September 30, 2019

“[W]hen I was growing up, the most liberal thing you could do is not see color. Well, that’s wrong now.”

“You see color, always, so you can register your white privilege. But I grew up in the Martin Luther King era: Judge by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. I still think that’s the best way to do it. Not see it.”

Said Bill Maher, in a NYT interview, “Bill Maher on the Perils of Political Correctness.”

The interviewer pushes him: “But we do see color, and no one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character. So what problem is being caused by the shift you just described?”

He responds: “If someone walks in the room, after a minute, I should not be thinking about color. And I am not. That’s how I have always been. I have actual black friends. I don’t think they want me to be always thinking: Black person. Black person. I’m talking to a black person. Look, I tried to drive a stake through political correctness in the ’90s. I obviously failed dismally. It’s worse than ever.”

Actually, that’s not a response to the question asked. He just changed the subject. I’d have liked to see some depth to the discussion of what problems have arisen because, as a culture, we gave up on the ideal of color blindness, which was so clear and dominant in the 1960s. The questioner put the issue out there, but Maher’s answer was, essentially, I still like the old color blindness approach. The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

164 comments:

tim maguire said...

The interviewer pushes him: “But we do see color, and no one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character.

Pro tip: when someone says "no one is arguing that...," 9 times out of 10, that is exactly what they are arguing. This is not the 10th time.

And THAT answers the question.

pious agnostic said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

It requires individuals to be sorted into castes and treated as the caste, instead of being treated as individuals with their own rich inner lives. Certainly, people are molded by their upbringing and communities; but the idea the individuals have individual rights, duties, and privileges that are their own and not granted due to their caste, is an essential idea to the functioning of our world.

If someone wishes remold societies around caste rights, duties, and privileges, they are certainly free to do so. But please stop messing with this one.

n.n said...

Affirmative discrimination. Color quotas. Minority blocs. Liberal inference. Assessment of value and trust based on low information attributes. Diversity or color judgment, not limited to skin color, breeds adversity.

Ken B said...

The interviewer injects a false premise, that we don’t judge people on their character. If you judge them by their color,and impose preconceptions based on their color, you are not in fact judging them on their character.

Michael P said...

The harm is that it pretty explicitly requires "good" racism. Suppose you see a person and think of their skin color as a major part of their identity. What impact is that supposed to have on how you treat them, or how you assess what they are saying? Is that impact based on their character, or the content of their speech or behavior?

Shouting Thomas said...

What happened is that 60 years of preferences and quotas didn’t change the fundamental status of most blacks.

Because the pathology of black culture hasn’t changed. In fact, it’s gotten worse.

And, a way must be found to blame that on whites.

Fernandinande said...

But I grew up in the Martin Luther King era: Judge by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.

LOL. I really hate that (paraphrased) quote because

-- it's grade-school level trivial, but people like to pretend it's profound.

-- King didn't actually mean that people should act, or "judge", that way when he said it, but rather they should judge by character at some time in the future, after blacks get reparations and other special treatment.

Xmas said...

The problem is inherit in the King quote. When you see color, you judge by color. You start saying things like, "This person can't say that because they are white." and "That person can say that because they are Chinese." You remove the ability to talk about things objectively and all discussions are judge subjectively based on the skin-color of the speaker.

When all topics for debate are dealt with subjectively, you end with up this (NSFW).

Gahrie said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

The fact that they then go on to treat and judge people differently based on their skin color.

Maillard Reactionary said...

What's wrong with it is that it forces you to interact with others through the filter of Leftist ideology. It is a form of thought control, which is always what the Left wants. E.g., "Speaking as a woman...", "speaking as a member of a minority group...", "speaking as [a member of any designated victim group]...", and similar constructions reflect this mindset.

What the Left afraid of is free people seeing, and willing to state, the obvious. Such as that we have more in common than what separates us, as MLK recognized.

I agree with Bill Maher on this one, it's not even close.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I have a dream...

