'Whites Can Be Black if They Wish' says Lecturers' Union

[marshwiggle]

Those exact words aren't used in meetings and email lists at my non-academic employer, but it's pretty clear the sentiment in some quarters at my work is we shouldn't hire any more white, cis, het men if any qualified other people are in the pool.  The hiring trend recently indicates that any qualified woman and/or underrepresented minority who doesn't blow the interview will be hired.

Yes, that's why you just don't see any more white men get hired anymore in academia.

So if no black men get killed by police in my community it doesn't matter that it happens somwehere else?

???????

The fact that "white men get hired" in some places seems to imply (by what you've said) that the kind of anti-white men issues that Polly raised are not a problem. So, if you apply that to other issues, then as long as a problem isn't absolutely universal, it isn't really a problem.

[Hibush]

The vast majority of inequality is related to class, not race. Malia and Sasha Obama will be able to write their own tickets in life. Being "women of colour" won't be a problem because of their socioeconomic status. Meanwhile, some kid who grew up in a trailer park in a rural community with 80% unemployment is not going to see any perceived benefits  of "privilege".

That was the frustration where I grew up and where I currently live.  There's no privilege in skin tone when it's so clear that one's socioeconomic status is low.  New clothes aren't enough to erase the obvious signs in behavior and other parts of appearance like access to cosmetic dental care.

The African Americans in town here moved for the high-paying, graduate-degree-required jobs.  The poor kids here are not Black.


My home town had exactly two Black families when I was growing up: the hospital administrator and a minister.  While money might have been tight for the minister's family, the poor kids in town who weren't going to college and really didn't have a good future of any kind were very pale.

A counterpoint is offered in a letter from Gary May, the chancellor at UC Davis. He is the biggest big shot in town, so his social status is undisputedly on top.

Yet the everyday dangers faced by all black men affect even him.

He writes, "George Floyd could have been any African American man, including me. Beyond the constant barrage of fear of the negative consequences of birding while black, shopping while black, cooking out while black, exercising while black — it is just exhausting. And I'm tired."

[financeguy]

Something may be true but totally unpersuasive. Just like you are never going to lessen the anger of someone who sees a member of their own group wrongfully killed by a single cop by pointing out any statistics about how likely it is to happen or even if true that it happens to whites just as often, you are never going to get any white person who has seen a single job "allocated" by race or gender to think it "isn't a big deal" by how often it happens. I'm not even necessarily making either of those statistical arguments. I'm just saying they wouldn't matter in the least to anyone who hears them. The only acceptable objective is going to be eliminate rather than lessen/accept the practice. Whites are never going to accept threats to their jobs as not a big deal no matter how small/infrequent/seemingly justified numerically. It's just a conversation non-starter that's a loser from a persuasion standpoint from the beginning.

[Caracal]

Something may be true but totally unpersuasive. Just like you are never going to lessen the anger of someone who sees a member of their own group wrongfully killed by a single cop by pointing out any statistics about how likely it is to happen or even if true that it happens to whites just as often, you are never going to get any white person who has seen a single job "allocated" by race or gender to think it "isn't a big deal" by how often it happens. I'm not even necessarily making either of those statistical arguments. I'm just saying they wouldn't matter in the least to anyone who hears them. The only acceptable objective is going to be eliminate rather than lessen/accept the practice. Whites are never going to accept threats to their jobs as not a big deal no matter how small/infrequent/seemingly justified numerically. It's just a conversation non-starter that's a loser from a persuasion standpoint from the beginning.

The first part is not true.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/investigations/police-shootings-database/

As for the second, really? Despite the fact that numbers suggest that discrimination goes the other way, what we need to do is really concentrate on making sure that no white person ever believes they have been discriminated against. It would be one thing if this sort of argument was made by people who seem concerned about discrimination against minorities, but that rarely seems to be the case. The base assumption is that if a white person gets hired, they must have been hired because they are the best choice. This despite the fact that it is pretty obvious that having more a more diverse faculty would be beneficial in a whole variety of ways.

[mahagonny]

The vast majority of inequality is related to class, not race. Malia and Sasha Obama will be able to write their own tickets in life. Being "women of colour" won't be a problem because of their socioeconomic status. Meanwhile, some kid who grew up in a trailer park in a rural community with 80% unemployment is not going to see any perceived benefits  of "privilege".

That was the frustration where I grew up and where I currently live.  There's no privilege in skin tone when it's so clear that one's socioeconomic status is low.  New clothes aren't enough to erase the obvious signs in behavior and other parts of appearance like access to cosmetic dental care.

