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KDS
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« Reply #975 on: May 06, 2016, 10:59:17 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 
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Emily
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« Reply #976 on: May 06, 2016, 11:01:20 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 
Then no offence taken.
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« Reply #977 on: May 06, 2016, 11:02:09 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?
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KDS
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« Reply #978 on: May 06, 2016, 11:04:56 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 
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Emily
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« Reply #979 on: May 06, 2016, 11:15:41 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase.  

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that.  
I do think there are some who give short shrift to white people who are caught in a poverty cycle. But there's firm evidence that there are and have been additional institutional and cultural barriers that make success harder for non-white people on the basis of their non-whiteness.
Lending institutions have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Employers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Police have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Teachers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Store keepers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Judges have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.

So, when a white person thinks about their own hard times, which everyone has, some much more than others, they can think, "damn, my life is hard and I'm sick of those other people complaining about their life being hard." Or they can think, "damn, life is hard, and how much more would it suck to have even less of a chance to get out of this hell hole?"
« Last Edit: May 06, 2016, 11:16:42 AM by Emily » Logged
Chocolate Shake Man
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« Reply #980 on: May 06, 2016, 11:16:31 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.
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KDS
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« Reply #981 on: May 06, 2016, 11:18:53 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 
I do think there are some who give short shrift to white people who are caught in a poverty cycle. But there's firm evidence that there are and have been additional institutional and cultural barriers that make success harder for non-white people on the basis of their non-whiteness.
Lending institutions have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Employers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Police have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Teachers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Store keepers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.

So, when a white person thinks about their own hard times, which everyone has, some much more than others, they can think, "damn, my life is hard and I'm sick of those other people complaining about their life being hard." Or they can think, "damn, life is hard, and how much more would it suck to have even less of a chance to get out of this hell hole?"

So, by that logic, the struggle of any white person instantly pales in comparison to the struggle of a minority.  

That is much more offense than a stereotype if you ask me.  
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KDS
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« Reply #982 on: May 06, 2016, 11:20:09 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 
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yonderhillside
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« Reply #983 on: May 06, 2016, 11:20:37 AM »

Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

Terrible choice of words. The way he said it was definitely a blanket statement and pretty damn offensive, but I highly doubt he meant it to be. I think this says it (what he PROBABLY meant) best:

"The fact of racial demographics and poverty is whites have it bad—but blacks and Hispanics have it worse. The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that 10 percent of white Americans live below the poverty line—but so, too, do 26 percent of African-Americans and 24 percent of Hispanic-Americans. The factors that keep white people in poverty—lack of education, addiction, and a dearth of available low-skilled jobs—affect black people far more, fulfilling the economic maxim: “When Americans get a cold, African-Americans get the flu.”

Take, for example, the most recent recession beginning with the housing crisis in 2007-08. By 2009, when economists say the Great Recession had officially ended, the median net worth of a white household had fallen 24 percent, while that of a black household fell 83 percent. While the national unemployment rate acted as a thermometer for the economy throughout the recession, it typically failed to detail the struggles of African-American workers. At its peak, the recession forced the unemployment rate to 10 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. But for African-Americans, unemployment topped at 19.5 percent and, in fact, has been consistently twice that of white Americans over the last two decades."
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Chocolate Shake Man
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« Reply #984 on: May 06, 2016, 11:21:22 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.
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Chocolate Shake Man
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« Reply #985 on: May 06, 2016, 11:23:11 AM »

And it would be nice to live in a world where we could say something like "regardless of race" and have it be true, but unfortunately that's not our reality.
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KDS
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« Reply #986 on: May 06, 2016, 11:24:10 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  
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Emily
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« Reply #987 on: May 06, 2016, 11:25:56 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 
I do think there are some who give short shrift to white people who are caught in a poverty cycle. But there's firm evidence that there are and have been additional institutional and cultural barriers that make success harder for non-white people on the basis of their non-whiteness.
Lending institutions have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Employers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Police have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Teachers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Store keepers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.

