• NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Have you studied why such things are in place? I mean I know why affirmative action in the beginning was in place?

    It seems to me that any law or provision that favors some races to the exclusion of others is both racist and systemic.
  • Kenosha Kid
    3.2k
    There is very little genetic difference between chimps and humans, yet their seems to a larger difference in morphology and physiology, even psychologically.Harry Hindu

    The physiological differences between a human and a chimp are small compared to the physiological differences between a human and a cockroach or a human and a blade of grass or a human and a rock. But those small physiological differences have a huge behavioural and social impact.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    While I understand why people may fall for folk wisdom on race, what makes me suspicious is when they cling to it after it's been debunked. Race essentialism is built on such flimsy foundations, it can be utterly obliterated in a couple of simple 20-minute videos. And the existence of systemic racism can be established by looking at one or two studies. If you want to plant a flag somewhere, find some solid ground at least.
  • Anaxagoras
    433
    It seems to me that any law or provision that favors some races to the exclusion of others is both racist and systemic.NOS4A2

    Laws have been doing that for centuries and decades in the United States which is why there is an economic gap between whites and blacks. For example, the only reason why certain minority groups that migrate to the United States and are successful is because of the civil rights campaign. So not only minorities were fighting for equality they were still left behind and even after amendments and equitable provisions have passed, black Americans still found themselves behind.

    This is ultimately why affirmative action existed to at least in part tried to close the gap by providing equitable opportunities that wasn’t fairly provided before.
  • Anaxagoras
    433
    Again, systemic racism does not mean that all cops are racist or there are explicitly racist rules in place in government bureaucracies or that white people don't also suffer from the failings of certain systems. It does mean that certain systems function in a way (often despite explicit intent) to disfavour communities of colour.Baden

    And I believe this hits the nail on the head. However, during the downtime at work I’ll be glad to look over your links. I’m sure there is some very good information there.
  • Harry Hindu
    5.1k
    The past sometimes leads to the present, hence is why civil rights movement existed. Hence is why we have modified laws in the Jim Crow era to make it equitable for all people in the present. However this doesn't change the fact that their stories are very important to remember.Anaxagoras
    Yes, their stories are important to remember, not to be projected into the present as if they are still happening today.

    My parents and grand-parents have passed on due to cancer and other ailments so I cannot show you anything. I've experienced racism myself. I've also experienced racial profiling. Of course the level of racism I've experienced is incomparable to what my parents and grand-parents experienced.Anaxagoras
    Maybe, but I've experienced racism too. How do you know that the level of racism I've experienced isn't comparable to what you have experienced?

    Ok and where in my post have I done this?Anaxagoras
    Here:
    Not to mention who is killed more per capita (see:https://www.statista.com/chart/21872/map-of-police-violence-against-black-americans/).Anaxagoras
    Are you not using statistics of cops killing blacks as evidence that all cops are racist, or at least most of them are? If not, then what exactly are you trying to show when providing these stats, while at the same time ignoring the context of those stats - as in blacks committing crimes at a higher rate relative to their population than other racial groups.

    Where are the stats showing that doctors are allowing more blacks to die in the emergency room than whites? Where are the stats of teachers giving lower grades to blacks than whites? And what would be the causes of these stats? You are assuming your conclusion if you claim that everytime a black and white person come into conflict it has to be because of racism. Instead of looking at each case individually, you automattically assert your conclusion - that racism is the cause of each and every instance where a black person was killed by a white cop. That is illogical.

    While I understand why people may fall for folk wisdom on race, what makes me suspicious is when they cling to it after it's been debunked.Baden

    What makes me suspicious is when people cling to the idea that certain ideas have been debunked. Sure, humans have a wide range of varying features, but some features only occur with certain other features. Genetic drift and kinship selection are real, natural processes.

    It is BLM and people like you that are still focused on race because you keep using circular reasoning in assuming your conclusion (that cops are racist) to support your claim that the actions of cops are racist.

    Why wasn't anyone marching in the streets after just one white person was killed,
    — Harry Hindu

    You'd have to ask the Caucasian community.
    Anaxagoras
    Excuse me? Who's focused on race again?

    Black Lives Matter specifically focuses on the issues regarding injustice in relation to police brutality and the issues concerning the lack of transparency in police conduct in relation to communities of color.Anaxagoras
    Then BLM used the wrong name for their institution. It implies that All Black Lives Matter, but then you just explained that it doesn't mean that, so it is more of a political agenda than a movement to actually save black lives.

