He weighs in on their definition of racism:
The only response is the exercize of ordinary reason, the insistence on individual moral responsibility, and political resistance to the inevitable attempts to impose these religious thought-structures by law or policy on everyone else. Occasional guffawing at the hubris of the new puritans helps as well. So scoff away. It helps you feel better as well.Posted by Andy MacDonald at May 16, 2006 01:31 PM | Email This
Here was mine:
I am disturbed to find that, on its web page http://www.seattleschools.org/area/equityandrace/definitionofrace.xml, the Seattle Public Schools take the position that “emphasizing individualism,” “having a future time orientation,” “defining one form of English as standard” are racist practices. I had hoped that the Seattle Public Schools would respect individuality, encourage students to have a future time orientation, and teach standard English. While I accept and encourage philosophical discussions on the nature of racism by academics, I am disappointed to find anti-Western ravings of a lunatic fringe adopted as official school district policy.
"Racism:
The systematic subordination of members of targeted racial groups who have relatively little social power in the United States (Blacks, Latino/as, Native Americans, and Asians), by the members of the agent racial group who have relatively more social power (Whites). The subordination is supported by the actions of individuals, cultural norms and values, and the institutional structures and practices of society."
According to them, Racism:
1. Only happens in the United States;
2. Is caused only by 'Whites';
3. Is experienced only by 'Blacks, Latino/as, Native Americans, and Asians'; and
4. Is caused only by those with 'more social power' and experienced only by those with 'little social power.
According to the Seattle Public Schools, 'Whites' have never been the victims of racism, nor has any group outside of the United States. I suppose the Taliban in Afghanistan was not racist because they weren't Whites from the U.S.
It all makes perfect sense, doesn't it?
Posted by: Larry on May 16, 2006 02:12 PMhttp://www.newyorkmetro.com/nymetro/news/media/columns/medialife/4822/index1.html
We on the left side of the aisle may not have a problem with that, but coming from a party that won it's last razor-thin presidential election margin via fag-bashing...
Hmm...can't find a knife sharp enough to cut through the viscous gel of them contradictions.
Posted by: bartelby on May 16, 2006 03:09 PMYou go, girl. And tell all them pansy ass multiculturalists while you're at it.
Posted by: bartelby on May 16, 2006 03:13 PM" Well there I was in Hollywood wishin' I was doin' good
Talkin' on the telephone line
But they don't need me in the movies and nobody sings my songs
Guess I'm just wastin' time
Well then I got to thinkin', man I'm really sinkin'
And I really had a flash this time
I had no business leavin' and nobody would be grieven'
If I went on back on Tulsa time
Livin' on Tulsa time
Livin' on Tulsa time
Gonna set my watch back to it
'Cause you know I've been through it
Livin' on Tulsa time"
Whaddaya think the song's about? My theory is it's the non-future oriented time structure of a slowed down countrified life in Tulsa!
Cowpoke style! Can you dig it?
Posted by: headless lucy on May 16, 2006 03:25 PMThanks to those commenters for conceding defeat. Now back to the subject of the post, the Seattle public school's use of crude racial categorizing, and Andrew Sullivan's reaction to their policy.
One of the things that struck ne most about the policy is just how insulting it was toward minorities. There are racial stereotypes in that policy that could have been taken directly from a KKK manual.
Posted by: Jim Miller on May 16, 2006 04:51 PMBartleby, HL, what are your thoughts on the SPSD definition of racism? Please point out where you disagree (or agree) with Andrew's post. Please see if you can get farther than three words without changing the subject.
Posted by: SouthernRoots on May 16, 2006 04:52 PMThat said, however, it's most disingenuous to think that you may quote or invoke the intellectual authority of others and be completely immune from having your sources questioned.
Sling Latin phrases as you may, we do not live beneath the bell jar of a logic class. Ideas have consequences, and the motives and credibility of their authors are not insignificant.