That one day leftwing progressives will call everyone racist until the word has no meaning.

hawkeyedjb said...

"what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?"

The new line of attack is specifically for the purpose of a) attributing negative characteristics to persons based on race, and b) gaining power over persons of the wrong color. Much like the bad old system we criticized way back in the day. Like many raised in the "civil rights era," I find the new and improved paradigm has pretty much the same goal as the old racist approach.

TreeJoe said...

“But we do see color, and no one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character."

When you argue to fire one person and hire someone of a certain color skin as a replacement - as a pre-condition - you are exactly arguing that someone should first be judged by their color and only THEN - thru the lenses of color - should you judge their character.

The Crack Emcee said...

They've turned the desire for Civil Rights - which implies wanting to be part of this thing - to an ideology that actively opposes it.

I blame white people.

By insisting they won't do reparations, they push blacks further and further over the edge, because reparations are based in the American sense of justice, which whites are betraying today - so why would anybody want to be with them now?

Now everybody's gonna be with us - the real Americans - if we can ever get the shit back on track...

rcocean said...

Not thinking about color was always absurd. First, people of color never "Stop thinking about color". Go talk to a black man and ask them. Second, how can liberals constantly Jabber about "race" and "Racism" and "racial politics" without thinking about color? Liberals/Leftist even disagree with the other strand of "Don't think about color" since they support affirmative actions and set-asides.

Nope, lets be honest. Lets "Think about color" & stop with the wishful thinking and dishonesty. And what can you say about a society that looks up to Dwarf-man Bill Maher, and prints interviews with him?

Infinite Monkeys said...

The consequences are that you have to always be aware of the other person's color but NO PROFILING. I suppose whites (and sometimes Asians) are to become emotional flagellants to atone for their sins.

Howard said...

I wear my color blindness as a badge of honor. Likely inherited from my Neanderthal grandma, it gives me superior night vision and the ability to spot phonies through their ill placed camouflage.

Ralph L said...

It would be confusing for mixed-race SJWs if they ever used their brains.

Kevin said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

Short answer: it divides us by color rather than uniting us as humans.

I see your hair color too, Althouse. But if I met you I wouldn’t keep thinking “Blonde Person. Blonde Person.”

Dust Bunny Queen said...

"what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

1) The harm is that you put that person into a little and rather inflexible box. It is blatant stereotyping of an individual based on your own learned and probably incorrect presumptions. Stereotyping is bigotry. You are a bigot and don't know it.

All people of X color (and now of X sexual persuasion) are viewed as being a cohesive whole. All people who are black are not from the same culture, same area of the earth, same family backgrounds. They are not all treated the same currently, have not all been treated the same in the past.

EACH person is an individual who has had experiences and challenges in their life. Has individual likes, dislikes. YES we can acknowledge that some people have had historical problems and discrimination due to their physical appearance and may still have experienced discrimination.

2) The other harm is to YOU the person who only sees the color. It makes you afraid or nervous on how to treat the Colored person. Am I doing the right thing? Is this offensive? How about that? You are disingenuous and unable to get past the surface of the person who you are interacting with. They are not a person....they are an object.

Instead of dealing with the person as a human being you are dealing with an OBJECT. A Person of Color. Ooooo...special.

If you think you are doing it 'right' then you get a feeling of self satisfaction. Wow. Look at how wonderful "I" am. I am better than others, those Deplorable Rednecks (who you also objectify as objects) because I can handle this "PERSON OF COLOR".

Stereotyping and Objectifying people. Who thinks this is really a good thing. Do YOU want to be treated that way?

I don't.

narayanan said...

After judging them by their character - you make excuses for any shortcoming you may perceive but now dare not to express

Brian said...

The interviewer pushes him: “But we do see color, and no one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character.

The white privilege movement is specifically designed around judging a person by their color and not character.


Unknown said...

What's the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

Here are a few of my issues with it.

