How Blacks are to blame for Racism vs. Blacks

[try another castle]

Being the fag that I am, my prejudice is more based on fashion as opposed to race. I tend to feel more guarded against people who are dressed like they are trouble. (Which can encompass many kinds of fashion, not only "thug wear".) I also try to give a wide berth to people who are "sporting" (i.e. flagging gang colors) and who also have gang tattoos. However, appearances can be deceiving. Ted Bundy dressed quite nicely and was very charming. (And let's not forget that most serial killers are white and for the most part, look like your normal, everyday white dude.) It doesn't mean that I am planning on dropping my guard as I walk along. It just means that I should expand my guard to people who may not seem threatening at first glance, and not trust someone just because they are dressed nicely.

I also try to keep an eye out for body language and subtle cues to see if someone is checking me out as a potential mark. Maybe it's my years of living in new york, where anyone could potentially be a mugger, or worse.

Back to the neighborhood thing, did anyone hear that Chris Rock joke? "One day we saw a white family move in across the street. I thought 'Well... here comes the neighborhood.'"

[The Liger]

I grew up in Hawaii, so my views on race are probably a lot different than people from "the mainland" (as we call the states here).  There are very few black people here.  Most of the time, when you see black people, they are in the military.  Same with Latinos.  So we don't really have this view of blacks and Mexicans being criminals or unemployed, because here there aren't any that are like that.  There is a lot of prejudice here, between Asian groups, between Asians and white people, and between Hawaiians and white people.  Racism between Asian groups is pretty interesting from the perspective of a white person.  I guess it's my own prejudice that makes me think it is strange.  I think that they are so much alike that it's silly, but they see themselves as distinctly different from other Asian groups.  I had a Cambodian friend who had a Vietnamese girlfriend and they were disowned when they got married, because they were expected to marry within their race.

I sort of went off on a tangent there.  The racism against blacks really shocks me.  I didn't know until I went to law school that there are still KKK groups in the US and that people still burn crosses in black people's lawns.  I thought all that stuff was over in the 60s, because I've been sheltered here in Hawaii.  I mean, I knew that there was still racism in people's hearts, but I didn't know about that stuff.  I actually thought that Hawaii was behind the times with the racism here.  I also never thought I would hear young people taking on the ingnorant hatred that their ancestors had toward different races.

[Antigen]

Race is just a handy excuse. Any discernable difference will serve. Look at the Irish, why don't ya? They're all the same color, they speak the same language, they virtually all subscribe to the Christian faith and all owe their heritage back to the same small corner of the Earth. And yet, for the past 200 years, they've been at war. Now, does that say more about the nature of bigotry or about the natural inventiveness of the Irish race?
 ::bwahaha2::

Time is running out. The Indians' botanical knowledge is disappearing even faster than the plants themselves.

--Richard Schultes, Harvard University educator, authority on medicinal plants

[bandit1978]

Liger, I have spent time in Hawaii, and also my boyfriend is Chinese.  I know what you are saying about racism within Asian culture.

I have been living in DC for 10 years or more.  My parents are Irish, and from New York, and have always taught me that "everyone deserves an equal chance", and so on...plus we always prided ourselves on being from the north, and not being so racist ignorant, like those from the south.  Like, when idiots in the south were having Klan meetings, my grandfather was serving as a judge and promoting civil rights.  

In New York, we all learned to live together- Irish, Italians, Jewish, Greeks, ect...

However, where I live now, most of the crime is perpetrated by African-Americans...and I judge people based on how they act.  I have lots and lots of African-American friends.

The other night, I really wanted to drive 4 blocks to 7-11 to get some cigarettes.  I did not feel safe to walk nor drive those 4 blocks...and I'm from NY!

I did not create the social situation in my city, I just have to live with it.  

In my neighborhood, 2 people (children) have been hit by "stray bullets" in the past 6 months, while sitting in their living rooms!

I know that there are "white ghettos", I mean, I'm Irish, after all!  Inconveniently, the fact is that in my neighbood, most of the crime is perpetrated by African-Americans.  So I invite you to come stay here for a month or so.  Anytime!  Then we can talk about "racism".