    While nearly twice as many white Americans were killed by on-duty officers than blacks, the Post’s updated data showed, black Americans remained 2.5 times as likely to die at the hands of police when adjusting for population.Anaxagoras
    Here are some stats that put your stats into context, which is what you seem to have been trying to avoid for awhile now.
    https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-3.xls

    https://ucr.fbi.gov/hate-crime/2018/topic-pages/offenders

    As you can see, blacks kill more than twice as any whites as whites kill blacks. Blacks make up more than 24% of hate crimes commited when only 13% of the population. If you want to use stats to show racism, there you go.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    It is BLM and people like you that are still focused on race because you keep using circular reasoning in assuming your conclusion (that cops are racist) to support your claim that the actions of cops are racist.Harry Hindu

    Again, systemic racism does not mean that all cops are racistBaden

    If you just want to repeat the same strawmen over and over, there's no need to reply to my posts. All cops are not racist, but some are. That's obvious and something every rational interlocutor here agrees on. Besides which, it has virtually no bearing on the existence of systemic racism, the topic of this discussion.

    What makes me suspicious is when people cling to the idea that certain ideas have been debunked. Sure, humans have a wide range of varying features, but some features only occur with certain other features. Genetic drift and kinship selection are real, natural processes.Harry Hindu

    What ideas do you think have been falsely debunked? What does it have to do with race? And what is your evidence for it? So far, you give the impression of being an ignoramus with regards to the issue of genetics and "race". So, now is your chance to prove you're not. Lay out in scientific terms exactly what you are trying to say. If you can't or won't, we'll be justified in drawing the conclusion you have no idea what you are talking about.
  • Harry Hindu
    5.1k
    Again, systemic racism does not mean that all cops are racistBaden
    Then all you have done is show what systemic racism isn't when I've been asking for what it is. You haven't shown the existence of systemic racism at all. You've only shown that there are some bad apples in law enforcement. No one is disagreeing with that. What we are disagreeing on is your terminology.

    If you want to keep bringing up history, then that doesn't cut the cake, as I am asking for examples of systemic racism today, and to bring up history is to ignore that if the roles were reversed - that if blacks were the more technologically advanced than whites - then whites would have been slaves, as if blacks aren't subject to the same errors in thinking as others are, and that it is wrong to give special treatment to anyone because of the color of their skin. As such, affirmative action is a good example of systemic racism. So, I might actually agree that systemic racism exists, just coming from the other side now as the pendulum swings. We need to stop the pendulum from swinging so that it becomes stationary in the middle.

    If blacks are more likely to be killed by other blacks because they interact more with blacks, then why is it not the same thing for blacks being killed by cops at a higher rate relative to their population? If blacks commit more crimes relative to their population, then they will encounter cops at a higher rate relative to their population. It's the same logic, but you aren't applying it consistently.

    Here are some examples of how this conversation can actually be had in a rational way, not the way it has been done here with a lack of intellectual honesty and consistency.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IFqVNPwsLNo
    At 21:55 is where Rubin and Elder begin talking about racism.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8C-VrsK93GE
    Here Coleman Hughs agrees that the problem is systemic corruption in law enforcement, not necessarily racism.

    It still stands that the bills being circulated in Congress have no language in them that provides special treatment to blacks. They are bills limiting the powers of the police against all races, not just one race. They are treating everyone as equal victims of police brutality and corruption.

    What ideas do you think have been falsely debunked? What does it have to do with race? And what is your evidence for it? So far, you give the impression of being an ignoramus with regards to the issue of genetics and "race". So, now is your chance to prove you're not. Lay out in scientific terms exactly what you are trying to say. If you can't or won't, we'll be justified in drawing the conclusion you have no idea what you are talking about.Baden
    You mean to claim that you know what you are talking about but don't know what genetic drift and kin selection is? How do we know that the person in fdrake's video knows what they are talking about? What are their credentials on the subject? If the person never mentioned those terms that I did, then I wonder if they actually know what they are talking about.

    And it still stands that it is people like you that are playing the race card, by assuming that every instance of blacks being killed by cops is an instance of racism. It is you that keep inserting race where it isn't necessarily so. So if races don't exist, then why are you contradicting yourself by bringing race into an event where race might not have been the cause. You have to have good evidence that it does, and to provide that evidence you'd have to know what the cop was thinking at the moment.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    Then all you have done is show what systemic racism isn't when I've been asking for what it is.Harry Hindu

    Wrong again, I gave an explanation of it earlier in the thread. If you were interested in reading instead of.. whatever it is you are doing here, you'd know that. And if you don't know what systemic racism is now, you must not want to know.

