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Comment by qshaman | Hacker News Reader

As a latino, I can tell you what type of racism I have faced in the east coast, for example: - While chatting on the phone with a friend in Spanish, I get people screaming at me: "Speak English! This is America, go back to your country!!. ......" - "Chinga tu madre!! Mexican!" (I'm not Mexican) - "We dont speak Spanish here, sorry..." even tho I can communicate perfectly well in English. and many more, in my personal experience, the west coast is way better regarding racism, I have Pakistani friends who have had a pretty rough time living in Oklahoma. I agree that racism is being using as a political weapon, and all of that, but is truly more common in some places. If you are a white European, you will have a hard time seeing racism, compared with people who are not white.

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I find it strange the phrase "political weapon". As if the idea that there might be an issue in the country and politicians wanting to do something about it makes it a weapon. "Oh no Mr. Smith, your not allowed to mention the things that are wrong, otherwise people might think your using it to point out the flaws in your opposition."

I think "political tool" is a better term, and I believe it's an incredibly effective tool for dividing people who might otherwise be united on certain issues.

I think that after the 2008 financial crisis and the following bailouts for the people who caused it, a lot of people got fed up, and occupy wall street was born. Occupy was a class based movement: the ultra-rich vs everyone else. And then something happened, and suddenly everyone had to be divided by every other attribute imaginable - race, sex, gender, disability - class just wasn't as important. Instead of the 1% vs the 99%, the 99% was divided by all those attributes and fought each other over whose issues were more important. Then it quietly fizzled out and nothing was accomplished.

The 1% must be so happy watching the 99% squabble amongst themselves over who's the most oppressed. I think that most, if not all, of the major political/social issues today should be viewed through a class-based lens _first_; everything else should come second. But the users of this tool cannot have that, and here we are: everything is about race/sex/gender and nothing is about class.

My guess is that the Occupy movement was one of the first things that got you into politics, otherwise I don't know how else to explain your opinion. Identity politics was around way before the Occupy movement and has been one of the greatest driving forces in progressive social change.

Yeah, but colbapar has a bit of a point: Identity was there, but it wasn't quite so all-consuming of an issue. But I think the timing is a bit off. I think Occupy had pretty much fizzled before identity exploded. I could be wrong - I'm not all that political, so I'm only a fringe observer of these things - but it seems to me that Occupy was pretty much over by 2013, and identity didn't really explode until 2016 or so.

Is that racism? In that case I have been subjected to it many times even in my country of birth (the Netherlands) by speaking ABN ('algemeen beschaafd Nederlands', meaning not a local dialect but the type of Dutch spoken by the king or queen) in a place like Limburg (the southern-most province) where they tell me 'Ich spreck niet met hollanders!" (literally "I do not speak with people from the province of Holland" where "Holland" is meant to be understood as "not from the southern provinces") in an angry voice. I can understand the Limburg dialect since I speak German as well as Dutch and Limburgs lies somewhere in between (depending on which local variety, sometimes it seems more German than Dutch). This is only within a single tiny country, if I set my foot outside of it and make the mistake of starting to speak English in France I'd often only be met with feigned misunderstanding or foul looks by people who understand me perfectly well but consider their language an integral part of their identity and as such feel that others should make the effort to use it when communicating with Frenchmen. Were I to start in halting French we'd often end up speaking halting English without any bad feelings. Is that racism? No, it is not. It it a form of chauvinism, a way to mark people as not being part of their group. It is not racism since they do not react to my "race" (skin colour, facial features and whatever else is linked to "race") but to the way I speak. I could have spoken Limbursch or French and avoided their reaction. I can not change my race while I can change the way I speak if I so desire.

> If you are a white European, you will have a hard time seeing racism, compared with people who are not white.

That is a racist statement in and of itself, and you do not even know whether I'm a "white" European, let alone the fact that "white" means just as much as "black" when it comes to indicating the culture people grew up and live in. Since I can only assume you are not a racist I assume you made that statement because it is part of the current narrative - it is called standpoint epistemology [1], part of critical theory - without really giving it some thought.

If you agree that racism is used as a political weapon it is only prudent to make sure you do not unwittingly make yourself become a part of that weapon.

Yes, people tend to react differently to people depending on whether they are from their own group or from the outside, up to and including to telling them to "go back where they came from". This is said to Polish migrant workers in western Europe, to Palestinian migrants in Syria, to Koreans in Japan - in all cases you'll be hard-pressed to find any "racial" differences between the groups. It is chauvinism, nationalism, protectionism or just fear of being overrun by "the other". It is not racism and should not be called such, specifically for the reason you yourself mentioned: racism is being used as a political weapon.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standpoint_theory

I lived in Limburg for a few years near Sittard. My daughter was even born there. I noticed her Dutch birth certificate doesn’t include race like US birth certificates. Kinda tells me race and Whiteness is a US construct.

Racism doesn't need the validity of a birth certificate to exist. My birth certificate doesn't list if I'm gay, straight, or bi. Doesn't mean the LGBTQ community isn't discriminated, attacked, and sometimes killed for simply existing.

The Dutch knowing nothing of racism is super fucking rich. Read your own history books.

Didn’t say the Dutch weren’t racist. Never understood the Zwarte Piet nonsense. Putting race on US Birth Certificates was a systemic racism before Jim Crow and still exists.

I didnt say you were a "white" european, I said: "IF you are....", there is nothing racist on what I said. You are using a common pattern the far right uses here in the US, ala Carlson Tucker "What is white supremacy anyway?". I agree there is racism everywhere , between all races, religions, etc... But , we were talking about the US, and the differences between regions regarding racism, etc. I was also exposing my personal experience. Also , the argument of "there is no such a thing as racism" is itself racist, regardless where you are from and how you look. Disregarding other peoples unnecessary hardship and the problems they have to deal with, just because they look different or come from a different place, is truly immoral.

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