[Anonymous]

I think Racism is a natural evolution of our society based on our policies enacted over the past decades.

Look at the drug war article I just posted:
http://fornits.com/wwf/viewtopic.php?to ... forum=22&0

At the present time, one-fourth of all of the young black men in America are either in prison or on parole. Most of them were arrested on non-violent drug charges.
In Washington, DC, the Bush administration's "demonstration" city, half of all of the black men in the city are currently in jail or on parole. More than ninety percent have arrest records. The same is true of inner city black men in Baltimore, New York, New Jersey, and Florida.
Two-thirds of all of today's black male high school students will be dead, disabled, or in prison before their thirtieth birthday. The majority will go to prison because of non-violent drug charges. For every black man who goes to college, three will go to prison.
By the year 2000, about half of all black men in America will have gone to prison. Most of them will go to prison for non-violent drug charges. Most of those who go to prison will be released into society again.

No wonder there is so much crime amongst the black community!

No wonder white people feel threatened and naturally react to protect themselves.

So long as the blacks are subjegated and treated so unfairly by our society, things will stay the way they are or get worse.

We need to be mad at our policy makers and politicians more than anyone.

We should give them a fair chance at life, instead of locking them up making them permanently unemployable.

It's a lose-lose situation.

Racism is only a symptom of a greater problem!!!

 :eek:

[Deborah]

Politicians aren't going to do much more than give lip service to this issue.
If our attention weren't on blacks (and other minorities/poor) crimes, we might pay more attention to white collar crimes- the HAVES who are responsible for far more injuries and death every year due to bad policies, pollution, faulty products, unsafe drugs and food stuff, harmful and unnecessary medical procedures, etc. etc. etc.
Or those have who 'steal' from the 'people' everyday through Corp Welfare.
We focus on crimes of minorities and poor because that's what the corp predators put on the news every night, san the occassional scandel where one of the own is scapegoated.
I think we'd have a far less 'violent' society if some of the wealth skimmed by the elite were distributed amongst those WHO CAN'T PROVIDE FOR THEIR FAMILIES ON MINIMUM WAGE.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl? ... /07/033241
THE BARONS OF BANKRUPTCY: SURVIVORS WHO LAUGHED ALL THE WAY TO THE BANK
They are the barons of bankruptcy - a privileged group of top business people who made extraordinary personal fortunes even as their companies were heading for disaster. They made their money at the top of the market, selling shares in companies whose values rocketed in 1999 and 2000. Today their companies, many in the telecommunications sector, have crashed, destroying hundreds of billions of dollars of investor wealth and almost 100,000 jobs. Yet the executives and directors of these bankrupt companies have walked away with gross earnings of $3.3 billion, a stunning pay-off for corporate failure.

This is how a report in yesterday's Financial Times begins. It's part of an exhaustive inquiry by the Financial Times into executive compensation at the largest US bankruptcies, covering the 25 largest US public  Companies to go bankrupt since January 2001.

Among the barons of bankruptcy are some familiar names. Ken Lay, former chairman and CEO of Enron, grossed $247 million. Jeff Skilling, former Enron president, grossed $89 million. Even these figures are dwarfed by the $512 million grossed by Gary Winnick of Global Crossing.
***
CORP PREDATORS
Top 100 Corp Criminals List for the 90's
http://corporatepredators.org/top100.html

Excerpts:
The point of the list contained in this report, The Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the Decade -- is to focus public attention on a wave of corporate criminality that has swamped prosecutors offices around the country.

This is the dark underside of the marketplace that is given little sustained attention and analysis by politicians and news outlets.

To compile The Top 100 Corporate Criminals of the 1990s, we used the most narrow and conservative of definitions -- corporations that have pled guilty or no contest to crimes and have been criminally fined.

The 100 corporate criminals fell into 14 categories of crime: Environmental (38), antitrust (20), fraud (13), campaign finance (7), food and drug (6), financial crimes (4), false statements (3), illegal exports (3), illegal boycott (1), worker death (1), bribery (1), obstruction of justice (1) public corruption (1), and tax evasion (1).

