On 07/10/09 11:35, Darren New wrote:
> Warp wrote:
>> In many places (especially in the US but very much also in Europe) some
>> people (such as employers) cannot treat everybody in the same way for the
>> fear of being accused of racism.
>
> To be fair, this *does* keep going back and forth. One not rarely reads
> articles where some court or other said it was discriminatory to not
> promote the white folks who passed the test just because none of the
> minorities who took the test passed, or that it's illegal to not admit

Citation for anyone interested:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hzSshxj3_ArctG2PKsP2_rYMV7iA

	To be fair, though, the judges who had previously ruled that the city 
did the right thing admitted it was silly, but they felt that it was 
mandated by the law, and it wasn't their job to argue whether the law 
was silly.

> americans to schools who did better than the asians, or something like

	This is a new one for me. My Asian colleague keeps pointing out that 
they're never the beneficiaries of affirmative action (which he is 
against). I keep pointing out to him that they usually do better than 
white Americans anyway. ;-)

> that. Every couple years there's a ballot in California to switch
> between "equal opportunity" and "no discrimination" in the state
> universities, for example.

	I haven't followed this, but my colleague, who did his undergrad in UC 
Berkeley, states that the UC system removed affirmative action in the 
90's and have not reinstated it since.

	(Which doesn't contradict your statement - I thought I'd just point it 
out).

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Stephen wrote:
> Tom Austin <taustin> wrote:
> 
>> I do remember way back in high school physics that we discussed the term
>> jerry-rig.  Our teacher reasoned that 'jerry' was a racial slur and
>> shouldn't be used.  So he suggested that 'billy-rig' was a better term -
>> referring to West Virginia hill billys.  Since we were in Virginia, it
>> was a better term than 'jerry-rig'
> 
> I think that your teacher may have been confusing jerry-rigged with jerry-built
> which is a slur against a certain English Jerry. Jerry-rigged is from WW2 and
> applied to Allied equipment repaired using German parts.

yes, you are right - I was referring to what he reasoned.


> To be honest, I have heard one phrase used by American oilmen that was a racial

> 

I've heard of that term - and I've never used it myself.  Tho, if I see 
something really well built I may use it ;-)

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Warp wrote:
>   To multiculturalists racism, ethnicism, xenofobia, islamofobia and
> basically everything is "racism". It's an umbrella term for everything
> related to how white men behave towards non-white people.

While many white men feel marginalised by these things, one must 
consider the very real notion that, for much of recorded history, males 
in general (and white males in the Western societies) *have* abused 
their positions of power, causing what is effectively a kneejerk 
reaction once that reaction is acknowledged as even slightly valid, and 
growing as acceptance of it spreads.

However.

We're pretty much all the same, us humans, all petty and greedy and 
otherwise not very nice towards each other, so you get the same sorts of 
things happening when you swap who's in any particular power role.

The vast majority of the world was, is, and will never really be 'in 
control', so there's no use b'awwwing over someone else calling the 
shots if you personally were never in the position to do it anyways. 
Feel slighted because of your gender/race/ethnicity/sexual 
identity/toothpaste preference?  Don't worry, just about everyone else 
has things just as bad, and that's just how things are.  In time, 
someone from 'your group' will rise to power, and...it won't change much 
of anything for all the other members of the group.  Their close friends 
will probably experience some benefits, and there might be spillover 
into the law to give your type a break, but big-picture-wise, it's 
status quo.  Noise will be made by some, and the squeaky wheel will get 
its grease, but only until it stops squeaking too loudly compared to the 
others.

--
Tim Cook
http://empyrean.freesitespace.net

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Tim Cook <z99### [at] gmailcom> wrote:
> While many white men feel marginalised by these things, one must 
> consider the very real notion that, for much of recorded history, males 
> in general (and white males in the Western societies) *have* abused 
> their positions of power, causing what is effectively a kneejerk 
> reaction once that reaction is acknowledged as even slightly valid, and 
> growing as acceptance of it spreads.

  I don't have any problem aknowledging history, and I am the first one
to promote learning from the past in order to avoid repeating the same
mistakes as our ancestors.

  However, I do have a problem with this modern idea that white people are
still somehow "responsible" for what their ancestors did, and that they have
to somehow compensate for that, to pay back what they took, especially when
this means discriminating against some people for what their ancestors maybe
have done.

  I am not responsible for what some people have done centuries ago. Even
if someone of my own forefathers had done something wrong, I'm still not
responsible for that. Nobody can and should not hold me responsible for
what someone else has done in the past, regardless of common ethnicity, or
even if it was a direct ancestor.

  "Equal rights" should be taken literally. "Equal rights" cannot mean that
some people are more protected than others, or that some people are given
better opportunities than others, based on something like ethnicity or
origin.

  Discriminating in order to eradicate some perceived "racism" is just
wrong, in a very ironic way. "Two wrongs don't make a right" may sound
like a cliche, but I think in this case it's a valid statement. You can't
eradicate racism by exercising it "in reverse". The only thing you are
going to achieve is frustration and resentment, which can only prolong
any existing animosity.

  (Some people suggest that many multiculturalists actually *want* to
maintain animosity and racism, while still keeping a facade of trying
to completely eradicate it. If racism was truely and completely eradicated,
they would be "out of job" (sometimes *literally*, as there are many jobs
which exist for this sole reason).)

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Neeum Zawan <m.n### [at] ieeeorg> wrote:
> http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hzSshxj3_ArctG2PKsP2_rYMV7iA

  I especially like the last paragraph:

"One group of firefighters threatened to sue for discrimination if
promotions were made based on the test results, and others said they
would sue if the city ignored the results and denied promotions to
candidates who did well."

