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karnythia recently linked to a news article about people studying the effects of television on racial biases. There was an old bit on SNL's Weekend Update when I was growing up, where Norm Macdonald would read a headline about a recent medical study and then announce that it and other news could be read in the pages of the medical journal "DUH!". As others observed on her post, there have been studies about this sort of thing for as long as there has been television... while more attention given to it is not a bad thing, the thought behind this research (as presented in the article, anyway) seems somewhat naive.
To quote:
The psychologists wondered how such biases could persist in a society in which racism is socially unacceptable and indeed publicly denounced.
I would submit that there is and always has been a difference between "this thing is not done in our society" and "this thing is not admitted to in our society". What is socially unacceptable is to be openly and overtly racist, to admit to racism... this is what makes talking about racism so difficult. If a person or group is doing something in a way that seriously disadvantages or negatively impacts minorities, attempts to discuss the very real problem they present frequently break down into protracted discussions of their motivations and their feelings.
Of course, people who shout "I HATE [epithet]S!" from the rooftops seriously suck. Seriously. But their ability to affect people on a day to day basis is severely limited because they are denounced so quickly and people are so quick to distance themselves from such overt racism. Such overt bigots can assault people, can injure and hurt them, but do not usually have the power to oppress all by their lonesome.
(This isn't to say we shouldn't denounce them. If we don't make it clear that such things are intolerable, then they won't stay lonesome and they will get power. "Society" is a shoutocracy: loudest voice frequently wins.)
Oppression is a systemic problem. It comes from institutional racism.
Example: when a company sells only products that are primarily useful for or attractive to white folks or markets them in a way that makes it seem like they're only meant for white folks, it might be described as a pure number-crunching exercise. They might describe their target audience not as white (or hetero, or able-bodied, or cis, or English speaking) but as "mainstream". And many people wouldn't argue with that.
But doing this is not only a response to our society where certain people and their perceived tastes are "mainstream" and thus more worth catering to, it perpetuates that perception, rebuilds it and makes it stronger all the time.
Take a look at this video:
Now, because some things are going to be raised as objections any time something like this is posted in an open forum:
1. Yes, the lighting conditions are not optimal and probably not in line with the manufacturer's recommendations or set-up instructions. It's certainly possible that with enough jiggering and a bit of poking, the man in the video could get the camera to recognize and track his face.
2. No, the HP engineers did not invent the laws of physics as they apply to optics.
3. No, no one is saying that Hugh L. Packard, president of HP, said "FUCK THE BLACKS. MAKE IT ONLY WORK ON WHITE PEOPLE."
The fact is that a major consumer electronics manufacturer released, shipped, and sold a device that at the very least works best for white people, works under a wider range of conditions for white people, and requires less fiddling around with your room's set-up out of the box for white people. That's charitably assuming it would work in a reasonable fashion for the gentleman doing the demonstration, if he dimmed the backlighting and put a light source in front, as some commenters on the video suggested.
"That's not racist, that's just how lighting and cameras work."... except... can anybody imagine this being considered a viable commercial technology if it worked the other way around? If the technology for using facial tracking on white folk was such that it would require a level of finicky fiddling about with ambient lighting that the old ROB robot that was bundled with the NES in the 1980s did, would a computer manufacturer actually bundle it with a computer webcam package on the cusp of 2010? Or would they be going "It's an interesting concept, but the technology is not really 'there' yet. Let's keep trying to improve it."
Some people will probably look at that and wonder if I'm suggesting that nobody should be able to buy this webcam product unless it works perfectly for everyone. I'm not. I'm suggesting we wouldn't be able to buy it... at least not as a feature with an HP media center computer rather than a quirky toy for techno-hobbyists who don't mind the fiddling around... if it didn't work well for white people. Because it does, it has "mainstream commercial appeal".
This is systemic racism, institutional racism in action. I'm sure some people are going to roll their eyes and say things like "Oh, life is so hard for people who can't get a webcam to follow their movements. It must be nice if that's the only problem they have to complain about." To which I say: yes, I'm sure it would be nice if that were the only thing that someone had to complain about. But this is not some weird random example of something that goes against the common trend. The "mainstreaming" of whiteness is pervasive and so are its effects.
