[Predator] Racism on SD.net forums

[Lord Revan]

so you think disliking large noses, would be racist only because it happens to prominent feature on certain race. My whole point is that you don't have to like everything, but if don't like certain features on certain races, but not others that can considerd racist.

But not all Jews have large noses. What we were arguing is not even what they are talking about.

nor do all black have them either, but if you dislike black for large noses, but not jews for the same feature you're racist.

[Zero]

What aesthetic judgements are deemed okay by the people claiming that racism is always evil and wrong? Can we admire a woman's big tits, or is that discrimination against those with smaller ones? If I prefer kind women to absolute bitches, am I a discriminatory ass hole? Should we just accept any woman on any grounds?
I think that if one person doesn't personally find a certain race visually appealing, then that's okay. They aren't denying themselves to that race any more then I deny myself to bitchy women, and both are just judgements of personal preference.
Typically, I prefer light-skinned women as well. Does this qualify me as a racist if it's only an aesthetic judgement, and it won't affect my treatment of those around me in any other way? I don't hate blacks, or hispanics, and I don't really resent anyone unless they deserve it. I harm no one with my preference, and if there were a woman that wasn't white that I found as attractive, I wouldn't say no just because she wasn't white. I also typically find blue eyes attractive... is this evil in any way?

Also, I would like to ask, how many of you have dated several people that are of several ethnicities/races? I don't mean just people within your own ethnicity... I'd fall outside of that one, since I'm not white.

[General Zod]

What aesthetic judgements are deemed okay by the people claiming that racism is always evil and wrong? Can we admire a woman's big tits, or is that discrimination against those with smaller ones? If I prefer kind women to absolute bitches, am I a discriminatory ass hole? Should we just accept any woman on any grounds?
I think that if one person doesn't personally find a certain race visually appealing, then that's okay. They aren't denying themselves to that race any more then I deny myself to bitchy women, and both are just judgements of personal preference.
Typically, I prefer light-skinned women as well. Does this qualify me as a racist if it's only an aesthetic judgement, and it won't affect my treatment of those around me in any other way? I don't hate blacks, or hispanics, and I don't really resent anyone unless they deserve it. I harm no one with my preference, and if there were a woman that wasn't white that I found as attractive, I wouldn't say no just because she wasn't white. I also typically find blue eyes attractive... is this evil in any way?

Personally, I'd say it's not necessarily racist so long as the individual feature is discriminated against across all races and/or ethnicities. Still discrimination, but not necessarily harmful or racist. If it's just a specific feature that's discriminated against, but you only discriminate against women of ethnicity x with that feature, then you'd be acting racist.

[Lord Revan]

What aesthetic judgements are deemed okay by the people claiming that racism is always evil and wrong? Can we admire a woman's big tits, or is that discrimination against those with smaller ones? If I prefer kind women to absolute bitches, am I a discriminatory ass hole? Should we just accept any woman on any grounds?
I think that if one person doesn't personally find a certain race visually appealing, then that's okay. They aren't denying themselves to that race any more then I deny myself to bitchy women, and both are just judgements of personal preference.
Typically, I prefer light-skinned women as well. Does this qualify me as a racist if it's only an aesthetic judgement, and it won't affect my treatment of those around me in any other way? I don't hate blacks, or hispanics, and I don't really resent anyone unless they deserve it. I harm no one with my preference, and if there were a woman that wasn't white that I found as attractive, I wouldn't say no just because she wasn't white. I also typically find blue eyes attractive... is this evil in any way?

Also, I would like to ask, how many of you have dated several people that are of several ethnicities/races? I don't mean just people within your own ethnicity... I'd fall outside of that one, since I'm not white.

that pretty much sums up point I was trying (and failing miserbly at it) to make , if deem preference for something racist then were all racist (haven't yet met person who had no preference what so ever), but disclude some people because of certain racial characteristic(s) that racist.

[Lord Revan]

On related note (to self) if you don't want to be misunderstood, learn how to write.

[Chmee]

I just want to be sure I follow the logic here ... if I prefer redheads to blondes, is that racism?

Are redheads a race? If they were, I suppose that would be.

I'm not sure an aesthetic preference translates to racism unless you are implying that those you don't aesthetically prefer are somehow inferior because of your preference.

Why don't you look up the word "discrimination" in an English dictionary, since it appears that English must not be your first language?

Nice dodge, since I didn't use the word 'discrimination', I used the word 'racism'.