Posted by: bartelby on May 16, 2006 06:21 PMI looked up definition of racism and was surprised to find that there are many different definitions. Some of them seemed to be definitions designed to support certain political views while other definitions seemed to associate racism with actions or crimes perpetrated on a victim primarily due to the victim's race.
The SPSD's definition seems guaranteed to promote class separation with the evil "whitey" being the only one capable of being racist. This definition certainly will not ever lead children in SPSD to become color blind nor will it aid in helping them see others "not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character".
Posted by: SouthernRoots on May 16, 2006 06:25 PMFirst, the term "troll" suggests to me that you are not interested in genuine intellectual dialogue. Sorry if I got too close to your pasty vulnerable underbelly, my friend, but politics ain't beanbag.
Second, listening to a sermon from you about what "racism" is or ain't is like hearing a Louis Farrakhan host a Passover seder. Yuckkkk....
Hah! that's a laugh! All I've ever seen from you is obtuse partisan puffery served up with simple-minded sanctimony.
Although you definitely qualify for troll-dom (as in a boorish POS that isn't welcome here) I must admit that the crap that you posted is in line with Andrew Sullivan's - a whole lot a talk talk with saying anything worthwhile.
(Why is it I know you're not finished spouting off yet?)
Bartelby . . . genuine intellectual dialogue . . . right.
They may not go away faster when challenged to stay on topic, but they make more idiotic and amusing remarks.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 16, 2006 07:29 PMThe only response is the exercize of ordinary reason,
Posted by: Cheryl on May 16, 2006 07:57 PMAll they know is garbage talk and baseless invectives. Your example of teen-aged graffiti taggers is perfect except that HA'ers are cases of aged arrested development. Though I mostly disagreed with Democrats in the past, I respected their opinions, but there is nothing left to respect any longer. Liberals are mentally deranged people who cannot be trusted with my back turned.
They are stupid enough to make a lot of money from though, and combined with the entertainment value of their nonsense it makes them useful fools.
Thanks.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 16, 2006 08:32 PMCaprice Hollins, who boasts of her Women Studies educational background, seems primarily interested in creating division. (Women Studies is particularly focused on the language of division and victimhood.)
She is half white and half black, which on the surface would seem to allow her to unify people, to help blacks and whites understand each other.
But, it seems pretty evident that her background primarily left her angry at white people. Her white grandparents rejected her, which would leave me angry too! One can hardly blame her.
I have no problem with the actions and efforts of people in the black community to help themselves, heal wounds, and deal with hurt that results from a horrible history (slavery) and - let's face it - the racism they must still experience on occasion even today. If there is some anger and anti-white feeling among the black community, I can hardly blame them.
The problem, however, is that Caprice’s anger and divisiveness has no business being sponsored by government. And, more importantly, the last place it should be is in the public school system. A special office dedicated to meeting the educational needs of black students seems like a good idea to me; Caprice isn’t filling that need.
On top of that, black boys are suffering the most in public schools. The anti-male ideology Caprice learned in “Women Studies” doesn’t offer those kids much hope.
Having such absurd definitions of racism provide a clear sign of poor judgment on the part of Caprice Hollins. She's not very savy and she'll keep steppin' in it. I doubt she will be around long, even in a bureaucracy as screwed up as SPSD.
Watch the video.
Posted by: BananaLand on May 16, 2006 08:48 PMThere are people in the world that don't like people because of the color of their skin no matter what color their skin is. I've run across some black people that can't stand Puerto Ricans or Asians, because of their race. Is that not racism? I don't think SPSD would think so.
I don't believe in racism, but in the fact that some people are nice and some are dicks. It doesn't matter if they are white, black, yellow or blue. Also, some people want to succeed and others want to be taken care of.
Remember, what matters isn't the color of your skin, but the quality of your character.
Posted by: Dengle on May 16, 2006 10:32 PMTo me, a troll is a small ugly creature that hides under bridges and annoys people trying to go about their business. Every time you pop in here, you behave in that manner.
"Second, listening to a sermon from you about what "racism" is or ain't is like hearing a Louis Farrakhan host a Passover seder. Yuckkkk...."
