What if I said that I hate black people, but it’s not because of the color of their skin, it’s because they play rap music deafeningly loud at 3 AM and I can’t get to sleep. Is that racism? I don’t think so. Believe me, if some white guy was playing Mozart ridiculously loud in the middle of the night, I would hate him too.
One could argue that I’m using a racial term, “black,” to arbitrarily describe a group of people, “loud music at night players,” which is in no way related to being black, and so that makes me a racist. I would disagree. If someone were to ask me what kind of people, in general, play rap music really loud at night, what am I supposed to say? I’ve never had any problems with Asians, Guatemalans, golfers, Canadians, short people, women, scientists, gays, swimmers, politicians, or Trekkies keeping me up at night with their loud music. “Black” is the best term to describe such people.
If a basketball coach allows only people 6 feet tall or taller to try out, is that short-ist? If a company decides to hire only college educated employees, is that dumb-ist? If an advertising agency decides to photograph only incredibly beautiful women, is that ugly-ist?
Maybe, but who cares? This is not some discrimination conspiracy out to get you, it’s just common sense. Of course there are some short people who are excellent basketball players, and some high school dropouts who are brilliant geniuses, and some ugly women who can sell products, but if you are trying to efficiently find the right person for the job, you go to the highest concentration of talent.
In every city there is a Chinatown, a Little Italy, the “white” part of town, the “black” part of town, etc. Why do you suppose everybody isn’t intermingled like the great melting pot we are supposed to be? It’s because people like hanging around their own race better than others. But, this isn’t racism! It’s culture. I like to be around people who like the same foods as I do, the same music as I do, the same TV shows as I do. So does everybody else. These racially separated neighborhoods that arise are completely natural. It’s because race, in general, affects your culture. I dare you to (honestly) take a look at the neighborhood you live in: is it not mostly homogeneous with people like you? Does this make you a racist? Take an honest look at your friends, too, while you are at it. Are 74% of your friends white, 14.8% Hispanic, and 13.4% black? If not, I could easily accuse you of being racist, since those are the demographics of the US.
If you find yourself only attracted to white people, does that make you racist? It’s not really a choice, after all, it’s just who you happen to find sexually appealing. Do we call gays sexist towards women, and lesbians sexist towards men? If a woman decides to walk home at night with another woman instead of with a man because she feels safer that way, does that make her sexist? According to Bureau of Justice statistics, men account for 86% of violent offenders. Maybe it’s not sexism but rather common sense for women to avoid men at night. If I choose not to live in the Bronx, does that make me a racist, or does that simply mean that I am fully aware that the crime rate of the Bronx is 50% higher than the rest of New York City?
Webster’s definition of racism is: “The prejudice that members of one race are intrinsically superior to members of other races.” None of the examples I have given above fit this definition. It’s possible to prefer one group of people over another without thinking they are superior. Although some racism still exists, of course, I think people are far too quick to point the finger at anybody who expresses a dislike for a certain type of people. In politics, for example, racism is often used as the trump card against one’s enemies in order to instantly win an argument. Is the phrase, “I hate politicians,” racist? I might be overgeneralizing, but I have yet to come across an honest one.
EDIT: By the way, the South Park episode, The Death Camp of Tolerance, does an excellent job at explaining prejudice and tolerance and the differences between being racist and simply not liking somebody.
Tags: blacks, discrimination, racism, stereotypes
dude I dont know what the point of this post was. But you’re racist/
If you’re White and not actively bemoaning your “privilege” and visibly working as hard as you can to force every White in America to give their money to the Blacks and Latinos, someone will say you’re a racist.
Deal with it as it should be dealt with – by ignoring the filth who jabber such accusations. They are undeserving of the respect inherent in listening to them.
Uh, so why don’t you just say you hate people who “play rap music deafeningly loud at 3 AM”?
Why generalize this behavior to all Black people? What percentage of Black people engage in this behavior?
Just because in your limited experience, you observe that all people who do X have property Y, it doesn’t mean that
(a) all people who do X have property Y, and that
(b) all people who have property Y do X.
Yeah?
Let’s say I’m looking to move into a new apartment, and I want to make sure that I don’t end up surrounded by noisy neighbors who play rap music deafeningly loud at 3 AM. Let’s also suppose that 70% of people who listen to rap music are black. Does it make me racist to actively look for apartments in non-black neighborhoods? I think that makes me smart, not racist.
You clearly read the first sentence of my article and then didn’t bother to read the rest.
The term “racist” is thrown around these days far too often. Nobody is allowed to express a negative opinion about a certain group of people, no matter how accurate it is. If someone said, “I hate those rich white men who nearly destroyed the country with their shoddy banking practices,” I wouldn’t consider that racist, I would consider that accurate, even though not all rich men were responsible and not all of them were white.
To use a slightly less inflammatory example, suppose I have a really small bathroom in my apartment and I’m looking for a new roommate, specifically a man, because I hate how women have so many toiletries that they start to overflow the bathroom. Is that sexist? Of course not, it’s true!
Stereotypes almost always have some basis in reality, that’s where they came from after all.
Logically, there is a HUGE difference between, “that man is black so therefore he must like rap music,” and, “that man is black so therefore there’s a good chance that he likes rap music.”
This makes me racist: “That 20-year-old young black man walking down the street is an uneducated idiot.”
