"Of course ALL white people are racist" (Barf alert)

Only by acknowledging the influence of subliminal stereotypes can we eradicate their pernicious effects

When the head of the crown prosecution service said he believed almost all British people were racist, he was roundly condemned. It was a moment of political correctness gone mad, commentators said. But one thing no one seems to have paused to consider was the possibility that he was right. In fact, what about: all white people are racist.

I don't mean they are all wilful bigots, of course. But racism is a combination of prejudice and power. And sadly prejudice is a deeply ingrained human trait.

Globally, white people are the dominant group, and in politics, economics, the media and all aspects of society, this power is used every day. It starts from the top and filters down to white people everywhere, regardless of their individual economic situation.

At the highest level, when President Bush tells Palestinians a different leader must take the place of the man they elected, he's treating them as second-class human beings. When the leaders of western economic powers deny fair trading terms to African countries, they are doing exactly the same. And the images of these pathetic victims help fuel more stereotypes about their "inferior" status.

Every day the white power structure - be it global, national or local - makes decisions which impinge on the lives of black people. Take the Metropolitan police, who last year decided to allow people to go unpunished if caught smoking dope in Brixton, south London. This scheme was brought in without the backing of the local black population, who fear the effect on their children of scenes of overt drug taking. If the police want to experiment with drugs, why choose black people as guinea pigs?

The actions of those in power create a constant drip of negative images which seep into the national consciousness. Why is it that every time a TV news report mentions unemployment, or school exclusions, or crime statistics you are virtually guaranteed to see a black face? Black and Asian people are seen far less often on reports on the health service, for example, where they make up a high proportion of nurses and doctors. Do you question it each time? Has this negative imagery become normalised in your own mind?

Only last week, a train crash in Tanzania which killed 200 people received the tiniest of mentions in the media. The Times ran a paragraph in its "In Brief" column. What impression does this give about the value of black life?

But the media is not entirely to blame. It is a chicken-and-egg situation in which editors know that their readers care less for non-white lives - they see the evidence in their sales - and hence devote less time and effort to covering them. Which makes the hypocrisy of their response to the crown prosecutor all the more stark.

And despite changes since the Stephen Lawrence inquiry - with black faces now regularly seen on TV in adverts and as presenters - the negative imagery still persists. Take the World Cup, where Egyptian and Ecuadorian referees were treated as second-rate, yet the Scottish official who missed a blatant goal-line handball was still somehow up to the job.

Some "non-racists" like to pretend that racial differences don't exist - they even proudly claim not to notice skin colour. This is manifest nonsense. Purporting to be "colour blind" is as ludicrous as suggesting you wouldn't notice a person's gender. What's important is what you do, not what you see.

It is naive to believe that the long history of racial distortion - which goes back to the days of slavery and colonialism - has not had a lasting effect on the individual subconscious. We receive these messages virtually from birth, and as children's thought processes develop, they build up into a bank of subliminal stereotypes. A black man and white man walking down the street: Which one is the doctor? Which one is good at sport? Which one does drugs?

Reaching adulthood, how can people realistically cast off all they've come to believe as a child? Even black people themselves are not immune, and these images have had an impact on their own self-esteem.

White people need to accept that, no matter how many anti-racist demos they've marched on, they inevitably make assumptions, however subconscious, which are influenced by a racist society and which help to form their views and opinions. To refute this is to be in complete denial. But this is not a blame game. Institutional racism is now an accepted term, but it's not the inanimate "institutions" which are racist; it's their staff who perpetuate the overall inequalities by their actions. The acknowledgement of personal racism is simply a prerequisite before anyone can begin to eradicate its pernicious effects.

As a black man, I admit I am bound to suffer from prejudices of my own. I cannot be racist, however, because in the global order I do not belong to the dominant group. If I were to mistreat a white person, no matter how low in social status, the weight of this country's white power structure would come down against me. As Stephen Lawrence's parents found, this force does not come to the aid of black people.

And how could I be racist anyway? I assure you, some of my best friends are white.

This was a nice garbage, bs, symantical excuse for being a racist.."I can hate white people and not be a racist because I dont have power."

My %$# I dont have any power either. The fact is that I have no more power over a non-white person than they have over me...and yet were I to voice a criticism of a non-white person I would immediately be labeled as racist. Waat world is this idiot living in where he thinks I have power. Were I to voice a "racist" opinion at work I would be fired in an instance...were I to be the owner of a business and express such beliefs I would be sued into bankruptcy. What "POWER" is this twit talking about which somehow all white people mysteriously posess that makes them racists but a black man somehow is deprived of which means he can speak the most hatefilled stereotypical garbage and claim to not be a racist.

"OK, you call me a racist no matter what I do. Therefore, I don't care what you call me. I'll be as racist as I want to be."

I've often wondered that myself. Kinda like the boy who cried wolf - they've used the "racist" label so many times, it doesn't mean much anymore!

This reminds me of an old Jewish joke. Two old Jewish men are sitting on a park bench in 1939 Germany reading newspapers. One looks over at the other and sees he's reading an anti-Jewish Nazi newspaper.