No sermons, just stating my opinion about what I read.
"I'm all in favor of intellectual honesty myself"
You've posted several times in this thread and have yet to add anything to the conversation except for veiled insults and righteous indignation. Intellectual? Hardly. Honest? Haven't hit that one yet either.
Try again. Dazzle us with your intellectual honesty and deep thinking. Enlighten us. Persuade us that our opinions are flawed and that we should come over to your way of thinking.
We are waiting, but at a very low priority.
The actions and efforts of people in the black community to deal with the hurt that results from the history of slavery is contrived. FACTUALLY Black slavery in America happened long, long ago and it is no longer relevant to anyones experience except as taught to blacks by racist white Liberals and blacks who love to keep this useless angst alive. Get over it or continue the farce.
All of us experience racism today. If there is some anger and anti-white feeling among the black community, it is no longer justified unless they recognize that they are simply feeeeling racist. I can blame them in the same way that anyone would ever blame me (as a white person) for anger and anti-black feeling. The only difference now as opposed to several decades ago is that blacks are far more racist than whites because of the liberal conditioning inculcated in schools, government programs and idiot-stick race based laws.
There are black people, white people, and there are people. Everyone individually chooses which they want to be. I like people. Racists best keep their distance. Black racist bull$hit is racism.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 16, 2006 11:28 PMIt's like some nightmare of group-think. Or a satire.
Posted by: Raw Data on May 17, 2006 02:00 AMstill waiting for that excuse.
So, I'm "a shameless blind liberal apologist for petty criminals and butt pirate liberal Democrats?" And you changed Stefan's backroom alleys to back rooms. You also didn't address my question to Stefan about where the ballot counting was being moved to, as he seemed to be implying. Nor did you address the presence of both the partisan (R and D) and non-partisan observers. In what way does raising these questions make me "a shameless blind liberal apologist for petty criminals and butt pirate liberal Democrats?"
Can you back up what you say with anything other than lies, smears, and distortions? Does the truth really make you so uncomfortable that you feeeel the need for irrational emotional attacks on anyone who asks questions whether they agree with you or not?
I'm still waiting.
Posted by eric at May 17, 2006 10:28 AM
"In what way does raising . . . questions make me "a shameless blind liberal apologist for petty criminals and butt pirate liberal Democrats?"
When nothing you say makes any sense -- most particularly because -- it is off-topic . . . moron.
I don't address some long-lost question of yours to Stefan about where the ballot counting was being moved to because it has nothing to do with Andrew Sullivan's definition of racism . . . moron.
Hold your breath.
Posted by: Amused by dense but tempermental liberal democrats on May 17, 2006 02:53 PMIf you want to be a rude asshole, I'll address you where I find you. If you don't like it, then don't be a rude asshole.
Posted by: eric on May 17, 2006 03:36 PMEric - When you stalk someone in this manner, you not only attack them but inflict collateral damage on the rest of us. Leave me out.
Do you have any substantive comments about the topic of this post? I won't be too rude - tell us all about your opinion of the SPSD definition of race, if you have one.
Please.
Posted by: SouthernRoots on May 17, 2006 05:16 PMI don't mean to intrude on your space, but I don't see why Amused should be so rude. I'm calling him on it, that's all. If he would like to discuss things like an adult that would be fine. It seems he would prefer to call me names and distort what I've said in an attempt to shut down any real conversation or dialogue. It usually seems to work. Piss off anyone who questions any of his assumptions and hope they leave. No reason to defend any positions or attempt rational argument then.
Posted by: eric on May 17, 2006 05:23 PMIn my opinion, the way I read the Seattle Public Schools definition of race, only whites can be racists and anything they do could potentially be deemed a form of racism. I think that is an asinine definition and should not be tolerated in our public schools.
What say you? Are we missing something?
Posted by: SouthernRoots on May 17, 2006 07:42 PM”Can you back up what you say with anything other than lies, smears, and distortions?”