Shows and movies (and books and magazines) centered around white actors/characters are marketed as the default. If a character with a different skin tone is cast white in an adaptation to broaden the appeal, it's a main character... characters who become minority in translation ostensibly for the same reason are almost always background characters or sidekicks (There are exceptions. They are played by Will Smith and Morgan Freeman. And Obama is president. And Sammy Davis, Jr. played at the Copacabana Club. The existence of minority superstars are one of the best examples of the hoary old chestnut about "the exception that proves the rule".) We judge the cleanliness and "professionalism" of people's hair based on the way white folks' hair looks when it's well-cared for. We have a similar rubric for judging the professionalism of people's names.
The number of people who can complain with a straight face on the "racism" of a channel called "Black Entertainment Television" when we spend our lives so immersed in things targeted directly at
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no subject
on 2009-12-21 08:45 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-21 08:56 pm (UTC)We really seem to have a similar rubric for judging everything.
A black person can't listen to rap with out being called a gangster. A Hispanic person can't listen to Manic Hispanic without being called a cholo.
And the way people talk is also a big thing. If someone doesn't speak in a completely white manner (both accent and dialect)then something is not right with them. If I spoke in the dialect or accent of where I am from lots of people (most, but not all, of them white) would be looking at me like I am mentally challenged or a gangster. Though, in fairness, they aren't all that likely to go with gangster because I'm far too pale.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 01:32 am (UTC)It's fairly rare to find someone in films who sounds like a 'hick' yet is entirely competent. When they show up, there's usually either some immediate display of competency to disprove the accent, or their displays of competency will be the surprise twist in a scene. And the same thing happens with other accents- think about the California surfer dude, or the valley girl, or someone from Boston or New York. The accent is so associated with a certain conglomeration of traits that it's a twist when someone doesn't match those characteristics. The only consistent displays of competency and respect you'll find in movies are with regards to characters who have no accent.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 01:57 am (UTC)See also: "mainstream people".
Having "no accent" is like having "normal hair" or listening to "normal music". There are accents associated with groups of white people (or with regions that are populated by large numbers of white people), but what you're calling "no accent" is how white people talk in the middle of the country. Yes, someone from the south might have to work to lose their accent (or at least make it more "telegenic") to get a broadcast career whether they're white or not, but you're still talking about a case where the standard is white.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 03:58 pm (UTC)As someone from the "Deep" South I have to agree with the poster before you. I've met aerospace engineers with "hick" accents who have to learn to speak normal when dealing with people outside the South to prove their competency.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 06:19 pm (UTC)In point of fact, we do not. The French have a governing body for their language. We don't and never have. We have several "recognized authorities", who conflict with each other in varying ways that only really matter to pedants.
But we'll let that go because that's a side point. You're arguing a point that's not in dispute. I'm not talking about grammar, I'm talking about accent. If you from the Deep South, myself as a white person from the suburban middle part of the country, and an African-American from here all read the same sentence written out verbatim, I would be the one that people thought had "no accent".
Now, I do have an accent. I have what they call a vanilla accent, because it's "plain". The hypothetical person of color in the experiment could have the exact same accent, minus the "whiteness"... but if his voice "sounds black", it will register as "more of an accent" than mine does, "sounding white".
That's my point. White is the default. White is the norm that everything's measured against.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 05:07 pm (UTC)And I honestly even wonder if normal or mainstream works. I remember something about 70% of the audience for rap and 'gangsta' music is young white males. Similarly, I'd guess the population of the US that has a noticeable accent is much larger than the portion that doesn't. And so on. It's not so much normal or average or typical, as it is bland, mundane, or utterly inoffensive. Idealization of the greatest common denominator, as it were.
no subject
on 2009-12-21 08:58 pm (UTC)One Will Smith does not a Post-Racial Media make.
no subject
on 2009-12-21 10:47 pm (UTC)"Freedom is never given to anybody!" MLK (the man who preached "brotherhood" to the Christian black masses) Even within the downtrodden bits of society there is a pecking order.
It's sad really.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 01:38 am (UTC)We can talk about discrimination is housing options, yes it still happens that minorities are "discouraged" from living in certain areas. Earlier this year a Justice of the peace in Louisiana refused to give an interracial couple a marriage certificate. And what about profiling by law inforcement? Lets no forget the huge amount of bigotry based on social class and religion. The Obama administration has passed up opportunities to make good on his campaign promises to further rights for GLBT people, instead spending his political capital on more poplar projects. And lets not forget that less than a year before he was elected, people in the national news media, as well as people on the street, were still making comments about "how well spoken" Obama is.
