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Open Theism Discussion Board > Public Forums > Tearing down walls > (No Subject)
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DLW
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 2457
| Posted 12/8/2003 7:13 AM (GMT -6) |   | Personal opinion: I dropped out of high-school choir after 10th grade because I was tired of hearing the racist drivel of so many of my basses.
I know at Bethel College, where I used to attend and Boyd used to teach, they have had problems with people writing racist remarks in public areas. I was part of a group of students who stood up publicly and said the college hadn't done enough to deal with a racism situation in the spring of 97. We had some days of prayer and fasting. I don't know if it did any good, but it seemed like the right thing to do.
I don't think racism has gone away. I do think that racism is like the term sin, hard to define exactly. Economically, I don't think employers are as able in the past to discriminate based on race, but that because of the racism of a long-period of time as well as the devastation done by drugs to many african-american communities, as portrayed in "Man-child in the Promised Land" by Claude Brown", there are many african-americans that grow up without the support framework at home and quality schools and are ill-prepared for today's labor markets.
I generally prescribe to the views from "More than Equals" by Spencer Perkins and Chris Rice. Race hasn't gone away, but I've faced situations where (white) people seemed to think it had gone away and were annoyed when I brought it up again. This happened in grad-school. My major field was in Labor Economics, which considers the economics of discrimination. It seems kosher these days to talk about discrimination based on using race as a signal for someone's expected "ability" as opposed to discrimination based on dislike of hiring people from a certain race.
I think the competitiveness of labor-markets affects how blatant racism is. We tend to demean the group of workers that are in competition with us, lowering our wages perhaps. Recently, with the improvements and decrease in expensiveness of computers, higher-skilled workers have done better and low or semi-skilled workers have done worse. The latter group is more likely to face more competitive pressure and be more antagonistic against lower-skilled african-americans, particularly if the perceive that affirmative-action is giving their jobs to others.
dlw
Niebuhr thought that sustained moral energy in politics depended on religion's power to mobilize reason along with self-transcending love. The prophetic tradition, meanwhile, gave Jews and Christians some protection against the temptation to identify their social causes with God's will. Lincoln's second inaugural address expressed the prophetic insight, "The almighty has His own purposes." | | Back to Top | | |
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honorman
Registered Member
Date Joined Oct 2002
Total Posts : 1137
| Posted 12/8/2003 9:00 AM (GMT -6) | | OhNO! We have a race problem that the church hasn't dealt effectively enough with...yawn... ...tackle that issue there...I would suggest that all our non-white brothers should also try and understand the problems of all the white brothers out there who aren't controling all their actions and getting all these "so called" benefits of racism.
DLW, maybe your "basses" should have spoken a little clearer | | Back to Top | | |
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Laplace
Registered Member
Date Joined Apr 2003
Total Posts : 138
| Posted 12/11/2003 12:47 PM (GMT -6) | | Excuse my slight irritation, but what is the point of this question?
However, I will say that there is a theory that there are 3 primary races analogous to 3 primary colors which all subsequent races are divided: Caucasoid (White), Negroid (Black), and Mongloid (Yellow/Asian).
For example, Native Americans might be a mix of Mongloid with Negroid, with a touch of Caucasoid. People in India have Negroid skin and hair, yet a facial structure much like Caucasoid.
It's also interesting that according to Genesis, only 8 people were saved from the flood and repopulated the earth. Noah, his wife, his THREE sons, and their wives. Hmmm.
"I say we blast the meatbag, Master" -HK-47, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic | | Back to Top | | |
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quest for truth
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 479
| Posted 1/10/2004 7:40 AM (GMT -6) | | yodorquote:
So, I guess the next question is, Do we have a race problem in America?
S.B.G quote:
In some ways it has more to do with differing cultures than skin color
BBBCanada quote:
there was some "racism" by the upper class white folks against the "poor white trash"
What is a stronger problem race or culture?
