have very likely have died if a competent doctor had not have intervened and corrected the incompetent orders issued by a female POC / minority who could only have gotten her medical degree due to Affirmative Action.

At the same time, I'm sure that there are many minorities / POC that have achieved their success in spite of racist hiring practices.

Finally, I think that we agree that POC / minorities have certainly received dismal treatment in the past but I don't think that racist policies, today, are a durable solution to racist policies of the past.

Thanks,

 

^ And POC are not interchangeable. I can't say that often enough. People have such difficulty recognizing it.

Giving a perk to one person who is POC doesn't alleviate the suffering of a different person who is POC. The latter is still suffering and nothing has been done to help them no matter how much you pat yourself on the back for giving a perk to the former.

Lowering the bar for privileged black kids getting into Harvard may help alleviate white guilt, but it does absolutely nothing to help inner city black kids fending off gang violence, and does absolutely nothing for historical victims of slavery, who have sadly died and can't ever be repaid.

 

I'm not quite clear as to what you are saying.

Please clarify.

Thanks,

 

I mean "POC" are not a monolith.

I edited my post to give an example.

 

Edna, along with many others (don't want to single her out) talk about how POC think this or POC do that, or how this is the POC experience or POC position on X. Don't I have sympathy for POC?

But no, that is in itself a form of racism. There is no one POC view, position, thought or experience. And helping one POC person doesn't help another. We are individuals and treating us as all the same is prejudice in action. Individuality isn't exclusive to white people.

 

Note that one super rich black guy coming into the picture will fix the mean, and leave just as many black folks suffering in poverty.

Also, many, both black and white, are in serious debt and can hardly imagine having zero net worth, nevermind $17,000 or $170,000.

 

If I understand you correctly, you're saying that generalizations about any group of people are inaccurate.
Is that it in a nutshell?

 

That's part of it, yes. But when's the last time you heard somebody try to speak on behalf of "white people"? We all recognize that is ridiculous. So why don't more people have the same reaction when somebody tries to speak on behalf of "POC", which means everyone but white people? There is a racist tendency in society to recognize white people as individuals, and to generalize "POC".

 

A 10:1 wealth difference now doesn't bother some because of past systemic racism. Some, especially on the right, say there is nothing keeping them back now, nothing needs to be done to right past wrongs. The victims of those past wrongs disagree. Do they just need to shut up?
The US has done little to right those wrongs giving us the 10 to 1 spread. One thing that has been tried is putting race into the calculation of college admissions. That may increase the number of Black admissions but from there they get the same course work as anybody else and thinking universities will be graduating the incompetent is nonsense. Targeting a traditionally underperforming group to help get into the trades or higher education raises the entire group which improves the whole of society, but some are stuck in racist finger pointing.

 

No. They should be compensated, and that compensation should not be diluted to everyone who happens to have the same skin colour as them.

Just as victims of wrongs should be compensated even if they happen to have the same skin colour as those responsible for the wrongs done to them.

Do you agree? Or do you push race as proxy, as racists do?

Which is racist and encourages more racism in all directions.

And also which mostly benefits the already privileged, and does very little for the downtrodden.

That's what happen when you focus on "fixing" group averages. As I said above, you could technically eliminate this wealth average gap you speak of with the introduction of a very few obscenely rich black people. And that would do absolutely nothing to address the injustice you speak of.

Are you concerned with injustice or with optics and virtue signaling?

If the former, then please consider that the group level approach, treating all of a race as the same, often does more harm than good to struggling non-white people, and that racism pushed in our favour will only excuse the racism pushed against us that we would like to end.

"Anti-racist" racism feeds directly into old style anti-minority racism in a viscous cycle that may allow some to feel good about themselves virtue signalling, but only serves to hurt us in the long run. No. Racism is unacceptable, full stop, regardless of who the targets are. And we can oppose and root out racism without being racist ourselves.

If you lower the bar too far for them, then those entering at that lower bar will struggle more with the work, more will drop out and they will get less out of the education than had they gone to a school better suited to their ability.

Lowering the bar is not helpful to anyone. It is better to find those who meet the bar and to encourage supportive homes for all and better intellectual development at earlier stages.