Sure we should fight racism in all it's forms, if we let the little things go, how can we expect to fight the big ones? but to cite Hanlons Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity."
no subject
on 2009-12-22 02:11 am (UTC)You will note I have not attributed malice. I'm using the HP product as an example of how systemic racism works and the results it can produce, in conjunction with the broader issue of how racially biased (and racially biasing) media gets put out when everyone we collectively listen to agrees that racism is bad. I'm specifically excluding malice as a possibility here.
But is it not ludicrous to think that HP would ever have shipped this thing if it worked great under even non-optimal lighting conditions for people with darker skin but was finicky or non-functional for white skin?
I think the worst QA process in the world would have caught that if it even made it as far as testing... because the product would have been developed by, calibrated for, and tested with white people. They either didn't test it with a wide enough range of skin colors or they didn't think it mattered that it worked so poorly with darker ones compared to lighter ones because they perceived white-skinned folk as the "more mainstream market".
Either way, arguing about how not malicious it is misses the point... and it's exactly what I was talking about when I said that conversations get derailed into discussions of the motivations and feelings of the people perpetrating/perpetuating racism.
The system that produced this device is racist. The people involved are one component of that system and they don't get a pass, but I'm not mentally fitting them for Klansmen robes.
Anyway, all of those things you list are things that need addressing (and things I've addressed, in some cases), but you're acting like the choice to use HP as an example of systemic racism was done at the exclusion of doing something about it. This is actually a form of derailment... "Why talk about this when there are worse things happening?"
That's great, but there are always worse things happening. The point of this post wasn't to create a big action committee to stir up and agitate against HP. It was to point to an illustration of a phenomenon.
No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 03:58 am (UTC)I don't work at HP but I have worked at places where that is essentially the testing model used. And considering how HP does a crappy job of testing in general, it is quite likely what happened. If that pair of people happened to include a black person (which would probably happen about ~25% of the time).
So, unless they are willing to pay more for testing (which cuts into their profit margin), it is unlikely to happen.
That makes the 'solution':
A) Stop using Capitalism which encourages this sort of behaviour as laying out an extra $Xk or so to test every possible combination of race cuts into a product's profit margin.
B) Boycott companies that do this sort of thing to encourage more complete testing methodologies in regards to race and encourage others to do so.
Also, I have bought a webcamera from HP (the one and only time I've ever bought anything from HP, and will never again) which can't focus on my white face and I have to do it manually. So I suspect HP's QA process really is this bad.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 04:13 pm (UTC)It's not your math that I'm questioning, it's the assumption that 12.4% of the population means that any slice of our population will yield somewhere around that same representation. If that were a safe assumption, then I wouldn't have made this post in the first place. It would be a funny odd quirk of fate that this happenstance slipped through rather than a symptom of something bigger and more troubling.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 06:19 pm (UTC)I note you skipped over the point of the post:
HP's QA process is really so bad that if they have two members of non-white folks in that pair, the camera might very well not work for white people. Hence my anecdotal evidence of the webcam that doesn't focus on my white face.
If you feel there isn't a fair representation of people in the workplace, that is an entirely different topic.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 06:33 pm (UTC)I don't disagree! I also don't disagree that more rigorous QA would have caught this, without any change in the racial dynamics of the world or the distribution of race in the workforce or anything else.
But we live in a world where it's very very unlikely that they would have tested the product exclusively on non-white people, which is the point of my post. The circumstances simply would not have arose.
The world we live in predisposes things like this to fall more harshly and more often on non-whites. Hence, systemic racism.
And while a crappy webcamera is not the end of the world, this same phenomenon isn't limited to HP. I picked this as a representative example of how things can "just so happen" to have a racially biased outcome.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 10:50 pm (UTC)65.4% of the country is white folks. Therefore, the odds make it highly probable one of them would happen to be in the testing pool.
So, if you take my example of 2 people, the odds of you picking two white people at random is 42.7%.
You are ascribing racism to probability and a poor QA process.