1) I personally don't want to be judged by the color of my skin. I imagine that other people are similar to me in this. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I was brought up to believe that we should see people as individuals not as stereotypes.

2) There are not a lot of successful multi-ethnic/multi-cultural societies in the world in history or even in the modern world. Multi-ethnic societies in which skin color/race is/has been among the foremost characteristics of importance have historically been ones like India with its caste system, South Africa, the Jim Crow south, the antebellum south, early twentieth century Germany etc. I am not aware of any multicultural societies with this focus that aren't considered evil by the people pushing this narrative. Why do think this time will be different?

3) The idea of color-blindness has been promoted by people of all races now for 50+ years in America. It has been very hard to get to the place we're at now where this belief is generally accepted. It's still not universally accepted, but the world that has come out of this push is inarguably better in terms of racial harmony than what was around before.

4) The movement to change this seems like a "high-tower" idea from universities where people just decide to jettison what is accepted in order to make waves and freak out the squares. It's hard not to see this idea in that vein. I have less than zero respect for these types of ideas.

5) The idea of removing race-blindness as an ideal always treats minorities as more fragile than the white majority. Frankly this is one of my main beefs with these movements. This idea infantilizes minorities and robs them of their personal agency.

6) This effort seems to be designed primarily to distract from bad general outcomes for some minorities. The enormous out-of-wedlock birth rate and lack of fathers in the homes cannot possibly be related to the crime rates in African American communities, for example. Right?

Hubert the Infant said...

I am a white parent of black children. The problem with identifying people by color is that the message that is really being conveyed -- especially on college campuses -- is that blacks will always be held down by racism no matter what they do or how talented they are. This is intentional, as making blacks dependent on the good grace of white liberals for success is clearly the goal. For instance, it explains why blacks vote overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates despite all of the evidence that a new approach is needed.

Two-eyed Jack said...

I have come to believe that the best way of understanding most political disputes is to recognize that we dynamically balance between two principles that conflict with one another. The principles are easy to express, the best balance is hard to determine and impossible to express. Therefore, we attempt to sway the balance by citing one or the other of these principles. Achieving some sort of strict adherence to either principle would be disastrous. We can coexist as a society if we agree on the principles, but disagree on the balance, but not if we disagree on the principles.

Dan in Philly said...

I struggle with this idea of not seeing color when I consider why it's ok for a black man to use the N word but not for a white man to do it. I concluded that it's because a black man has a different relationship with that word than does the white, and it would be inappropriate to think otherwise. Just I I wouldn't call my neighbor's wife "my dear" just because he can, I can't use certain words just because others can.
But where does this leave me? Should I embrace the points the liberals make and always consider others when I use any words? If we conclude the colorblind approach doesn't work, does this mean we can stereotype based on color or race or gender? Are we really back to separate but equal?

Patrick Henry was right! said...

Because it promotes racial tribalism, which is the most dangerous form of a most dangerous thing.

rehajm said...

When BIll Maher was growing up the most liberal thing you could do was kill the guards in a bank robbery.

Sherman Broder said...

Me: "There are none so blind as those who will not see."

Interviewer: "So, you're saying blindness is voluntary?"

Me: "You, sir, are a moron."

Althouse: "Actually, that’s no a response to the question asked."

rhhardin said...

It keeps blaxks from acting white, is the harm.

AllenS said...

I enjoy being judged by the color of my skin. I am swarthy, and damned proud of it.

AMDG said...

Our system, for better or worse, was set up on the basis individual rights. Identity politics and Intersectionality represent a return to tribalism represent a return to the old way of political interaction - a way that is not compatible with a proper functioning Republic. If indentity politics prefvail the Republic will end.

Sebastian said...

"So what problem is being caused by the shift you just described?”

This is covered by the Universal Theory of Progressive Instrumentalism.

Concepts, theories, arguments are tools. The idea that colorblindness is wrong is a tool: a tool to divide and conquer, a tool to denigrate the liberal culture of the United States, a tool to impose prog rule on all our interactions.