"Why are you reading that awful thing?!" He asks.

The other replies, "According to our papers, we are all being rounded up, stripped of our possessions, and taken away. According to this one, however, we run the banks, we run the ports, we run the media, we run the world! I like this better!"

"Only by acknowledging the influence of subliminal stereotypes can we eradicate their pernicious effects."

Ah, yes, the wonders of Stalinist psychology. Here, the author makes the case that he not only has knowledge of "subliminal stereotypes," but he knows how to combat them.

Of course, there's one little problem. If "stereotypes" are indeed subliminal (what he really means is subconscious), we can have no conscious knowledge of them. They are, by definition, beyond the domain of consciousness.

Which begs the question as to how so many liberals are aware of the evil effects of the subconscious mind.

It is time that we stop responding to the word "racist," which has lost all meaning. The next time one of these hustlers calls a white person racist the proper rejoinder should be, "So?"

I have recently come to the same opinion.

I wonder what kind of grade Joseph Harker's middle school world civ teacher gave him for this essay.

He'd better give him an "A" no matter what Harker writes, or he'll lose his job for being a racist.

This article is pathetic and enraging. According to this 'writer', whites are the dominant group worldwide and only the dominant group can be racist. This is similar to the argument that Je$$e, Al, and the other race-baiters use here in the US.

But whites account for less than 10% of the population of the world. How is it that the other 90+% of people in the world cannot be racist? How is it that 9 out of 10 people on the planet are somehow under the domination of this tiny minority of whites?

Too convenient ... too self-serving ... completely WRONG!

"To allow the more-radical-than-thou crowd to strip the word "racist" of all real stigma, by using it promiscuously, unjustly or inaccurately, is to risk more than the radical idiots imagine."

Jolly well said...MUD

"Kinda like the boy who cried wolf - they've used the "racist" label so many times, it doesn't mean much anymore!"

Are you listening to Limbaugh?! The man's literally ON FIRE!!

RUSH: "Immediate Fix for Economy...Announce a "Capital Gains Tax Cut!!"...market would turn around the next day!!!"

BUY! BUY!! BUY!!!

Quite Sincerely...MUD

"I have Orcs that are smarter than any Klingon, pitiful mortal"

"And I have the One Ring to bind them."

Y'all are entirely too weird...MUD

BTW...are you gonna be at the cookout up in NOVA tomorrow afternoon?! Anybody gotta link to that thread? I hear Senator George Allen (R-VA) is gonna be there, as well as Asa Hutchinson.

Ya know, I've seen a similar article, substituting "heterosexual" for "white."

That's right, straight white people are the debbil.

We need to get away from the neurotic nonsense that there is anything wrong with any group preferring those like themselves. Calling those preferences nasty sounding names does not make them nasty; it cannot make normal human preferences wrong.

Of course, this whole silly business has been deliberately promoted by Leftists seeking an undifferentiated humanity. The most notorious advocate of the sort of nonsense in the lead article was Gordon Allport, a Harvard Professor very far Left in both his associations and thinking processes. He has been widely promoted in academia, but his thought processes are no secret. He was even against family loyalty as a "prejudice.' (See Myths & Myth Makers In American "Higher" Education.)

William Flax

My day is never complete unless some liberal calls be me a racists or fascist conservative pig.

One of my best friends, a rare critter, a black conservative, will call once a week to talk to the old honky, red neck racist who kills spotted owls to go with his Red Legged Frog dinners.

He really knows how to make my day for me!

Truth be told, everyone's a racist(which is stupid because we're all the same race). We all have traits, characteristics, behaviors, etc. in our individual etnic groups that we pride ourselves in and frown on others about and stereotype them about it. With that said, it doesn't mean that everyone's a bigot. I mean I know some white people who do and say things which makes me sit back and wonder and they do the same about me, but we don't hate each other.

"The next time one of these hustlers calls a white person racist the proper rejoinder should be, "So?"

Touche'...MUD

The other possibility is that "racism" is a concept that means whatever people want it to be. This "I can't be racist because I am a ________, and don't have any power" line shows up the threadbare and manipulative character of the word. The force of the word comes from the underlying moral imperative of ignoring race in one's dealings with others. Make "racism" something that a member of a minority can never be, no matter how bigoted, and you rinse away that moral force. And of course, who says that minorities don't have "power." That assumption is another narrow-minded, thoughtless evasion.

"Racism" is a term no one should use except within inverted commas.

Only by acknowledging the influence of subliminal stereotypes can we eradicate their pernicious effects

Only by acknowledging the destructive influence of radical left-wing thinking can we eradicate such pretentious, sophomoric tripe.

racism is a combination of prejudice and power

No it isn't. Racism is hatred of a person based on their race.

But liberals hated that definition because it implicates their favorite victim groups too. So they redefined the word. That's about as intellectually dishonest as you can get.

But hey - we're talking about liberals here. The very word "liberal" was kidnapped by this same crowd some time ago (it used to refer to liberty, not socialism), so why should this come as a surprise.

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