The African Americans in town here moved for the high-paying, graduate-degree-required jobs.  The poor kids here are not Black.


My home town had exactly two Black families when I was growing up: the hospital administrator and a minister.  While money might have been tight for the minister's family, the poor kids in town who weren't going to college and really didn't have a good future of any kind were very pale.

A counterpoint is offered in a letter from Gary May, the chancellor at UC Davis. He is the biggest big shot in town, so his social status is undisputedly on top.

Yet the everyday dangers faced by all black men affect even him.

He writes, "George Floyd could have been any African American man, including me. Beyond the constant barrage of fear of the negative consequences of birding while black, shopping while black, cooking out while black, exercising while black — it is just exhausting. And I'm tired."

So the chancellor goes into convenience stores and passes counterfeit money? He does home invasions and sells cocaine in the neighborhood? He fathers five children without a plan to support all of them?

[Caracal]

The vast majority of inequality is related to class, not race. Malia and Sasha Obama will be able to write their own tickets in life. Being "women of colour" won't be a problem because of their socioeconomic status. Meanwhile, some kid who grew up in a trailer park in a rural community with 80% unemployment is not going to see any perceived benefits  of "privilege".

That was the frustration where I grew up and where I currently live.  There's no privilege in skin tone when it's so clear that one's socioeconomic status is low.  New clothes aren't enough to erase the obvious signs in behavior and other parts of appearance like access to cosmetic dental care.

The African Americans in town here moved for the high-paying, graduate-degree-required jobs.  The poor kids here are not Black.


My home town had exactly two Black families when I was growing up: the hospital administrator and a minister.  While money might have been tight for the minister's family, the poor kids in town who weren't going to college and really didn't have a good future of any kind were very pale.

A counterpoint is offered in a letter from Gary May, the chancellor at UC Davis. He is the biggest big shot in town, so his social status is undisputedly on top.

Yet the everyday dangers faced by all black men affect even him.

He writes, "George Floyd could have been any African American man, including me. Beyond the constant barrage of fear of the negative consequences of birding while black, shopping while black, cooking out while black, exercising while black — it is just exhausting. And I'm tired."

So the chancellor goes into convenience stores and passes counterfeit money? He does home invasions and sells cocaine in the neighborhood? He fathers five children without a plan to support all of them?

Rancid.

[marshwiggle]

This despite the fact that it is pretty obvious that having more a more diverse faculty would be beneficial in a whole variety of ways.

So diversity being inherently good must mean you're in favour of Kanye running for president, since otherwise it's just two old white guys.

[mahagonny]

There's no guarantee that any individual, upon leaving his house on any particular day, will not be the victim of police malpractice. But there are moral and common sense choices that affect your odds.

The chancellor doesn't sound like he has a lot of depth, frankly. Very given to gross generalization, and quite possibly misleading statement. Plenty of whites die in confrontations with police. He's not interested in that.

[financeguy]

Caracal, you can't ensure that no white person ever believes they are discriminated against. What you can do (and should do if you wish your policy preferences to actually succeed) is to attempt to pursued whites effectively, just as you would pursued any other interest groups. Let's say we're approaching affirmative action. These things don't tend to pursued whites:

-Stating institutional racism or "white privileged" as causes necessitating affirmative action rather than stating the benefits to those who ultimately attend, perhaps even those who are white! Stating the case as something that is owed based on a transgression that must be atoned for is a conversation non-starter more likely to cause whites to dig in their heels rather than attempt to see the benefit of the program.

-Stating that AA is "one of many factors" is one of the worst approaches from a logical or persuasion standpoint, so much so that it surprises me that people still use it as a defense. So if an admission rep chose females he considered physically attractive as "only one of many factors" rather than as a determining factor, it would render it acceptable when it would otherwise not be? Sorry, just drop this talking point. It won't work.

-Downplaying the numbers. Regardless of AA stats for hiring or college admission, anyone who has seen it happen ONE time has enough of a data point to have a negative visceral reaction independent of how the level of frequency fits into overall statistics. Don't try to downplay the numbers. Reframe based on benefits.

If you simply want to seem woke or virtue signal, you can do whatever you want and have a ready trump card to pull from your back pocket to own those who oppose your desires by simply implying or outright stating they're racists. If you actually want your policies to succeed, whites are the same as any other group. Tell them what's in it for them or why something "works" in general rather than why they owe you, the latter of which has never succeeded in attracting voters/supporters from any group, whites or anyone else.