But we live in a world where it's very very unlikely that they would have tested the product exclusively on non-white people, which is the point of my post.
Incorrect. Less than a third of the population is white. Only in countries where the white people are in the majority, is that statement true. China and India alone (which make up a third of the world's population) are both likely to test products on purely non-whites. That is not counting the entire continent of Africa, the rest of Asia, or South America.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 10:59 pm (UTC)'Racism' caused by probability and poor QA isn't a problem. It is not even 'racism'. Rather, it is simply the reality of being in the minority and buying products from a company with a QA process that is poor.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-22 11:26 pm (UTC)You demonstrate your selective understanding by first citing the figure of white folk in this country, where HP is based, and then pointing out that whites are a global minority when it helps you defend your point.
You're misusing statistics from start to finish. 12.4% of the population being one race does not equal a 12.4% chance of anybody in any walk of life being that race. 1 in 3 people being white worldwide does not equal a mere 1 in 3 chance that a given tester would have been white. Probabilities are often expressed as percentages, but that does not mean you can treat a percentage from one context as a probability in all contexts.
I mean, it's not as though there's an equal chance that a major consumer electronics product that will be sold on the North American market will be tested in America by Americans or in Africa by Africans... and yeah, major consumer electronics products will probably be increasingly made and tested in China and India but I guarantee that when that happens the people doing the testing will think about the importance of any differences in the North American market before selling here. They couldn't afford to not do so.
'Racism' caused by probability and poor QA isn't a problem. It is not even 'racism'.
It creates an outcome that favors whites, the majority race in the United States and one with a considerable amount of privilege, over a minority race. It arises out of those same circumstances. Hence, systemic racism.
As for whether or not it's a problem? Well, having a webcam feature that doesn't work for you is the very definition of a "first world problem", as nobody actually needs a webcam that does that... and I hope you'll note that nothing in this post indicts HP as a bunch of cross-burning bigots who need to be boycotted out of existence. I picked this as an example because the video happens to be going around right now and it's a perfect example of systemic racism.
The fact that so many people feel the need to defend this shit so vociferously actually makes me angry in a way that the specific issue highlighted in the video. The kneejerk dismissal of any charge of racism that's less overt and clear-cut than outright hate speech is troubling... it's like people are going, "If any one can be accused of racism, I could be accused of racism and that would be awful."
I refer back to the main point of my post: that it seems like admitting to racism has become the unforgivable sin in our society, and that this makes it difficult to have a discussion about racism that's anything more than everybody standing around condemning the KKK and Hitler for being obviously evil.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-23 06:08 am (UTC)You are intentionally taking what I said and claiming something else to defend your point.
You claim I'm misusing statistics without any evidence besides misconstruing what I said as something other than what it is.
1) That statement was about India and China, primarily, and non-US products in general. HP is a global conglomerate. Part of why they are investigating this? So they can sell to India, China, and other places where white people are not the majority. It was also refuting your claim on the basis of a literal interpretation of what you wrote. It has nothing to do with anything else. Which, in context, it is valid.
2) You are missing the point of me pointing out numbers. Instead of attacking my point, you attack my choice of numbers. Which is further proof you are simply misconstruing it. The purpose of the numbers is to show that it is a coincidence brought about by the percentages of people in a population. It doesn't matter if it is 1% instead of 12.4% or 80%. Simply because an outcome 'favours white people', on the basis of probability alone, is not systemic racism. Rolling a dice and coming up with a result other than X%, is not racism. Neither is a poor QA process.
3) You are claiming major consumer electronics products are not are not tested and made in India and China. That shows gross ignorance of the facts.
Where do you think ASUS is based and operates? Taiwan, China, Mexico, and the Czech Republic. Where is their production? Taiwan. They produce a ton of computer products. Guess who tests them? I doubt there is enough Caucasians living in those countries to fill out ASUS's QA process, and similar companies. Let alone everything else. The only difference between them and HP is a better QA process and the location of their operations.
4) 'They couldn't afford to not do so' China and India, combined, would be the third largest economy in the world. They have entire companies which service only domestic markets.
5) Your angry? So what. It is not relevant. Your claims of a 'kneejerk' dismissal of any charge of racism is also unfounded. But rather an ad hominem attack made without any evidence beside the fact I don't agree with your example of systemic racism. If you really feel such generalised ad hominem attacks are valid, without any real evidence, that is your prerogative. However, it only weakens your argument.