    You mean to claim that you know what you are talking about but don't know what genetic drift and kin selection is? How do we know that the person in fdrake's video knows what they are talking about? What are their credentials on the subject? If the person never mentioned those terms that I did, then I wonder if they actually know what they are talking about.Harry Hindu

    Yes, I know what they are and I think you know I do but are playing some silly game here. Apart from having a basic knowledge of these things, I studied genetics and evolution in university and have a related degree. Now stop the bluffing and man up. What is your scientific argument? Where are your references? What are your objections to what's in the video? You haven't even told us that. You come across as not having any substance behind your rhetoric. Prove me wrong.

    And it still stands that it is people like you that are playing the race card, by assuming that every instance of blacks being killed by cops is an instance of racism.Harry Hindu

    I literally just dealt with this type of objection and pointed out it was a strawman in the last post. And yet you insist on repeating it. So, again, every instance of a black person being killed by cops does not have to be racist nor does every cop have to be racist for systemic racism to obtain. Please tattoo that on your forehead and look in the mirror before responding to any more of my posts.
  • Harry Hindu
    5.1k
    Wrong again, I gave an explanation of it earlier in the thread. If you were interested in reading instead of.. whatever it is you are doing here, you'd know that. And if you don't know what systemic racism is now, you must not want to know.Baden
    You didn't have a problem posting a link to fdrake's post with the videos, but you can't seem to do the same thing when it comes to your definition of "systemic racism". Why are you being so evasive?

    Did you even bother watching the videos I posted in the previous post? If blacks are disagreeing that systemic racism exists, then how do you explain that? Just as theists need to explain the existences of atheists who don't see the existence of god as obvious, you need to explain why blacks disagree that the existence of systemic racism isn't obvious. If you don't know what god is, then you must not want to know. :roll: See how stupid that argument is?

    I literally just dealt with this type of objection and pointed out it was a strawman in the last post. And yet you insist on repeating it. So, again, every instance of a black person being killed by cops does not have to be racist nor does every cop have to be racist for systemic racism to obtain. Please tattoo that on your forehead and look in the mirror before responding to any more of my posts.Baden
    Your objection was to disqualify the existence of systemic racism as put forth by Anaxagoras in their post that you "liked". If not all cops are racist, then why did you "like" Anaxagoras's post that had a link showing the rate at which cops kill blacks vs whites, as if that shows systemic racism in law enforcement? Such statistics don't show racism, so then why like posts that have links showing such statistics? :roll: I'm waiting on your definition of "systemic racism". Did Rubin define it properly in the video I posted a link to? As Rubin attempted to define each instance of systemic racism, Larry Elder debunked each one.

    Yes, I know what they are and I think you know I do but are playing some silly game here. Apart from having a basic knowledge of these things, I studied genetics and evolution in university and have a related degree. Now stop the bluffing and man up. What is your scientific argument? Where are your references? What are your objections to what's in the video? You haven't even told us that. You come across as not having any substance behind your rhetoric. Prove me wrong.Baden
    I asked for the credentials of the person that made the videos in fdrake's post, but you failed to do that. If you have a degree, then I don't understand why you're using videos by someone who you can't verify as having a degree in lieu of your own explanation when you do have a degree.

    The fact that you think I am playing silly games just goes to show that you aren't going to take my explanation seriously. But I'll give it a go anyway, at least for the more reasonable people on this forum.

    First, what determines what, or who, you are? Your genes? Philosophical discussions on this topic seem to disagree on what exactly defines you as you. So to assert that genetics determines your "you" seems to have some philosophical implications that not everyone agrees with.

    Even if we give you that genes determine who or what you are. There are still genetic differences between the races, thanks to genetic drift. You might claim that the differences are small - genetically - but to the eyes, the macro-expression of those genes, the differences seem much larger. That has an effect on kin selection. If the genetic differences are only skin deep and our genetic similarities lie under our skin as in our bodily systems (we all have hearts, lungs, brains, blood clotting, etc.,) those qualities don't play a role at all in kin selection, and how those differences become pronounced over time.

    Some of the research I have found indicates that neanderthals and homo sapiens mated, even though they are different species. What is the genetic differences between homo sapiens and neanderthals compared to the genetic differences of human races? If neanderthals and humans are categorized as different species, and they are able to mate, and their genetic differences are minimal, then what does that say about the genetic differences in human races?

