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Comment by PhasmaFelis | Hacker News Reader

> articles like this, in 2016, seem divisive to me.

I dunno, this seems kinda like the "racism is over" argument. As long as there are many, many people who (consciously or unconsciously) believe that nothing of value was ever accomplished by a non-white non-male, there's value in pointing out that they're wrong.

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>"As long as there are many, many people who (consciously or unconsciously) believe that nothing of value was ever accomplished by a non-white non-male"

Nothing good will come of trying to forcefully change those peoples' minds. Because such actions are incredibly divisive, even if you sugar-coat it with noble ideals.

An article on the internet is "trying to change someone's mind by force"?

No, but an article will hardly change my opinion on black people.

The old expression about bringing a horse to water comes to mind. Doing divisive things that constantly beat the war-drum of past wrongs is "physically" forcing the horse to drink. Living peacefully and treating everyone around you equally (including those with views you disagree with) is akin to bringing them to the water and drinking it next to them.

Your use of the word "force" when talking about race is an odd choice when we consider the huge amounts of force coming from the other side - the armed militarised police who seem to want to escalate every confrontation; the lynchings; the red lining; the jim crow laws; the terrorist racist groups who firebomb churches; the "lone wolf" extremists who murder people.

"someone wrote a blog post" seems pretty mild in response.

It is an appropriate choice of word in the context of my post regarding changing peoples' attitude towards race, and their prejudices.

So mentioning that black women accomplished cool stuff one time is "beating the war drum of past wrongs" and "trying to forcefully change peoples' minds"?

Basically, you're saying we should cover up any history that might make people uncomfortable?

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