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It totally is systemic racism. But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. There's a hell of

It totally is systemic racism. But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. There's a hell of a difference between "you're racist" and "you're spreading misinformation that only exists because your grandparents were racist". The latter will get a reaction from the vast majority of people like "oh shit, I had no idea, that's awful". The former will cause anger, frustration, defensiveness and denial. If the idea is to get everyone on board with the idea that the deck is still stacked against minorities even in the absence of conscious contemporary racism (which I believe to be true), telling people they're racist is probably the worst way to go about that.

rayiner 6y ago
> If the idea is to get everyone on board with the idea that the deck is still stacked against minorities even in the absence of conscious contemporary racism (which I believe to be true) Chinese Americans have higher incomes than white people on average. In terms of income mobility: Vietnamese Americans who came here in the 1970s as refugees went from being among the poorest groups in the country, to parity with white Americans today. Asian Americans are richer, have higher income mobility, and live longer than white Americans. Once you adjust for age and citizenship status, they’re also pretty close to evenly represented among billionaires and Fortune 500 board members. That is not to say they don’t face unpleasant racism, xenophobia, and stereotypes. But saying “the deck is stacked against them” is a much stronger statement. It implies a structural racism that impairs prosperity. While some minority groups do face such structural racism, specifically, Black and indigenous people, others do not: https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353.
- aksss 6y ago
  Thurston County in WA, which is the seat of the state capital, has decided Asian people are not “people of color” anymore because they’re doing too well. https://reason.com/2020/11/16/equity-report-north-thurston-asian-students-of-color/ https://reason.com/2020/11/16/equity-report-north-thurston-a...
  - rayiner 6y ago
    Oh it’s worse than that: https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-school-be-antiracist-a-new-superintendent-in-evanston-ill-has-a-plan-11601982001 https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-school-be-antiracist-a-new-... Under a policy proposal by the Evanston, IL superintendent, white and Asian students would be held behind doing remote learning while other students were prioritized for return to in-class education. When people opposed the policy, they were called racists. The condemnation was worse for Asians who objected to their kids being given a worse educational experience on account of their race—they were called, in essence, traitors to non-white solidarity. Critical theory has some really f—ked up premises about Asians. The classical liberal, even left-liberal view, doesn’t require an explanation for Asian economic success. Asians don’t face the legacy of say Jim Crow, and the American system is otherwise basically fair, so Asians have been able to prosper even if roadblocks have hampered other groups. Under critical theory, however, the country and its institutions are considered systematically racist and white supremacist. That creates a dilemma with respect to Asians. How can they have prospered in a system of white supremacy? The solution is to suppose that whites “allowed Asians to succeed” to “serve as a wedge with other non-whites.” Asians are thus stripped of agency—their success isn’t their own, but instead the byproduct of a ploy by whites. Therefore, when an Asian complains when his child must continue distance learning while other students return to in-person education, they’re not merely being self-centered. They’re not merely failing to acknowledge that other kids suffer from disadvantages that their own children don’t. That would be the typical liberal view. In the critical theory view, they are collaborators. They owe their status due to white supremacy and they’re complicit in white supremacy unless they act in solidarity with other non-whites. Even if that means suffering disadvantageous treatment in schools, etc.
    - thaumasiotes 6y ago
