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Comment by nitrogen | Hacker News Reader

Your characterization of racism as a "belief" is alarming.

What word would you use for something someone believes is true, even if it isn't? I'm having a really hard time imagining what's wrong with the word "belief" here, to talk about the state of someone's mental expectations of the world.

Racist people don't magically become unbiased in the workplace.

People can and do change, and most of them can compartmentalize in the mean time. "Racist" is not a fundamental, unchangeable attribute of a person, and it's too easy to scope creep once you've got the weapon of ostracism and censorship ready at hand. No matter how wrong they are, we can't just permanently deny people access to jobs and public life. That makes them martyrs.

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If someone views YOU as an unintelligent/incapabable person then they are at home because you look a certain way, do you really trust them to make unbiased decisions about your future at work?

If you do, fair enough. I certainly don't.

Also. '"Racist" is not a fundamental, unchangeable attribute of a person' I would love to know the secret to changing someone's mind on this. I think the whole world would to be honest. If it were that easy, we wouldn't be having this conversation.

If someone views you as unfairly taking advantage of the system through some never defined but ever present skin color privilege, do you really trust them to make unbiased decisions about your future at work?

Sadly in USA circa 2021 many people have forgot elementary moral wisdom.

Matthew 7:1 Do not judge, or you too will be judged.

Matthew 7:2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

Matthew 7:3 "Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?

John 8:7 He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her.

Romans 12:17 Do not repay anyone evil for evil.

I would love to know the secret to changing someone's mind on this

This guy seems to have a pretty good track record: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryl_Davis

One thing that helps is just exposure to counterexamples of whatever bias a person has. If someone thinks that all of group A are lazy, show them hard-working members of group A.

That's a great suggestion but it doesn't cover all the bases. It won't cover areas of unconscious bias. Plus some people just don't want to be convinced no matter what you do. This can be evident when a biased culture is pushing them harder in the opposite direction than you're able to push back. When that happens there's not much you can do besides avoid them. This stuff is a discrimination lawsuit waiting to happen.

Again, maybe you're trying to be forgiving when you say "we can't just deny people access to jobs and public life" but we absolutely can do that when they become a detriment to everybody else involved in those jobs and public life. It's sad but it's true. For people who are particularly detrimental to the point where they commit hate crimes, we send them to prison.

>we can't just permanently deny people access to jobs and public life

Please can you stop using this line of reasoning to dismiss racist behavior, it's incredibly frustrating to read this in this context. The risk with hiring someone who's being discriminatory is that they'll act in a discriminatory way towards the other employees, which then puts those other employees at risk for being denied access to jobs and public life. The weapon of of ostracism and censorship is already being wielded once that discriminatory rhetoric has been put out, perhaps you're trying to have good intentions and be forgiving, but the way you're going about it guarantees you'll be a step too late and the damage will have been done already.

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