And that emerging consensus is this: corporate crime and violence inflicts far more damage on society than all street crime combined.

The FBI estimates, for example, that burglary and robbery ? street crimes -- costs the nation $3.8 billion a year.

Compare this to the hundreds of billions of dollars stolen from Americans as a result of corporate and white-collar fraud.

Recite this list of corporate frauds and people will immediately say to you: but you can't compare street crime and corporate crime -- corporate crime is not violent crime.

Unfortunately, corporate crime is often violent crime.

The FBI estimates that, 19,000 Americans are murdered every year.    Compare this to the 56,000 Americans who die every year on the job or from occupational diseases such as black lung and asbestosis and the tens of thousands of other Americans who fall victim to the silent violence of pollution, contaminated foods, hazardous consumer products, and hospital malpractice.

Click on the link above to see if any of your favorites made the list.

[Antigen]

On 2005-12-28 09:45:00, Deborah wrote:

Recite this list of corporate frauds and people will immediately say to you: but you can't compare street crime and corporate crime -- corporate crime is not violent crime.

Unfortunately, corporate crime is often violent crime.

The FBI estimates that, 19,000 Americans are murdered every year. Compare this to the 56,000 Americans who die every year on the job or from occupational diseases such as black lung and asbestosis and the tens of thousands of other Americans who fall victim to the silent violence of pollution, contaminated foods, hazardous consumer products, and hospital malpractice.

Click on the link above to see if any of your favorites made the list.

More to the point, how many people have beceme ill or even died because they lost their pensions (well... not lost, exactly. we know right where the money is, it just no longer belongs to the hard workin' sops who earned it) and couldn't afford adequate heat, clothing, medical care, etc? Countless. Ask some pensioner who's stealing cat food for a living how unviolent corporate crime is.

say what you will about the sweet miracle of unquestioning faith, I consider a capacity for it terrifying and absolutely vile.
--Kurt Vonnegut, American author

[empathy]

Bill Cosby's overemphasis on personal responsibility, not structural features, wrongly locates the source of poor black suffering?and by implication its remedy?in the lives of the poor. When you think the problems are personal, you think the solutions are the same. If only the poor were willing to work harder, act better, get educated, stay out of jail and parent more effectively, their problems would go away. It's hard to argue against any of these things in the abstract; in principle such suggestions sound just fine. But one could do all of these things and still be in bad shape at home, work or school. For instance, Cosby completely ignores shifts in the economy that give value to some work while other work, in the words of William Julius Wilson, "disappears." In our high-tech, high-skilled economy where low-skilled work is being scaled back, phased out, exported, or severely under-compensated, all the right behavior in the world won't create better jobs with more pay. And without such support, all the goals that Cosby expresses for the black poor are not likely to become reality. If the rigidly segregated educational system continues to miserably fail poor blacks by failing to prepare their children for the world of work, then admonitions to "stay in school" may ring hollow.

In this light, the imprisonment of black people takes on political consequence. Cosby may be right that most black folk in jail are not "political prisoners," but it doesn't mean that their imprisonment has not been politicized. Given the vicious way blacks have been targeted for incarceration, Cosby's comments about poor blacks who end up in jail are dangerously naïve and empirically wrong.

Cosby also slights the economic, social, political and other structural barriers that poor black parents are up against: welfare reform, dwindling resources, export of jobs and ongoing racial stigma. And then there are the problems of the working poor: folk who rise up early every day and often work more than forty hours a week, and yet barely, if ever, make it above the poverty level. We must acknowledge the plight of both poor black (single) mothers and poor black fathers, and the lack of social support they confront. Hence, it is incredibly difficult to spend as much time with children as poor black parents might like, especially since they will be demonized if they fail to provide for their children's basic needs. But doing so deflects critical attention and time from child-rearing duties?duties that are difficult enough for two-parent, two-income, intact middle-class families. The characteristics Cosby cites are typical of all families that confront poverty the world over. They are not indigenous to the black poor; they are symptomatic of the predicament of poor people in general. And Cosby's mean-spirited characterizations of the black poor as licentious, sexually promiscuous, materialistic and wantonly irresponsible can be made of all classes in the nation. (Paris Hilton, after all, is a huge star for just these reasons.)
[ This Message was edited by: empathy on 2005-12-28 13:58 ]

[try another castle]

Now, THAT, I agree with. Cosby really doesn't understand what he is talking about, IMO.