      > The classical liberal, even left-liberal view, doesn’t require an explanation for Asian economic success. Asians don’t face the legacy of say Jim Crow, and the American system is otherwise basically fair, so Asians have been able to prosper even if roadblocks have hampered other groups. I guess, but this viewpoint fails pretty badly at explaining why Asians prosper so much more than whites do. > Asians are thus stripped of agency—their success isn’t their own, but instead the byproduct of a ploy by whites. To be fair, critical theory says exactly the same thing about blacks -- their lack of success isn't their own, it's the product of a ploy by whites. I don't see why we'd expect a different analysis for Asians.
- ineedasername 6y ago
  It could impair prosperity for Asians. Comparing raw average income alone isn't sufficient to settle the question. Consider the counterfactual possibility that Asians might be even more prosperous with even higher income if not for structural racism. I fact, it seems that Asians do make as much as 8% less than others in comparable jobs [0] though that difference may disappear somewhat for Asians born in the US, indicating a more complex dynamic than discrimination on appearance alone. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_pay_gap_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_pay_gap_in_the_United_S...
  - rayiner 6y ago
    > Asians still make 8% less than whites in comparable jobs except for Asians who have been in the United States for one and a half generations, whom have reached full parity in income. This sounds like the difference is due to things like immigration status and citizenship, not race. Most Asians are immigrants, and many aren’t citizens. That limits opportunities quite a bit even within the realm of “comparable” jobs.
    - ineedasername 6y ago
      Yes, that is possible. One way that might help determine things would be to look at the income of first-generation immigrants from European countries to see if there is a similar dynamic (but not English-speaking countries, to keep that variable constant). It bring my example only to show that merely point to income isn't sufficient to show the existence of structural racism, that it's more complex than that. (and harder to measure)
- lifeformed 6y ago
  Economic prosperity isn't the only metric that matters. Racism isn't just about money - the deck can also be stacked in social, cultural, and political ways.
an_opabinia 6y ago
MSG aversion is relatively new. People’s attitudes about it change over the scale of decades. This is pretty consistent with most other food additives, like aspartame, certain preservatives and certain food colorings. While I agree there exists racism against Asian Americans in many places, it would behoove people who feel passionate about the elimination of prejudice around the world to fight for things not because of how they interface with ignorant people (ie because all ignorant people seem to like good Chinese food, like all other human beings) but because the goal is worthy. And personally, “greater acceptance of MSG as a food additive in Chinese food as opposed to Doritos” is better achieved by better marketing, clearly.
- aksss 6y ago
  Yes, there’s a strong, recurring aversion to food additives that doesn’t require racism as an explanation. I think the MSG/Chinese connection was because the restaurants would add it to their dishes, which was at the time kind a unique thing - even though many processed foods contain MSG, having it added to your prepared food would be as strange as them adding Yellow #5 to your dish, and the reaction no different. There’s a quality of integrity to prepared dishes that most all but the modernist restaurants trade upon. Chemical additives, in the days Red Dye #2 scares and the rest hardly need a racist explanation to understand the aversion.
- Ensorceled 6y ago
  > MSG aversion is relatively new. I encountered the "MSG is Harmful" trope in university in the 1980's ... it's literally been around for generations now.
rubicon33 6y ago
It's called being biased, misinformed, or at worst stereotyping, and it used to be accepted that everyone does it and it's not the end of the world that your aunt from Wisconson thinks MSG gives her hives. Nowadays that aunt is racist, her whole family is racist, and it's the reason why everyone else can't get ahead in life.
- ineedasername 6y ago