I believe cultural barriers present a heavier problem in America then race and it works on all sides. The majority tend to stay within their comfort zone instead of trying to learn ways of communicating and interacting on a personal basis with those of differing cultures. Let's face it -- it's a lot of work! My bias is that most people do as little work as possible in really understanding different cultures. Perhaps a big reason for this is due to there not being enough education in this area.
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quest for truth
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 479
| Posted 1/11/2004 5:33 PM (GMT -6) | | quote:
As a white person, however, I DO see myself as both part of the problem -- and part of the solution -- to "race" problems.
And the solution, despite our differences, is to LOVE. Love tears down barriers and walls even when we come from very different backgrouds, cultures, races... The more we choose to love the less we will notice. | | Back to Top | | |
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BBBCanada
Registered Member
Date Joined Jun 2001
Total Posts : 2763
| Posted 1/12/2004 6:57 AM (GMT -6) | | quote:
Originally posted by DLWAbe did care about African-Americans, surprisingly so since he came from a very racist background. Initially, the Civil War was fought primarily to keept the Union together. He was initially in favor of freeing the slaves with some compensation for their former owners and then shipping them back to Africa, primarily because he knew how pervasive racism was in the US and how difficult it would be for them after being freed.
The important thing is that his views changed as he deliberated on the Civil War and its purpose. I recommend the book, "Lincoln's Virtues" or Mark Noll's reflections in "America's God" on the theological reflections of Abraham Lincoln during the war. I wouldn't trust a revisionary southern interpretation of Abraham Lincoln.
dlw
Yes, "aye do believe" you are correct here saaar. In "Abraham Lincoln and a New Birth of Freedom" Howard Jones (from the southern University of Alabama) explores the relationship between President Lincoln's wartime diplomacy and his interrelated goals of forming a more perfect Union and abolishing slavery. At the outset of the Civil War, Lincoln's central purpose was to save the Union by defeating the South on the battlefield. But he also wanted to prevent a European intervention that would have facilitated the South's move for independence. Lincoln's goal of preserving the Union, however, soon evolved into an effort to form "a more perfect Union", one that rested on the natural rights principles of the Declaration of Independence and thus necessitated emancipation.
I was highlighting Lincoln's earlier thinking and possibly got it mixed up with his later thinking. My bad.
Brandon
"Corporations are simply the kind of structure that rises when hordes of people need to be managed, and after spending some time in a large church, I've found that our spirituality does not exempt us from these inefficient and dehumanizing practices."--Steve Lansingh's review of "The Office" at The Film Form | | Back to Top | | |
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fyodor
Registered Member
Date Joined Dec 2002
Total Posts : 179
| Posted 1/12/2004 12:55 PM (GMT -6) | | Wow, I haven't been around here in a while and was shocked to see this one sparked up again.
Here is the gist of why I asked the question....
I've been trying to engage in discouse with folks from different ethnic backgrounds than myself lately on the topic of racial healing/reconciliation whatever ya want to call it...
Increasingly, I find that there is a hurdle in the conversation that consists of this: White folks want to frame the conversation by saying "race doesn't exist" "I don't see you as black, I see you as human."
Well....I've found this to be a stab in the back for many black folks who find race to be very real. Race is not a myth. It is a human construct of categorization in which we apply worth to people based on skin tone.
So when some black folks hear that some white folks don't believe in race, it has a tendency to stop a somewhat hopeful conversation dead in its tracks. That is, to suggest that I (being caucasion) don't believe in race can be detrimental to my friends of other ethnicities who in a very real way, experience what we've come to call racism. If I don't believe myself to be a part of a race while desiring to be in a racial healing/reconciliation conversation, it can send me back two steps.
I'll agree that essentially we're all human 99.whatever percent the same, but the social construct of race is very real and not a myth pure and simple.
Iconoclast
No it does not. Martin Luther King wanted a society that was color blind. Do you agree with his vision or do you think it is better to have a society that is very sensitive to differences based on race?
Fyodor-
Absolutely. I would love to be a part of a color blind society, but I think that is were we want to end up, not start. I would suggest that starting from the position that race doesn't exist makes the dialogue towards a colorblind society quite difficult.