  That is wrong in *so* many levels I cannot even count. This is what the
world has become.

> > americans to schools who did better than the asians, or something like

>         This is a new one for me. My Asian colleague keeps pointing out that 
> they're never the beneficiaries of affirmative action (which he is 
> against).

  A cynic could say that Asians might not be "colored enough" to get
special treatment...

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Tim Cook wrote:
> While many white men feel marginalised by these things, one must 
> consider the very real notion that, for much of recorded history, males 
> in general (and white males in the Western societies) *have* abused 
> their positions of power,

Wait, worse than the Asians abused their positions of power? Worse than the 
africans abused their positions of power over other africans?  Worse than 
the native americans in power over other native americans? Why are white 
people in power buying black slaves worse than the black people in power 
buying black slaves? Why is white people conquering India worse than Japan 
invading China?

I strongly suspect it's because the white folks know their own history much 
better than they know the history of other cultures. Quick, without looking, 
what was going on in Africa and India during the medieval ages? Who were the 
power players?

And, interestingly enough, when you look around the world today, where do 
you see the *most* civil rights?  What countries are the ones where people 
are *shocked* by abuses rather than saying "we really should get them to 
change that"?

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   "We'd like you to back-port all the changes in 2.0
    back to version 1.0."
   "We've done that already. We call it 2.0."

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Neeum Zawan wrote:
>> americans to schools who did better than the asians, or something like
> 
>     This is a new one for me.

Honestly, I was trying to make it not all about blacks. :-) Lots of people 
think there should be rules against immigrant asians taking spots that 
residents should have, too, regardless of qualifications. Same thing, 
different type of discrimination.

>     I haven't followed this, but my colleague, who did his undergrad in 
> UC Berkeley, states that the UC system removed affirmative action in the 
> 90's and have not reinstated it since.

Yeah.  Before then, there was lots of back and forth, and lots of failed 
initiatives and such. Not unlike the whole gay marriage thing nowadays.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   "We'd like you to back-port all the changes in 2.0
    back to version 1.0."
   "We've done that already. We call it 2.0."

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Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> I strongly suspect it's because the white folks know their own history much 
> better than they know the history of other cultures. Quick, without looking, 
> what was going on in Africa and India during the medieval ages? Who were the 
> power players?

  AFAIK there have been and even still are many atrocities committed by
many African countries (or at least some of their inhabitants) towards
their neighboring countries, based on what can basically be called pure
racism (in other words, the people on the other country are of the "wrong"
race, and thus are despised if not even abused). The most prominent case
of this was the Rwandan genocide where between half and one million people
were killed (which sadly most western people don't even remember anymore!)
However, AFAIK, this is just the most prominent case and the tip of the
iceberg.

  The Rwandan genocide is completely in par with the nazi holocaust. However,
which one of these two is better remembered?

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Tom Austin wrote:
> I recently read a story on CNN
> http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/07/09/philly.pool/index.html
> 
> The story is about how a group of black kids were 'expelled' from a pool 
> because of race.
> 
> 
> An interesting quote is:
> "He said two other day-care centers, neither of which included minority 
> children, had previously been similarly disinvited."
> 
> So, two groups of kids had been 'disinvited' with no loud complaining. 
> As soon as the exact thing happens to a racial minority, it becomes a 
> problem.
> 
> I don't know if the action was racially motivated or not - I'm not 
> judging that.  But it is amazing how people jump to say this is racially 
> motivated.
> 
> Just look at the quote:
> "But Duesler told two Philadelphia television stations that the children 
> had changed "the complexion" and "atmosphere" of the club."
> 
> While I can see how this could be a racially charged statement, it could 
> easily apply to ANY group of people and not be racially charged.
> 
> 
> Even with the bias of the article I can see plenty of evidence that the 
> incident may not have been racially motivated.
> 
> 
> I guess people should be sensitive to things like this because it was 
> such a big problem in the past, and continues to be problem today.  But 
> at times it seems that it goes a little too far.
> 
> I wish people would take the time to understand the facts before passing 
> judgment.  IMHO much in this article points towards people making snap 
> judgments without taking time to try to understand what really happened. 
>  Black group - kicked out by white people - something must be wrong.
> 
Actually, got a better one for you:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqbL9-HzxH4

Didn't know that Italians and Irish where "different species"... Even 
the women in the room asked him if he wasn't suffering from a mental 
disorder himself, and given that his is Fox News... lol

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void main () {

     if version = "Vista" {
       call slow_by_half();
       call DRM_everything();
     }
     call functional_code();
   }
   else
     call crash_windows();
}

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Darren New wrote:
> Wait, worse than the Asians abused their positions of power? Worse than 
> the africans abused their positions of power over other africans?  Worse 
> than the native americans in power over other native americans? Why are 
> white people in power buying black slaves worse than the black people in 
> power buying black slaves? Why is white people conquering India worse 
> than Japan invading China?

"Because the White Man is 'civilised'."  (and should know better)  wink 
wink.  Also see below.

> I strongly suspect it's because the white folks know their own history 
> much better than they know the history of other cultures. Quick, without 
> looking, what was going on in Africa and India during the medieval ages? 
> Who were the power players?

Exactly.  So much focus is on the whites now primarily because the 
British Empire was so expansive and is pretty darn recent.  So people 
learn about that.

--
Tim Cook
http://empyrean.freesitespace.net

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