  I might agree that the pendulum has swung too far, but we also now have a better understanding of how bias and stereotyping can nonetheless be damaging. though yes, racism is much too loaded of a term to be thrown around the way it currently is. If you admit to no gradations, well that's when you get cancel culture, when a joke in poor taste that might reveal some bias can result in the same consequences as blatant hate speech.
  - rubicon33 6y ago
    Totally. Some might even say it was a necessary evil, that the pendulum swung far, for progress to be made. I'm glad that society as a whole recognizes systemic "racism" and how unfair the world is for many. I'd love nothing more than for us as a world community to move toward a reality that is a true meritocracy and equal opportunity isn't just a buzz word. Who can honestly say they enjoy unfair advantage? No one. That said, not everything is a product of your race/gender. We have a long way to go and I hope we don't eat each other before we get there. The cancel culture and reverse racism that I'm seeing is an unfortunate side effect of "progress".
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      > Some might even say it was a necessary evil, that the pendulum swung far, for progress to be made. The trouble is, because of the way pendulums work, the harder you push it in one direction, the harder it swings back the other way. The level of polarization in the US right now is dangerous and cancel culture is playing with fire in a room full of gunpowder. Cf. alien machinery: https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/07/25/how-the-west-was-won/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/07/25/how-the-west-was-won/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/
hellodang 6y ago
Chinese food prominently features MSG. Chinese food is served in Chinese restaurants. MSG (and most foods containing natural glutamate) has been identified as a common migraine trigger in individuals sensitive to them, and this is just one symptom among many grouped under the term. “Chinese Restaurant Syndrome” is the end result of this chain of logic, grounded not in racism, but in fact.
- pessimizer 6y ago
  No Chinese restaurants add MSG in the US. Doritos are pretty much solely an MSG delivery system, and I've watched the person who I know who claims a bad reaction to MSG shovel them down.
- Ensorceled 6y ago
  "No MSG" signs are prominent at pretty much every Chinese restaurant I've been to. This is hogwash of the worst sort.
avs733 6y ago
When I tell people “you’re on fire” They do just fine differentiating when I’m complementing their golf game and when I’m literally telling them they are aflame. On the surface your suggestion of a different word seems reasonable but it’s not. People are perfectly capable of choosing to seek understanding of nuanced use of words and phrases. The fact that they disengage rather than doing so is not the responsibility of the speaker.
shoyer 6y ago
Not being a “conscious racist” doesn’t make you any less racist. Racism isn’t about intentions, it’s about consequences. It’s a convenient slight of to pretend otherwise.
- zdragnar 6y ago
  "Racism isn’t about intentions" Appropriating words to steal the emotional strength of them for your own, novel concept is silly. Not everyone will buy the new definition, and you'll end up with two groups yelling at each other, about different things, with no common understanding. If you cannot read "racism isn't about intentions" and not laugh, you are doing yourself a disservice.
1MachineElf 6y ago
It's not systemic racism, it's the headache I get from excess glutamate. My family is Chinese. Don't @ me.
JohnBooty 6y ago
But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. I understand both sides of the argument. Many people learned an overly simplistic definition of "racism" at some point. Essentially, "overt racism" or "active racism" -- using slurs, joining the KKK, refusing to hire people of a certain race, etc. Anything less overt than this is not "racism" to them. Having generally steered clear of such actions in their lives, they are dismayed to consider the possibility that there are a lot of other institutions and individual actions that are racist. We could invent a new term for "systemic racism." But, ultimately, it's still racism. To the people experiencing it, it has the same net result as other forms of racism. If a white person in a predominantly white society doesn't hire you because you're non-white, there's no material difference to you whether