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Perhaps he visited more than one country during his trip to Africa? > Sure, the national boundaries are just some lines colonists in Europe drew on a map All

Perhaps he visited more than one country during his trip to Africa? > Sure, the national boundaries are just some lines colonists in Europe drew on a map All of us need to stop referring to the place as just 'Europe'. It's an incredibly diverse place, etc.

mtalantikite 13y ago
That's similar to claims of reverse racism (towards whites); you need to be able to have an exertion of power to make that claim. Since you can't, those claims aren't particularly valid. It's the same in this situation. Europe is one of the executors of the notions of otherness, and as such it needs to be working to fix that.
- mtalantikite 13y ago
  Really, lots of down votes? How can we get the tech community to learn about race/class/colonialism? Because this is some freshman year cultural studies stuff right here. Opening your mind sure helps when you're doing all the 'disrupting' and 'innovating'
  - sanswork 13y ago
    I down voted you because of your comment about "Reverse racism" that's not a thing. It's still just racism. You claim that it's only racism if the racist has the ability to exert power. Racism is racism no matter who is doing it to who. Claiming that only whites can be racist is ridiculous and something racism apologists often do.
    - mtalantikite 13y ago
      Not to people that believe racism is systemic and doesn't rely on individual racists
    - Fomite 13y ago
      There is a well established argument that racism is "prejudice plus power", which actually makes disempowered groups incapable of being racist. Small minded, bigoted and prejudiced, sure.
      - sanswork 13y ago
        That argument is mostly used by racists to support their racist beliefs(by claiming that there is no way they can be racist). There are so many different levels of power and influence in society and it's so variable depending on location and situation that saying only one race or group is in a position to be racist is a joke.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        > There is a well established argument that racism is "prejudice plus power", which actually makes disempowered groups incapable of being racist. Note that that "argument" was an attempt to redefine racism after people had generally agreed that the old definition was a bad thing, so that the emotional negativity of that association would be limited to only things that the people doing the redefining didn't like. Its obviously the case that, generally speaking, the harms produced by any kind of harmful attitude are increased as the people holding the harmful attitude have greater power, but its pretty silly to redefine racism from its generally accepted definition of "prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior". But, even if you accept the silly redefinition, you can still have prejudice plus power in a person of any race, even if in general members of that race are less likely to hold power than members of another race, so it would still not be the case that members of a disadvantage race could not be racist.
      - Fomite 13y ago
        > Note that that "argument" was an attempt to redefine racism after people had generally agreed that the old definition was a bad thing, so that the emotional negativity of that association would be limited to only things that the people doing the redefining didn't like. Citation needed. I have only encountered it in the context of wanting to disambiguate a series of words used as synonyms (bigot, prejudiced, racist...) to better distinguish between individual and societal level effects. > But, even if you accept the silly redefinition, you can still have prejudice plus power in a person of any race, even if in general members of that race are less likely to hold power than members of another race, so it would still not be the case that members of a disadvantage race could not be racist. That's why you'll note I only said disempowered groups. > That argument is mostly used by racists to support their racist beliefs(by claiming that there is no way they can be racist). There are so many different levels of power and influence in society and it's so variable depending on location and situation that saying only one race or group is in a position to be racist is a joke. It's a really bad argument for them then, because it still allows for them to be bigoted asses whose positions should be discounted entirely. I've also never seen it used that way - I've only seen it used in discussions of the intersection of...you guessed it, prejudice and power, and recognizing that not all petty hatred has the same systematic level effect. Tends to co-occur with statements like "Context matters".

mtalantikite 13y ago

That's similar to claims of reverse racism (towards whites); you need to be able to have an exertion of power to make that claim. Since you can't, those claims aren't particularly valid. It's the same in this situation. Europe is one of the executors of the notions of otherness, and as such it needs to be working to fix that.

mtalantikite 13y ago
Really, lots of down votes? How can we get the tech community to learn about race/class/colonialism? Because this is some freshman year cultural studies stuff right here. Opening your mind sure helps when you're doing all the 'disrupting' and 'innovating'
- sanswork 13y ago
  I down voted you because of your comment about "Reverse racism" that's not a thing. It's still just racism. You claim that it's only racism if the racist has the ability to exert power. Racism is racism no matter who is doing it to who. Claiming that only whites can be racist is ridiculous and something racism apologists often do.
  - mtalantikite 13y ago
    Not to people that believe racism is systemic and doesn't rely on individual racists
  - Fomite 13y ago
    There is a well established argument that racism is "prejudice plus power", which actually makes disempowered groups incapable of being racist. Small minded, bigoted and prejudiced, sure.
    - sanswork 13y ago
      That argument is mostly used by racists to support their racist beliefs(by claiming that there is no way they can be racist). There are so many different levels of power and influence in society and it's so variable depending on location and situation that saying only one race or group is in a position to be racist is a joke.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > There is a well established argument that racism is "prejudice plus power", which actually makes disempowered groups incapable of being racist. Note that that "argument" was an attempt to redefine racism after people had generally agreed that the old definition was a bad thing, so that the emotional negativity of that association would be limited to only things that the people doing the redefining didn't like. Its obviously the case that, generally speaking, the harms produced by any kind of harmful attitude are increased as the people holding the harmful attitude have greater power, but its pretty silly to redefine racism from its generally accepted definition of "prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior". But, even if you accept the silly redefinition, you can still have prejudice plus power in a person of any race, even if in general members of that race are less likely to hold power than members of another race, so it would still not be the case that members of a disadvantage race could not be racist.
    - Fomite 13y ago
      > Note that that "argument" was an attempt to redefine racism after people had generally agreed that the old definition was a bad thing, so that the emotional negativity of that association would be limited to only things that the people doing the redefining didn't like. Citation needed. I have only encountered it in the context of wanting to disambiguate a series of words used as synonyms (bigot, prejudiced, racist...) to better distinguish between individual and societal level effects. > But, even if you accept the silly redefinition, you can still have prejudice plus power in a person of any race, even if in general members of that race are less likely to hold power than members of another race, so it would still not be the case that members of a disadvantage race could not be racist. That's why you'll note I only said disempowered groups. > That argument is mostly used by racists to support their racist beliefs(by claiming that there is no way they can be racist). There are so many different levels of power and influence in society and it's so variable depending on location and situation that saying only one race or group is in a position to be racist is a joke. It's a really bad argument for them then, because it still allows for them to be bigoted asses whose positions should be discounted entirely. I've also never seen it used that way - I've only seen it used in discussions of the intersection of...you guessed it, prejudice and power, and recognizing that not all petty hatred has the same systematic level effect. Tends to co-occur with statements like "Context matters".