So the problem is that the shift represents a morally corrupt and politically dangerous attempt at solidifying prog hegemony.

Bob Smith said...

When I ran into one of those “I don’t see color” morons I asked them if they drove a car.

JAORE said...

Step one, observe color (even if inaccurately).
Step two,assign person to box appropriate to that color.
Step three, ANY observations on character must remain strictly within the confines of that box.

And the boxes are strongy constructed by layer and layers of bias.

Sure he's XXXXX, but he's a GOOD one. Oh, he's XXXX, must be racist. She looks like a XXXX.

What could go wrong?

dreams said...

Liberals believe in collective rights and conservatives believe in individual rights. People should be treated as individuals based on their on merit.

Marcus Bressler said...

Nigga, please!!!

THEOLDMAN

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

The problem with current Progressivism and race is that insist race uniquely matters and that all other human traits are dependent on skin color, which leads to resegregation (this time it’s voluntary!) and purposeful discrimination, punishing “people of NO color” by pretending that everything we do is based on our lack of melanin. It’s idiotic kindergarten-level mores. There’s more racial harmony in America than anywhere else and more than has ever existed in any society before. But Progressives are all about destroying what works in pursuit of unattainable utopias. Too bad Bill is too dumb to figure out he supports the wrong side even though he knows the right thing to do.

Nonapod said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

pious agnostic @8:13 AM more or less answered this. To me, these things seem almost comically self evident. One of the earliest lessons we recieve as children is not to judge other people based on their appearence alone. I hope we all know why you shouldn't do that. But beyond that, categorizing people into victims and oppressors based soley on race is dehumanizing unfair, and inaccurate. It reduces interactions between people to an advisarial zero sum game

Lucien said...

1) If you want to discern someone’s preference, watch what they do when they have a choice. When you hear “I am mixed race, but I identify as X” how often is X “white”? Anecdotally, X is usually some other race, which suggests that white is not the preferred race.

B) had you spoken with a black civil rights advocate in the 1950’s, don’t you think they would have said “All we want is the opportunity to be judged based on our own merit”? Now merit based decisions are supposed to be racist.

Rory said...

"what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?"

It gives the rich bastards at the top an opportunity to manipulate the whites and blacks below them against each other forever. The same applies to every other -ism.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

I have a dream...

Democratic candidates on parade will offer promises of Reparations. That promise will go undelivered and forgotten once said D is given power.

sean said...

Well, I think Prof. Althouse got her answer. Not that it will change her mind.

M Jordan said...

Maher’s lying. He sees color. Everyone sees color. His phrasing “Actual black friends” betrays him. Actual?

The key is not pretending color doesn’t exist or even that it doesn’t immediately create a filter to judge a person through, but to set aside those judgments and examine the character of the person. This is King’s Dream, not to pretend humans don’t judge outwardly but to learn to get past that superficial, instinctive assessment and judge rationally and fairly.

Amadeus 48 said...

"The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?"

I'm glad you asked.

In my view, a big challenge in life is to see past stereotypes that the culture provides, to go beyond the surface of things. One of the most obvious things about a person is the color of his or her skin. It is a low information signifier. That doesn't tell you much about a person if you are dealing with people as individuals. It doesn't tell you much about a person if you are dealing with people as groups. So, as MLK indicated, to get beyond the low information signifier is to get beyond the simplest prejudices that are offered up by society.

I am not a Maher fan because of other prejudices that he and I don't share, but I am with him 100% on this one. I am glad he changed the subject on the reporter, because the follow-up question was a trap, and I think Maher viewed MLK's sentiments as almost self-evident and certainly as good for society. To look at it the other way is to hard-wire divisions into our culture that should be mitigated or eliminated.

Don't patronize or condescend to black people. Don't elevate white people. By their works ye shall know them is a genuine challenge.

narciso said...

When did this third rate dwarf comic become the benchmark of anything, he was a stock name on amazon women on the moon

DarkHelmet said...

