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A Question For The White Folks.......

#63
That's a really hard situation. While your not racist, it shouldn't be your job to prove it. So rolling with it is ok I think sometimes. And considering the gentleman's age, he is a product of his environment. Not that it makes it right, it just makes him who he is.

I have a complete IDIOT BIGOT!! for a brother in-law. Sends me racist texts all day long. For sake of sanity, I simply ignore him. I don't join in the banter, but I don't say " well I don't feel that way so stop it" either. Reality is, by not acknowledging him I am not agreeing or disagreeing. And I will never change his opinion, and I am stuck with him so I simply grin and nod.

Its funny because for some reason white racists always assume your the same way. They always drop the N- word out of no where, like they have the need to establish they are a douche.
 
#64
My observation is that most of you guys like to talk about race in terms of individual interactions, especially situations where someone else is being racist. Personally, an individual jackass calling me a N****R is very low on my list concerns.

I think most black people are much more worried about job discrimination, availability of credit, neighborhood redlining, institutional discrimination in law enforcement, than bozos in bars.

The really big problems are beyond getting to know or each other or being a nice guy to all people.
 
#65
DWBass said:
I'm 1/4 white.
Click to expand...

I hope this isn't too forward, but when you say you're 1/4 white I'm wondering if you mean that's your guestimate of your genetics? Or are you referring to recent family history that you're aware of? Like, 1 white grandparent?

Cuz I mean, when African Americans go to the heart of Africa, from sheer skin tone it becomes pretty obvious that 95% of them are of mixed race, right? And Africans that come to America look pretty darn dark.

I saw a documentary on PBS some months ago, where they used DNA to trace roots way back in time, and they kept turning up the most interesting and surprising interacial ancestry -- both in black and (nominally) white Americans! Fascinating; and quite moving. They connected up some white and black families that were related, and they were all blown away.


Personally, I wish we were all of mixed race; then we'd have to surrender race as a social issue altogether. We'd all be forced to find another pretext to channel our stupidity into. :^D lol
 
#66
What really took me a while to get used to was when I joined a group that had a mix group of friends that would hang out, and listen to the white dudes call the black dudes the N- word!! I was totally uncomfortable!! I quickly realized that this was their way of bluntly dealing with racism. I think it was established well before I came along that its ok to poke fun at each others race, because the white and Spanish jokes would flow just as often.
 
#67
pbasswil said:
Personally, I wish we were all of mixed race; then we'd have to surrender race as a social issue altogether. We'd all be forced to find another pretext to channel our stupidity into. :^D lol
Click to expand...

Goobacks.jpg

South Park did it....
AND THEY TOOK OUR JERBS!!!
 
#70
Dr. Cheese said:
My observation is that most of you guys like to talk about race in terms of individual interactions, especially situations where someone else is being racist. Personally, an individual jackass calling me a N****R is very low on my list concerns.

I think most black people are much more worried about job discrimination, availability of credit, neighborhood redlining, institutional discrimination in law enforcement, than bozos in bars.

The really big problems are beyond getting to know or each other or being a nice guy to all people.
Click to expand...

I defintely hear that Doc. I think that what we're focusing on though is the small is scale/personal level at the moment, at least that's how I'm seeing it. Very few here will deny that the items you mention above exist. At least I'd hope so. But that's for another thread altogether.



pbasswil said:
I saw a documentary on PBS some months ago, where they used DNA to trace roots way back in time, and they kept turning up the most interesting and surprising interacial ancestry -- both in black and (nominally) white Americans! Fascinating; and quite moving. They connected up some white and black families that were related, and they were all blown away.


Personally, I wish we were all of mixed race; then we'd have to surrender race as a social issue altogether. We'd all be forced to find another pretext to channel our stupidity into. :^D lol
Click to expand...