But if you mean "the process by which two stimuli differing in some aspect are responded to differently", which is the medical definition of discrimination, then yes you have pointed out an area where you can discriminate between two different people without having the slightest trace of racism, "The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others."

Different is not inferior or superior, it is different. To say that a human being cannot recognize differences without simultaneously making a value judgment on inferiority or superiority is nonsense.

[Darth Servo]

What I'm asking is how can whether or not someone is attractive be preconceived? How can it be prejudice?

You can discriminate without being prejudiced.

[Kamakazie Sith]

What I'm asking is how can whether or not someone is attractive be preconceived? How can it be prejudice?

You can discriminate without being prejudiced.

My earlier mind set was that the discrimination must be one of prejudice.

[Lord Revan]

It very easy to build a no-win scenario for this debate by declearing that preference=evil (as IIRC everybody has a preference)

[Darth Wong]

Why is it so fucking hard for some people to understand that it is impossible to crack open your own psyche and figure out what truly drives your preferences, so this is nothing but a worthless bullshit red herring? The point is that if you discriminate based on race, you fit the definition of a racist. All of this hand-waving is nothing more than irrational evasion.

so you think disliking large noses, would be racist only because it happens to prominent feature on certain race.

Which race has all large noses? Isn't that a stereotype in itself?

[Darth Wong]

It very easy to build a no-win scenario for this debate by declearing that preference=evil (as IIRC everybody has a preference)

Bullshit. There are plenty of people out there who couldn't care less whether they're dating a black chick, a white chick, an Asian chick, a latino chick, etc. It's simply not a factor, and none of the distinctive physical features on any of those ethnicities are necessarily a turn-off.

[Predator]

I had an entertaining thought for a contribution to this thread. Unfortunately, it requires that I make some generalisations about races which I dont like doing, but I'll try to find statistics to back them up where possible. It's a hypothetical scenario so just bear with me.

Bob has a number of attributes he looks for in the ideal woman. An absolutely perfect woman is a rare thing, as it is for most men. Bob doesnt expect to find a woman who has all of his maximally preferred features, but he does like it when a woman has many or most of them. Recently however, Bob has found out that his preferences are racist. Here is a list of his preferences, and how they make him racist.

Bob loves long legs. He particularly likes women with legs that are proportionately long for their height. This means that since Australian aborigines have the longest legs for their height, followed by africans, then caucasians, then asians, he's racially discriminatory to various levels against africans, caucasians, and asians.

Bob loves straight hair too. Virtually all asians have straight hair, a sizeable proportion of caucasians do, but extremely few africans, or australian aborigines do. It turns out Bob is racially discriminatory to various levels against the other races, particularly african, aborigine, etc, except for when they artificially straighten their hair as many do.

Bob loves dark eyes. Blue, grey, and green eyes just arent as appealing as a nice set of brown or black eyes. Unfortunately for caucasians, many have blue, grey, or green eyes, and as such are subjects of racial discrimination from Bob.

Bob likes women with a lower body fat percentage. It turns out that caucasian and asian women tend to have a higher body fat percentage than african women. Bob's preferences seem to be discriminatory against caucasian and asian women.

Bob also likes a nice set of thick lips on his ladies. Well, africans and aboriginals seem to most commonly have a nice set of thick lips leaving caucasians and asians in the dust. Once again, his preference for an african correlated feature makes him racially discriminatory against caucasians and asians.

But Bob loves blonde hair the best, and red hair the least. Well, northern european and scandinavian caucasians are the most likely to have blonde hair. Only a few Aboriginals, and a tiny percentage of africans and no asians have blonde hair, and correspondingly, Bob's preferences are racially discriminatory against them, except for when they artificially colour their hair. However, red hair is found most commonly in caucasians, and as such, he is racially discriminatory against them too.

I hate having to cite statistics and make broad generalisations about races, but it's hard to avoid when dealing with the subject of race and racism. I thought this was an amusing way of illustrating a potential absurdity.

[Darth Wong]

What's the potential absurdity? Bob's personal tastes jump all over the map on race, so as a result, he finds certain features of every major race attractive, and he probably won't racially discriminate.

Whoops, I just realized that you probably thought that was a really devastating point. Sorry.

[His Divine Shadow]

Which race has all large noses? Isn't that a stereotype in itself?

Well no race has all big noses, but there are certain groups that tend to have certain characterstics that occur more than in others, but even so said preference could/would apply to any ethnic group if it's noses that are your thing.