Everybody sees skin color. Just like they see hair color, height, weight, pretty face/ugly face, etc. The problem comes from deciding that appearance dominates personhood. If I see a really fat person today (black, white or any other skin tone) I'll probably think, "Whoah! That guy's really fat!" And it will sum up my impression of the person. If I interview the person for a job I'll have his fatness at top of mind. More so than color. If that same day I also interview a very petite, attractive young woman her appearance will likely tend to dominate my impression of her.

Now, if I'm hiring for a nose tackle position the young woman's appearance is going to work against her, and the big dude's size will actually help him. But if I'm interviewing for a network newsreader? Hmmm. Skinny woman has a leg up, no matter how I try to focus on things like intelligence, speaking voice, poise, etc. (Not that much intelligence is required to be a newsreader these days.)

It's all too easy to judge a book by its cover. There are great books with lousy covers and some really trashy books with great cover art. I suppose if you're looking for a coffee table book the cover is mostly what matters. Still, there is a sense that what's inside should be more important.

Fernandinande said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

On problem is the tendency to blame "systemic racism", namely white people, for the economic and social successes of Asians, when those successes are really their own fault.

Fernandinande said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

OT: While the corrupt democrats stroke their own dicks... Cuba and Russia continue to prop-up Maduro in Venezuela. - you know like Bernie and his progressive brethren would.


Venezuela’s Struggle for Legitimacy Comes to New York

Michael K said...

Gahrie said...
The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

The fact that they then go on to treat and judge people differently based on their skin color.


What's the matter with that ? Democrats have been doing that for over 200 years. Since the Party's founding, in fact.

Republicans have a different history, of course.

MikeDC said...

That was actually a very Trumpian answer. It did answer the question but only by indirect reference.

Maher is saying the harm in color-obsession is that it makes for uncomfortable interactions. Neither he no his black friends want him, as a white person, sitting there and constantly thinking "the guy I'm with is black, the guy I'm with is black, etc.)

But, of course he couldn't just come out and say, "the harm of being truly being politically correct with respect to race would make every interaction stilted, stressful, and unpleasant for everyone, and thus, be counterproductive". So, he shortcuts that, and relates the same meaning without expressly saying it.

traditionalguy said...

MLK like Ghandi was a pacifist relying on the Bible Belt Christian culture Approach that sees men equal in God’s eyes. Ergo: we are all one race, the Human Race. Today the Soros paid force at work is Black Supremacy, and that requires resurrection of White Supremacy as the common enemy of all Non Nordics...which, eureka, is the majority.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

At heart it’s not about seeing or perceiving skin color, “color blindness” is awkward shorthand for treating everyone the same, assumed to be polite acceptance as is the American norm. “Fairness” is a concept rooted deep in our history and culture. It’s the reason our Founding Fathers wrote that all are created equal and put the ideal in writing at a time when not all were treated equally. Striving to adhere to great ideals is in our blood. Demagogues and hustlers can always stir up resentments, like the Serpent did with Eve in the garden, but our collective will has been dedicated to getting along because most Americans aren’t “Progressives” seeking Utopia but normal people seeking peaceful “life, liberty and” pursuing happiness, not misery. Progs ARE misery.

n.n said...

That one day leftwing progressives will call everyone racist until the word has no meaning.

We have reached that point individually, but the institutional memory of the diversity racket persists because it is politically congruent (e.g. leverage, profit). This development has been accelerated through calls for reparations that explicitly exclude acknowledging and compensating the People and Posterity who sacrificed blood and treasure to confront redistributive change, [skin color] diversity, thus progressing color bias to normalize color prejudice, and breeding adversity.

Social justice (e.g. appeals to empathy, political congruence) anywhere is injustice everywhere.

n.n said...

Classical liberal. Classical progressive. Liberalism is a progressive (e.g. monotonic, generational) ideology that is divergent (e.g. rebels with a cause, again, and again, and again) in principle.

wendybar said...