that person did it for overt, conscious reasons or otherwise. That is why is it is useful to think of systemic racism as racism, rather than inventing a new word for it. Here's an interesting thought experiment. Think of the people in your life who are vehemently opposed to the use of the term "racism" to include systemic racism. Suppose we actually did invent a new term for systemic racism so that they could feel more comfortable. How do we think these people would respond? I think a significant number of them would complain about the new term just as much. I can hear them now in my mind. "First we have to worry about being 'racist', now we have to worry about $SOME_NEW_TERM!?!? What will 'they' think of next?!?" Because it's not really about words for them. It's about a refusal to examine their own actions.
- rayiner 6y ago
  The distinction isn’t between overt and passive. The traditional definition of “racism” still includes “implicit bias.” The recent distinction is between “prejudice” and “effect on racial equity.” Ibram Kendi distills the view quite clearly. He explains that the lower tax rate for capital gains is “racist.” He doesn’t say it’s motivated by racial prejudice (either overt or implicit), or deny that it’s nearly universal in the developed world, including in non-white countries. What he means is that the tax preference has the effect of delivering more benefits to white people because white people are more likely to own capital assets. In the traditional view, by contrast, racism is a mental state—it’s an attitude that’s held by people, whether consciously or unconsciously. Studies show that these attitudes, what’s now called “prejudice,” is probably overstated and isn’t the dominant driver of racial differences: https://www.chronicle.com/article/can-we-really-measure-implicit-bias-maybe-not https://www.chronicle.com/article/can-we-really-measure-impl.... The recent approach has been to reuse “racism” to refer to systems that create or perpetuate racial disparities whether or not they’re motivated by what’s now called prejudice. An example of this usage is saying that “standardized testing is racist.” To people familiar with the traditional definition, this implies that test makers have racial prejudice and, consciously or unconsciously, designed tests to hinder minorities. Under the new definition, this just means that the practice of using standardized tests perpetuates racial disparities because it hurts students that have suffered disadvantages. Of course we had words for this before. I studied what would now be called “environmental racism” in law school. We would say “minority communities suffer disproportionately negative effects from the siting of coal plants.” We don’t need to come up with a new term for this, as you speculate. That’s a concept I could easily explain to my Trump-voting in laws and they’d get it. But when you call that “racism” that implies (not only to my in laws, but to my Biden voting non-white dad) that people involved in the siting decisions were motivated by racial prejudice. They’d say, “no, they’re just putting the coal plant where the land is cheapest.” Under the traditional view, a decision like that based on purely objective, relevant, non-race factors can’t be “racist” because that concept refers to a state of mind (whether overt or implicit). Now, there is a logic to academics and activists using the term “racism” for that. As you observe, the effect on the groups themselves is similar. Most important, by framing “racism” in terms of effects rather than mental state, it forces a consideration of racial equity impacts on otherwise race-neutral policies.
AnthonyMouse 6y ago
> But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. Especially where in this case it's much more like systemic culturalism. Suppose the same thing had happened, but rather than the initial dispute being between the vendors of British food and the vendors of Chinese food, it was between the vendors of British food and the vendors of Italian food. So you would have a lot of people believing that they're allergic to the gluten in pasta, when almost none of them really are, and also ignoring that plenty of British food contains gluten as well. It would be pretty hard to argue that as racism unless you're using a definition of racism not characteristically used in America, but you can still imagine the same thing happening in the same way. So what does that tell you?