So, when a white person thinks about their own hard times, which everyone has, some much more than others, they can think, "damn, my life is hard and I'm sick of those other people complaining about their life being hard." Or they can think, "damn, life is hard, and how much more would it suck to have even less of a chance to get out of this hell hole?"

So, by that logic, the struggle of any white person instantly pales in comparison to the struggle of a minority.  

That is much more offense than a stereotype if you ask me.  

I think it's appropriately empathetic given the reality that the cards are stacked against non-whites in our economy. The struggle of white people, on a macro level, does pale in comparison to the struggle of non-white people in the US. That's really just fact.
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Mr. Verlander
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« Reply #988 on: May 06, 2016, 11:35:31 AM »

Bernie supporters are just as bad (and racist, believe it or not) as the Trump supporters for the most part. Hillary is the Democratic nominee; it's in the BAG, guys. Give it up. Trump will smash Hillary. Gods help us with either candidate...

I agree with you on either candidate being crap; however, I disagree that Trump will smash Hillary, for the simple fact that minorities (or 'people of color') are going to come out in droves to vote against Trump. They all believe (rightly or wrongly) that Trump hates them. There's no way they allow him to win the presidential election.
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Chocolate Shake Man
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« Reply #989 on: May 06, 2016, 11:35:48 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  

I'm unclear on this. Your family would disagree with the factual evidence given above by yonderhillside? I'm sorry that this has come across as offensive but I'm really unclear what I have said that is troubling.
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Emily
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« Reply #990 on: May 06, 2016, 11:36:43 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  
I'm sorry they wouldn't be civil. I have family members in poverty too. And a few of them wouldn't be civil either. But the fact is that they have fewer barriers than non-white people. Their situation sucks. And in the case of my cousin's family - in which he has a chiari malformation and his wife has just been diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and they have four children under the age of 18; or my other cousin who left her drug-addicted, in-and-out-of-jail, thieving, abusive husband and is trying to support herself and her three kids on her own; or my mom as a kid whose parents were immigrants, illiterate, and dug up bugs and worms to sell as bait and killed the kids pets for food to make it through the depression; or my dad, whose mom was an abusive schizophrenic addict and whose dad just gave up trying to deal with life in his forties - it's not, unless you're a real a**hole, of their own making. So, some white individuals have almost unspeakable disasters in their lives. But it doesn't negate the reality that, as white people, they and their children had a better chance at getting out of their economic situations, and at finding support for their situations, than people of color in the same situation would have had. It might be hard when you have troubles to empathize, but again, the reality is that people of color have less opportunity.
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KDS
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« Reply #991 on: May 06, 2016, 11:38:21 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 
I do think there are some who give short shrift to white people who are caught in a poverty cycle. But there's firm evidence that there are and have been additional institutional and cultural barriers that make success harder for non-white people on the basis of their non-whiteness.
Lending institutions have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Employers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Police have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Teachers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Store keepers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.

So, when a white person thinks about their own hard times, which everyone has, some much more than others, they can think, "damn, my life is hard and I'm sick of those other people complaining about their life being hard." Or they can think, "damn, life is hard, and how much more would it suck to have even less of a chance to get out of this hell hole?"

So, by that logic, the struggle of any white person instantly pales in comparison to the struggle of a minority.  

That is much more offense than a stereotype if you ask me.  

I think it's appropriately empathetic given the reality that the cards are stacked against non-whites in our economy. The struggle of white people, on a macro level, does pale in comparison to the struggle of non-white people in the US. That's really just fact.


If you're talking in a historical sense, maybe.  Even if the Irish struggled mightily in the US too, but nobody talks about that.  