I guess if you like blondes you might be more likely to hook up with a finnish or swedish chick.

I like blondes but I also like asians, but as we all know there are no natural asian blondes, it just makes me so sad

[Justforfun000]

LOL!!!

Wow has this ever turned into a firestorm. I was away, so I missed it all.

K..let see:

Darth Wong said:

Why does it matter whether something is under your control? Let's take a kid who was raised by rabid white-supremacists and carefully cloistered away from minorities. Due to what is literally a lifetime of indoctrination and conditioning, he is terrified of black people. When he meets one, he feels a palpable sense of fear. Is this his "fault"? Is it a conscious choice, or is it subconscious conditioning?

In the end, it doesn't matter. What matters is that he discriminates, and that is racism.

Now I'm not arguing with you at all as to the definition of racism. Other people are trying to use an apologetic argument to excuse the concept, but they are wrong. It IS racism if you will discriminate against someone based on race. Period.

What I was postulating is whether racism in that form is negative. It gets into semantics then.

Is it IMPORTANT for every person to overcome any preconceived notions of attraction to individuals? Do I have the moral right to judge somebody because they will not take courses and/or social conditioning steps to try and change their personal attractions?

I could haul 5 people off my street as a hypothetical example and find that they all have no innate attraction to a certain race regardless of what. Maybe one doesn't find asians attractive, the next one doesn't find natives attractive, etc...

But if they treat everyone equal in a social manner, and profess and display absolutely no reluctance or antipathy to socialize, live with, work with, etc etc,... but simply in their own personal desires have no interest in having sexual relations with someone of that race, regardless if they can't find a reason to explain it, what should be the attitude I give them?

Ideally like myself, I would like to think that all humans can find something equally attractive in every race, but what if some just simply do not and there is no good explanation?

In this case, the racism, even though fitting that term, does not seem to me to be a negative thing. It's something that simply IS. I mean I would consider it negative as to how it narrows your choices and such, but again it's all semantics. After all, many are happy with ONE partner.

Anyway I'm just brainstorming here trying to find a fair viewpoint...since I don't have any specific race turnoffs I can't really relate, but I'm trying devils advocate.

[Lord Revan]

Which race has all large noses? Isn't that a stereotype in itself?

if said all that indeed in stereotype, but like it's a fact certainfeatures are more common in certain races then others. But if you don't have for example disliking black could considered racist as only white have naturally different hair color then shades of black, but if prefer a blond, but would date a black or asian person (both races don't natural blonds) if other attributes (s)he had were something you find attrative. race issues are a proverbial minefield as there's few features that are found only in single race or the fact that the concept of race it itself is far from clear (that's why I don't have any racial preference what-so-ever (if she's Human, female and over 18 the rest is up to debate)

as large noses I picked it because while common feature, it's not exclusive to blacks as long your turn off isn't race specific (for example don't like black because of dark skin, but don't mind it on asians)

also a funny question: are Iranians and Europeans of the same race.

[Bob the Gunslinger]

Similarly, women ovger 80 are less likely to be fertile than women of your age. How many octogenarians have you dated? None? You racist bastard.

Were you born this stupid, or do you inhale paint thinners in your spare time? That would make you ageist, not racist, and yes, I admit to being ageist. Besides, what moron would marry someone who's going to die in the next ten years, if he's got another 50 years to go? Got any other dumb-shit arguments to throw my way?

Actually I do tend to be around paint thinner a lot...

However, I was not being serious in my post, and thought that would come across better.

[Edi]

Were you born this stupid, or do you inhale paint thinners in your spare time? That would make you ageist, not racist, and yes, I admit to being ageist. Besides, what moron would marry someone who's going to die in the next ten years, if he's got another 50 years to go? Got any other dumb-shit arguments to throw my way?

Actually I do tend to be around paint thinner a lot...

However, I was not being serious in my post, and thought that would come across better.

The smilies are there for a reason, use them next time and maybe you won't get blasted. Without them, it is much harder to tell when somebody is being sarcastic when the thread is already full of bullshit from so many people.