[ergative]

This despite the fact that it is pretty obvious that having more a more diverse faculty would be beneficial in a whole variety of ways.

So diversity being inherently good must mean you're in favour of Kanye running for president, since otherwise it's just two old white guys.

I'm just ducking in here to point out that, of the two wildly unqualified men in this example, the black guy dropped out after one day and the white guy is running for a second term. Part of diversity is allowing people other than the white dudes to be mediocre failures, without allowing those failures to reflect on their larger group as a whole. XKCD has commented on this.

[Caracal]

If you simply want to seem woke or virtue signal, you can do whatever you want and have a ready trump card to pull from your back pocket to own those who oppose your desires by simply implying or outright stating they're racists. If you actually want your policies to succeed, whites are the same as any other group. Tell them what's in it for them or why something "works" in general rather than why they owe you, the latter of which has never succeeded in attracting voters/supporters from any group, whites or anyone else.

Apparently now virtue signaling is just not engaging in overt racism? Seriously, this is usually a pitiful deflection, as it is in this case. When groups in power insist they are being discriminated against by minority groups, it is rarely part of some fair minded crusade for universal justice.
I can't say I'm really interested in impressing anybody on here, but as far as it goes, sure I'd prefer to not be on the side of white people engaged in creating false narratives of racial resentment.

[mahagonny]

Caracal, you can't ensure that no white person ever believes they are discriminated against. What you can do (and should do if you wish your policy preferences to actually succeed) is to attempt to pursued whites effectively, just as you would pursued any other interest groups. Let's say we're approaching affirmative action. These things don't tend to pursued whites:

-Stating institutional racism or "white privileged" as causes necessitating affirmative action rather than stating the benefits to those who ultimately attend, perhaps even those who are white! Stating the case as something that is owed based on a transgression that must be atoned for is a conversation non-starter more likely to cause whites to dig in their heels rather than attempt to see the benefit of the program.

-Stating that AA is "one of many factors" is one of the worst approaches from a logical or persuasion standpoint, so much so that it surprises me that people still use it as a defense. So if an admission rep chose females he considered physically attractive as "only one of many factors" rather than as a determining factor, it would render it acceptable when it would otherwise not be? Sorry, just drop this talking point. It won't work.

-Downplaying the numbers. Regardless of AA stats for hiring or college admission, anyone who has seen it happen ONE time has enough of a data point to have a negative visceral reaction independent of how the level of frequency fits into overall statistics. Don't try to downplay the numbers. Reframe based on benefits.

If you simply want to seem woke or virtue signal, you can do whatever you want and have a ready trump card to pull from your back pocket to own those who oppose your desires by simply implying or outright stating they're racists. If you actually want your policies to succeed, whites are the same as any other group. Tell them what's in it for them or why something "works" in general rather than why they owe you, the latter of which has never succeeded in attracting voters/supporters from any group, whites or anyone else.

There is one mindset wherein academics know they are out of the mainstream politically, and don't wish things to be otherwise. They still have classrooms of kids who need passing grades. The study of racism, white privilege, white superiority etc. are big business, and getting bigger.
If someone thinks we are just going to have to agree to disagree, I can get along. If they just want to do ad hominem, In all honestly, they may serve as instructive negative examples. In other words, you're not gonna talk to them, but you're gonna talk about them.

[marshwiggle]

Apparently now virtue signaling is just not engaging in overt racism? Seriously, this is usually a pitiful deflection, as it is in this case. When groups in power insist they are being discriminated against by minority groups, it is rarely part of some fair minded crusade for universal justice.

"Groups" generally aren't discriminated against by "groups"; individuals get discriminated against by other individuals. Most of the recent protesters were actually white, including ones who trashed properties owned by people who were black.

And in the cases of preferential hiring that have been mentioned here, it's mostly white people on hiring committees vowing to avoid hiring white people.

So, since white people can be racist, can they be called out for being racist against other white people?

I can't say I'm really interested in impressing anybody on here, but as far as it goes, sure I'd prefer to not be on the side of white people engaged in creating false narratives of racial resentment.

Again, the racial resentment usually comes from other white people, who are all caught up in their excessive wokeness.

[polly_mer]

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/07/dehumanizing-condescension-white-fragility/614146/ is a relevant article for those want to discuss.

Years ago, Dave Barry pointed out that while the people in charge might be white guys, those people in charge didn't call up all the white guys as equals.  The power is really in just a few humans.

[Hegemony]

The arguments and beliefs on this thread just make me despair.