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> always indicate the underlying intention or psychological leaning You can say that all you want, but words have cultural meanings, and it's just not true. We

> always indicate the underlying intention or psychological leaning You can say that all you want, but words have cultural meanings, and it's just not true. We're not going to get very far if your argument boils down to "the way that people commonly use the word racism is wrong." Society disagrees with you, and they get to choose what words mean. More to the point, I think it's a little naive to say that the current situation with Black neighborhoods doesn't have intentionality behind it. Redlining was on purpose, it was not an accident. Regardless of whether every single person participating in that system today is trying to be racist, the position we're in exists because of intentional action during America's history. If you want to argue that the intentionality goes away or should be ignored as soon as a law is passed, first I disagree that racism is completely absent in modern policy decisions, but second, it's just a silly thing to argue even if racism had ended when we passed civil rights. It's like if I start a chess game with 2 queens, and halfway through the game I throw one of my queens away. Is the game suddenly fair? No, because I've built myself a structural advantage during the first half of the game, pushed you into a worse position, captured more pieces, and that advantage can't suddenly be ignored during the second half just because I'm no longer actively cheating. > the word "racism" is just to obscure different levels of mechanisms People say this, but I have noticed a strong correlation between people understanding what the words "systemic racism" means and understanding a lot about how these systems operate. If people using the words "systemic racism" were just running around doing nothing, and it was everyone else trying to get rid of problematic housing policies or qualified immunity, then I might be more sympathetic to this concern. But that's not what I see. The people who understand the racial origins of ghettos are also the people on the ground working hard to reform housing policies. They're very much not using systemic racism as a distraction, they're using it as a motivation to examine how our modern systems work and to try and make them more equitable. That's unequivocally a good thing for everyone, regardless of race.

temp8964 6y ago
> Society disagrees with you, and they get to choose what words mean. Lol. Society disagrees with you. Vast majority of people knows racism mean intentional. "Systemic racism" is just a political jargon throw around by one side of politics. > People say this, but I have noticed a strong correlation between people understanding what the words "systemic racism" means and understanding a lot about how these systems operate. If you really understand how the systems operate, you would have known the biggest issue with Black Americans is more than 70% single parenthood of Black kids. "In the Harlem neighborhood of New York City in 1925, 85 percent of kin-related black households had two parents.[15] When Moynihan warned in his 1965 report on the coming destruction of the black family, however, the out-of-wedlock birthrate had increased to 25% among the black population.[12] This figure continued to rise over time and in 1991, 68% of black children were born outside of marriage.[16] U.S. Census data from 2010 reveal that more African-American families consisted of single mothers than married households with both parents.[17] In 2011, it was reported that 72% of black babies were born to unmarried mothers.[11] As of 2015, at 77.3 percent, black Americans have the highest rate of non-marital births among native Americans.[18]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_family_structure#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_family_struct... Unfortunately, people like to throw "systemic racism" around are the same people try their best to avoid addressing the real issue here.
- danShumway 6y ago
  > are the same people try their best to avoid addressing the real issue Okay, I'll bite. What are you personally doing to address the issues leading to single parenthoods in Black communities, since the rest of us are just avoiding the issue? Are you lobbying to support better sex education? Better healthcare coverage? More social safety nets for single-parent children who need additional help? More school resources for schools in those areas that have an outsized number of students struggling with family issues at home? You support those policies, right? And do you think that monetary issues might have anything to do with family stability? Might money coincidentally be the single leading cause of divorce in America today? Out of curiosity, might financial stability be one of the single most significant leading indicators of family stability?
  - temp8964 6y ago
    Before make any policy suggestions, first honestly admit its existence and admit it has nothing to do with slavery. And then you might find what caused it and how to fix it.
    - danShumway 6y ago
      Admit that single parent families often struggle? Yes, admitted. Single parent families often struggle and they need more support. That it has nothing to do with slavery? You haven't been paying attention. Black communities do not magically have higher single-parent rates because God ordained it. They have higher rates because of literally everything I've been talking about in the past 3 comments. > and how to fix it. And this is exactly what I mean. You can look at the comments in this thread, and one group of people are proposing policy solutions, and the other group is complaining that words make them feel bad. There's some weird tiptoeing around the issue here, which I sort of suspect is because you're hesitant to publicly say what you believe the solution really is. So I'll ask it directly: how do you think we should help single-parent kids who need additional support?
      - temp8964 6y ago

temp8964 6y ago

> Society disagrees with you, and they get to choose what words mean. Lol. Society disagrees with you. Vast majority of people knows racism mean intentional. "Systemic racism" is just a political jargon throw around by one side of politics. > People say this, but I have noticed a strong correlation between people understanding what the words "systemic racism" means and understanding a lot about how these systems operate. If you really understand how the systems operate, you would have known the biggest issue with Black Americans is more than 70% single parenthood of Black kids. "In the Harlem neighborhood of New York City in 1925, 85 percent of kin-related black households had two parents.[15] When Moynihan warned in his 1965 report on the coming destruction of the black family, however, the out-of-wedlock birthrate had increased to 25% among the black population.[12] This figure continued to rise over time and in 1991, 68% of black children were born outside of marriage.[16] U.S. Census data from 2010 reveal that more African-American families consisted of single mothers than married households with both parents.[17] In 2011, it was reported that 72% of black babies were born to unmarried mothers.[11] As of 2015, at 77.3 percent, black Americans have the highest rate of non-marital births among native Americans.[18]" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_family_structure#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_family_struct... Unfortunately, people like to throw "systemic racism" around are the same people try their best to avoid addressing the real issue here.

danShumway 6y ago
> are the same people try their best to avoid addressing the real issue Okay, I'll bite. What are you personally doing to address the issues leading to single parenthoods in Black communities, since the rest of us are just avoiding the issue? Are you lobbying to support better sex education? Better healthcare coverage? More social safety nets for single-parent children who need additional help? More school resources for schools in those areas that have an outsized number of students struggling with family issues at home? You support those policies, right? And do you think that monetary issues might have anything to do with family stability? Might money coincidentally be the single leading cause of divorce in America today? Out of curiosity, might financial stability be one of the single most significant leading indicators of family stability?
- temp8964 6y ago
  Before make any policy suggestions, first honestly admit its existence and admit it has nothing to do with slavery. And then you might find what caused it and how to fix it.
  - danShumway 6y ago
    Admit that single parent families often struggle? Yes, admitted. Single parent families often struggle and they need more support. That it has nothing to do with slavery? You haven't been paying attention. Black communities do not magically have higher single-parent rates because God ordained it. They have higher rates because of literally everything I've been talking about in the past 3 comments. > and how to fix it. And this is exactly what I mean. You can look at the comments in this thread, and one group of people are proposing policy solutions, and the other group is complaining that words make them feel bad. There's some weird tiptoeing around the issue here, which I sort of suspect is because you're hesitant to publicly say what you believe the solution really is. So I'll ask it directly: how do you think we should help single-parent kids who need additional support?
    - temp8964 6y ago