There's something about the topic of institutional racism that cuts white people very deep. We simply aren't comfortable discussing it, even in a polite way. Y

There's something about the topic of institutional racism that cuts white people very deep. We simply aren't comfortable discussing it, even in a polite way. You're right that stories like this and comments like yours don't lead to enlightened discussion on HN, but they are necessary. Racism doesn't just hurt black people; it hurts white people, too - not in the sense that white people are targeted, but in the sense that it lulls us into a false sense of social stability and desensitizes us to the human cruelty embedded in that stability. It conditions us to accept that cruelty as just part of some natural equation of society. So IMO anything we can do to combat it is admirable, even just as small as just discussing it and therefore acknowledging that it's a problem.