The most RACIST people on the Web today are liberal white people. THEY seem to be the ones with the most to say about their "so called" privilege. If whites have privilege, why did Lizzy Warren lie and say she was an Indian? She got plenty of play with that one. Why are Rachel Dolezal and Shawn King still pretending to be black???

NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...

Apparently Mahr somewhat went after White Guilt on his show this week.

mockturtle said...

Maher is right. But the 60's were actually the advent of color-consciousness among blacks. Black Power, Afros, etc.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

Whatever is worse for whites at any time is what is liberal.

mockturtle said...

Hubert the Infant keenly observes: This is intentional, as making blacks dependent on the good grace of white liberals for success is clearly the goal.

Yes, this has always been the goal of Democrats. Fostering dependency for their own political power is being played to the hilt today. Disgusting and demeaning.

The Godfather said...

"what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?" Talking about whether we should "see" color is stupid. Of course we "see" someone's race -- and height, and hair color, and so forth. What liberals are insisting upon is not that we "see" color, but that we afford Black people certain treatment BECAUSE they are Black, and that we treat white people in certain ways because they are white. In an earlier era, the idea was to restrict the opportunities available to Blacks to preserve the opportunities available to white people. Today's "liberal" wants to give benefits to Black people because they are Black, and to impose the costs of such benefits on white people because they are white -- and Asian people, too, by the way. The harm, then, is diminishing the importance of all the characteristics of an individual other than his/her race.

If you need to have it explained to you why it is bad to diminish the importance of all the characteristics of an individual other than his/her race, you are probably hopeless.

LYNNDH said...

"I have actual black friends" smacks of the 60's and is in of itself very Racist.

Francisco D said...

By insisting they won't do reparations, they push blacks further and further over the edge, because reparations are based in the American sense of justice, which whites are betraying today - so why would anybody want to be with them now?

If you are arguing that reparations are symbolic and without practical value, I agree. However, the symbolism is destructive to racial relations.

JPS said...

We don't see color here.

But we celebrate it.

The Bubble

bagoh20 said...

The old institutional racism has been replaced with the new institutional racism. Same objective: power, only this time to a different group: the new racists. Congratulations, newbies!

vanderleun said...

More mush from Bill the Blobfish. Ignore.

RigelDog said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

But Maher did address that, at least to some degree, when he pointed out that black people would not appreciate it if all a white person could think about as they interacted is that this is a black person. There's a lot you can "unpack" (don't like the term but sometimes it fits) just from that example. The interaction is fatally stunted. Each person is just a stereotype of some sort; each is behind a wall that prevents truly knowing the other's essence.

bagoh20 said...

When you insist on seeing race it's becuase you think that people of that race can't handle being treated equal. You are by definition a white supremacist, and not someone who just esposes it; you really believe it in your heart. You need a mirror.

Pettifogger said...


Patrick Henry was right! said...

"Because it promotes racial tribalism, which is the most dangerous form of a most dangerous thing."

Bingo. Focusing on color divides us. We need to be united.

Geoff Matthews said...

How about this?
We would be criticized for holding negative, pre-conceived notions about racial minorities. We would be criticized for relying on stereotypes about racial minorities.
So why are we criticized for not relying on stereotypes and negative, pre-conceived notions about racial minorities?

Because many of those racial minorities are still doing poorly.

Jupiter said...

"The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?"

Hmmm? Are "liberals" now insisting on racism? Good for them. I learned when I first went to Boston, if you get off the subway, and everyone there is a different color than you are, you got off at the wrong stop. That was fifty years ago. Glad to hear the liberals are finally catching up.

Megthered said...

I was raised to be color blind. My parents would have whipped me if I said the N word to or about anyone. I was raised to see people, not color and judge them on their actions and behavior. It's how I raised my children. I have a black son in law and mixed grandchildren. My son in law says I'm one of a kind.

James Pawlak said...

