if you voted for obama then you are a racist

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Dox47
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22 Jan 2009, 6:59 pm

DentArthurDent wrote:

I can see your sentiment, it would be a bit like me using Aspergers to excuse my behaviour. However just because two black people have reached the pinnacle of US government does not make everybody equal. The american underclass needs much work, you cannot wash away years of generational poverty, generations of underachieving in education, a culture of subjugation; overnight just because a black man is now president. In a situation of extreme unemployment, substandard housing , poor education, third world health system and a complete lack of equality how can you expect people to have self respect in such a situation, saying look at Rice and Obama does not do it. Yes one or two can rise out of the muck, we had a prime minister here that did just that, but people with that sort of drive and ambition are rare

Maybe, but the excuse of simply being black has suffered a perhaps mortal wound. It's one thing to complain that poverty puts you at a disadvantage, quite another to claim that there's no use trying to better yourself because your race will inevitably hold you back. No, Obama's election is not the final end of racism in America, but it is a very large nail in it's coffin.

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monty
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22 Jan 2009, 8:09 pm

Dox47 wrote:

monty wrote:

90+% of blacks typically vote for the Democratic Party, mostly because it doesn't insult them like you and many Republicans do.

Actually, I consider the attitudes of the Democrats towards blacks to be far more insulting. The Republicans have simply largely written them off, since they seem to vote Dem no matter what.

Naive, and wrong. The Republican party is a party of the south - by design. Nixon's "southern strategy" was to oppose desegregation and convert southern Democrats to Republicans. It worked, but required adopting racist positions and welcoming large numbers of racists. That strategy changed the makeup and tone of the party.

Democrats are not perfect on issues of race, but have built a coalition where people of all races are given greater opportunity to run for office and be a part of the party. The Democratic platform promotes things like the minimum wage, low interest loans for college, and other policies that help all people to rise to the level of their talents.

Another factor in the recent election was an increase in Hispanic support for the Democrats. When McCain (or Bush, for that matter) criticized what they thought was xenophobia and racism on immigration matters, they were shut down by their fellow Republicans.

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22 Jan 2009, 10:09 pm

falcorn wrote:

if you voted for him because hes black. that means you are a racist bigot and you dont like white people

i voted for mccain becuase hes white. Oh you say that makes me racist?

i guess it does, but what does that make all the black people that voted for obama. there were even commercials on BET saying vote for obama hes the "black vote"

oh yea and everyone in africa is racist too because they only have black presidents, i guess we should all go there and vote for white people and get excited about the first "white" president in nigeria.

racist scum blacks

The race thing and really Obama's whole background is momentous, but to be blunt, Barack Obama was the much better candidate, and even better, he wasn't associated with the Republican Party.

Voting for John McCain because he is white is racist and bigoted; the same applies for Obama of course, but your need to point this out by saying, "racist scum blacks," shows how seething your own racism is.

The_Cucumber
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22 Jan 2009, 10:16 pm

The final deciding factor, was that in the final days of the election, Obama was talking about what he would do while McCain was too busy making accusations about Obama to go into depth about his own plan. This showed that Obama viewed the Presidency as a means to a goal (rather than the goal itself) more so then McCain does. Meaning he would be more likely to make good on his campaign. So in voting for Obama I was confident I knew what I was voting for.

The fact that Obama is black was just the icing on the cake. If their was no cake underneath the icing then the icing would collapse.

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twoshots
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22 Jan 2009, 10:27 pm

Yes, the McCain campaign came off as a bit of a joke.

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DentArthurDent
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23 Jan 2009, 12:33 am

Dox47 wrote:

The so called 'excuse' will only suffer a mortal wound when a semblance of equality is delivered to the majority of the American underclass, the election of Obama might deliver this we will have to wait and see. So far all that the likes of Rice, Powell and Obama tell me that it is not so much a race issue as a class issue, and for whatever reason blacks seem to be disproportionately represented. I suspect that part of the reason for this is historical and has much to do with previous racism.