    The stats I have found is that neanderthals share as much as 99.7% DNA as homo sapiens. If that difference qualifies as a difference in species, then what benchmark qualifies as a difference in races? If there are differences at all in the frequency of certain alleles within certain geographical groups, and those alleles are expressed only on the outside as in skin color, hair type, facial structures, etc. (AND those differences occur together, ie Asians, blacks and whites aren't simply defined by the color of their skin, but their hair type and facial features as well - skin color alone doesn't determine your race), then that small genetic difference will have a large impact on psychology and behavior, as in kin selection.

    I guess it depends on which size scale of reality you want to focus on that determines what makes you you and me different from you - genes or the macro expressions of those genes and their impact on behaviors like kin selection.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    You didn't have a problem posting a link to fdrake's post with the videos, but you can't seem to do the same thing when it comes to your definition of "systemic racism"Harry Hindu

    It's on page one of the thread, so I expected you would find it yourself. In any case, here it is and it's in line with the standard definition.

    Systemic racism obtains when a system(s) function (regardless of explicit rules) to favour certain racial groups over others. It doesn't require overt individual racists (though it may protect and even reward them) nor does it necessarily require any conscious acts of racism at all (and obversely you could have conscious acts of racism in a system where no systemic racism exists, only rather than being performative of the system, they would be antithetical to it). Systems are culturally contextual, they're embedded in cultures and how they function depends on their relationship to the culture they're in. So, often it's what the system allows rather than what the system demands that's important. E.g. if you've got a justice or policing system embedded in a culture that's only recently emerged from the acceptance of explicitly institutionalised racism, you need extremely strong safeguards to avoid the continuance of implicit racism in whatever ostensibly non-racist institutions are substituted. Not having those safeguards in place means the explicit racism of before doesn't just disappear but finds footholds in the new institutions and festers there looking for opportunities to express itself.

    Systemic racism occurs in all areas of social life, policing, housing, education etc. And again, it's not primarily about explicitly racist acts or explicitly racist policies or legislation but how things work in practice to disadvantage communities of color. Here's an example relating to housing.

    https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/race/reports/2019/08/07/472617/systemic-inequality-displacement-exclusion-segregation/

    "For much of the 20th century households of color were systematically excluded from federal homeownership programs, and government officials largely stood by as predatory lenders stripped them of wealth and stability.

    In the decades preceding the Fair Housing Act, government policies led many white Americans to believe that residents of color were a threat to local property values. For example, real estate professionals across the country who sought to maximize profits by leveraging this fear convinced white homeowners that Black families were moving in nearby and offered to buy their homes at a discount. These “blockbusters” would then sell the properties to Black families—who had limited access to FHA loans or GI Bill benefits—at marked-up prices and interest rates. Moreover, these homes were often purchased on contracts, rather than traditional mortgages, allowing real estate professionals to evict Black families if they missed even one payment and then repeat the process with other Black families.57 During this period, in Chicago alone, more than 8 in 10 Black homes were purchased on contract rather than a standard mortgage, resulting in cumulative losses of up to $4 billion. Blockbusting and contract buying were just two of several discriminatory wealth-stripping practices that lawmakers permitted in the U.S. housing system."

    Most likely, as with you, objections to the existence of systemic racism turn on a misunderstanding of what it is. As if it's just the type of claim that police are racist or police departments have racist policies. That's really not it. It's usually far subtler than that and, for being so, all the more pernicious.
    Baden
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    Laws have been doing that for centuries and decades in the United States which is why there is an economic gap between whites and blacks. For example, the only reason why certain minority groups that migrate to the United States and are successful is because of the civil rights campaign. So not only minorities were fighting for equality they were still left behind and even after amendments and equitable provisions have passed, black Americans still found themselves behind.

    This is ultimately why affirmative action existed to at least in part tried to close the gap by providing equitable opportunities that wasn’t fairly provided before..

    Racist policies, whether “positive” or “negative”, are wrong and for the same reason. They discriminate on the grounds of race.

    I think it could be argued that individuals who suffered through systemic racism (by that I mean racial policy) may deserve some recompense, even if it is in the form of better opportunity. But that cannot be argued for those who never suffered through such policy, and I do not think it can be shown that everyone of that skin-color suffered through such policy.
  • 180 Proof
    15.3k
    Happy hour on the occassion of the 155th Emancipation Day (U.S.), some sounds of a lusty free spirit breaking chains:

    "How will it end?
    Ain't got no friend.
    The only sin
    Is in my skin"

    https://youtu.be/qN5lrj01DoE

    :death: solitaire et ...

    sometimes, though, my blues can kiss my jazz -

    composed in honor of the
    COngress for
    Racial
    Equality ... "The Core"

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=nljvdRWsfG4

    :flower: solidaire

    FUNK it!

    https://youtu.be/UbkqE4fpvdI

    :fire:

    We invented the blues; Europeans invented psychoanalysis. You invent what you need. — Albert Murray

    ... addendum: Murica. :eyes:
  • Harry Hindu
    5.1k
    It's on page one of the thread, so I expected you would find it yourself. In any case, here it is and it's in line with the standard definition.Baden
    I didn't see this as a definition because it is just as vague as your other explanations. You even admit at the end that it is subtle.

