Bit of a Rant About the Term "Racist"

[NotQuiteCockney]

There's been a bit of a scrum with people being called racist here today (after the whole bombings thing). It's bugging me quite a bit.

There aren't two big categories of people in the world, a racist one (with the BNP, Hitler, etc in it) and a not-racist one (all the nice folks). Racism is a continuum. At one end, ok, there's the BNP, Hitler etc.

At the other end, the completely not-racist one? There's pretty much nobody. Small children, who see skin colour as a human characteristic, like ear size and finger length. Probably some SN folks. I honestly believe that nobody here is completely and utterly not-racist.

Why do I say that? Because we see skin colour (and other racial characteristics) as indicators of people's behaviour. I am racist. I try to control it, but I make generalisations, based on what I hear and see, and apply them, unfairly, to people based on their colour.

Some of these are innocuous. For example, I find Black men are more likely to help me carry a pram up and down tube stairs than white men (some don't). I would expect a South Asian person to be more likely to know about a good curry house (some won't). I would be surprised to meet an East Asian person who was Jewish (but I'm sure some are, why not?). But these views are still racist.

Yes, Black people are racist. As are White people and everyone else, all to varying degrees. And who people are racist about, and how much, varies so much that it doesn't really make sense to call someone racist - calling an opinion or an attitude racist is probably fairer, although also very incendiary.

Sorry Blu, I clogged it!

Whether or not you've heard the big-penis/sex-mad connection, you have heard both assumptions, right?

And it's still racism, whichever race you believe is superior. It's not as harmful to believe that Black people are superior at things (particularly in this country where white people aren't much discriminated against), as long as you don't believe this means they're not as good at other things, like, say, intellectual things. Lots of people believe that abilities all balance out, so people who are better at sports or dance must be bad at say, childrearing or maths.

After reading all that I could shorten it to this - I think racism is a choice

And there's actually only one race, human.

Would you think an asian person was being racist if they asked you where the best fish and chip shop int he area was? I wouldn't.

the asian man knowing a good curry house was a terrible example i know. I was trying to pick up on NQC's original example.

But it isn't racist, its an assumption. If one thinks an Asian man may be a good person to ask about curry's - they are not being derogatory, offensive or rude. A little ignorant yes, but not racist.

It's only racist if asked in a sniggering "I bet they only eat X, let's ask them where best place to get X is."

Once again SD you say it better than i can!

Are you assuming NQC is white though? or do you know so

Hello monkeytrousers!

I do think it's worth trying to distinguish between, say, thinking Black men are more likely to help me get prams up the stairs on the tube, and more harmful ideas.

But it's very hard to know where to draw the line.

(I agree that the curry thing could be tiresome and irritating and rude. I don't ask people where to eat anything based on their colour, although I will ask questions based on accent/cultural basis ... although that's generally French people or other nationalities I'm good at identifying.)

I'd like to think harmful racism isn't innate, but prejudice, as you say, is. If we didn't see colour as a defining characteristic of humans - if we, say, used ear size ("who said that?" "that guy with the big ears over there"), presumably we'd have prejudice about ear size. Hopefully no ear-ism, with people denied housing and jobs on the grounds of their ears, but who knows?

I agree that people can say racist things and not be (seroiusly, harmfully) racist. They can be unaware of the implications of what they say, or not have thought it through thoroughly enough.

I think being colour-blind isn't possible in our culture. There are cultural differences between races, generally.

I guess what I'm talking about is more prejudice than racism ... but I still think that drawing the line is pretty much impossible, and that calling anyone racist isn't very useful. "Racist" means: you're further over on the scale than I am, at least on this issue, and hence you are repugnant, and should shut up. Which is an honest feeling, but not very helpful.

I think I've implied that I'm white, which I am, more or less.

Ok thanks for clearing that up!! was just checking there was no racist assumptions being made

NQC - you're absolutely right. In fact you have posted what I wanted to say last night, but I couldn't find the words and tried to change the subject instead.

"positive" racism (eg saying black people are good at sports) is still racsism, partly because there's often an underlying assumption that therefore they're not very clever, but also because it's not true: there may be more black sports stars, but there are plenty of black people who are rubbish at sports.