Perhaps we should see "color" as did Rev.Jesse Jackson in his statement about being, walking on a dark street at night, being followed by a group of Black vs. a like group of White youths.

Iman said...

The soft bigotry of noting levels of pigmentation...

Bay Area Guy said...

Racism is bad - false claims of racism are equally bad and much more prevalent in the modern era.

I don't ignore a person's color, but I tend to judge individuals as, well, individuals - how a person acts and what they say.

William said...

Sexism is far more primal and pervasive than racism. The first time you meet a pretty woman, that's the thing you notice about her and it tends to shape your opinion of her other qualities. Nonetheless, in a work environment anyway, you soon notice if she's vapid or lazy or incompetent or suffers from any of those thousand faults that exist independent of good looks.....Something like this happens with black people. You notice the race of a coworker, but, after a while, that's not their most noteworthy characteristic......It would be nice to live in a world where your race, sex, height and looks didn't matter. As a matter of fact, you're living in one (right here) where such things are irrelevant.

stonethrower said...

I can't believe that anyone thinks that question needs to be answered

jeremyabrams said...

What's the harm in a color-conscious approach? I'm white (or Ashkenazi Jewish, anyway) and my wife is Japanese. What special narrow cubicle must our two sons occupy as a result of this color-consciousness.

The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. was either right or wrong. Ann's question suggests he was wrong, and Black Lives Matter and Rep. Pressley ("We don't need no brown skins that aren't brown voices,,,") are right.

chuck said...

> the message that is really being conveyed -- especially on college campuses -- is that blacks will always be held down by racism.

Especially by the racism of elite colleges that have a habit of pawning off blacks into BS political subjects like black history and gender studies.

Lewis Wetzel said...

The assumption by the libs of the 60s was that there were disparities between the races that being colorblind would eliminate. That was not true. It can never be true of any peoples who are culturally distinct.
So the libs, rather than recalibrate the way they think about how different distinct groups interact politically, has followed the path of the Back Nationalists of the 60s: There is only conflict, now and forever.
Picture how today's liberal view race relations. Now tell me where what they envision has actually worked without being authoritarian. Democracy is certainly not compatible with a political state that is anti-majoritarian, e.g., anti-democratic.

GatorNavy said...

I am a 3rd generation military brat, who put 22 years in the Navy. The military way is to hate on everyone equally until the realization dawns that everyone is equally in the shit and we had to collectively pull our asses out of it or perish.

Leland said...

In order to accept White Privilege; you must see more than color. You must see that a person is white or black. When you see white, you must assume the white person had advantages not available to the black person and, disregarding their outcome, assume they owe something to those that are black. When you see black, you muse assume the black person was disadvantaged and, and disregarding their outcome, assume they should be given something for just being black.

When I don't see color, I see a person and judge their character. Their character often tells me if the trappings of their life were well earned or not. Usually to know if they were advantaged or not; I need to learn more than just a moment judgement of their color. In fact, I may need a strong acquaintance with them to really know what obstacles or assistance they had to accomplished whatever they have done. There is absolutely no way I can make a judgement that someone was privileged or advantaged by just looking at the color of their skin.

This is the problem with people like Kaepernick. He had obstacles, but he also was given assistance to help him reach his goal of playing in the NFL. He's earned more money than I will, and his physical characteristics (being 6'4") gave him an advantage over me to being a pro level athlete. I feel for him not fully living a dream to being a big star and having a hall of fame career. But I think he should be proud of accomplishing what many could not do and he should enjoy his financial reward.

However, I'm not to look at any of that. Instead, I am supposed to see he was born to a white mother. Oh wait... I am supposed to see he was born to a black father, well not to... His white mother was knocked up by a black dude, who left her to carry a child that is called black because of a few drops of semen. The white mother couldn't raise him because she was so privileged, so a white couple adopted him to assuage their white guilt (and mostly because this white privileged couple lost two young sons they conceived to heart defects). Personally, I think judging Kaepernick this way is insulting to many people including himself.