Edi

[Spoonist]

->Wong
Personally I think that all humans are racist by the way that we are conditioned to think. But I would never argue the point or push for people to recognize the point.
Why?
Because it is counterproductive to the goal of making people less racist.
The problem when arguing that everyone is racist comes when you don't have the relative grayscale in the vocabulary.
Since our dictionaries/vocabularies doesn't have the whole grayscale of descriptive terms for different levels of racism, you end up bunching people with wide differences in their intolerance together, this combined with the human minds tendency to think in absolutes will bring only negative effects (since this is a web discussion I'll shorten it to two):
1. By letting people equate themselves with a description you make their mindset more open for other effects of the description.
For example: By actively persuade someone that they are racist will make them react less to being called racist in another setting.
2. By descriptively bunching up people with other people they will tend to be less critical of those people.
For example: "I" don't consider myself all bad and if I'm a racist then other racists can't be all bad.

This is due to semantics/psychology and nothing to do with absolute rationality or fact.
So if there isn't a better descriptive term for something I either use whole sentences to describe the concept or I just don't call them on it.
This so that we don't take away the power of calling someone a racist, which today provokes quite a strong reaction, but which if we use the word more pragmatically could become less and less effective.

So for the sake of semantics make a distinction between:
Racism, as someone who thinks that one/some races are superior and other are inferior and acts upon that belief.
Racist selection, as a selection which in itself is racist even though the person/context can have other selections which isn't.
Racial selection, as a selection which is based on race but which isn't racist.
Culturalist, as someone who thinks that one/some cultures are superior and other are inferior and acts upon that belief.

So I wouldn't call a personal sexual preference as racism. Instead I'd ask if the person is aware that such a preference could be based on a subconscious racial preference. This will automatically give the impression that I question the preference but that I because of it don't question the individual.

As a side note, I consider that interracial porn is more fun just because of the color difference. This by itself is a racial preference, but can't even by the wildest stretch be called racism.

[Darth Wong]

So for the sake of semantics make a distinction between:
Racism, as someone who thinks that one/some races are superior and other are inferior and acts upon that belief.

And "aesthetically superior" doesn't count?

Racist selection, as a selection which in itself is racist even though the person/context can have other selections which isn't.
Racial selection, as a selection which is based on race but which isn't racist.

You have failed to present anything remotely resembling a rationale for this utterly meaningless distinction you throw up. Your whole long-winded tripe argument basically boils down to "well, if it's relatively harmless racism, then it doesn't count". Which is a bit like saying that the term "bullying" should not be applied if the child isn't seriously injured, or saying that the term "violence" should not be applied if the victim doesn't require hospital treatment.

[Lord Revan]

OK this become too of flamewar for me to handle, so I quit (and conseed to any argument put).

[Spoonist]

You have failed to present anything remotely resembling a rationale for this utterly meaningless distinction you throw up. Your whole long-winded tripe argument basically boils down to "well, if it's relatively harmless racism, then it doesn't count". Which is a bit like saying that the term "bullying" should not be applied if the child isn't seriously injured, or saying that the term "violence" should not be applied if the victim doesn't require hospital treatment.

Hmm, the rationale was that the distinction isn't meaningless.

I just put up some distinctive examples instead of generic terms.
If you can come up with better ones, then go ahead.

But by your summary it seems that I didn't explain it enough since your summary was:
"well, if it's relatively harmless racism, then it doesn't count"
Which wasn't my point at all.
I said that I consider all humans to be racist but that I would be reluctant to use the word so that it won't lose its power.
Hence I seperate racist behaviour and racism.

I know that in webdiscussions it's much easier to stick to black-white topics (pardon the unintended pun).
But I think that a grayscale to racism/intolerance is necessary in todays society.
There is a big difference between someone who is a full fledged crossburning bigot and someone who would defend everyones equal right but have certain preferences in bed.
To say that they are both "racist" is true, but to use that in real life is counterproductive.

It's the same with your sexism argument.
For the sake of argument you can claim that anyone who doesn't want to have samesex experiences is a sexist/homophobe, the problem is that you would make all asexual/heterosexual part of that group and thereby diminish the effect of the word.


I know that psychology isn't your expertise, but the best way to get people to change is to change their selfimage.
You can do this by two ways, positive reinforcement or negative reinforcement.
By having words with negative association you can make people wish to not include it in their selfimage.
Like racism or homophobe, if I think that I'm neither I will also strive to be neither.
Especially if you combine it with other values, "only stupid people are racist".
If you then reduce the value of the words then people will be less inclined to include it in their selfimage.
"It doesn't matter if I'm racist or not since everyone is just more or less racist."
This leads to the problem being marginalized.

Look at feminism. The value and also the effect of the word has changed.

