4 ms·

> People who are not white can rule out a happy existence in 90% of American cities Why in the world would that be the case?

dragonwriter 4y ago
Because America is built on, and much of it (and not only the historically obvious bits) is still drowning in, racism.
- jeffbee 4y ago
  It is not just the racism but also practical facts. There are American cities without a black barber. A given city may lack the food culture or language of some ethnic group. The incredible whiteness of some cities is self-perpetuating.
  - _dain_ 4y ago
    Do you think that "whiteness" is a bad thing? What is wrong with white people? Do you not like us for some reason?
    - jeffbee 4y ago
      There isn't anywhere near enough space in this box to answer the question "What is wrong with white people" and that isn't my purpose here. I'm trying to tell you why there are non-obvious reasons why people don't just immediately move to Lincoln, Nebraska, when the rents change in Manhattan. It's because there aren't any Persian restaurants, or whatever people view as an amenity.
      - _dain_ 4y ago
        But you do think there is something wrong with white people? You actually do think there's something wrong with me, on account of the colour of my skin?
        speakfreely 4y ago
        You're not going to have any more luck reasoning with them than a black person would have trying to reason with a klan member. If you've decided you hate people because of the color of their skin, no online discourse is going to change your mind.
        _dain_ 4y ago
        Yes it just seems like he's prejudiced against certain people and he's invented some complicated-sounding intellectual justification for it.
        arolihas 4y ago
        Doesn't really sound that complicated, people wanting to live in a place where barbers know how to style their hair and restaurants serve the food they enjoy eating.
        randomopining 4y ago
        He's mistaking the invisible hand of individual incentives etc for some sort of coordinated "attack" on "non-privileged". It's funny because in NYC you see tons of people of all different types of backgrounds making it, and also not making it.
    - dragonwriter 4y ago
      > Do you think that "whiteness" is a bad thing? What is wrong with white people? “Whiteness“ is not the same thing as “white people”. There's nothing wrong with white people qua white people. (There's lots of things wrong with people as individuals, some of which are significantly more common among White people than other groups—e.g., sealioning about racial issues on internet fora—but that is a different issue.) There's something in particular wrong with whiteness, which is grounded in identifying with, valorizing, and perpetuating shared experience as the oppressing class under the system of White supremacy.
      - _dain_ 4y ago
        Well I remember people used to say the same thing about other groups -- they'd say "oh it's not that I don't like Jews, I just don't like Jewishness", whatever that means. And then that Dave Chapelle routine about black people. I don't see how what you're doing is any different. I hadn't heard of that "sealioning" term before, and honestly I'm just even more baffled having Googled it. I guess I'm like the sealion in the comic, and the sealion is meant to be ... obviously in the wrong? But ... he's not? People are mouthing off about him and he wants them to explain themselves. Why is he in the wrong? You're mouthing off about me and people like me, where I can hear you, and you think you're just entitled to do that and nobody can say a word? If you have a problem with people like me, why don't you be a man and say it plainly? Instead of trying to squirm out of it with these silly little clique terms. And "oppressing class under white supremacy"? What is this gobbledegook? My family is working class, I come from a long line of iron-mongers, my great grandfather had rickets because the smog blotted out the sun. They peddled this same race-war nonsense back in Czarist Russia, all the Elders of Zion conspiring to keep everyone down, it's a siren call of hatred. Snap out of it.
    - speakfreely 4y ago
      Whenever someone wants to talk about what's wrong with group of people with skin color (X), you already you're talking to someone with the wrong priorities.
    - dllthomas 4y ago
      It's possible for there to be no problem with white people, regardless of how "white" they are being, while there is still a big problem with structural barriers to others moving to areas that might otherwise be the best choice for themselves and their family. I think the parent intended the latter, pointing at overwhelming prevalence of white people (rather than - as you seem to have read it - overwhelming... intensity(?) of white people) as being an indicator of the persistence of such barriers.

dragonwriter 4y ago

Because America is built on, and much of it (and not only the historically obvious bits) is still drowning in, racism.

jeffbee 4y ago
It is not just the racism but also practical facts. There are American cities without a black barber. A given city may lack the food culture or language of some ethnic group. The incredible whiteness of some cities is self-perpetuating.
- _dain_ 4y ago
  Do you think that "whiteness" is a bad thing? What is wrong with white people? Do you not like us for some reason?
  - jeffbee 4y ago
    There isn't anywhere near enough space in this box to answer the question "What is wrong with white people" and that isn't my purpose here. I'm trying to tell you why there are non-obvious reasons why people don't just immediately move to Lincoln, Nebraska, when the rents change in Manhattan. It's because there aren't any Persian restaurants, or whatever people view as an amenity.
    - _dain_ 4y ago
      But you do think there is something wrong with white people? You actually do think there's something wrong with me, on account of the colour of my skin?
      - speakfreely 4y ago
        You're not going to have any more luck reasoning with them than a black person would have trying to reason with a klan member. If you've decided you hate people because of the color of their skin, no online discourse is going to change your mind.
        _dain_ 4y ago
        Yes it just seems like he's prejudiced against certain people and he's invented some complicated-sounding intellectual justification for it.
        arolihas 4y ago
        Doesn't really sound that complicated, people wanting to live in a place where barbers know how to style their hair and restaurants serve the food they enjoy eating.
        randomopining 4y ago
        He's mistaking the invisible hand of individual incentives etc for some sort of coordinated "attack" on "non-privileged". It's funny because in NYC you see tons of people of all different types of backgrounds making it, and also not making it.
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > Do you think that "whiteness" is a bad thing? What is wrong with white people? “Whiteness“ is not the same thing as “white people”. There's nothing wrong with white people qua white people. (There's lots of things wrong with people as individuals, some of which are significantly more common among White people than other groups—e.g., sealioning about racial issues on internet fora—but that is a different issue.) There's something in particular wrong with whiteness, which is grounded in identifying with, valorizing, and perpetuating shared experience as the oppressing class under the system of White supremacy.
    - _dain_ 4y ago
      Well I remember people used to say the same thing about other groups -- they'd say "oh it's not that I don't like Jews, I just don't like Jewishness", whatever that means. And then that Dave Chapelle routine about black people. I don't see how what you're doing is any different. I hadn't heard of that "sealioning" term before, and honestly I'm just even more baffled having Googled it. I guess I'm like the sealion in the comic, and the sealion is meant to be ... obviously in the wrong? But ... he's not? People are mouthing off about him and he wants them to explain themselves. Why is he in the wrong? You're mouthing off about me and people like me, where I can hear you, and you think you're just entitled to do that and nobody can say a word? If you have a problem with people like me, why don't you be a man and say it plainly? Instead of trying to squirm out of it with these silly little clique terms. And "oppressing class under white supremacy"? What is this gobbledegook? My family is working class, I come from a long line of iron-mongers, my great grandfather had rickets because the smog blotted out the sun. They peddled this same race-war nonsense back in Czarist Russia, all the Elders of Zion conspiring to keep everyone down, it's a siren call of hatred. Snap out of it.
  - speakfreely 4y ago
    Whenever someone wants to talk about what's wrong with group of people with skin color (X), you already you're talking to someone with the wrong priorities.
  - dllthomas 4y ago
    It's possible for there to be no problem with white people, regardless of how "white" they are being, while there is still a big problem with structural barriers to others moving to areas that might otherwise be the best choice for themselves and their family. I think the parent intended the latter, pointing at overwhelming prevalence of white people (rather than - as you seem to have read it - overwhelming... intensity(?) of white people) as being an indicator of the persistence of such barriers.