4 ms·

Yes. It would be naive and racist to just assume that people just aren't trusting for some arbitrary reason. A lot of it is rooted in memory of having experien

Yes. It would be naive and racist to just assume that people just aren't trusting for some arbitrary reason. A lot of it is rooted in memory of having experienced exploitation and abuse from "official authorities" that they could not trust, for they were merely the enforcers of plutocrats.

rayiner 10y ago
It's not "racist" to recognize failings in cultures. My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed. That cultural trait isn't something us Bangladeshis get to blame on the British or whatever. It's deep-seated and long-standing. And it holds us back as a country and a people. What we really don't need is people calling any criticism of those cultural traits "racist." It's not healthy for the cultures that need external pressure to overcome these problems, and it undermines the internal reformers trying to move beyond them.
- RodericDay 10y ago
  I think it is pretty racist to posit that the source is mysterious and possibly sticky to the people as they migrate and uphold visibly cultural habits such as dress and language. Peruvians haggle and bribe cops because it's fresh in everyone's memory that cops weren't impartial agents of justice, but paid-up enforcers of the colonizers. I expect the same holds for Bangladeshis. "Cultural traits" follow the money. In the 70s, South Koreans were a lazy, unproductive people. Now the stereotype is workaholic to the point of suicide. In the 1800s, Germans were thieves, now they're industrious. Look at culture if you want, but it's going to be much less instructive than economics and history. edit: It seems I "triggered" some of our resident race realists, since these posts are garnering a lot of silent downvotes lol
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - rayiner 10y ago
    It's not "mysterious." It's what parents teach their kids and what kids observe growing up. Take, for example, the issue of domestic violence. In the U.S. (at least, outside of certain subcultures), if people find out you're beating you're wife you become a social pariah. In Bangladesh, it's just an "issue" everyone tries to help the couple "overcome." No wonder 87% of women in Bangladesh are victims. And just so I'm not beating up on Bangladesh--I think Americans' treatment of criminals represents a profound cultural failing. Kids hear jokes about people getting raped in prison or see life sentences for minor crimes as routine. It's a defect in the morals of the people no different than say the muslim world's treatment of homosexuals or the culture of petty bribery endemic in India and Bangladesh. Calling it racist to point those things out elevates cultural sensitivity above justice.
    - RodericDay 10y ago
      Maybe mysterious was the wrong word. Saying the issue is "cultural" is, imo, a bit of a dog whistle. Conceptually it acts like a black box, and it evokes solutions like "exporting our culture", and ties the bad in their society with their essence rather than their circumstances. This is why I don't like it. I didn't mean to chastise you, I think you're one of the best posters around here. Insofar society and culture are used interchangeably, there's no issue with anything you said. Insofar "culture" is a polite way of talking about race, it can can be pretty bad.
      - golergka 10y ago
        But it's not a black box — it's a pretty straightforward thing. Of course, it usually has corellation with racial and ethnical groups, so critique of certain culture will always land close to racism. But also, a lot of naive racists just don't think abiut the issue enough to word it right. Racism is wrong for two very simple reasons: (1) there's no causation between person's ethnicity and moral values, as you yourself mentioned about Korea, and (2) it's something a person cannot change about himself. At the same time, both things are different for cultures.
      - rayiner 10y ago
        > Insofar "culture" is a polite way of talking about race, it can can be pretty bad. That's true, and unfortunate.
- syedkarim 10y ago
  "My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed." That's exactly why my parents left. My dad had a much better life in Bangladesh than he would face coming to the US, but he just wasn't interested in the mental cost of participating in Bangladeshi society. Race is an ill-defined term coined when science was often quackery. We should really move on.
- splintercell 10y ago
  "My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed." In India we had this problem, I have two anecdotes which demonstrate this. In 1992 we waited for over a year to get a phone line installed at our place. When the 'lineman' came, we offered him lunch, and I'm sure the dad paid him money for the service. Fast forward 12 years later in 2004. During this time, Indian government liberalized the telecom market and allowed private sector to provide telecom services. In 2004, my dad got a temporary phone line for the summer vacation so that I can have faster internet. He got it within 2 days of applying for it. Two months later when my dad wanted to cancel it, the telecom company people kept on trying to make him keep the connection. After an hour of negotiations (when they tried to sweeten the deal) they finally agreed to cancel it. I'm just saying that it was the same town, same group of people, the difference was clearly in the economic system they were following. The culture evolves in response to the systematic pressures. Change the system, and you'd change the culture.

rayiner 10y ago

It's not "racist" to recognize failings in cultures. My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed. That cultural trait isn't something us Bangladeshis get to blame on the British or whatever. It's deep-seated and long-standing. And it holds us back as a country and a people. What we really don't need is people calling any criticism of those cultural traits "racist." It's not healthy for the cultures that need external pressure to overcome these problems, and it undermines the internal reformers trying to move beyond them.