This, on the other hand, is true: “That 20-year-old young black man walking down the street has only a 33.4% chance of being in college right now.” — http://www.jbhe.com/vital/index.html “Percentage of the entire black population ages 18 to 24 who were enrolled in higher education in 2007: 33.4%
(U.S. Department of Education)”
Statistics easily generalize to entire populations, and to probabilities, but not to single people. Nevertheless, why should we ignore them?
By the way, this is a fascinating thread: http://www.city-data.com/forum.....music.html
Philip,
You appear to be defending yourself against a charge of racism. If it helps, I’m not making such a charge towards you. Nor am I concerned, for the purposes of this and my earlier comment, with the semantics of precisely what a racist or racism is.
My earlier comment was a challenge to the idea of hating Black people because of an experience you had with a few of them inconveniencing you with loud rap music. Reaching a conclusion from this that all or most Black people are blameworthy for such behavior is clearly irrational.
Thanks for clarifying. I agree that it’s technically irrational to take a small sample and apply it to the group as a whole, but surely at some point it becomes reasonable and understandable?
For example, what if I said, “Man, those black people back in the 1800s were so racist. How could they possibly hate white people when very few white people actually owned slaves? Just because of a few bad apples, suddenly black people hate white people? What racists!”
According to Wikipedia: Of all 8,289,782 free persons in the 15 slave states, 393,967 people (4.8%) held slaves, with the average number of slaves held by any single owner being 10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.....ted_States
So, less than 1 in 20 white people actually owned slaves. That doesn’t seem so bad. By your logic, any black person who holds a grudge against white people is clearly overreacting.
Again, I’m technically agreeing with you!
All I’m saying is that there is a little more to it. I think black people have every right to be pissed with white people, at least back then. You see, it’s a cultural thing. Even if most white people didn’t own slaves, it was still culturally accepted.
Likewise, even if only 4.8% of black people listen to rap music, it’s still a cultural thing that affects everybody. Sure, most black people don’t annoy me with their rap music, and it’s just a few bad apples that give rap music a bad name, but I still don’t think it’s quite as irrational or unfounded as you think to make a generalization.
So if I was to generalise I would say all black men have huge dicks and all white men have small dicks. I think thats a valid assumption, don’t you?
I’m black and I totally agree with you. But where I stand with racism is a) I was brought up in a predomaintely white area.
Now everyone I’ve met doesn’t see me is totally comfortable of black people. Mainly because society pressures them to be tolerant of ‘others’.
b) Although I’ve seen times where people have accidently (or sometimes purposely) given me stereotypes from people who look like me. I don’t blame them, it’s what they’ve been given by media, they didn’t CHOOSE that.
Generalization on my part is something which I care for deeply. It’s entirely unfair to mark everyone with the same brush, no matter what they look like, or you THINK they are. No matter if there’s a “technical” assumption that they will like rap music.
Just treat everyone like human beings. I honestly don’t know what good generalizing someone has done for me.
Note: When I say generalizing, I’m talking apart from the obvious differences between people. E.g: black people take in less Vitamin D from the sun (that’s factual, not environmental).
To say something is highly probable (such as a black person liking rap music) is just as well as improbable… you get my drift?
Reply to Tristan:
To say something is highly probable means that the odds of it happening are greater than the odds of it not happening. It is probable that the sun will rise in morning. It is “not” equally probable that the sun will not rise given the history of astronomy. Tristan’s statement is not correct that “to say something is highly probable is just as well improbable”.
Also, I happen to agree with Philip. To search out an apartment in a predominantly white part of town would decrease your chance of living next to people who enjoy loud rap music. I think it is very duplicitous of black people to on one hand claim something as their own art form, that being rap music. And then on the other hand make the claim that the odds of a black person enjoying rap are the same as a white person enjoying it. It is hard to have it both ways.
funny..i moved into a predominantly white community to avoid the terribally loud boomcars and wall booming neighbors cranking up the rap and hip hop music.2 years ago the area became predominantly black and in he process became exacly what i was trying to move away from.so there IS something to sterotyping but i’m not certain what exactly.
Hey sooo I fully believe that your basically generalizing black people into one category which is completely mind blowing to me.
Well I believe that from your inconvenient experience with a black person you believe that every black person blasts music deafeningly at 3 AM. That to me seems as though you are stereotyping and you try to justify it by saying well everyone does it so it right, right? Well I agree everyone does it, but the way your presenting yourself and carrying on about Black people makes me believe that you are in actuality skeptical of the black race, aka racist.
There’s one thing worse than being racist in my book, and that’s refusing to consider things that might be true just because they are offensive. If I said something like, “Men are stronger than women,” and women immediately yelled at me, “Oh my god, I can’t believe you said something so offensive and sexist,” then THEY are the ones who need perspective, not me, because they are immediately dismissing something that’s TRUE just because they find it offensive. Yes, it’s true: most men are stronger than most women. Obviously, there are always a few exceptions.
Likewise, now that I’m saying something like, “Most people who play their music obnoxiously loud are black,” I have people jumping down my throat yelling, “Oh my god, I can’t believe you are such a racist, apologize immediately,” and yet they haven’t even CONSIDERED that what I’m saying might be TRUE because they are blinded by their belief that what I said is “offensive”.
Remember the lesson: whether something is offensive or not has absolutely NOTHING to do with whether or not it’s true.
Philip, you are a racist.