rayiner 6y ago

> If the idea is to get everyone on board with the idea that the deck is still stacked against minorities even in the absence of conscious contemporary racism (which I believe to be true) Chinese Americans have higher incomes than white people on average. In terms of income mobility: Vietnamese Americans who came here in the 1970s as refugees went from being among the poorest groups in the country, to parity with white Americans today. Asian Americans are richer, have higher income mobility, and live longer than white Americans. Once you adjust for age and citizenship status, they’re also pretty close to evenly represented among billionaires and Fortune 500 board members. That is not to say they don’t face unpleasant racism, xenophobia, and stereotypes. But saying “the deck is stacked against them” is a much stronger statement. It implies a structural racism that impairs prosperity. While some minority groups do face such structural racism, specifically, Black and indigenous people, others do not: https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353 https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/135/2/711/5687353.

aksss 6y ago
Thurston County in WA, which is the seat of the state capital, has decided Asian people are not “people of color” anymore because they’re doing too well. https://reason.com/2020/11/16/equity-report-north-thurston-asian-students-of-color/ https://reason.com/2020/11/16/equity-report-north-thurston-a...
- rayiner 6y ago
  Oh it’s worse than that: https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-school-be-antiracist-a-new-superintendent-in-evanston-ill-has-a-plan-11601982001 https://www.wsj.com/articles/can-school-be-antiracist-a-new-... Under a policy proposal by the Evanston, IL superintendent, white and Asian students would be held behind doing remote learning while other students were prioritized for return to in-class education. When people opposed the policy, they were called racists. The condemnation was worse for Asians who objected to their kids being given a worse educational experience on account of their race—they were called, in essence, traitors to non-white solidarity. Critical theory has some really f—ked up premises about Asians. The classical liberal, even left-liberal view, doesn’t require an explanation for Asian economic success. Asians don’t face the legacy of say Jim Crow, and the American system is otherwise basically fair, so Asians have been able to prosper even if roadblocks have hampered other groups. Under critical theory, however, the country and its institutions are considered systematically racist and white supremacist. That creates a dilemma with respect to Asians. How can they have prospered in a system of white supremacy? The solution is to suppose that whites “allowed Asians to succeed” to “serve as a wedge with other non-whites.” Asians are thus stripped of agency—their success isn’t their own, but instead the byproduct of a ploy by whites. Therefore, when an Asian complains when his child must continue distance learning while other students return to in-person education, they’re not merely being self-centered. They’re not merely failing to acknowledge that other kids suffer from disadvantages that their own children don’t. That would be the typical liberal view. In the critical theory view, they are collaborators. They owe their status due to white supremacy and they’re complicit in white supremacy unless they act in solidarity with other non-whites. Even if that means suffering disadvantageous treatment in schools, etc.
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    > The classical liberal, even left-liberal view, doesn’t require an explanation for Asian economic success. Asians don’t face the legacy of say Jim Crow, and the American system is otherwise basically fair, so Asians have been able to prosper even if roadblocks have hampered other groups. I guess, but this viewpoint fails pretty badly at explaining why Asians prosper so much more than whites do. > Asians are thus stripped of agency—their success isn’t their own, but instead the byproduct of a ploy by whites. To be fair, critical theory says exactly the same thing about blacks -- their lack of success isn't their own, it's the product of a ploy by whites. I don't see why we'd expect a different analysis for Asians.
ineedasername 6y ago
It could impair prosperity for Asians. Comparing raw average income alone isn't sufficient to settle the question. Consider the counterfactual possibility that Asians might be even more prosperous with even higher income if not for structural racism. I fact, it seems that Asians do make as much as 8% less than others in comparable jobs [0] though that difference may disappear somewhat for Asians born in the US, indicating a more complex dynamic than discrimination on appearance alone. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_pay_gap_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_pay_gap_in_the_United_S...
- rayiner 6y ago
  > Asians still make 8% less than whites in comparable jobs except for Asians who have been in the United States for one and a half generations, whom have reached full parity in income. This sounds like the difference is due to things like immigration status and citizenship, not race. Most Asians are immigrants, and many aren’t citizens. That limits opportunities quite a bit even within the realm of “comparable” jobs.
  - ineedasername 6y ago
    Yes, that is possible. One way that might help determine things would be to look at the income of first-generation immigrants from European countries to see if there is a similar dynamic (but not English-speaking countries, to keep that variable constant). It bring my example only to show that merely point to income isn't sufficient to show the existence of structural racism, that it's more complex than that. (and harder to measure)
lifeformed 6y ago
Economic prosperity isn't the only metric that matters. Racism isn't just about money - the deck can also be stacked in social, cultural, and political ways.

an_opabinia 6y ago

MSG aversion is relatively new. People’s attitudes about it change over the scale of decades. This is pretty consistent with most other food additives, like aspartame, certain preservatives and certain food colorings. While I agree there exists racism against Asian Americans in many places, it would behoove people who feel passionate about the elimination of prejudice around the world to fight for things not because of how they interface with ignorant people (ie because all ignorant people seem to like good Chinese food, like all other human beings) but because the goal is worthy. And personally, “greater acceptance of MSG as a food additive in Chinese food as opposed to Doritos” is better achieved by better marketing, clearly.

aksss 6y ago
Yes, there’s a strong, recurring aversion to food additives that doesn’t require racism as an explanation. I think the MSG/Chinese connection was because the restaurants would add it to their dishes, which was at the time kind a unique thing - even though many processed foods contain MSG, having it added to your prepared food would be as strange as them adding Yellow #5 to your dish, and the reaction no different. There’s a quality of integrity to prepared dishes that most all but the modernist restaurants trade upon. Chemical additives, in the days Red Dye #2 scares and the rest hardly need a racist explanation to understand the aversion.
Ensorceled 6y ago
> MSG aversion is relatively new. I encountered the "MSG is Harmful" trope in university in the 1980's ... it's literally been around for generations now.

