6 ms·

Can anyone explain how you can immediately attribute any of this to outright racism and his brown skin, when the staff and students are predominantly non-white

Can anyone explain how you can immediately attribute any of this to outright racism and his brown skin, when the staff and students are predominantly non-white in that school. School body is 86% non-white: http://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/texas/districts/irving-independent-school-district/macarthur-high-school-19313/student-body http://www.usnews.com/education/best-high-schools/texas/dist... And in the entire disctrict, whites are 12%, and "browns" are 70%. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Independent_School_District#Demographics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Independent_School_Dist...

nolite 11y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
mindslight 11y ago
Racism is currently fashionable in the press and it plays to a core progressive narrative. The people doing so mean well, but unfortunately don't realize the price of this intellectual laziness is to completely alienate anybody else. People mostly care about problems that apply to themselves, so framing a problem as happening to "others" is actually extremely counter productive. PS: read for understanding instead of just trying to stoke your fauxrage.
- Floegipoky 11y ago
  I think people are downvoting you because of your implied suggestion that the issue of racism in the US should be approached from the perspective of white people, which is pretty messed up.
  - mindslight 11y ago
    How, exactly, is it "pretty messed up" ? I'd think if your goal was to convince the majority of something, you would look for ways to convince that majority of something. Like perhaps that their own kids could very well be arrested and traumatized in exactly this manner. Reducing racism gets us more "benefit of the doubt" that might have resolved the situation informally. But it does nothing to change school administrators thinking that turning a 14 year old over to the police on a whim is an appropriate thing to do. In this specific case I'm just glad this kid is actually innocent so that he can hopefully disassociate the event from himself and see that the school and police are horribly broken. Imagine if the arrest had been "justified" for accidentally bringing a pocket knife or aspirin to school - what kind of lasting psychological damage does that cause?
werber 11y ago
Race data in the US typically groups Middle Eastern people into the white box. And I think people are specifically calling out perceived anti Muslim bias. Even though almost all domestic terror attacks are done by white men
stefantalpalaru 11y ago
Contrary to popular belief, xenophobia is not the monopoly of pink-skinned people.
- kolev 11y ago
  Yeah, pink-skinned people in the Middle East will get even harsher xenophobic treatment.
ebiester 11y ago
What is the ethnic makeup of the teachers and administrators?
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
blktiger 11y ago
I also find it odd how this is immediately chalked up to racism instead of simply assuming that the school administrators are simply overzealous about "something that somebody thought looked/sounded like a bomb". I mean, it certainly _could_ be racism, but there isn't really any evidence at the moment to say that it _is_ racism.
shas3 11y ago
You pulled a fast one there by linking to student body data and claiming admin and teachers are non-white. It is quite likely that the school district administration and teachers are mostly white. Multiple reasons for this, 1. Brown people are recent (~last 25 years) immigrants in most cities. Remember, up until 1960s you had citizenship quotas and racist immigration policies. 2. By being recent immigrants, they are less likely to be part of the police force, political establishment, city administration, and so on. It takes a minimum of 10-15 years before someone who has entered the US becomes a citizen. School districts, etc. seldom employ H1Bs or other immigrants. 3. Most brown immigrants come to the US as refugees, illegal immigrants, or skilled labor. That creates a bit of a bimodal distribution in everything from income to educational outcomes of their children. Teachers, school administration, etc. do not, in general fit into the ends of this bimodal distribution. There are obviously many, many, exceptions, but I'd hypothesize that brown people are severely underrepresented among school district administrators, school teachers, policemen, etc.
- powertower 11y ago
  From the picture on the schools's website, the school panel looks to be at least 50% non-white.
  - waterlesscloud 11y ago
    The school administrators- http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/1670 http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/1670
    - powertower 11y ago
      That appears to be the wrong high school, it's this one instead - http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/2031 http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/2031
- powertower 11y ago
  > You pulled a fast one there by linking to student body data and claiming admin and teachers are non-white. What I'm claiming is it's unlikely to be blatant white on brown racism when 9 out of 10 students are non-white and 50% of the school admin panel is non-white. The media is making this out to be some type of a racial profiling case... Where a lone brown student in a class of all whites is singled-out due to his skin color and name.
rootedbox 11y ago
Racism is the unequal distribution of privilege, and goods dependent on race. It does not deal with race distribution in a population. However seeing racism should even be more apparent when the race with power is in the minority population. A good example would be South Africa in apartheid; or the south during segregation. But basically if this kid was white, and was named Chris(the christian equivalent of Mohamed).. He would not have been subjugated to any of this. That is privilege that is racism.
- jmorphy88 11y ago
  Since when does "the distribution of [whatever]" have anything to do with the definition of racism?
- powertower 11y ago
  The problem with that definition is that it assumes all groups contribute equally to the larger collective. Or at least that if one group contributes less, it is entirely because the other groups have already disadvantaged it in some way. There are a large number of examples where this is simply false.
  - rootedbox 11y ago
    That definition makes no assumption about a groups contribution; as the definition is indifferent of the socio-economic system at hand (free-market, closed market, communal, etc) if the distribution of privilege and goods is different for individuals depending on race then there is a system of racism at hand.
    - powertower 11y ago
      So if 1 racial demographic group does better than another group, and they profit (in some way related to privileged) from this, while the other group does not, how is this racism?
- webXL 11y ago
  Racism is the individual or collective act of blindly favoring one race over another, or hurting one race over another. There's this thing called the dictionary. If you don't like the definitions in there, come up with a new word and definition! You have no evidence that this wouldn't happen to a white kid, but that's the most likely outcome. If this were pre-9/11 (pre-Patriot Act BS), I'm not so sure. Racism and prejudice to some extent is just part of the human condition. Perhaps one day we'll advance enough to make it a non-issue, but we need to stop the hysterics about "only in America" and "whites always get favored" without some concrete evidence and historical context.
forgottenpass 11y ago
People want to see the problems their preferred media has taught them to be enraged about (or, has taught them is a problem the other team is irrationally concerned about). Sometimes it's wanting to find the racial injustice that increases the sensitivity to other injustices. While the student's race might have played a role in the punishment, I'm at least as suspicious that it has played a role in increasing media coverage of it. Of course both assessments are non-falsifiable when limited to this one specific case. No big brand really focuses on the increasingly authortarian nature of American society, especially not in the treatment of minors. Although they'll pay lip service to it every now and again when it's useful fodder for other topics.
7Z7 11y ago
You think Black and East-Asian teachers are immune from racially profiling a student? How does their non-whiteness protect them from seeing Brown men and boys, or just Muslims in general, as potential threats?