I think for me the problem is that accusations of racism are bandied around too easily and used to shut down debate eg over the role of women in Islam. Remember the poster who was terrified her son was 'racist' because he made one negative comment about black people, and had actually never seen any black people? Surely the sensible thing to do is just quietly correct a comment made out of a small child's naivety?

I just don't think small children, for example, are conscious of race. I know of one child, for instance, struggling to explain to her mother which other child she wanted to invite to her party. The mother didn't know the other child well. Small child described other child in detail, right down to her socks and shoes but didn't mention the other child was black. Presumably skin colour isn't a distinguishing feature to small children, just as eye colour isn't worth mentioning if you come from a society where almost everyone has brown eyes.

We shouldn't load them with our prejudices, including our prejudice that the world is full of racists and they must be prepared to accuse themselves of racism.

Positive discrimination isn't about making any assertions about people based on their skin colour, except to regognise the fact that racist discriniation exists and has held people back for generations and so deserve extra help to overcome this.

Monkeytrousers, I think there's positive discrimination in the ... damn, I forget the proper name for it, but when you change the requirements based on race, to compensate for ongoing and previous racism. You know, the institutional thing.

And then there's positive discrimination in the "black people dance better" sense.

Affirmative Action. That was the expression I wanted. It doesn't matter that my brain is broken, I have the net.

I think people going to extremes to misinterpret someone else's comment as racist is quite irritating too - like on last night's thread when someone made reasonable point about the bombers had made people afraid of young Asian men with rucksacks on the tube and got a horrified response from people accusing them of blaming the Asian community for the bombings.

I do understand what you mean.

But i feel so frustrated with how far these things have to be taken.

I genuinely feel (going by the night clubs i used to frequent many moons ago } that black people are often better dancers.
And i can make the reverse statement that many white people are crap dancers.

Both are using sterotypes. But neither racist nor discriminating.

Because i am not denying that some black dancers are crap and some white dancers are great.

Many HIV patients are gay men. - this is not discriminatory to gay men(or hiv patients) this is fact.

Many footballers are hooligans.

Many two year olds have tantrums.

i just wanted to say something about assumptions.
When on the tube with my babs 90% of the time, the people who will voluntarily help me are young asian men. While of course, I can't assume that EVERY young asian man is a helpful person who has consideration for mothers with children,BASED ON MY EXPERIENCE I will think that they are more likely to be help me than young white women for example.
What i am trying to say is that our life experience will affect our assumptions.
I think this is different to the ' all black people have rhythm' assumptions which are offensive i think. As are the 'all gay men are good to their mothers', ' all women can cook' 'all straight men like football' assumptions.
not sure if i'm getting my point across here so i'll shut up.

Change 'all' to 'most' and its not offensive though.

alexsmum, you're right. People do make assumptions, and often those assumptions are (generally) accurate, and they're not necessarily offensive. It's just hard to know where to draw the line, and hard to know what can cause offence.

I'm not claiming this stuff is clear-cut or simple - I'm saying it's not.

I don't think calling comments, or people, "racist" in the general perogative sense is helpful. I don't think anyone responds to this accusation well. I don't think anyone, even someone who says something mildly racist out of ignorance, will respond to this accusation by saying "gosh, you're right, that was a horrid thing to say". It just gets people's backs up.

I'm relieved that some people seem to understand what I'm on about (thanks SP!)

Go one step further and say 'alot of' and there you have the right balance, as it becomes meaningless. IMHO.

I was troubled by a thread a while ago where one women from a multicultural family posted that she'd personally never experienced racism and therefore didn't think it was a huge problem.. She was deluged by a series of very aggressive emails demanding that she recant - reminded me of witch trials or McCarthyism. The appalled posters wouldn't let up until she'd been terrified into believing that as soon as her kids left her village they'd face vicious racism on every street corner. I thought that was unecessary - people could have calmy pointed out that her experience related to her personally and there are major problems with racism in wider society. It was the 'how dare you say that, you are evil and stupid for even thinking it' tone of the posts she received, and the sheer volume, that struck me.

edam, I was part of that and you have completely exaggerated that.

That's how it came across to me. Lots of energy directed at her for daring to post what she did and demanding that she recant.