A lot of "POC" struggle not because racism and not because of their genes but because of poverty and related issues. So the answer is to help alleviate that (for poor white people too), and not to help the already privileged have easy rides just because they share skin colour with the underprivileged.

Groups don't underperform. Individuals do.

And no, rich black kid getting easy entrance to Harvard doesn't do anything help poor black kid dodging gangs and absentee fathers. It is very racist to pretend the former kid and latter kid are the same.

 

I may be wrong but I think that it is helpful to discuss race related issues even when there is disagreement.

I don't know how old you are but do you feel that you are a victim of past wrongs and in what ways do you feel that you've been victimized?

If you do feel that you have been victimized, in what way do you feel that should be compensated and by whom?

Re:

I mentioned, earlier, the dangers of Affirmative Action especially in the field of medicine where I have personally witnessed the gross incompetence of 2 minority doctors who could only have gotten and kept their positions at a V.A. Hospital through A.A.
The incident involved Patient "Z" who was White had a heart condition and chronic, inoperable pain from wounds sustained in combat. Patient Z had his pain medications stolen and submitted the required Police report as proof of theft.
In addition to other heart med.s, Patient Z had been prescribed 240 mg of Morphine, 60 mg Oxycodone and 40 mg of Valium for 5 years by Dr. "A" who was Black.

In spite of the Police Report and Patient Z's heart condition, Dr. A abruptly discontinued the Morphine, Oxycodone and Valium causing withdrawals and near death heart failure in patient Z.
Over ten years later and after numerous other complaints, Dr. A not only kept her job but was promoted over several better qualified White Dr.s for the simple reason that she was a Black female.

I suspect that it is policies like this that medical incompetence is the third highest cause of death in the US.
It also exemplifies why AA is not only unjust but can also be fatal.

Thanks,


(1) "The third-leading cause of death in US most doctors don’t want you to know about"
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/02/22/medical-errors-third-leading-cause-of-death-in-america.html

 

What contact I have had with the VA, it seemed to have a lot of foreign born doctors whose training could be suspect.
Interestingly the most common last name for a physician in the US is now Patel.

 

In your Post #118, you wrote:

After that, I asked a few questions in my Post # 120 in an attempt to better understand your grievances which is the opposite of asking that you "...just need to shut up".

I sincerely want to know if you feel like you are a victim and in what ways you feel that you have been victimized.

I also asked: "If you do feel that you have been victimized, in what way do you feel that should be compensated and by whom?"

All I know is that I try to treat Blacks just a little bit better and pay them just a little bit more in a quiet acknowledgment of the shameful way they have been treated in the past.

Concerning the medical incident I described in Post # 120, "Dr. A" is an American born Black female who is still malpracticing and "Patient Z" had actually been prescribed 400 mg Morphine plus the other drugs that were suddenly discontinued in spite of a serious, chronic heart condition. "Patient Z" subsequently suffered months of hellish, costly and near death withdrawals due to the grotesque incompetence of an Affirmative Action beneficiary.

Thanks,

 

I have never been a victim of anything, but I am aware of the world around me and take the legitimate complaints of others seriously and those that ignorantly blow them off really grinds my gears as Peter Griffin would say.
You know she is a "affirmative action beneficiary" because she is black? I could give you an equally "grotesque incompetence" anecdote by a white physician and what would that prove?
I had a coworker who went on disability after multiple abdominal surgeries. The last time I saw him he was very happy because he told me he finally found a doctor at the VA who will give him all the pain medicine he wants.
How about another anecdote? I had a family member (passed away), by marriage, who was a foreign born physician at a VA who was working in geriatrics, but he had been an OB/GYN in the old country. I have no knowledge that he was incompetent, but...

 

If there was affirmative action for white physicians, and if they lowered entrance requirements for them then it would be a serious question. If not, then it obviously wasnt affirmative action. The point is, it creates a legitimate doubt as to the competence of all people of the affirmative action grouping and thereby creates racism. Even the best of the group may be looked upon with some suspicion until they prove themselves, over and over to new people.

 

Never of anything? Is that why you want to see everything at a group rather than individual level? So you can be included in restitution for your group?