6) The problem with the main point of your post is, your example does not support it. It looks more like an excuse to call 'systemic racism' to me in support of your pet theory. You even admit in your first post that they may not have set things up properly in the first place.
Show a pattern of behaviour. Write a well researched paper on the subject. Don't go and post crap like this and then make personal attacks on people who don't agree with your example.
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-23 06:18 am (UTC)http://www.racismreview.com/blog/2009/11/01/throwaway-cities-systemic-racism-and-capitalism/
Re: No offense but...
on 2009-12-23 06:55 am (UTC)2. I didn't attack your choice of numbers. I attacked the fallacy which states that if X% of the population are Star-Bellied Sneetches, then we can pick any situation and any walk of life and there will be an X% chance of any one individual there being a Star-Bellied Sneetch. You seem to think this is true. I'd love to live in a world where it is, but it isn't.
3. I made no such claim. I said "increasingly made and tested"... i.e., I predicted that it will happen more and more in the future. Do you think that's not true?
4. Again you selectively ignore things. I said they cannot afford to ignore the difference when they're selling here. Does anything in that statement suggest that their domestic economy could not support a consumer electronics market? No. It's talking about what would happen if a company that developed goods for the Chinese or Indian market chose to sell to North America without looking at the differences in the marketplace.
5. I'm angry that somebody feels the need to ignore what I'm actually saying, take issue with things that haven't been said and throw up a bunch of smokescreens rather than admit that the world he lives in is one in which bias is built in, most likely to his own advantage.
If it wasn't a kneejerk response, you'd be able to dismiss points I actually make instead of
And you know what? While I'm glad you say you're done arguing, part of me wants you to respond. Part of me wants to see you explain the blatant discrepancies between what I said and what you have said I said (in your points 3 and 4 in particular... golly, that is so blatant I wonder how you think your points can possibly stand when anybody who reads them can also read my comment and see how badly you've twisted things), but I've wasted enough time and enough energy and enough spoons filling out a bingo card with you.
You are done here. Thank you, ban_set.
6. It supports it perfectly. It's a racially biased outcome growing out of racially biased circumstances. In a dream world where "X% of the population being race Y = X% chance of any individual in any specific circumstance being race Y" held true, you would be perfectly right. We don't live in that world. This is an example of systemic racism. Not the most consequential, not the most shocking, not the most devastating, not the most harmful. One reason it's brilliant as an example is because it's so easily dismissed that it
And you know, what I said in point 5 goes back to the actual point of the post: admitting to racism. I can admit it. I'm white and I benefit from white privilege. I'm not perfect. I participate in racist systems. I have furthered racism through my actions and my inactions. We all have. Everybody who is part of society to a meaningful degree has, and we should all feel free to admit it and to examine our actions, past and present, because that's the only way things are going to get better. I'll be making a post at some point in the near future that will deal with this... my own failings... in more detail, because really that is the problem here: that the idea of racism is so strongly reviled that we can't deal with the small bits of racism, the subtle racism, the "background" racism, as it were, because everybody acts like talking about it is tantamount to calling everybody KKK members.
The KKK are a bunch of assholes, to be sure, but they're not half the problem that the everyday shit is. You call this everyday shit the reality of being a minority, and you know what? You're right. It is.
You know what else is "just reality"?
Every other problem that needs solving.
potato v potaato
on 2009-12-22 04:46 am (UTC)For this to have been racist on HP's part there had to have been a decision at some point that people of color were not an important demographic to market to. I'm not saying that didn't happen, but my experience with the brand leads me to believe that their product simply doesn't work well.
If there was no race-based decision, if HP simply made a shoddy product, that (by definition) isn't racism, it's incompetence. If it simply never occured to HP's engineers that the camera wouldn't work properly with someone who has a dark complexion and if they tested the camera with white people because they didn't think complexion would matter, that isn't racism.
Bigotry should not be tolerated, but overplaying the race card doesn't help anyone, it makes people jaded and makes it harder for people with legitimate grievances to be heard.
That being said, complain to HP, if this was deliberate they need to know racism will not be tolerated, if it wasn't they need to know that consumers don't want products that don't work as advertised.