But on the individual level, the idea of "white privilege" is pure grade A bull plop.  And you know what, when you really think about it, it's pretty insulting to non-whites as well.  
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KDS
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« Reply #992 on: May 06, 2016, 11:40:40 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  

I'm unclear on this. Your family would disagree with the factual evidence given above by yonderhillside? I'm sorry that this has come across as offensive but I'm really unclear what I have said that is troubling.

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle. 

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it. 
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Chocolate Shake Man
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« Reply #993 on: May 06, 2016, 11:45:46 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  

I'm unclear on this. Your family would disagree with the factual evidence given above by yonderhillside? I'm sorry that this has come across as offensive but I'm really unclear what I have said that is troubling.

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle. 

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it. 

I suggest you look back. We've already had this discussion. I've responded to the Sanders quotation and disagreed with it. So I'm not sure who you are disagreeing with at this point but you are certainly content to not engage with any of the points that I have been making. The comment about "logic" doesn't merit a response.
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Emily
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« Reply #994 on: May 06, 2016, 11:48:14 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 
I do think there are some who give short shrift to white people who are caught in a poverty cycle. But there's firm evidence that there are and have been additional institutional and cultural barriers that make success harder for non-white people on the basis of their non-whiteness.
Lending institutions have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Employers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Police have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Teachers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.
Store keepers have been proven to discriminate strictly on race.

So, when a white person thinks about their own hard times, which everyone has, some much more than others, they can think, "damn, my life is hard and I'm sick of those other people complaining about their life being hard." Or they can think, "damn, life is hard, and how much more would it suck to have even less of a chance to get out of this hell hole?"

So, by that logic, the struggle of any white person instantly pales in comparison to the struggle of a minority.  

That is much more offense than a stereotype if you ask me.  

I think it's appropriately empathetic given the reality that the cards are stacked against non-whites in our economy. The struggle of white people, on a macro level, does pale in comparison to the struggle of non-white people in the US. That's really just fact.


If you're talking in a historical sense, maybe.  Even if the Irish struggled mightily in the US too, but nobody talks about that.  

But on the individual level, the idea of "white privilege" is pure grade A bull plop.  And you know what, when you really think about it, it's pretty insulting to non-whites as well.  
A really interesting book about this is The Great Arizona Orphan Abduction, which makes clear the relativity of the concept of 'white'. In New York in 1904, the Irish weren't considered 'white'. And 'white' New Yorkers thought about the Irish in the same way that a lot of 'white' people in troubled cities think of other non-whites now. So, they had a system where they gathered up Irish 'orphans' (often kids with moms but without present dads so not necessarily what we consider orphans today) and shipped them out west where there was a lot more room for excess people and a lot of willing adoptors. When they arrived the 'white' people there thought it was shocking that kids that they considered 'white,' because they lived among Mexican-Americans (remember, for all our yelling about Mexicans in the southwest, they were there first) would be adopted by non-white people. So, they kidnapped the Irish kids to save them from being raised by Mexican-Americans. The concept of 'white' is fluid and the Irish were not 'white' to the protestants of the northeast when they arrived. However, since then, the Irish have definitely succeeded to 'white' status in our country, so they currently have all the advantages of 'whiteness'. But definitely, those who decried racism and the disadvantaged treatment of the Irish at that time would have been right.
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alf wiedersehen
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« Reply #995 on: May 06, 2016, 11:48:42 AM »

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle. 

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it. 

Yes, that is what an average indicates. There are items to the left of the average, and there are items to the right of the average. Most are piled up in the middle. The family and friends you mention would be the left.
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« Reply #996 on: May 06, 2016, 11:50:52 AM »

Wow. I'm going to assume that wasn't in the tone it reads like it was in.

No malice towards you Emily.  I just hate the phrase. 

Why?

Because the idea of white privilege is thrown around by clueless extreme liberals like Bernie Sanders and so-called civil rights leaders, and it implies that, because one is white, they haven't had to struggle in life.  Complete bullsh$t.  Sanders himself even said "it's impossible for a white person to be poor."  I have a lot of family members who'll disagree with that. 

