From: mfriedma@uucp (Michael Friedman)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american
Subject: Re: How white America perceives African-Americans??!??
Date: 9 Jan 93 01:29:00 GMT
Organization: Oracle Corporation
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by an unauthenticated user
              at Oracle Corporation.  The opinions expressed are those
              of the user and not necessarily those of Oracle.

In article <1993Jan8.144326.12175@netnews.noc.drexel.edu> glovercj@duvm.ocs.drexel.edu writes:
>>>1) White America believes African-Americans are out to take their jobs.

>>    Many white Americans wish that this were so. They are sick of 
>>    sitting at meetings and seeing the same old circle of pale
>>    faces. To the extent that anyone likes to compete for a job 
>>    (which isn't much of an extent, who does?), I don't think it
>>    makes much difference to most whites what the color of the 

>
>Unfortunately, I've seen this reality, ask yourself why there are so many glass
>ceilings for African-Americans.

Plenty of reasons.  Among others, if an AA program is in place then
people will be hired who would not be hired in a race blind admissions
process.  If you make the usual assumption that abilities of any
identifiable group fall in a Gaussian distribution (a standard
assumption that you will have to prove incorrect if you disagree) then
if you break the company's employees up into groups based on
percentile rankings of abilities you would expect the AA beneficiaries
to be worse represented the higher the percentile.  

This is a very simple statistical result that totally ignores
questions such as whether blacks are innately inferior or sufferning
from racism and poor education.


>>>3) WA believes AfAms shouldn't get Afirmitive Action because it is reverse
>>>discrimination.

>>    It IS reverse discrimination. The issue of race-based AA is dead,
>>    dead, dead! Need-based AA enjoys the wide support of the majority
>>    of the populace. That's not racism.

>Then I guess we should negate that fact that African-Americans have been
>enslaved for 438 years and still counting, and say everyone is on the same
>level, so no one should get anything.

Whatever you want.  The growing resistance to AA is a political
reality whether you like it or not.

>>>4) WA believes AfAms are criminals and only capable of criminal acts.

>>    Look, pal, there are jerks in every racial category, but I know
>>    hundreds of white people, and not one of them would agree with such
>>    a ridiculous statement.

>I'm sorry to burst your bubble, but going to a predominately white college,
>where several individuals have never seen "a black" except through the eyes of
>the media makes people believe that "blacks" are only capable of crimes. Why is
>it that when I walk down the street, white people avoid me, as if I have green
>bubbles coming out of me. That's the facts. Why is it, when I sit on the
>trolley or bus, white people won't sit next me, when in fact I am the last
>person on this planet that would attack someone. It's real,sorry.

This does not follow.  For example, if whites thought that only 50% of
AfAms were criminals and only capable of criminal acts they would
still act exactly as you describe.

Unfortunately, personal experience of most whites tends to justify
this kinds of attitude.  How many people do you know who have been
mugged by blacks and by whites?

I've had 5 or 6 attempted muggings (one was kind of borderline and I
was never sure).  Of the 6 muggers involved in the 5 attempts I'm sure
of 6 out of 6 were black.  The borderline situation was a white, and I
was never sure whether he was a particularly rude and aggressive
beggar or a mugger.

Now, I'm sorry if you get offended when I keep a particularly close
eye on young black males when I walk home at night, but based on my
personal experience that's who I need to watch out for.

>>>6) WA believes that everyone can "Pull themselves up by their own
>Bootstraps",
>>>regardless of color.

>>    Some people can, some can't. Life is pretty tough for everybody,
>>    but it's even tougher if you're poor, or undereducated, or badly dressed,
>>    or ugly, or fat, or stupid, or non-white, etc. EVERYBODY KNOWS THIS!

>Well, if everybody knows this, then why isn't something done to fix
>this, and I 
>don't mean that band-aid type stuff, but I do mean actually healing.

Such as?  Perhaps mass mind control?

>>>7) WA doesn't care about African-Americans until African-Americans do
>something
>>>to effect them.  

>>    Is this a PC way of saying "the government won't do anything to help
>>    minorities until there is Hell in the streets"? I'm afraid the
>>    answer is YES.

>I'm glad you agree on something.

Please remember, however, that one thing you can do about minorities
is shoot them.  A lot of people cheered the Korean shop owners who
shot at rioters and a lot of people bought guns after the LA riot.
-- 
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