It seems rather obvious this thread is in for a rocky ride just based on the title.
Surprised it lasted this long.
How much ‘money’ is being spent on the project should we replace Black/Negro with African American OR American of African Heritage?
Is the word ‘Wigger’ in the language yet?
How can WE, as a country/government, say RACE DOESN’T MATTER, Religion doesn’t matter, Heritage doesn’t matter, etc etc when we are continually plummeted with it on a daily basis by those that ‘supposedly’ want to ban it.
We all know that when a crime is reported (for the most part) there is no mention of Race. Fair enough, but IF ‘they’ are not going to point out a D in an article, why make the fact that someone is an R part of the headline -without personally wanting to take ‘pot shots’ at the R, White etc.
Seinfeld used to point this idiocy out on occasion - when Mrs C was taking advice from a person named Lee(?) who was passing herself off a Chinese - Well, if YOU thought she was Chinese, she did nothing to discourage it.
When found she wasn’t Chinese, the advice, all of a sudden, became useless ONLY because the person wasn’t Chinese.
Of course, ask me about a problem again while you sit there and name your children “Chaquwindeforgiac”, “Glutenguxtonial”, and whatever combination of consonants and vowels come off your finger tips.
When Indians (American) wanted to ‘change’ they started naming their children William, Mary, Phil etc and kind of dropped “Bubbling Brook”, “Lone Wolf”, etc, same with Asians, Russians, and whatever country of origin, the names kind of fit in with ‘local customs’ and usage.
The American Blacks just (to a goodly portion) went in the ‘other’ direction.
Nothing says *HIRE ME* more than being tagged with a ridiculous name - AND if able to get by it, just load yourself up with ink on every portion of your body, stick a bunch of metal studs on all visible parts of the the body, then tell me I am ‘racist’ or ‘sexist’ for not wanting to HIRE YOU and send you out in the public representing MY NAME.
This applies to ALL, not just a ‘Chosen Few’.
You nailed it. The fundamental difficulty with all these "affirmative action initiatives", or "leveling the playing field" type plans, is that by definition they are dividing people on racial lines, and therefore perpetuating the problem, particularly as they will never (voluntarily) dissolve themselves. After all, you can always find new expressions of racism/sexism/ageism/whatever-ism if you look hard enough, or at least identify things that can be interpreted that way (which in practical terms is just as good).
I think the answer is always to be as truthful as possible. The simple fact is that race DOES matter (obviously, we wouldnt be having these discussions if it didnt) but its not that important (or at least its not as important as most people around the world seem to think it is). We are all different yes, but we are all far more similar.