    You give an example on housing from last century. What about policing? You said that not all cops are necessarily racist, yet you claim that systemic racism occurs in policing. How is that not a contradiction? Give concrete examples.

    As for race not being a biological reality, I found some interesting tidbits from actual evolutionary biologists. Jerry Coyne writes in his book, Why Evolution is True:

    Traveling around the globe, you quickly see that humans from different places look different. Nobody, for example, would mistake a Japanese for a Finn. The existence of visibly different human types is obvious, but there’s no bigger minefield in human biology than the question of race. Most biologists stay as far away from it as they can. A look at the history of science tells us why. From the beginning of modern biology, racial classification has gone hand in hand with racial prejudice. In his eighteenth-century classification of animals, Carl Linnaeus noted that Europeans are “governed by laws,” Asians “governed by opinions,” and Africans “governed by caprice.” In his superb book The Mismeasure of Man, Stephen Jay Gould documents the unholy connection between biologists and race in the last century.

    In response to these distasteful episodes of racism, some scientists have overreacted, arguing that human races have no biological reality and are merely sociopolitical “constructs” that don’t merit scientific study. But to biologists, race—so long as it doesn’t apply to humans!—has always been a perfectly respectable term. Races (also called “subspecies” or “ecotypes”) are simply populations of a species that are both geographically separated and differ genetically in one or more traits. There are plenty of animal and plant races, including those mouse populations that differ only in coat color, sparrow populations that differ in size and song, and plant races that differ in the shape of their leaves.
    Following this definition, Homo sapiens clearly does have races. And the fact that we do is just another indication that humans don’t differ from other evolved species.

    The existence of different races in humans shows that our populations were geographically separated long enough to allow some genetic divergence to occur. But how much divergence, and does it fit with what the fossils indicate about our spread from Africa? And what kind of selection drove those differences?
    — Jerry Coyne

    And here is a link to his blog where he discusses it more:
    https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2012/02/28/are-there-human-races/

    And a sit-down discussion with Rubin:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EAH2qOFHggE

    And here is another article written by Patrick Whittle who has a PhD in philosophy and is a freelance writer with a particular interest in the social and political implications of modern biological science.
    https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2019/02/13/genetics-and-race-how-do-we-have-this-awkward-conversation/

    Here is another article showing how the founder effect can lead to genetic drift. When a population of humans left Africa, genetic drift set in. This is actually evidence for the "out of Africa" theory.
    https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/which-population-is-most-genetically-distant-from-africans

    So it seems to me that you are clinging to the idea that race as a biological reality has been debunked.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    You said that not all cops are necessarily racist, yet you claim that systemic racism occurs in policing. How is that not a contradiction? Give concrete examples.Harry Hindu

    Because there's nothing contradictory about it. If you see a contradiction, you still don't understand what systemic racism is. I don't know what the block is here. And I already did give a concrete example from policing just on the previous page.

    "African Americans are far more likely to be arrested for petty crimes." Here's just one study demonstrating that "a black person more than 3 1/2 times more likely to be arrested for possession [of marijuana] than a white person, even though rates of usage are similar."

    https://www.aclu.org/report/tale-two-countries-racially-targeted-arrests-era-marijuana-reform
    Baden

    So, maybe you can explain why black people being more likely to be arrested for petty crimes necessitates all cops being racist?

    As for your apparent race realism, I've been debunking a biological basis for the folk notion of race. And I am right because there is none. There is no biological basis for a division of humans into "Black", "White", "Asian" etc. What there is is genetic variation among populations, including within and across folk racial groups. And that's explained in your own Whittle link above.

    "...it is important to distinguish between the word ‘race’ as it is socially used — say, the Black/African American, Native American, White, etc. racial categories used in the US census — from the biological sense, used to describe distinct populations within a species.