rubicon33 6y ago

It's called being biased, misinformed, or at worst stereotyping, and it used to be accepted that everyone does it and it's not the end of the world that your aunt from Wisconson thinks MSG gives her hives. Nowadays that aunt is racist, her whole family is racist, and it's the reason why everyone else can't get ahead in life.

ineedasername 6y ago
I might agree that the pendulum has swung too far, but we also now have a better understanding of how bias and stereotyping can nonetheless be damaging. though yes, racism is much too loaded of a term to be thrown around the way it currently is. If you admit to no gradations, well that's when you get cancel culture, when a joke in poor taste that might reveal some bias can result in the same consequences as blatant hate speech.
- rubicon33 6y ago
  Totally. Some might even say it was a necessary evil, that the pendulum swung far, for progress to be made. I'm glad that society as a whole recognizes systemic "racism" and how unfair the world is for many. I'd love nothing more than for us as a world community to move toward a reality that is a true meritocracy and equal opportunity isn't just a buzz word. Who can honestly say they enjoy unfair advantage? No one. That said, not everything is a product of your race/gender. We have a long way to go and I hope we don't eat each other before we get there. The cancel culture and reverse racism that I'm seeing is an unfortunate side effect of "progress".
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    > Some might even say it was a necessary evil, that the pendulum swung far, for progress to be made. The trouble is, because of the way pendulums work, the harder you push it in one direction, the harder it swings back the other way. The level of polarization in the US right now is dangerous and cancel culture is playing with fire in a room full of gunpowder. Cf. alien machinery: https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/07/25/how-the-west-was-won/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2016/07/25/how-the-west-was-won/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/ https://slatestarcodex.com/2017/06/21/against-murderism/

hellodang 6y ago

Chinese food prominently features MSG. Chinese food is served in Chinese restaurants. MSG (and most foods containing natural glutamate) has been identified as a common migraine trigger in individuals sensitive to them, and this is just one symptom among many grouped under the term. “Chinese Restaurant Syndrome” is the end result of this chain of logic, grounded not in racism, but in fact.

pessimizer 6y ago
No Chinese restaurants add MSG in the US. Doritos are pretty much solely an MSG delivery system, and I've watched the person who I know who claims a bad reaction to MSG shovel them down.
Ensorceled 6y ago
"No MSG" signs are prominent at pretty much every Chinese restaurant I've been to. This is hogwash of the worst sort.

avs733 6y ago

When I tell people “you’re on fire” They do just fine differentiating when I’m complementing their golf game and when I’m literally telling them they are aflame. On the surface your suggestion of a different word seems reasonable but it’s not. People are perfectly capable of choosing to seek understanding of nuanced use of words and phrases. The fact that they disengage rather than doing so is not the responsibility of the speaker.

shoyer 6y ago

Not being a “conscious racist” doesn’t make you any less racist. Racism isn’t about intentions, it’s about consequences. It’s a convenient slight of to pretend otherwise.

zdragnar 6y ago
"Racism isn’t about intentions" Appropriating words to steal the emotional strength of them for your own, novel concept is silly. Not everyone will buy the new definition, and you'll end up with two groups yelling at each other, about different things, with no common understanding. If you cannot read "racism isn't about intentions" and not laugh, you are doing yourself a disservice.

1MachineElf 6y ago

It's not systemic racism, it's the headache I get from excess glutamate. My family is Chinese. Don't @ me.