My wife and I took DNA tests last year, just to kind of see what's in our genetic backgrounds.
If there was one thing that I got out of it, it's that NONE of us are really what we think we are. I always thought that I was just 100% slavic extraction...well, yeah, but when you factor in paternal and maternal haplogouping, it becomes REALLY obvious that what you think you are is really just illusion. My wife discovered that she has no small amount of African genes and I had discovered that I have Jewish in my background which totally threw me. I think it's awesome to be honest that we're so much more than we think we are in terms of where we each come from.
 
#72
Phalex said:
Relic's Lamentation (Great name for a band there!) kinda got me thinking.

How do you deal with racists? I mean the anonymous white dude that you meet that just blows your mind with vitriol?

The reason I ask:

A while back my band had a gig in a fairly rural area. The bar is literally across the road from a dairy farm, and the other 2 corners of the intersection are corn fields.

I was just heading up onstage to get tuned up and make sure everything was turned on, when I ran into this older guy that was looking at my rig. We got into a discussion about my bass, and he volunteered that he played bass way back when, and had a 60 something P-bass that he hadn't played in years. He said he and his wife had been coming to this same bar for 40 years or so, and he'd known the previous owners pretty well. They were regulars and always came out for dinner on Saturdays.

Then he looks over towards the bar, and says; "There's a N----- sitting at the bar!!" "In the 40 years I've been coming here, there has never been a N----- in here!"

I looked over where he was looking, and there was a younger black guy sitting at the bar with a white girl that I assume was his girlfriend.

I had no idea what to say in this circumstance. I still had to play all night, and didn't really didn't want to "start anything" or "Make a scene", so I was just kinda like "huh".......... And excused myself to go do my prep before it was time to play.

I made it a point to keep an eye on the guy at the bar in case there was trouble (There wasn't any) but I'm still at a loss as to how I could have better handled it.

(We're back there this weekend, and I'm kind of worried I might run into the old guy.)

So how do the rest of you white folks deal with the rest of the white folks??
Click to expand...
I usually just say "Well a very very heavy ah heavy d burtation tonight. We had a very derris derrisen bite. Lets go get terris tasting those plubeh had the pet".
 
#77
I try to handle it with humor while making it clear that I don't share that belief, and that people of all races are OK by me.

Sometimes my humor may get a bit dark.
My model is 19th century British philanthropist Moses Montefiore, who was Jewish.
At a formal state dinner, one of the other guests said loudly "I just got back from a trip to South Africa. Wonderful place - there are no pigs or Jews there".
To which Montefiore replied coolly "Well, Lord X, I suggest that you and I travel there together. Then they would have one of each".
 
#78
In my part of Canada, there's definitely a lot of racism here. In my end of the city, we've got a large population of East Indians (in particular, Sikhs/Punjabi). A lot of people I know who normally aren't racist all of a sudden change into a racist redneck. 'I hate brown people', 'stupid' this, 'stupid' that. They know my dislike of that opinion, so they've learned to not bring it up with me.

Working at Canadian Tire, they made up about 50% of our customers. In their culture, the 'retail' industry is very different. Correct me if I'm wrong, but they can open boxes, examine them, haggle, all that. Here...Good luck, buddy. They don't like the language barrier (...I can understand them fine), they don't like the 'stupid' questions...Ugh, I'm getting frustrated just writing this.

There's the asian population in Canada, aswell. Again, most people in the retail industry have the same kind of feelings towards them as they do East Indians. However, there's a significantly less feeling of 'annoyance/dislike' towards them.

However, that feeling of dislike isn't shared nation wide. The dislike that's nation wide is towards the Aboriginal population and the Québec-French Canadian (hehehe) population. Obviously from the history shared in the past between the Whites and the Aboriginals, there'll be some animosity. White people feel resentment because if you've got your status card, there's free education (both grade school and post secondary), there's free money from the government, reduced tax rates, no cigarette tax on reserves, et cetera. Natives towards white people because they 'stole their land hundreds of years ago', treating them like crap, et cetera.

Again, when people express these sentiments to me, I tell them (politely, but bluntly) to talk to someone else about it. I'm not interested.
 

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