Re: potato v potaato
on 2009-12-22 05:11 am (UTC)Except for that AE's whole point is that a lack of conscious decision doesn't necessarily mean that it's not racist.
Re: potato v potaato
on 2009-12-22 03:52 pm (UTC)I know you're not saying that. Have you noticed that I am saying that? I'll say it more explicitly: it didn't happen. Nobody at HP made a decision to exclude people based on color.
I'm open to the possibility of being wrong, because I've seen worse and more shocking displays of blatantly overt racism, but it's incredibly unlikely to me that the company said "This is a white people's camera and it doesn't need to work for anyone else.", to the point that I'm comfortable saying this:
It didn't happen.
Which is why it's a great example of systemic racism. Racism that's inherent in a system. Think about the implications of that. Our society is so fucked when it comes to race (and other things) that discrimination can happen without a single individual person deciding "I'm going to fuck over people based on the circumstances they were born into."
That thought should chill you to the bone, but instead, you find it reassuring that everybody's hands as an individual are clean. I'd say "more power to you", but I'm not sure I'd be comfortable with you having power.
If we build a system that punches every third person in the throat, that system is a problem whether it's an example of poor design or sinister design, isn't it? And ideally we should be able to talk about that problem and why it's a problem without someone jumping into the conversation to issue us a criteria based on unprovable speculations of intention that we must fulfill before we're allowed to discuss it.
You are the problem I'm talking about in the paragraph that begins "I would submit..."
If you could find actual flaws in any of the points I raise, that would be one thing, but no, you just see an accusation of racism and you feel the need to shut it down by dredging up the motivations and feelings of a giant corporation and its employees, like they're the things that matter in a world where the system punches people in the throat based on criteria that are as identifiable as they are irrational and arbitrary.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 10:42 am (UTC)My only gripe isn't really with this post, but one thing that can sort of evolve out of the ideas behind it.
I'm visibly part of the "mainstream" or "dominant" culture. I'm white, male. Certainly, I do enjoy benefits from this status. Certain assumptions are not made about me and not having to deal with them makes my life a lot easier. However, there are a completely different set of assumptions that are often made about me. Because I am visibly part of the "mainstream" I can be targeted as the source of the problem or an enabler, etc. Which is annoying because I don't perpetuate, engage in, or even particularly approve of mainstream culture. I'm a super weird loner kid without the money or inclination. I understand that the majority has to be in some way complicit for this "mainstream" to continue, and that I am a sort of "invisible" minority not being so but, man it still sucks.
Just to be clear, I'm not suggesting that this post is accusing me or anyone else of being part of some sort of underground racist conspiracy. I see this post as rather more cautionary than accusatory.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 04:07 pm (UTC)The narrow definition of "mainstream" hurts everyone to a degree. Even people who are white, heterosexual, men with the interests expected of men still have pressure to conform to all the ideals that go along with those labels. It is the nature of a human shitheap that there will be many people on the bottom and few on very top, and unless you're at the very top there will always be someone above you, and it will suck. This is why so many people choose to focus on the people below them.
But here's the thing: without knowing you, I can say that you do engage and participate in and reinforce the systems I'm talking about. You do. I do. The guy in the video up above does. No one's an island. No one's a rock. No one's immune.
It's like the risk of skin cancer from the sun: you can be an "indoor" type person and be really careful to limit exposure when you go outside, but unless you live a life completely cloistered in darkness you are being exposed to the sun and you are being affected by its radiation.
And this is why it's a problem that we've made the great sin admitting to racism (and sexism and any other ism), because now we can't examine ourselves and the ways in which we participate in these systems without feeling like we are signing up to be social pariahs.
I could make a whole series of posts about the racefail I've perpetrated in my own writing and how I would like to improve in the future. I sometimes start to and then I delete it. Why? Because I know the response I'll get... supporters telling me, "Oh, but you're not that bad. We know you're not racist. Some people are just oversensitive." And other people going so far as to say that I'm letting myself be sabotaged by the "PC" movement.
My analysis of my own behavior would be seen as an accusation against myself... an accusation that cannot stand because it seems to impugn anybody else who's doing similar things.
