The problem with having an exceptionally entertaining and interesting discussion in comments is that it really takes away from my blogging time – I’ve got a huge build-up of links that I’ve been meaning to blog about, and yet I haven’t posted a new blog entry for days and days.<\/p>\n
I’ve been meaning to link to a post by Prometheus 6<\/a>, for example, in which he bounces off an old comment of mine (which itself bounced off a comment of Bean’s) to discuss what the meaning of “racist” is. But now some time has passed, and I can’t even find the post. Weird. (Go read Prometheus 6 <\/a>anyway, there’s always a lot of great stuff at his blog).<\/p>\n Anyhow, the comments to that post (which I maybe just imagined?) led me to read Vision Circle<\/a>, a groupish-blog sort of thing that is largely (but not exclusively) focused on race issues, and in particular on Black issues. There’s a lot of really excellent blogging going on there. For example, I thought this classification<\/a> of racism into three classes of action was interesting:<\/p>\n Class Two – Political Intransigence<\/strong> Class One – Crime<\/strong> Also highly recommended: This post<\/a>, discussing the DLC’s belief that Democrats lose elections because special interests scare regular folks away from the Democratic Party. But in practice, it seems that “special interests” is a code for “black people”… and “regular folks” is code for “white men.”<\/p>\n 1. The DLC is arguing implicitly that the success of the Democratic Party comes from following the mandates of the DLC. With the exception of Clinton’s elections in 92 and 96, the Democrats have lost both houses of the Senate, the majority of state governships, and a significant number of state legislatures, under the DLC watch. This signals that Clinton’s election was not so much the norm for the DLC strategy as the exception.<\/p>\n 2. White men are the most conservative voting bloc in the country, and represent a special interest themselves. Moving towards this bloc inherently leads to a conservative policy orientation. And given the choice between a conservative-lite and a conservative, there is no reason to expect that the white male will choose Bud Lite over Bud. Plus there is every reason to expect that other constituencies will stay home, feeling their policy preferences aren’t being articulated.<\/p>\n 3. If we’re strictly focusing on voting blocs (ACTUAL voting blocs rather than potential ones–I know, I know, focusing on them rather than on getting new voters is another problem but I’m short on space!) the most important voting bloc is NOT the white male, but the white FEMALE. And support for the Democratic Party among THIS group is growing…largely because they feel that the Democrats are more sympathetic on gender and race issues.<\/p><\/div>\n And here’s a third example – this time a terrific post about Measure 54<\/a>, the proposed California law which says that the government shouldn’t even acknowledge race when doing things like measuring inequality or gathering statistics.<\/p>\n So we started counting noses. You can’t look into peoples faces without doing so. The liberated people demanded that they be counted, and that the government of the people started recognizing the people for whom they wanted to be. The census form doesn’t say ‘Colored’. It doesn’t say ‘ex-slave’. It doesn’t say ‘dark complected’. It says black and African American because that’s who we have decided to be.<\/p><\/div>\n Anyhow, go check it out<\/a>..<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The problem with having an exceptionally entertaining and interesting discussion in comments is that it really takes away from my blogging time – I’ve got a huge build-up of links that I’ve been meaning to blog about, and yet I … Continue reading
\nThis will include all such insults, slights and disrespect as is generally expected to be found everywhere in this nation. Examples include but are not limited to being ignored by cabbies, flying confederate flags, nazi propaganda, being mistaken for the help, being shown costume jewelry, being asked one’s opinion of, or to account for the opinions of the Fungibles, and most nigger calls.<\/p>\n
\nClass Two racism involves denials of public accommodation or private standing which are not criminal, yet grossly unfair and unjust. Such acts would include imposition of glass ceilings, racial profiling, white flight, medical misdiagnosis, educational tracking, false arrest, false imprisonment, racist vois dire, racist jury nullification, denials of service with plausible deniability, any institutional individual or institutional racism which must be tried in civil courts and all such active bigotry one associates with hate groups which fall short of incitement.<\/p>\n
\nTheft, criminal defamation, cross burnings (now), hate crimes, murder, rape & all that stuff for which America has never made any extraordinary effort to repair. <\/div>\n