And if your ultimate goal is a society where race is irrelevant and we all treat each other equally, exactly how does doing the opposite get you there?
To me, ultimate goal is a society that is not biased for or against any racial group. Currently society is biased against some racial groups, so to redress the balance I believe that we should give more support to those that society is biased against.
Maybe it's a silly metaphor, but imagine a seesaw. Currently more weight is on the left than the right, so it's unbalanced. I'd like it to be equally balanced so at the moment, I think the best thing to do it place more weight on the right.
How will your two dimensional seesaw work when there are millions of dimensions to consider in making these “adjustments”?
And what does your dream unbiased society look like? It sounds like a colour blind society to me. So why deliberately move in the other direction?
And once implement your schemes, and then the fixes to correct the problems it introduces, and then the fixes for those fixes, how are you going to reverse it all?
Conversations like these make me extremely glad that I don’t live in America.
Of course there are millions of dimensions to account for. That doesn't mean that you give up on trying to address them! That line of argument lets you discredit any attempt at doing good.
Help black people who are discriminated against in the workplace? But what about asians!
Make life easier for deaf people by adding accessibility features to websites? But what about people who can't afford a computer!
Save the rainforest? But what about the arctic!
> So why deliberately move in the other direction?
Because western society is not currently colour-blind, in a very particular direction! That was the point of the seesaw metaphor: not to say that race is one straight line with black at one end and white at the other, but to say that if you want people to have equal opportunities regardless of their race then you have to help the people who are currently at a disadvantage.
> Conversations like these make me extremely glad that I don’t live in America.
Me too :)
Do you think this applies to all disadvantaged groups, or just when discussing issues of race?
What's more common: black people attempting to pass as white, or white people attempting to pass as black?