Looking for genuine discourse re:Jay-Z/NBA

[One Brow]

It was in reference to the "music" comment from earlier in the thread. Kicky has commented that I was latently racist in writing the way I did, whereas I have said that I was simply conveying my dislike of rap.

To be clear: this one element was not the only, nor even primary, piece of evidence for the conclusion of racist thinking. Taqking this one comment and acting like it was the primary evidence is a distortion.

No one holds me accountable, per se. However I believe that we can hold ourselves accountable to weed out our own racist thoughts and actions. A person with some self-awareness is capable of doing that I think. Consciously trying to be empathetic and fair to your neighbors seems like a good place to start. Then work up from there.

I'll add one more to make it a good start: when you hear someone tell you something is offensive, ask why and listen carefully, without looking to rebut it.

If I had said it like this: Racist actions from a hateful black person does not, in my opinion, justify racist attitudes from a white person. I believe it would also work that way,

If you had said it like that, it might also work that way. The point was, you did not choose to say it like that, and only after reflection did you realize this. That's all I wanted to point out.

Would that have been a better way to say it in your eyes?

People shouldn't use the words of other people to justify their own prejudice.

My question to you is this: If my two sons (ages 6 and 4) are fighting, and have been constantly for several hours, who holds the blame for continuing to fight? I know it's not a perfect analogy, but that is my thought on the subject.

If the ages are 14 and 4, do you hold one in more blame? How about 24 and 4? Again, your first instinct here is to characterize the situations in terms of a nearly equal power balance, when this is not the reality in race relations.

 

[PearlWatson]

Hmm, I wonder if there are any studies on that. The social trend seems to be pointing towards middle skin tones. From what I have seen in my personal experiences at least. I've seen much more mocking of pale skin tones over olive ones. By far.