Yes eric . . . your comments are the rantings of an addled peanut sized brained errand boy sent by grocery clerks, to deliver day-old macaroons, what up? . . . see I can comment as inanely and far off-topic as you can.
Sorry Roots (just funnin')
There . . . no lies, smears, or distortions . . . how’s that?
whirrrrrrrrrr
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 17, 2006 08:31 PMM-A-A-A-M ! ! amused is being ruuude tooo meee.
As I said earlier on this thread (May 16, 2006 08:32 PM), emotionally retarded, ruled by pettiness, and profane invective liberals like eric feeeel that they can make their perceived adversaries feeeel as badly as they do in their clueless and hateful plight of liberal intolerance and ignorance. Drive-by posting of garbage where their intellectual superiors reside (Sound Politics) is the best way they feeeel to "get even." In their mind, it's another way of keying our cars. Not one of them can hold a rational exchange with and defeat a conservative on any subject; even when they cheat; and they prove it every time they come here.
All that any of this dogged nonsense by eric proves is that he can dish out hit-and-run remonstrations (out of context) but he can't take them head-on. He is so ruled by his emotions that he loses his temper and proves that he is an immature putz.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 18, 2006 09:57 AMThe Seattle school district has a nasty, insane message for budding entrepreneurs, civil libertarians, and free market conservatives: your belief in individual rights or individual initiative brands you as a racist.
The Seattle Public Schools define individualism as a form of “cultural racism,” declaring that “cultural racism” includes “emphasizing individualism as opposed to a more collective ideology.”
On their web site, they also define racism to include stereotypically white traits such as “future time orientation,” which is a pejorative word used for studying and “acting white” to reap future advancement, rather than devoting one’s energy to being hip or cool and enjoying the moment.
It is racist for the Seattle schools to stereotype achievement as a “white” characteristic. Plenty of non-whites study and exercise self-discipline. No school system should disparage student studying and achievement. That is at odds with a school system’s basic educational mission.
The Seattle schools also declare “equality” of treatment to be a form of racially-biased assimilation, favoring instead affirmative action in the form of “unequal treatment for those who have been disadvantaged over time,” to give historically oppressed groups “special programs and benefits.”
The “equality” they deride – the notion that “people who are the same in those respects relevant to how they are treated in those circumstances should receive the same treatment” – is the same notion of equal treatment whose infringement is the basis for a disparate-treatment discrimination lawsuit under the federal civil rights laws, under U.S. Supreme Court precedent.
In an apparent conflict with federal law, the Seattle schools deny that whites can be the victims of racism. They define racism as limited to acts against groups that have “little social power in the United States (Blacks, Latino/as, Native Americans, and Asians), by the members of the agent racial group who have relatively more social power (Whites).”
By contrast, federal appeals courts routinely rule against institutions that fire or harass white employees, recognizing that whites can indeed be victims of racism. See, e.g., Bowen v. Missouri Department of Social Services (2002) (racial harassment of white employee by black co-worker); Taxman v. Board of Education (1996) (termination of white teacher instead of black teacher). And the Supreme Court held that racial discrimination against whites by local governments is generally illegal in City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co. (1989). Affirmative action can’t be used to justify terminating or harassing an employee.
The Seattle schools’ racist policy, which appears to condone unlawful racial discrimination and retaliation against whites, is on the web site of its Equity and Race Relations department, directed by Caprice Hollins, a politically-correct self-proclaimed multicultural “educator.” Some education.
Caprice Hollins is a racist, pure and simple.
It appears that the Seattle schools would rather spend their time teaching (and practicing) racism, rather than reading, writing, and arithmetic.
Again, here is the interaction which occurred on 12 May:
I said:
Are the ballots going to counted at a different location than they have been? Will partisan and non-partisan observers no longer be able to observe the ballot counting process?
"...then they try to take away your right to choose how to vote, and to force all of us to have our votes counted in Backroom Alleys by member of the Teamsters Union."
How are the teamsters involved? I'm sure it would be a terrible thing if the ballots were counted by people with decent wages and health care benefits.