RodericDay 10y ago
I think it is pretty racist to posit that the source is mysterious and possibly sticky to the people as they migrate and uphold visibly cultural habits such as dress and language. Peruvians haggle and bribe cops because it's fresh in everyone's memory that cops weren't impartial agents of justice, but paid-up enforcers of the colonizers. I expect the same holds for Bangladeshis. "Cultural traits" follow the money. In the 70s, South Koreans were a lazy, unproductive people. Now the stereotype is workaholic to the point of suicide. In the 1800s, Germans were thieves, now they're industrious. Look at culture if you want, but it's going to be much less instructive than economics and history. edit: It seems I "triggered" some of our resident race realists, since these posts are garnering a lot of silent downvotes lol
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- rayiner 10y ago
  It's not "mysterious." It's what parents teach their kids and what kids observe growing up. Take, for example, the issue of domestic violence. In the U.S. (at least, outside of certain subcultures), if people find out you're beating you're wife you become a social pariah. In Bangladesh, it's just an "issue" everyone tries to help the couple "overcome." No wonder 87% of women in Bangladesh are victims. And just so I'm not beating up on Bangladesh--I think Americans' treatment of criminals represents a profound cultural failing. Kids hear jokes about people getting raped in prison or see life sentences for minor crimes as routine. It's a defect in the morals of the people no different than say the muslim world's treatment of homosexuals or the culture of petty bribery endemic in India and Bangladesh. Calling it racist to point those things out elevates cultural sensitivity above justice.
  - RodericDay 10y ago
    Maybe mysterious was the wrong word. Saying the issue is "cultural" is, imo, a bit of a dog whistle. Conceptually it acts like a black box, and it evokes solutions like "exporting our culture", and ties the bad in their society with their essence rather than their circumstances. This is why I don't like it. I didn't mean to chastise you, I think you're one of the best posters around here. Insofar society and culture are used interchangeably, there's no issue with anything you said. Insofar "culture" is a polite way of talking about race, it can can be pretty bad.
    - golergka 10y ago
      But it's not a black box — it's a pretty straightforward thing. Of course, it usually has corellation with racial and ethnical groups, so critique of certain culture will always land close to racism. But also, a lot of naive racists just don't think abiut the issue enough to word it right. Racism is wrong for two very simple reasons: (1) there's no causation between person's ethnicity and moral values, as you yourself mentioned about Korea, and (2) it's something a person cannot change about himself. At the same time, both things are different for cultures.
    - rayiner 10y ago
      > Insofar "culture" is a polite way of talking about race, it can can be pretty bad. That's true, and unfortunate.
syedkarim 10y ago
"My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed." That's exactly why my parents left. My dad had a much better life in Bangladesh than he would face coming to the US, but he just wasn't interested in the mental cost of participating in Bangladeshi society. Race is an ill-defined term coined when science was often quackery. We should really move on.
splintercell 10y ago
"My dad left Bangladesh because he didn't want to raise kids in a country where he had to pay a bribe just to get a second phone line installed." In India we had this problem, I have two anecdotes which demonstrate this. In 1992 we waited for over a year to get a phone line installed at our place. When the 'lineman' came, we offered him lunch, and I'm sure the dad paid him money for the service. Fast forward 12 years later in 2004. During this time, Indian government liberalized the telecom market and allowed private sector to provide telecom services. In 2004, my dad got a temporary phone line for the summer vacation so that I can have faster internet. He got it within 2 days of applying for it. Two months later when my dad wanted to cancel it, the telecom company people kept on trying to make him keep the connection. After an hour of negotiations (when they tried to sweeten the deal) they finally agreed to cancel it. I'm just saying that it was the same town, same group of people, the difference was clearly in the economic system they were following. The culture evolves in response to the systematic pressures. Change the system, and you'd change the culture.