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kleinbl00  ·  3158 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: RACE BAITING 101

So lemme quote what the original poster said about this video:

    it's a pretty compelling YouTube video and he backs up his factoids repeatedly with sources. What are your thoughts?

I'm almost positive that was you.

So I gave you my thoughts. You asked for them. There they are. Nowhere did I jump down your throat. So before you continue down this path, kindly unrustle your jimmies, take a deep breath, and know that if you double down with me, it's gonna get ugly. I'm empirically better at being an Internet Dickhead than you will ever be and I'm opting not to be.

Pulse below 90? Angry sweat on your top lip wiped? Okay.

You're basically making the same argument as the video - economic oppression and racial oppression are linked. THEY'RE NOT. That's my argument ("But let's not conflate racial hatred and economic predation just because they're culturally universal"). Further, my argument is that conflating the two diminishes the understanding of both, which helps to perpetuate them.

What does slavery committed by Africans have to do with anything? It illustrates that racism is universal. Igbos hate Yorubas, Jews hate Arabs, Serbs hate Croats and tribalism drives cultures. It also illustrates that there's an economic basis to slavery and oppression. Am I denying "there were feelings of supremacy against Africans"? Hardly. I'm saying every culture on earth feels morally, intellectually and superior to every other culture on earth. I know it's easier to win the argument you want, rather than the argument you have, but meet me in the middle here.

By the way - if you're going to claim what I say is untrue, you should probably make sure that your reference is accurate.

    "Zinn basically declares the high-water mark of the civil rights movement to be Martin Luther Kings sell out moment. He quotes nothing of King’s I have a Dream speech, but gives a full page quote to Malcolm X, part of which reads

    “This is what they (the establishment) did with the March on Washington. They joined it… became part of it, took it over. And as they took it over, it lost it’s militancy. It ceased to be angry, it ceased to be hot, it ceased to be uncompromising. Why, it even ceased to be a march. It became a picnic, a circus. Nothing but a circus, with clowns and all…

    Not, it was a sellout. It was a takeover.. The controlled it so tight, they told those Negroes what time to hit town, where to stop, what signs to carry, what song to sing, what speech they could make, and what speech they couldn’t make, and then told them to get out of town by sundown…” (458)

Page 458, yo. I did it as an audiobook or I'd type it all out for you.

So I'll repeat myself: Your video draws useless parallels between economic oppression and racial oppression. These parallels obscure the real reasons for oppression and suggest that there are simple solutions. There are not. The more we look for causality, the less simplicity we should find and when some talking head on Youtube tries to condense it all down to ten minutes, you should doubt his motives.

And I'll leave you with this:

    The reality is that the US has racial problems. Being the "melting pot" doesn't give the country a pass. It's quite ridiculous to even contend that it should be given one.

Read my words:

"What's missed in these discussions is the fact that people who aren't the majority get the shaft in all countries and the United States, as the most multiracial melting pot country in the world, gets to grapple with them for everyone else."

I'm saying the US gets the opposite of a pass.