First, I'm not sure what an "extreme liberal" is. We've discussed this elsewhere, but I would be curious what the extreme version of a right-of-centre position is supposed to be. But I suppose that when one considers that Sanders is a moderate in a reactionary far-right society, the term "extreme liberal" might make sense since a moderate right-of-centre position is as far left as you are allowed to go in a country where the left has been actively marginalized, silenced, and excluded from political power.

I do agree though that white people can be poor and I do think that class privilege is a better thing to focus on than race privilege. That said, while there aren't any races that are excluded from poverty, there are races that can more easily avoid poverty thanks to historical circumstances and the way that the country is economically structured to maintain the inequalities that came out of these historical circumstances.

For some people, regardless of race, poverty can never be "easily avoided." 

I didn't say otherwise. But on average, it's more easily avoided for one race over others.

I'd love to hear some of my family members' reactions to this.  I guarantee you that they wouldn't be as civil as I'm being right now.  
I'm sorry they wouldn't be civil. I have family members in poverty too. And a few of them wouldn't be civil either. But the fact is that they have fewer barriers than non-white people. Their situation sucks. And in the case of my cousin's family - in which he has a chiari malformation and his wife has just been diagnosed with stage four lung cancer and they have four children under the age of 18; or my other cousin who left her drug-addicted, in-and-out-of-jail, thieving, abusive husband and is trying to support herself and her three kids on her own; or my mom as a kid whose parents were immigrants, illiterate, and dug up bugs and worms to sell as bait and killed the kids pets for food to make it through the depression; or my dad, whose mom was an abusive schizophrenic addict and whose dad just gave up trying to deal with life in his forties - it's not, unless you're a real a**hole, of their own making. So, some white individuals have almost unspeakable disasters in their lives. But it doesn't negate the reality that, as white people, they and their children had a better chance at getting out of their economic situations, and at finding support for their situations, than people of color in the same situation would have had. It might be hard when you have troubles to empathize, but again, the reality is that people of color have less opportunity.


Emily,

Weren't you the one who criticized me for generalizing or labeling groups of people? 

You're doing the same thing here by saying, in general, white people are less likely to struggle. 

My point is, as long as there are individual white people who suffer in poverty, there can be no such thing as "white privilege."
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« Reply #997 on: May 06, 2016, 11:52:00 AM »

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle. 

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it. 

Yes, that is what an average indicates. There are items to the left of the average, and there are items to the right of the average. Most are piled up in the middle. The family and friends you mention would be the left.

But, as I just pointed out to Emily, the fact that there are white people who do struggle completely debunks the myth of "white privilege." 
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« Reply #998 on: May 06, 2016, 11:53:47 AM »

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle.  

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it.  

Yes, that is what an average indicates. There are items to the left of the average, and there are items to the right of the average. Most are piled up in the middle. The family and friends you mention would be the left.


But, as I just pointed out to Emily, the fact that there are white people who do struggle completely debunks the myth of "white privilege."  

Mathematically speaking, it adds support to theory. You can't have an average without a lower end.
« Last Edit: May 06, 2016, 11:56:13 AM by Bubs » Logged
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« Reply #999 on: May 06, 2016, 11:55:26 AM »

I know that logic is tough for some people to handle. 

What he said was the poverty is easier to avoid for white people.  I have a lot of family members and friends who're white who have not been able to avoid poverty, despite their best efforts.  That is factual.  They're white.  They're poor.  They've tried, but can't avoid it. 

Yes, that is what an average indicates. There are items to the left of the average, and there are items to the right of the average. Most are piled up in the middle. The family and friends you mention would be the left.

Mathematically speaking, it adds support to theory. You can't have an average without a lower end.
But, as I just pointed out to Emily, the fact that there are white people who do struggle completely debunks the myth of "white privilege." 

So, you're trying to say that "white privilege" is a real thing? 
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