    ...the idea of an overarching ‘Black’ race utterly fails to capture the genetic diversity of African (or African-descended) peoples, irrespective of how we are now able to distinguish genetically related groups within the wider human population of Africa."

    https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2019/02/13/genetics-and-race-how-do-we-have-this-awkward-conversation/

    What Whittle misses, maybe as he's not a biologist or geneticist but is more interested in promoting free speech, is that we have, to replace "race", the concepts of haplogroups, clines, and demes, which are much more accurate and useful when talking about variations between human populations and don't carry the confusing baggage of folk notions of race, not to mention the taxonomical baggage of races being equated with subspecies etc. There are no subspecies of humans, there is one human race. And race essentialism is pseudoscience.

    "Social conceptions and groupings of races vary over time, involving folk taxonomies that define essential types of individuals based on perceived traits. Scientists consider biological essentialism obsolete"

    "all living humans belong to the same species, Homo sapiens, and ... subspecies, Homo sapiens sapiens."

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_(human_categorization)

    Again, from your other link, a quote demonstrating how the folk notion of race has no basis in biological reality:

    "In some ways all non-Africans can be thought of as a subset of the genetic variation of Africans. Those humans who reside outside of Africa are simply a diversified branch of Africans."

    https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/which-population-is-most-genetically-distant-from-africans

    Do you read your own links?

    So, it's all there even in your own material. Race essentialism is bunk. Race realism is bunk. And folk notions of race have no special biological significance but are social constructs. If you still don't get it, consider the following short conversation in which A is a shade realist and B is not.

    A: There are two shades of blue, dark blue and light blue.
    B: OK, but that's just an arbitrary cultural judgement with no basis in science.
    A: No it's not. Due to colour drift, the difference in wavelength between an average dark blue and an average light blue is absolutely discernible.
    B: Yeah, I know about colour drift, but colours vary on a continuum. Like I said, your division is arbitrary.
    A: No, no, no, watch this Dave Rubin video, he explains everything!

    Anyone who mentions genetic drift as support for the idea of the folk notion of races (rather than for variation among populations not coextensive with such folk notions) sounds as silly as A above. And it's a very close analogy only that we're not dealing with a perfectly smooth continuum but maybe 300 different groups. So, objectively if you absolutely must use the term 'race', you could say that there are either 300 races or 1 (as per @fdrake's video). All other divisions are arbitrary and trying to make them line up with folk notions of race as race realists try to do is not a scientific endeavour but an ideological one. And that ideology is called racism.

    Anyway, this is not the subject of the thread and as race realism is racist pseudoscience, I'm not going to give it any further oxygen here.

    "Scientific racism, sometimes termed biological racism, is a pseudoscientific belief that empirical evidence exists to support or justify racism (racial discrimination), racial inferiority, or racial superiority. Historically, scientific racism received credence throughout the scientific community, but it is no longer considered scientific."

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

    Back on topic>> systemic racism.
  • Anaxagoras
    433
    But that cannot be argued for those who never suffered through such policy, and I do not think it can be shown that everyone of that skin-color suffered through such policy.NOS4A2

    What about though of us who suffer from the residual effects of such policies?
  • Anaxagoras
    433
    Are you not using statistics of cops killing blacks as evidence that all cops are racist, or at least most of them are?Harry Hindu

    No. Actually it is to demonstrate that blacks are targeted and that there exist racial bias in policing citizens.

    How do you know that the level of racism I've experienced isn't comparable to what you have experienced?Harry Hindu

    Pray tell share your story

    Where are the stats showing that doctors are allowing more blacks to die in the emergency room than whites?Harry Hindu

    Are you talking about racial bias in the healthcare field? There is research on that.

    You are assuming your conclusion if you claim that everytime a black and white person come into conflict it has to be because of racism.Harry Hindu

    Nope. Never said that nor implied.

    Then BLM used the wrong name for their institution. It implies that All Black Lives Matter, but then you just explained that it doesn't mean that, so it is more of a political agenda than a movement to actually save black lives.Harry Hindu

    Apparently you are unaware that BLM is beyond the nationalism that many right-wing think tanks believe it to be.
  • DingoJones
    2.8k
    What about though of us who suffer from the residual effects of such policies?Anaxagoras

    Then we call that “residual effects of those policies”, not “systemic racism”. If you are suffering from a policy, we change it. If you are suffering from the consequences of history then you do what everyone else does when history has done them a disservice. Calling it systemic racism drastically alters the problem and shifts the response to, perhaps coincidently perhaps not, unjustified social/political control. Race doesnt really matter to anyone except the minorities of racists and people who think everyone is a racist. Everyone else gets it, race is mostly irrelevant.
  • NOS4A2
    9.2k


    What about though of us who suffer from the residual effects of such policies?