I suspect that blacks today are mistaking (in part) class discrimination for racial discrimination. I mean it would also be extremely difficult for a disadvantaged white American to become President.

So maybe in relation to the race excuse you guys are sort of correct, but there is still serious discrimination against a class of people whom are predominantly black.

How hard must it be for someone to rise above poverty in a country where there is such a division between services available depending on your level of wealth.

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ike
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23 Jan 2009, 12:42 am

DentArthurDent wrote:

ike wrote:

It was hyperbole... but there's a significant amount of truth within it regardless... Teenagers who previously only expressed that "I want to be Tupac when I grow up" are now talking about loftier goals. Regardless of the fact that most of them are picking a goal they won't achieve (president), they are still setting higher goals for themselves. That's the important part.

You are talking about setting people up for failure which would have disastrous consequences. If you want the impoverished underclass to have some respect, show them some, deal with their conditions. Oh and one other thing whilst you are dismissively telling these folk that Obama did it so get of your arse, remember Obama and Rice come from privileged middle class backgrounds, not housing projects

That's rather far removed from what I'm actually saying. What I'm saying is that THEIR attitudes have changed, entirely irrespective of whatever I have to say about it. As long as their attitude is "I want to be Tupac when I grow up", it doesn't matter how much money you poor into offering them better educational opportunities. And it's not "setting them up for failure" either... they weren't going to be Tupac to begin with, so they've moved from one unrealistic expectation to another... the key point here is that they are now looking for opportunities to further their education instead of disavowing those opportunities. All kids have unrealistic expectations about how their lives will pan out -- that's not unique to poor kids. Rich kids say they want to grow up to be Bill Gates or a big Hollywood star -- they're just the dreams of kids. Few of the privileged kids ever make it. Regardless the target can change the choices they make along the way - maybe they take an elective ethics or business-prep class in their public high-school instead of choosing the art class they think will be an easy A. This is more likely to inspire others to create new educational opportunities for them as well, with the belief that those efforts will be fruitful.

But y'know, hey, if you just want to grind your axe without listening to what anyone else has to say about it, by all means, grind away.

EDIT: "loftier" was a poor word choice.

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twoshots
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23 Jan 2009, 12:50 am

DentArthurDent wrote:

I'm not sure what you mean by the "majority of the American underclass". Although it is commonly supposed that most poor in America are black, it is not accurate to say so. For example, .105 of whites are in poverty, multiplied by .68 of the population is non-hispanic white, ergo ~7% of Americans are poor whites, and a similar calculation says .245*.12 ~3% of Americans are poor blacks.

Quote:

I suspect that blacks today are mistaking (in part) class discrimination for racial discrimination. I mean it would also be extremely difficult for a disadvantaged white American to become President.

This I think is true. However, there is a not altogether irrational cultural component too.

Quote:

So maybe in relation to the race excuse you guys are sort of correct, but there is still serious discrimination against a class of people whom are predominantly black.

Again, see above.

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DentArthurDent
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23 Jan 2009, 1:49 am

twoshots wrote:

Although it is commonly supposed that most poor in America are black, it is not accurate to say so. For example, .105 of whites are in poverty, multiplied by .68 of the population is non-hispanic white, ergo ~7% of Americans are poor whites, and a similar calculation says .245*.12 ~3% of Americans are poor blacks.

The stats I have found suggest that 24.5% of all blacks are living in poverty compared to 8.2% of all whites and 21 % of all hispanics, this may correlate to your figures but when you look at it this way it certainly gives a different perspective

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census, Aug. 2008 supplement to the Current Population Survey taken from http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0104520.html

Or put another way
Hispanics 9.9m
Blacks 9.2m
Whites 16m

So yes you are technically correct; there are more disadvantaged whites, but, as a percentage of their populations blacks and Hispanics are represented extremely disproportionately compared to to the rest of the country.

