Systemic Racism

I literally can't find a single policy ANYWHERE that supports what anyone is defining as "structural racism". Yet they're protesting / rioting about it.

My perspective is, racism exists (that is, making a value judgement on a person based on the color of their skin or on their perceived race), but it is not systemic.  To answer your question, no, I cannot bring to mind a single example of implicit or explicit racism in government, overall, but I can think of individuals IN government who do appear to be racists.  Mayor Lightfoot from Chicago, for example, is one such.

my use of the word “appear” [to be racists]:  We whites are accused of inherent racism, that is, we are racist in our minds.  I do not believe that is accurate.  It is my understanding we can only identify racism by actions we can see.  Whether or not an individual has racist thoughts is irrelevant:  Absent conversion to faith in Christ, nothing can be done about our thoughts and, in fact, we don’t even know the thoughts of another (never mind assign meaning to one’s thoughts based on our belief they are there).  Sometimes, even if we see racist acts, the individual might not be a racist at all, just has some,other kind of personal issue with the other person... and this is where the media mislabels behaviors so frequently.

for example, a black man rapes my daughter.  I find him at some later date, and let’s really stack the deck here, walking to his car with his family and confront him.  A local news outlet sees the confrontation, turns on the cameras, which ONLY see me grab the guy and threaten him with prison... he pushes me, I push him back... VOILA, on TV that night, “WHITE MAN IN RACIST ATTACK.”

so, no, racism is not systemic and, in fact, the races were healing fairly well until President Obama exacerbated the tension with his constant need for approval and, likely, validation as a “black man” (he was only bi-racial).

I don’t disagree... but Bick asked about examples in government.  

I think in examples like this latest one, it is too easy to get emotionally wrapped up in one case (that's what the left does best) and stop seeing the big picture. We are a nation of 330 million people, and there will always be a small percentage of us who hates African-Americans, Hispanics, Asians, Jews, Muslims, etc., for no other reason than that they are of different races, ethnicities or religious beliefs. And some small percentage of that small percentage will find ways to rise to positions of power where they can indulge that hatred with some measure of impunity, be it as a police officer, drill sergeant or prison guard.

Despite what the left may wish for, we will never eliminate them all. Yes, we can better screen and remove those kinds of cadets, rookies, military and prison personnel, but they will always be there in some numbers. The best we can do in those cases is to keep our heads and prosecute the offenders to the fullest extent of the law.

If you're asking for an explanation of how Newsom's brain works and what he's calling for, I'm not up to the task. I think he is a horrific politician who is always pandering and campaigning, and I think everything he says and does is in support of those two priorities. In this case, the only "structural" or "systemic" issues might be the frequency with which officers like this are found to be innocent after internal affairs reviews what they did, and the ability of damaged cops like this one to keep his job. However, the officer has already been arrested and charged with murder, so perhaps the protesters should find a way to articulate what it is they want. I wouldn't hold my breath for that to happen, as it looks like the typical "protest" with no purpose other than to mill around late at night, loot stores and damage private property.

You can add me to that list.

I was trying to look up a quote I vaguely remember from Ludwig Wittgenstein, something to the effect that the insoluble problems of philosophy (including the current topic) are often simply a problem with the definition of words. But I came across a different one that conveys the same idea:

"The limits of my language means the limits of my world."

I agree with frog that "We should probably start with the modern definition of racism." I had to take a class in ethnic studies in college with a prof who had this interesting definition we all had to memorize. It defined racism in part as a collection of negative beliefs and expectations attributed to a group of people based on their race alone.  There was more to it than that, but that's all I remember. Given that, I had to agree that I was a racist and I suspect the vast majority of people are. We will have preconceptions, sometimes negative. The trick is to be aware of your a priori conceptions and make sure that they don't creep into your behavior. It's the behavior that would make you a racist.

But I likewise don't understand what is meant by "structural racism." I'm not aware of any guidelines or protocols - legal or otherwise - that discriminate against people based on race, other than what MDDad pointed out. UCI is not largely Asian because of "structural racism". As has been stated endlessly elsewhere, inequality of outcomes does not equal racism.  Otherwise the NBA would be amongst the most racist organizations in America. 


If you cannot define the problem, if you cannot express it in understandable terms - or if it does not exist - how can you correct it? Gavin Newsom embarrasses me. He had - it kills me - a Jesuit education and he certainly learned the obfuscation part, but must have skipped the courses on clarity.......................................Luca