    Which effects of which policies?
  • Harry Hindu
    5.1k
    "African Americans are far more likely to be arrested for petty crimes." Here's just one study demonstrating that "a black person more than 3 1/2 times more likely to be arrested for possession [of marijuana] than a white person, even though rates of usage are similar."Baden
    Legalize marijuana. :cool: Problem solved.

    Anyway this is just more generalizations, as if there aren't black cops arresting blacks. What percentage of cops are targeting blacks? If you're willing to admit that the stats aren't reflective of all police, then what percentage of cops are targeting blacks? What percentage would qualify as systemic racism? How do you distinguish between a small percentage of individual cops targeting blacks on their own vs. systemic racism? It seems like you are unwilling to make that distinction. Pockets of racism still exist but that doesn't mean that it's systemic. We have laws against racism, just as we have laws against rape, but we still have some racists and some rapists. It doesn't mean that racism and raping are systemic.

    So you need to show what percentage were white cops, and how many blacks vs whites each one arrested. If we end up showing that only a small percentage of cops were arresting more blacks does that still mean that racism is systemic or that we simply still have some individuals are racist, like we still have individuals that are rapists? Does it even mean that the reasons that more blacks are being arrested could only be racism?

    Do we know how many of these arrests were simply for possession, or selling it, or tied to gang activity, or that marijuana possession was in addition to other charges that they were being arrested, or stopped, for? It seems like you're unwilling to ask these pertinent questions about these stats. Using stats that don't take into account other relevant information is typically spinning stats to support your assumptions, as if racism is the only cause of each and every black person being arrested for marijuana. Any time stats on blacks being arrested at higher rates without also showing that blacks commit crimes at higher rates is an endeavour in intellectual dishonesty.

    It's the same logic used to show that blacks being murdered by other blacks is because of the close proximity of other blacks. Well, when you're committing crimes at higher rates, then you're going to be exposed to bad cop decisions at higher rates, not necessarily racism. Again, you keep assuming your conclusion - as if every stat you show is indicative of racism being the only possible explanation for the stats.

    There are no subspecies of humans,Baden
    Then you're basically saying that humans are somehow special.
    So, it's all there even in your own material. Race essentialism is bunk.Baden
    Not if you read and watch Jerry Coyne, which you didn't address at all. I will also take issue with your interpretation of the content of the other links in just a moment, but let's look at what Coyne has defined race as:
    Races (also called “subspecies” or “ecotypes”) are simply populations of a species that are both geographically separated and differ genetically in one or more traits. There are plenty of animal and plant races, including those mouse populations that differ only in coat color, sparrow populations that differ in size and song, and plant races that differ in the shape of their leaves.
    Following this definition, Homo sapiens clearly does have races. And the fact that we do is just another indication that humans don’t differ from other evolved species.
    — Jerry Coyne
    So there are two qualifiers here: being geographically isolated and differing genetically in one or more traits.

    Humans were geographically isolated for thousands of years once they moved out of Africa. They began to diverge genetically, but even 100,000 or so years isn't long enough in evolutionary time to diverge too much, but still enough to where certain alleles became more prominent in certain groups as opposed to other groups.

    It is believed that early Europeans mated with neanderthals, which is categorized as a different species, with a 0.3% difference between them and homo sapiens. If this is the case, then there are certain groups of humans that have more neanderthal DNA than other groups, which counts as a genetic difference and is geographically isolated from Africa and Asia.

    Coyne goes on to say in his blog that I linked:
    Under that criterion, are there human races?

    Yes. As we all know, there are morphologically different groups of people who live in different areas, though those differences are blurring due to recent innovations in transportation that have led to more admixture between human groups.
    — Jerry Coyne
    So while we used to be geographically isolated, we are no longer isolated like we used to be, but most of us still live our lives in our communities we were born in, mating with those within our community.

    The lines are beginning to blur, and eventually there won't be races as Coyne has defined them, unless some of us move to Mars and lose contact with Earth for 100,000 or more years.

    The quotes you took from Whittle:
    "...it is important to distinguish between the word ‘race’ as it is socially used — say, the Black/African American, Native American, White, etc. racial categories used in the US census — from the biological sense, used to describe distinct populations within a species.

    ...the idea of an overarching ‘Black’ race utterly fails to capture the genetic diversity of African (or African-descended) peoples, irrespective of how we are now able to distinguish genetically related groups within the wider human population of Africa."
    Baden
    You don't see that he is making the distinction between the socially used word and the biological one? They are two separate things. One is "folk" and the other a biological reality. One is racist/xenophobic while the other is scientific, and science isn't in the business of assigning values to those differences. Cultures do that.