Also you need to take into account the concentration of disadvantaged Blacks and Hispanics compared to the relatively larger spread among disadvantaged whites. The formations of "ghettos' just magnifies the problems.

DentArthurDent
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23 Jan 2009, 1:54 am

ike wrote:

What I'm saying is that THEIR attitudes have changed, entirely irrespective of whatever I have to say about it. As long as their attitude is "I want to be Tupac when I grow up", it doesn't matter how much money you poor into offering them better educational opportunities. And it's not "setting them up for failure" either... they weren't going to be Tupac to begin with, so they've moved from one unrealistic expectation to another... the key point here is that they are now looking for opportunities to further their education instead of disavowing those opportunities.

All very nice but until the opportunities are made available to these people in sufficient quantities all they are going to have are pipe dreams.

ruveyn
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23 Jan 2009, 2:54 am

DentArthurDent wrote:

How hard must it be for someone to rise above poverty in a country where there is such a division between services available depending on your level of wealth.

The steel magnate (to be) Andrew Carnegie arrived in the United States with the clothes on his back and a few dollars in his pocket. That was it. The rest is history.

Thomas Edison was a poor boy. That did not prevent him from becoming a top inventor and industrialist.

Henry Ford was a farm boy.

Nikola Tesla was an immigrant from Serbia. He come to this country with hardly a cent on him. However he came with his brain.

David Sarnoff was a European immigrant born to poor parents. He become a move and shaker in the world of radio and television. All he really had to his name was his mind and his ambition. He made NBC from scratch.

Should I produce further examples? Adversity is the catalyst that produces greatness.

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DentArthurDent
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23 Jan 2009, 3:06 am

ruveyn wrote:

DentArthurDent wrote:

How hard must it be for someone to rise above poverty in a country where there is such a division between services available depending on your level of wealth.

There are always people that are able to rise above the adversity they find themselves in; to assume that because a few can do this therefore so should the majority, is feebly simplistic and shows a complete and utter lack of understanding of sociology.

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23 Jan 2009, 7:39 am

falcorn wrote:

<<< and now you know why the rest of the world thinks that Americans are generally stupid.

ike
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23 Jan 2009, 9:12 am

DentArthurDent wrote:

ike wrote:

All very nice but until the opportunities are made available to these people in sufficient quantities all they are going to have are pipe dreams.

Ahh, but you cut out the part where opportunities are more likely to be given to people who appear to be genuinely interested in them.

Since you seem hell bent on not allowing any kind of even semblance of a possibility of good having come from this, as I said before, grind away!

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monty
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23 Jan 2009, 9:22 am

ruveyn wrote:

DentArthurDent wrote:

How hard must it be for someone to rise above poverty in a country where there is such a division between services available depending on your level of wealth.

Yes, please produce all examples - or at least a comprehensive picture. It is wrong to generalize from a few exceptions. With such selective attention, one might assume that we could all win the lottery every week and become rich. Or that we could all become doctors and lawyers and make a 6 figure salary. A real economy doesn't work that way - there will always be some who are successful, and many more who are not so.

You are attempting to propagate the Horatio Alger myth - the idea that anyone and everyone can work hard and become well off. Since Alger began pumping out words in the 1850s, there have been two depressions, multiple recessions, and even in times of prosperity, there was systematic poverty... not because we simply failed to believe in Alger's optimism, but because that is the way that economies work. Likewise, there has been systematic exclusion of non-whites and women from many arenas - that has started to change, but lets be honest about where we've been, and where we are.

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23 Jan 2009, 9:48 am

DentArthurDent wrote:

twoshots wrote:

While you are correct that blacks and hispanics are disproportionately poor, this in no way detracts from the poverty of the larger numbers of white Americans, who are by and large as far as I can tell at best completely off the class radar for most people and at worst are merely a subject of derision. It is not fair to concern oneself with the poor only if they are of the correct color.

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