Will there be options for those who would rather not fill out their ballots at home or mail them in?
Wouldn't a more uniform voting system throughout the county make it easier to ensure accuracy?
Posted by: eric on May 12, 2006 12:17 PM
To whiwhich you replied:
'Hey eric.
I suppose now that you know that the elections staff are Teamsters Union members you are going to tell us that there is no reason anyone might ever think that having our votes counted by them in backrooms is questionable.
I'm sure you would also be very comfortable to have the Building Industry Association of Washington do the final tally and issue the final elections certification.
While the BIAW is not in the habit of creating spreadsheets without column summaries, and making false reports to the voters like the Teamsters en camp with petty criminals like Deanron, they can add, subtract, and discern the difference between right and wrong.
As a shameless blind liberal apologist for petty criminals and butt pirate liberal Democrats -- you don't seem to have much more to say here.
What other half-hearted and clueless attempts at corrections do you have for us?
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 14, 2006 11:53 AM
Again, what is your excuse for your insults? Did I insult you or anyone you know? Is this how you address the many 'liberal' roommates of which you are so proud of besting in 'argument'?
The only question you attempted to answer was with an unproven assertion followed by insults for, what, daring to ask questions? Do this website and yourself embody the unquestionable authority which is blasphemous for me to ask questions of?
Alas, intellect amidst a sea of inane banality.
First rate comments.
I find the reference to "religious thought-structures" particularly interesting. It purports to link individualism to religious faith as though individuality is nothing more than a harmful consequence of enforced devotion to creed in substitution for reason; a white male conspiracy to brainwash and control society. To them it as a decisive factor in the human social condition that must be removed through the worship of multiculturalism.
Presumably, whites were taught to be dominant by their ancestral religious leaders, insisting that only whites (or those who agreed with them) were entitled to grace in the eyes of the white male god, thus creating a power bloc that evolved into today’s inborn white racism. An obvious conflict arises between separating people by characteristics of birth and national origins (multiculturalism) in an effort to instill collectivism, and individualism born of an inherited belief in personal responsibility and a free society.
Liberals insist that individual freedom negates equality, and they are right, but for the wrong reasons. Liberals view literal equality as an achievable social objective that is more important than freedom, but actual literal equality as opposed to figurative equality under the law is a fantasy, an impossibility that only fools attempt to mix with politics. Actual literal equality can only exist in the eyes of god. On the right, equality of treatment under the rule of law is an indispensable and express extension of individualism. Liberal judges turn equal protection under the law on its head by the absurd application of equalitarianism.
In effect liberals say, never mind the fact that all cultures are in some similar way biased in favor of their inherited cultural and religious customs. We must self consciously renounce our cultural strengths (religious thought-structured white racism) only to embrace the social norms of immigrants who came to America to escape the consequences of those very social norms they abandoned. Immigrants come to America to participate in our society, and liberals want us to surrender it. For them, the over-arching idealistic inconsistency of dividing people through so-called religious thought-structured individualism and dividing them through multiculturalism is easily swept aside.
Such clear contradictions in terms don’t faze those who embrace this peculiar construction of ideas because the “ideas” are constructed out of petty resentment and appeal to an idealized vision of equalitarian symmetry. The pseudo-rational leap of faith they call “ordinary reason” is achieved through a common insensibility to reason created by mindless repetition of the multicultural mantra from early stages of mental development. In practice, it amounts to pitting the “equal” . . . against the “equal-er,” in the bizarre pursuit of a practical impossibility.
Liberal blind faith revels in the assumption that individualism is somehow anathema to moral responsibility, and collective consciousness through “ordinary reason” is the solution to its ills. To these people, “ordinary reason” is something teased out of the white male conspiracy by the collective idiocy of mindless repetition.
Collectivist communism is certainly nothing new, but modern liberals feeeel that they invented it by applying "ordinary reason" in opposition to white male dominance. They fail to recognize that the straw men they set up are . . . themselves.
Thanks.
Posted by: Amused by liberals on May 20, 2006 12:20 PM