    Your quoting the other link:
    "In some ways all non-Africans can be thought of as a subset of the genetic variation of Africans. Those humans who reside outside of Africa are simply a diversified branch of Africans."Baden
    That's what a subspecies is.

    A: No, no, no, watch this Dave Rubin video, he explains everything!Baden
    You obviously didn't watch any of the videos. It was Rubin that was being educated by his guest, and I was hoping that they would educate you as well. The rest of your A and B example is ridiculous and it makes wonder if you actually received your degree as a surprise from a box of Froot Loops. The fact that you're using Wikipedia to try and debunk a well-respected evolutionary biologist says a lot as well.

    Anyone who mentions genetic drift as support for the idea of the folk notion of races...Baden
    That isn't what is being done here. As I have shown there is a distinction between the "folk" notion and the scientific one, so you're using a straw-man. The latter isn't supporting the other. It is simply making discoveries that might or might not be used to promote some already built-in assumptions about certain people. Science doesn't define distinctions as inferior or superior. Cultures do that.

    Since you like Wikipedia so much:
    The founder effect is a special case of genetic drift, occurring when a small group in a population splinters off from the original population and forms a new one. — Wikipedia
    The "Out of Africa" theory explains that a small group of Africans moved out of Africa (splintering off from the original population) and forms a new, geographically isolated group.

    Here is an in-depth article explaining the genetic variance supporting the theory:
    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3267120/

    In Figure 2, it shows "Phylogeny based on the first mtDNA complete sequence data available in 2000 (from 52 individuals randomly selected around the world)". Around 83,000 years ago, a branch split off from the African L3 branch that then became the foundation of all the other non-African races and ethnic groups. These branches aren't social constructions. They are outcomes of scientific research. The lines aren't meant to be interpreted as one being more superior as some other. That is the "folk" use of the word, race, that you are referring to. Science is simply about making discoveries that allow us to live our lives better by hopefully using this information to make medial breakthroughs that can help each individual.
  • Baden
    16.3k
    The rest of your A and B example is ridiculous and it makes wonder if you actually received your degree as a surprise from a box of Froot Loops.Harry Hindu

    :lol:

    You can have the last word, Harry. Like I said, it's off-topic and posters can make up their own minds on which one of us is the Froot Loop here.
  • Tzeentch
    3.8k


    There seems to be little evidence to suggest any racial disparity in police violence.

    Please respond.
  • Benkei
    7.7k
    Is he talking about this : https://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=dcdetail&iid=251 ?

    Universe: Respondents aged 16 years and older to the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) during the last six months of 2011.

    So people who were victims of a crime that either went to the police, were then approached by the police or were involved in a traffic accident and we are to infer no systemic bias from that?
  • Benkei
    7.7k
    Because victims and perpetrators are treated the same by police?
  • Outlander
    2.1k


    Aw, man. He was just saying your argument was bad and making a joke about how any evidence to the contrary to that is cheap. You didn't have to go and call him a homosexual now.

    Jeez man now anyone who disagrees with someone is now not only wrong but scientifically should no longer reproduce? Can't imagine what people like that would do without cops or diversity frankly.

    Scary. Makes you wonder about the intents of some who "support" gay rights.
  • Tzeentch
    3.8k
    I recommend you read some of the reports before making assumptions about their faulty methodology.
  • Enai De A Lukal
    211
    There seems to be little evidence to suggest any racial disparity in police violence.

    Aside from the many studies finding precisely that, you mean? So, aside from e.g. Kramer and Remster 2018 ("Findings show that Black and White civilians experience fundamentally different interactions with police. Black civilians are particularly more likely to experience potential lethal force"), Edwards et al 2018 ("Police kill, on average, 2.8 men per day... Black men’s mortality risk is between 1.9 and 2.4 deaths per 100 000 per year, Latino risk is between 0.8 and 1.2, and White risk is between 0.6 and 0.7... Black and Latino men are at higher risk for death than are White men, and these disparities vary markedly across place."), Fryer 2016 ("blacks and Hispanics are more than fifty percent more likely to experience some form of force in interactions with police") and so on?
  • Benkei
    7.7k
    I did and I'm not questioning their methodology. I'm questioning the conclusions you think you can derive from it.

    So again, what's the universe of people questioned as part of the PPCS?
bold
italic
underline
strike
code
quote
ulist
image
url
mention
reveal
youtube
tweet
Add a Comment

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.