I *am* a feminist AND... : comments [Battles with Integrity]

I'm not really sure what reductio ad absurdum means (and I've yet to find a good latin-English translator online) so I'm going to have to put the last question aside.

I have no intent of defining anything. To properly answer your essay would involve writing a research paper with all the quotes and statistics you seem to demand, and frankly, I've not the time to do that for a comment in a journal entry. Furthermore, it's doubtful it would make you change your mind in any way, which then seems like a bit of a waste of my time, no?

All I am saying is that the system is rotten, has been rotten, and there's no easy way of fixing it. But we white people do still benefit from it and it seems to be wise to acknowledge that if for nothing else than the actual verbal acknowledgement is a step toward a truly color-blind society. Speaking as a woman, it sure would be nice if white men ever got around to acknowledging that they do make more money and have more social status in general than women, instead of snarling at "feminists" and identifying as Angry White Men. You can't focus on the problem if you can't speak about it. Most white men choose not to. Unfortunately, silence won't make any of the problems go away.

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Reductio ad absurdum is to defeat an argument by following its logical premises to an absurd conclusion - to reduce it to an absurdity.

Since you are making assertions about overdevelopment, underdevelopment, and upon-preying, the burden of definition rests on you. That's the way argument works. As I'm sure

caramida will confirm, I am nothing if not rational and pragmatic, and can be persuaded by convincing arguments. Since you offer none, I am not persuaded.

I am no Angry White Male. I believe I am, if not a Modest White Male, at least a Peaceful White Male. I freely admit that I have benefitted from my race, sex, socio-economic status, and other things. I occasionally even feel guilty about it, until I consider that a) I also have worked very hard to get where I am in life; b) I personally treat people as kindly as I can, with as little regard to their skin color, ethnic or national background, sex or sexual orientation, wealth, education, religious beliefs, and hygiene as I can manage; and c) life is full of accidents of fortune that depend on none of those things.

I wholeheartedly agree that each of us should treated according to our merits, that we should have equality under the law, and that we should be civil to each other, if not nice. But when someone begins to suggest that there need to be set-asides or compensation or "justice," I will always ask, how much from whom to whom for how long? Until someone presents a convincing answer, I will remain unpersuaded.

Have a nice day! :-)

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Again, I have no wish to argue. Take from my words what you will. I have no time to write footnoted essays, and my comment was not meant as an argument, but only an observation.

Regarding paragraph 3 - good for you. The world needs more mild-mannered white guys. However, treating people kindly (and do you do this consistently, or only on whim?) is generally not enough. What are you doing to rectify the problem? (Bear in mind I have no idea who you are.)

Are you aware that paragraph 5 (perhaps better called line 5) reads rather patronizingly? I would not expect that from someone who purports to be a kind, even-handed soul, and so I'm not certain how to read the tone of that bit. It's probably not important anyway.

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I don't deny that that's pretty twisted. I've stated that I think it's best to treat people for who they are, and not infer their characteristics and define your treatment of them from some perceived or believed "group" that they belong to, of any kind (except maybe stupid people).

That said, the stupid, angry, ignorant, and prejudiced dwell among us, and probably always will, and while I don't think that's an ideal situation, I also don't support attempting to forcibly change their beliefs, nor restrain their behavior before they inflict harm on the person or property of others. It seems to me that doing so will only harden those prejudices.

This is why, for example, I think "hate crimes" laws are a bad idea. An assault is an assault, battery is battery, and murder is murder, regardless of who the attacker and who the victim. Murder victims aren't any more dead because their attacker was prejudiced against them. Treating crimes against some people as somehow worse than others sets them aside as a "special" class, which is just going to piss off those who already hate them even more, and perhaps even create some resentment among those who otherwise would be favorably or neutrally inclined.

But, I digress. What do you propose should be done?

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I'm not certain what should be done. I've not yet studied the problem enough to know, and I don't know whether there are ANY perfect solutions, but here are some ideas. You can feel free to shoot them down, but I'd prefer to challenge you to suggest something that you think might work better.

Perhaps a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a la South Africa. I don't know if it would help to open up the subject of race in America to wide examination, but the standard White reaction of pretending the problem is only a problem when non-Whites bring it up fails as a solution. To paraphrase vito_excalibur, as long as non-whites keep quiet about race, race isn't a problem for whites.
I have no problem opening a discussion about reparations. I was raised in an almost exclusively white county, by northern Europeans of peasant stock who all came to the US after 1870. Nobody in my direct line lived in the South before Brown v Board and the Civil Rights era, but I recognize that I am privileged as a result of my birth as a white male in California. If we as a society claim to preserve life, liberty and property, then we as a society might justly ought to see compensation justly due when someone is improperly deprived of one or more of those. The country has failed to uphold the Constitution, a contract made by the people of the United States with the people of the United States. When the government unjustly mistreated American citizens of Japanese descent, it (eventually) admitted its liability, and sought to pay reparations. Those reparations were paid with the taxes of all Americans (including those who came to the US after 1945). If we didn't exempt my high-school Civics teacher from paying his taxes toward reparations (who arrived from Hungary in 1951), why should it exempt me from paying reparations to African-Americans (or their issue) whose lives, liberty and property were unjustly deprived.

Failing that, who should pay? Well, I suppose we might start with those people still extant who directly profited from slavery, for example. If a corporation is a person, and a person must be responsible for actions he/she takes, or actions taken under the authority of that person, then we perhaps might undertake a strict accounting of Chase, or Bank of America, who bought, sold, lent money for, and insured slaves.

Hell, I don't know. But I do know that what has happened, and is happening today is criminal. When we shrug our shoulders and say, "Sucks to be them," and not do anything about it, we're accessories after the fact.

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...And I don't mean such to say that you aren't doing anything. I recognize that treating people individually with respect is far from nothing. Individual action is important. Still, this as with so many other things, is bigger than any person can do singly. Isn't that what we have government for? I can't singly protect my family from the depredations of North Korea¹, but I pay my taxes so that my government can use my resources and others together to establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.

¹ Admittedly, bad example.

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