nolite 11y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamophobia

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

mindslight 11y ago

Racism is currently fashionable in the press and it plays to a core progressive narrative. The people doing so mean well, but unfortunately don't realize the price of this intellectual laziness is to completely alienate anybody else. People mostly care about problems that apply to themselves, so framing a problem as happening to "others" is actually extremely counter productive. PS: read for understanding instead of just trying to stoke your fauxrage.

Floegipoky 11y ago
I think people are downvoting you because of your implied suggestion that the issue of racism in the US should be approached from the perspective of white people, which is pretty messed up.
- mindslight 11y ago
  How, exactly, is it "pretty messed up" ? I'd think if your goal was to convince the majority of something, you would look for ways to convince that majority of something. Like perhaps that their own kids could very well be arrested and traumatized in exactly this manner. Reducing racism gets us more "benefit of the doubt" that might have resolved the situation informally. But it does nothing to change school administrators thinking that turning a 14 year old over to the police on a whim is an appropriate thing to do. In this specific case I'm just glad this kid is actually innocent so that he can hopefully disassociate the event from himself and see that the school and police are horribly broken. Imagine if the arrest had been "justified" for accidentally bringing a pocket knife or aspirin to school - what kind of lasting psychological damage does that cause?

werber 11y ago

Race data in the US typically groups Middle Eastern people into the white box. And I think people are specifically calling out perceived anti Muslim bias. Even though almost all domestic terror attacks are done by white men

stefantalpalaru 11y ago

Contrary to popular belief, xenophobia is not the monopoly of pink-skinned people.

kolev 11y ago
Yeah, pink-skinned people in the Middle East will get even harsher xenophobic treatment.

ebiester 11y ago

What is the ethnic makeup of the teachers and administrators?