[Anonymous]

the blacks are not to blme dressing has nothing to do with racism. Cultures differ and beliefs differ. Maybe you are missing a point black people are different and do thinss different

[Anonymous]

Thank you, my fine, fine nigger.

[Anonymous]

There was a time in this country when our foreign dignataries could honestly answer questions about poverty in America with "We'll let you know when we see some." What were we doing differently then? It wasn't welfare or any other socialist programs. It was what the Europeans kept calling squalor and anarchy till they needed us to intervene in their world war. And we've been in hock and at war ever since.


<

In hock to the original racists, the jews, with their elitist religion and sceming, usurious ways.  They foment racism and class division for the benefit of Israel.

They knew about 9/11 but said nothing so as to get an American army in that part of the world to do their bidding.

[Anonymous]

I am speaking to the fact that YOU in particular have jumped on this issue, because of your previous instance in this forum of taking on the mexican issue. I question your motivation and agenda. It seems to me that you are more the opportunist who is willing to exploit any issue that supports your bias towards people who are not your own race,......If you post an article that discusses weaknesses and problems within your own racial community and population, then I might give your other opinions a little more consideration.


.

Hey, lets watch the world-wise and media savvy Jew take on the inscrutable Asian  in a discussion about Negro shoplifters and spic gangbangers.!!!!!  "Try another Castle" gets bonus points for being a fag.  You minorities crack me up.  Signed, Whitey

[Bluechair666]

I have read your posts, and have truly come to the conclusion that there is no hope left in the world. Nothing will ever get better, because by the time all the people have worked out their problems, many more will have been born, and they won't like each other either. I'm praying for hurricanes, plagues and tidal waves. Die fuckers die!
I want to see your cities abandoned and decaying in the wind, and the corpses of your ugly children burning on stakes with dogs slathering below for a morsel. I want in my life time to be able to ride my bicycle down the interstate because you are all just smelly abandoned skeletons sitting there rotting in your cars, while crows peck at the glass trying to get to your eyeballs while they are still juicy. i want to set fire to the houses you used to live in when i want to stay warm or read a book. You are all worthless, and if you want to make the world a better place, then I think you know what to do. Sorry Cassandra, you seem cool, but the rest of you are kooks, and should kill yourselves.
Have a nice day.

[Anonymous]

If the rigidly segregated educational system continues to miserably fail poor blacks by failing to prepare their children for the world of work, then admonitions to "stay in school" may ring hollow.

The rigidly segregated, social engineering experiment that is our Prussian based school system will continue to fail all of the overly pathologized, studied, readjusted children. But that doesn't mean the school system is a failure. Not at all. To look at it another way, our school system is a booming success, it's just that the designers' and gatekeeprs' interests are not the same as yours or our kids'.

Think about it for a moment in the simplest of terms. He who pays the piper he calls the tune. Uncle Sam is footing this bill. So what interest does govenment have in the 'proper' education of our children and what are the interests of families, friends and home towns?

I want my kids to be clever, confident, clear headed, ambitious, skeptical and powerful. Governments was people to be obedient, predictable, unquestioning of authority, maliable and directable.

I think Cosby is a fucking sanctimonious idiot who Uncle Tomed his way to third base and thinks he hit a home run. But there's a grain of truth to what he's saying, whether he understands it in this context or not (I strongly suspect not). Regardless of the root causes of social breakdown and overall environment our kids have to deal with, they still have to deal with it. They grow up fast and this is going to take a long, long time to change. We'll be old, tired and irrelavent when they take over and run things. We need for them to be clever, confident, clear headed, ambitious, skeptical and powerful.

 So get your kids out of school or at least talk turkey with them about these things.