I'm just throwing this outthere, but I think the "problem of race" can only go away through dialogue, repentance, forgiveness...But to start from the colorblind perspective limits the dialogue, repentance, forgiveness that is needed to get there.
†††"One rarely finds an exposition of which it holds true that the exposition is that which is expounded." – S. Kierkegaard | | Back to Top | | |
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GregBoyd
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 1818
| Posted 1/12/2004 6:18 PM (GMT -6) | | Fydor: Race is not a myth. It is a human construct of categorization in which we apply worth to people based on skin tone.
Doc: A human construct of categorization and valuation is exactly what most authors mean by saying it is a myth. The original concept of race was not that it was a human construct but that it reflected historical and empirical realities -- three different origins of human (like) beings... with caucations, of course, on the top.
Fyodor: to suggest that I (being caucasion) don't believe in race can be detrimental to my friends of other ethnicities who in a very real way, experience what we've come to call racism.
Doc: To not believe in "race" is doesn't mean one doesn't believe in racism. To the contrary, its the lynch pin of (in the words of a recent book) Dismantling Racism. What people of color often object to is Whites saying they are "color blind"... they just see people, not phenotypes. This can be a cheap way of bypass real life issues of racism. But to acknowledge differences, and acknowledge ongoing racial realities, and acknowledge historical atrocities, is not to "believe in race." For one of the atrocities is the concept of race itself.
Fyodor: but the social construct of race is very real and not a myth pure and simple.
Doc: Sounds like your saying "the myth is real." Absolutely, which is why its important we STOP BELIEVING IN IT and thereby giving it credibility.
Blessings
"The responsibility is with the chooser -- God is blameless." Plato, Republic, 10. | | Back to Top | | |
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fyodor
Registered Member
Date Joined Dec 2002
Total Posts : 179
| Posted 1/12/2004 8:20 PM (GMT -6) | | Doc: A human construct of categorization and valuation is exactly what most authors mean by saying it is a myth. The original concept of race was not that it was a human construct but that it reflected historical and empirical realities -- three different origins of human (like) beings... with caucations, of course, on the top.
Fyodor: Hmmm...To my understanding, the concept of race long predates the mongloid, caucasoid, negroid and sometimes australoid classifications of race. The social distinction based on physical or genetic traits appears throughout human history, while the classification into the three sub-species being only a (relatively) recent development in human history.
Doc: To not believe in "race" is doesn't mean one doesn't believe in racism.
Fyodor: Correct, poor word choice on my part (believe).
Doc: Sounds like your saying "the myth is real." Absolutely, which is why its important we STOP BELIEVING IN IT and thereby giving it credibility.
Fyodor: Right, I guess framing race in terms of myth or reality matters very little as long as we operate from the acknowlegement that whether race is a social or scientific concept, the "racial realities" that stem from this problematic concept are indeed real and sometimes that acknowledgement forces a primary discussion by which we engender ourselves as part of a race to acknowledge that we are indeed somewhat trapped inside that race problem trying to work our way out. I can consider myself to be outside of the "racial construct" all I want, but as long as someone else operates from within and suggests that I am of any particular race, than in order to further the discussion either I have to first convince the other person that race doesn't exist, or the other person has to convince me that race does exist. Otherwise the possibility is there that the conversation is at a stand-off from the outset and we are indeed inside the "racial construct."
†††"One rarely finds an exposition of which it holds true that the exposition is that which is expounded." – S. Kierkegaard | | Back to Top | | |
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quest for truth
Registered Member
Date Joined Jul 2001
Total Posts : 479
| Posted 1/13/2004 6:02 AM (GMT -6) | | Any prejudice or segregation at this point, in my opinion, is much more about culture than race. Name someone who is of a particular race pure and true. Most people have several blood lines in them at this point in history -- is there really such a thing as race or is it more culture?
I think of myself as belonging to a particular cultural group MUCH more than I do to a particular race. I am a mixed breed. | | Back to Top | | |
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