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

blktiger 11y ago

I also find it odd how this is immediately chalked up to racism instead of simply assuming that the school administrators are simply overzealous about "something that somebody thought looked/sounded like a bomb". I mean, it certainly _could_ be racism, but there isn't really any evidence at the moment to say that it _is_ racism.

shas3 11y ago

You pulled a fast one there by linking to student body data and claiming admin and teachers are non-white. It is quite likely that the school district administration and teachers are mostly white. Multiple reasons for this, 1. Brown people are recent (~last 25 years) immigrants in most cities. Remember, up until 1960s you had citizenship quotas and racist immigration policies. 2. By being recent immigrants, they are less likely to be part of the police force, political establishment, city administration, and so on. It takes a minimum of 10-15 years before someone who has entered the US becomes a citizen. School districts, etc. seldom employ H1Bs or other immigrants. 3. Most brown immigrants come to the US as refugees, illegal immigrants, or skilled labor. That creates a bit of a bimodal distribution in everything from income to educational outcomes of their children. Teachers, school administration, etc. do not, in general fit into the ends of this bimodal distribution. There are obviously many, many, exceptions, but I'd hypothesize that brown people are severely underrepresented among school district administrators, school teachers, policemen, etc.

powertower 11y ago
From the picture on the schools's website, the school panel looks to be at least 50% non-white.
- waterlesscloud 11y ago
  The school administrators- http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/1670 http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/1670
  - powertower 11y ago
    That appears to be the wrong high school, it's this one instead - http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/2031 http://www.irvingisd.net/domain/2031
powertower 11y ago
> You pulled a fast one there by linking to student body data and claiming admin and teachers are non-white. What I'm claiming is it's unlikely to be blatant white on brown racism when 9 out of 10 students are non-white and 50% of the school admin panel is non-white. The media is making this out to be some type of a racial profiling case... Where a lone brown student in a class of all whites is singled-out due to his skin color and name.

rootedbox 11y ago

Racism is the unequal distribution of privilege, and goods dependent on race. It does not deal with race distribution in a population. However seeing racism should even be more apparent when the race with power is in the minority population. A good example would be South Africa in apartheid; or the south during segregation. But basically if this kid was white, and was named Chris(the christian equivalent of Mohamed).. He would not have been subjugated to any of this. That is privilege that is racism.

jmorphy88 11y ago
Since when does "the distribution of [whatever]" have anything to do with the definition of racism?
powertower 11y ago
The problem with that definition is that it assumes all groups contribute equally to the larger collective. Or at least that if one group contributes less, it is entirely because the other groups have already disadvantaged it in some way. There are a large number of examples where this is simply false.
- rootedbox 11y ago
  That definition makes no assumption about a groups contribution; as the definition is indifferent of the socio-economic system at hand (free-market, closed market, communal, etc) if the distribution of privilege and goods is different for individuals depending on race then there is a system of racism at hand.
  - powertower 11y ago
    So if 1 racial demographic group does better than another group, and they profit (in some way related to privileged) from this, while the other group does not, how is this racism?
webXL 11y ago
Racism is the individual or collective act of blindly favoring one race over another, or hurting one race over another. There's this thing called the dictionary. If you don't like the definitions in there, come up with a new word and definition! You have no evidence that this wouldn't happen to a white kid, but that's the most likely outcome. If this were pre-9/11 (pre-Patriot Act BS), I'm not so sure. Racism and prejudice to some extent is just part of the human condition. Perhaps one day we'll advance enough to make it a non-issue, but we need to stop the hysterics about "only in America" and "whites always get favored" without some concrete evidence and historical context.

forgottenpass 11y ago

People want to see the problems their preferred media has taught them to be enraged about (or, has taught them is a problem the other team is irrationally concerned about). Sometimes it's wanting to find the racial injustice that increases the sensitivity to other injustices. While the student's race might have played a role in the punishment, I'm at least as suspicious that it has played a role in increasing media coverage of it. Of course both assessments are non-falsifiable when limited to this one specific case. No big brand really focuses on the increasingly authortarian nature of American society, especially not in the treatment of minors. Although they'll pay lip service to it every now and again when it's useful fodder for other topics.

7Z7 11y ago

You think Black and East-Asian teachers are immune from racially profiling a student? How does their non-whiteness protect them from seeing Brown men and boys, or just Muslims in general, as potential threats?