[Darth Wong]

I said that I consider all humans to be racist but that I would be reluctant to use the word so that it won't lose its power.

You are saying that we shouldn't call something racist even if it is, because we want the word to be reserved exclusively for really bad racism. In short, that's exactly what I accused you of saying.

The fact is that racism, like sexism or many other sociological concepts, is a sliding scale. And it is possible to function in life without discriminating on the basis of race, so don't be too eager to say that racial discrimination is something that everyone does, or that we shouldn't be allowed to identify it as such unless it meets some subjective criterion of "power" according to you.

PS. Taking a single point and expanding it into several wheezy repetitive paragraphs does not make it stronger. Hint for the future.

[Spoonist]

->Wong

Sorry for the long delays in my responses but I'm in a different timezone and only have internet at my work. (Where my lunchbreak coincides with your backup through some grand conspiracy).

Why I'm expanding my explanations is because you are still responding to the "is it" /or/ "isn't it" question. you are not responding to the fact that it is counterproductive.
The "is it" debate at least to me is over because it's a moot point.
By using the word "racism" as you do, means that it is a useless word. All humans who are aware of the concept of race/racism will automatically act racist. Be it positive or negative. As soon as you let other peoples so called 'race' affect how you act towards them you are in effect racist and it is impossible not to do this. For example, from birth our conditioning of face recognation is patterned around those who interact with us, all who fall outside this pattern recognition will trigger our "this-is-a-stranger" instincts. So unless you interact with ALL so called 'races' during your first 5-7 years you are screwed. (This quite interestingly includes all the great apes as well, so human kids hanging out with schimpanzees can be patterned to recognize those as well). In sexual interest this can give different reactions, some people are excited by what is different others are turned off by it. This has little or nothing to do with your actual thoughts on racism it's just how you have been coded.

So if you include stuff like sexual preference and similar things in the concept of racism you have made the word racism redundant since we are all racist with the only exception being those who can't understand the concept. (The mentally or physically handicaped).

That is why my argument is that there is a huge difference between racism and racial-based behaviour and that to be able to counter the effects of real racism (the bigot one) it is important that the definition doesn't become bland.

Human psychology works the way that we wan't to keep things simple. If someone uses the word "chair" we want to know the general idea even though they can look totally different. So if someone says that something is "racism" and I have to ask which kind, how much or what you mean, then the word will change, or lose it's meaning, hence it's power is gone.
And even if you don't like the word there is power in someone on the street saying that they are racist or that they are not racist.

Response point-by-point if you like that way of discussion better:

You are saying that we shouldn't call something racist even if it is, because we want the word to be reserved exclusively for really bad racism. In short, that's exactly what I accused you of saying.

Again no. I said that there is a difference between "something racist" and "a racist someone".
If I want to change people I wouldn't call THEM racist, instead I would call certain parts of their BEHAVIOUR racist and try to make them change that.

The fact is that racism, like sexism or many other sociological concepts, is a sliding scale.

Here we agree fully.

And it is possible to function in life without discriminating on the basis of race, so don't be too eager to say that racial discrimination is something that everyone does,

I don't agree here. Racial discrimination is too common for it to be feasible for many generations to come.
By not discriminating, I first have to be aware of the concept and then I must make a difference in how I treat people to balance out conditioning, language and society, thus I effectivly have to use racist thinking (racial behaviour) to counter racism (the bigotry one).
Also I'm very likely to end up using positive racism (racial selection), that is; I treat those better that I think are mistreated by others.

or that we shouldn't be allowed to identify it as such unless it meets some subjective criterion of "power" according to you.

It has nothing to do with me. To talk about these things without using a more discriptive language is confusing. That is why you got the responses you did from several different people.

PS. Taking a single point and expanding it into several wheezy repetitive paragraphs does not make it stronger.

Why I expand the concept is because I interpreted your responses as you not grasping the concept itself.
To me you are still stuck in the "it is" racism, which I didn't continue.

Hint for the future.

If you are repetitively only responding to a single part of a post you have probably missed something. Also those of us who don't have english as our first language are used to having carefully explain what we are saying so that people don't misinterpret the intention.

[Darth Wong]

You are so full of shit it's oozing out of your fucking nostrils. What the fuck do you not understand about "this thread has a subject, and you shouldn't try to change it", asshole?

Now you're telling me that I'm somehow WRONG for not letting you change the subject from "is it racism" to "do you think we should avoid pointing that out for political reasons?"