Hacker News Reader

Comment by Spivak | Hacker News Reader

It really isn’t. You’re just uncomfortable with a group of people that you’re a member of did something bad that was directly related to their membership in that group and you want a carve out so you can feel separate from them. We’re talking about an era in the US where white people were literally in control of everything, nobody else could have done this. And the response was directly related to their whiteness and racism.

So sure, it was only white racists that did this, and without a doubt you wouldn’t have been one of those had you been born back then despite it being the view of the overwhelming majority at the time.

View on HN

> We’re talking about an era in the US where white people were literally in control of everything, nobody else could have done this.

It's also the era that created the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, Medicare, Medicaid and the War on Poverty. You're correct that political leadership in the United States was almost entirely white at the time. But the fact that they passed many substantial pieces of legislation helping other groups shows that people are more decent than the "race war" narrative that gets pushed a lot these days.

I contend that the logic of segregation became unsustainable legally, morally, and in the social conscience of a large portion of the public. With the demonstrations, riots, etc. it became necessary to make the appropriate legal adjustments. However, whites largely weren’t comfortable with the sudden requirement to desegregate and white flight from cities and the other things I mentioned in my original comment occurred.

From my perspective, what occurred is that people wanted desegregation in principle but not in their particular social circles. They didn’t want large numbers of black students in their child’s school for instance.

It was expedient; decency was unnecessary to explain their actions.

These laws were passed in an environment of both great social upheaval domestically, and the cold war internationally. Both contributed.

The Soviet Union kept pointing out US race relations whenever the US claimed to be for freedom. The hypocrisy of the US could not be ignored by the predominantly white christian leaders who enacted these laws while expecting to have any credibility abroad. And, now that the cold war is over, the predominantly white christian political right is attempting to dismantle every single one of these acts and more.

> you want a carve out so you can feel separate from them.

I am separate from them. I didn’t do any of that stuff.

Also, I have many opinions that disagree with the overwhelming majority of my peers. Do you think you would have been racist back then?

Oh hell yeah I would have probably been super racist. I’m not no naive as to be believe that growing up in an environment where racism is the norm, pushed and supported by my community leaders, surrounded by everyone circulating stories of the evil scary black people to stroke fear, depicted in media, and backed by “science” wouldn’t have affected me.

Statistically speaking, yes. We have a sample size in the tens of millions that demonstrate this fact. A large majority of your views on right and wrong are based on the society you grew up in. For instance, if was a man born in Afghanistan in 1990 it is extremely likely that my views on divorce, marital rape, child abuse, etc. would be quite different than what my views currently are.

> I am separate from them. I didn’t do any of that stuff.

You're doing it right now.

Is there some "fellow white people" group I need to apply to ?

Or you you're a "member of a group" that you never even joined or cared to get close to ?

That's incredibly racist dude. It is exactly same thing actual racists do when they assume someone is <minority> therefore they will do <bad thing>.

If you say, “you’re a white man and therefore you must like Weezer” that’s the prejudice you’re describing. But if you say white men like Weezer you see how that’s an entirely different statement, right?

One is the behavior of an individual ant, one is describing the colony.

> white men like Weezer

This is exactly wrong though - do a majority of white men like Weezer? The right thing to say is "People who like Weezer are overwhelmingly white" (assuming it's true of course).

> You’re just uncomfortable with a group of people that you’re a member of did something

Projection much? I'm not white and I feel the same way as gp

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33831208

Yep, textbook projection.

> white people were literally in control of everything

I think there's a big difference between "white people were in control of everything" and "the people who were in control were white".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_sin

Reply on news.ycombinator.com