Eh, you know what? :P I've just convinced myself to make that post anyway. It'll be interesting.
no subject
on 2009-12-23 05:18 am (UTC)Anyway, I guess my (attempted) point was that in the same way that I can fall into the trap of saying, "Absolutely nothing I do or have ever done has ever supported society's unconscious judgements of people based on their race," other people seem to fall into the trap of saying, "Because you are of the visibly dominant race and gender, you are more responsible for the continuation of society's unconscious judgements of people based on their race." Which is ridiculous and hurtful. Even the people suffering from these labels can have a hand in them, and not just for "fitting" them, believing them too.
I always feel so silly posting ideas or concepts that I know my audience already aware of.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 05:13 pm (UTC)2. One of the problems with racism isn't just skin color. Because people of different color also tend to have different facial features, specifically nose shape, it changes the way their voices sound. There was a study (can't remember which, so please don't ask) where people listened to voice recordings and tried to guess the race of the person speaking and most people were fairly good at it.
Also, people are genetically predisposed to recognize and better distinguish others of their own race. A white person would be better able to pick a white person out of a line up, an Asian out of an Asian. It has to do with how we perceive features. And it is completely genetic, not cultural; you can be adopted from birth and raised with a different race until adulthood, never seeing another person of your own race, and then if you're put in a multiracial situation you will still be able to distinguish people of your own race better. It probably goes back to when we were all preverbal in small hunting and gathering groups with lots of fighting and we needed a way to distinguish our own people (the good guys) from the other people (the bad guys) who were trying to kill us. Maybe that's where racism started. It really sucks that our instincts haven't caught up with our social development.
3. Another problem is that most people don't even realize they're racist, so they genuinely are offended when called out on it because it's so taboo that they're too horrified to believe that it's something that they could possibly be, rather than examine it.
4. You forgot Denzel
5. When it comes to mainstream media, especially television, 90% of people of color are "bleached out" anyway. If you take "All American Girl" the one and only Asian American show to ever be on mainstream t.v. Margaret Cho was told that her show was too ethnic (not to mention that this was after they made her lose 30 lbs in 2 months, but that's a different post) and canceled it. All those Fox and CW teen shows have the "Token Black Kid" who just so happens to talk like all the white kids, dress like all the white kids, listen to all the same music as all the white kids, have the completely same culture as all the white kids. And have you noticed that all the shows with Black casts on Prime Time t.v. are sitcoms? They only want funny Black people; no, never have a show that shows what it's really like to be Black, a serious show that shows racism and discrimination and adversity and communities coming together to celebrate their culture. White people would never want to see that, and that's all that really matters, right?
6. I totally argue against the BET with a straight face. Usually to be ironic, to show someone how ridiculous his/her argument is. Rarely I do so to complain that it is not fair that they are the only minority with a t.v. channel on mainstream cable and that the others don't; but then I'm not saying that they shouldn't, just that if they can have one the others should get one too.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 06:28 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-22 06:31 pm (UTC)He's the first (and only) black actor to win an Academy Award for best actor since Sidney Poitier in the 60s.
no subject
on 2009-12-22 06:35 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-22 11:09 pm (UTC)http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0004937/awards
What about Forest Whitaker?
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001845/awards
no subject
on 2009-12-22 11:30 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-22 11:41 pm (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-23 03:05 am (UTC)Reading that reawakened old frustration I have about the lousy treatment that Sci-Fi gave to Le Guin's Earthsea books, which numbered that among the atrocities it committed.
no subject
on 2009-12-23 04:14 am (UTC)no subject
on 2009-12-23 03:24 am (UTC)And while people well versed in the subject understand what it means, most folks don't share that understanding, which makes the negative phrasing sound to those that enjoy such a position like an attack on them rather than an attempt to properly equalize an unbalanced system.
no subject
on 2009-12-25 03:59 am (UTC)I understand that this 'overt' quality is more that simply systemic bigotry, but that fact that the marketing team felt that that could even get away with saying that shows how ingrained that attitude is.
BBC
on 2009-12-25 04:26 am (UTC)http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8429634.stm
"HP has been informed of a potential issue with the facial-tracking software included on some of its systems, which appears to occur when insufficient foreground lighting is available," an HP spokesman told BBC News.
"We take this seriously and are looking into it with our partners."
Re: BBC
on 2009-12-25 04:28 am (UTC)no subject
on 2010-02-08 04:04 pm (UTC)