JohnBooty 6y ago

But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. I understand both sides of the argument. Many people learned an overly simplistic definition of "racism" at some point. Essentially, "overt racism" or "active racism" -- using slurs, joining the KKK, refusing to hire people of a certain race, etc. Anything less overt than this is not "racism" to them. Having generally steered clear of such actions in their lives, they are dismayed to consider the possibility that there are a lot of other institutions and individual actions that are racist. We could invent a new term for "systemic racism." But, ultimately, it's still racism. To the people experiencing it, it has the same net result as other forms of racism. If a white person in a predominantly white society doesn't hire you because you're non-white, there's no material difference to you whether that person did it for overt, conscious reasons or otherwise. That is why is it is useful to think of systemic racism as racism, rather than inventing a new word for it. Here's an interesting thought experiment. Think of the people in your life who are vehemently opposed to the use of the term "racism" to include systemic racism. Suppose we actually did invent a new term for systemic racism so that they could feel more comfortable. How do we think these people would respond? I think a significant number of them would complain about the new term just as much. I can hear them now in my mind. "First we have to worry about being 'racist', now we have to worry about $SOME_NEW_TERM!?!? What will 'they' think of next?!?" Because it's not really about words for them. It's about a refusal to examine their own actions.

rayiner 6y ago
The distinction isn’t between overt and passive. The traditional definition of “racism” still includes “implicit bias.” The recent distinction is between “prejudice” and “effect on racial equity.” Ibram Kendi distills the view quite clearly. He explains that the lower tax rate for capital gains is “racist.” He doesn’t say it’s motivated by racial prejudice (either overt or implicit), or deny that it’s nearly universal in the developed world, including in non-white countries. What he means is that the tax preference has the effect of delivering more benefits to white people because white people are more likely to own capital assets. In the traditional view, by contrast, racism is a mental state—it’s an attitude that’s held by people, whether consciously or unconsciously. Studies show that these attitudes, what’s now called “prejudice,” is probably overstated and isn’t the dominant driver of racial differences: https://www.chronicle.com/article/can-we-really-measure-implicit-bias-maybe-not https://www.chronicle.com/article/can-we-really-measure-impl.... The recent approach has been to reuse “racism” to refer to systems that create or perpetuate racial disparities whether or not they’re motivated by what’s now called prejudice. An example of this usage is saying that “standardized testing is racist.” To people familiar with the traditional definition, this implies that test makers have racial prejudice and, consciously or unconsciously, designed tests to hinder minorities. Under the new definition, this just means that the practice of using standardized tests perpetuates racial disparities because it hurts students that have suffered disadvantages. Of course we had words for this before. I studied what would now be called “environmental racism” in law school. We would say “minority communities suffer disproportionately negative effects from the siting of coal plants.” We don’t need to come up with a new term for this, as you speculate. That’s a concept I could easily explain to my Trump-voting in laws and they’d get it. But when you call that “racism” that implies (not only to my in laws, but to my Biden voting non-white dad) that people involved in the siting decisions were motivated by racial prejudice. They’d say, “no, they’re just putting the coal plant where the land is cheapest.” Under the traditional view, a decision like that based on purely objective, relevant, non-race factors can’t be “racist” because that concept refers to a state of mind (whether overt or implicit). Now, there is a logic to academics and activists using the term “racism” for that. As you observe, the effect on the groups themselves is similar. Most important, by framing “racism” in terms of effects rather than mental state, it forces a consideration of racial equity impacts on otherwise race-neutral policies.

AnthonyMouse 6y ago

> But I wish there was another word for it, or that racism were not used interchangeably with systemic racism. Especially where in this case it's much more like systemic culturalism. Suppose the same thing had happened, but rather than the initial dispute being between the vendors of British food and the vendors of Chinese food, it was between the vendors of British food and the vendors of Italian food. So you would have a lot of people believing that they're allergic to the gluten in pasta, when almost none of them really are, and also ignoring that plenty of British food contains gluten as well. It would be pretty hard to argue that as racism unless you're using a definition of racism not characteristically used in America, but you can still imagine the same thing happening in the same way. So what does that tell you?