I also don't think Maher changed the subject. He's right. I don't walk into a meeting at work, see the black engineering manager and assume he is having a rougher go at it than the white junior engineer because "white privilege". Rather, I see an engineering manager and a junior engineer.

The problem is being forced to see a person's color and assume something about them based on their color.

hombre said...

Actually, he did respond to the question by pointing out the unnecessary awkwardness created by focusing on color first.

Leland said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

I actually think the seeing-color approach is just a continuation of Democrat racial preference agenda in order to garner votes. It is just as ugly today as it was a 150 years ago. It just supposedly has adjusted to a different color (although it is interesting that most of the proponents for white privilege thinking are... white, like David Marchese).

CJinPA said...

The questioner put the issue out there, but Maher’s answer was, essentially, I still like the old color blindness approach. The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

As always, the discussion of the pros/cons of a seismic cultural shift occur AFTER they were forced, top-down, on the culture from above.

Same with the shift on single-parent homes, immigration, etc. The burden is placed on those questioning the change, when it should have been on those advocating it. Of course, they didn't have to advocate. Once elite academic/media consensus is reached, there is not debate.

Birkel said...

The harm is never seeing the person as they exist, but rather only seeing one facet of their being.

Roy Lofquist said...

“When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’

’The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’

’The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master — that’s all.”

― Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

Rabel said...

"I'm glad he's dead, and I hope the end was painful."

Bill "Character" Maher on the day of David Koch's death from cancer.

Rosalyn C. said...

"So what problem is being caused by the shift you just described?” I know with a POC that there is a barrier that can not be removed so I do not even bother trying anymore. Intellectually I know we humans are all one, emotionally I feel that, but when I deal with individuals who are a different race I observe and respect their differences. I closed down my heart a bit and felt badly about it, but that's what people of color say they want. Not a problem anymore.

viator said...

If you want to see character rather than color all you have to do is go to Canada. That cosmopolitan city Toronto would be a good place to start. There white/black interactions carry none of the charged elements so invariably found in the US.

Joel Winter said...

I have a black car. I don't really care about the color--but my wife would NEVER EVER let me buy a white car. Sometimes when I see a nice white car on the road, I think "Looks nice, but I'll never be able to buy that car." She'd never let me (we share money and decisions in our house).

The cars drive the same, regardless of their color. I notice color because it's *noticeable.* There IS difference--in color. I even have complex thoughts about the color and its impact on whether I could buy that car or not. If my wife didn't have this bias against white cars, I probably wouldn't think about white cars in that way--ever.

But the white and black Ford Fusion cars all drive the same. They have the same shape, same mileage, same options--just the color is different. Should I be using some other ruler or measuring stick to judge these cars?

Should I start approaching white cars differently than I do black cars? What is the impact of different color cars that I'm missing here? Does color matter? How are colors and people different than colors and cars? Why, and how?

Yancey Ward said...

The very first comment in the thread outlines it perfectly, and it is the answer that Maher should have given to the question. Well done, Tim Maguire.

BJM said...

A little story; A girlfriend was visiting from Mexico City and I made Shakshuka for breakfast. I casually asked her flour tortillas or toast? She looked at me, I looked at her and we burst out laughing.

Toast it was.

We've been friends for almost twenty years and that the question could be perceived as racist would never have occurred to either of us. This woke BS actually inserted racism where none existed. Good job.

Martha said...

OH NEVERMIND:

Virginia sixth-grader now says she falsely accused classmates of cutting her hair - The Washington Post

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/virginia-sixth-grader-now-says-she-falsely-accused-classmates-of-cutting-her-hair/2019/09/30/ad0cbd92-e390-11e9-a331-2df12d56a80b_story.html

Laslo Spatula said...

I am reasonably sure that a woman's breasts play a more significant factor in my opinion of a woman than the color of her skin.

Unless I first see her from behind. Then I make first judgement by looking at her ass.

At some point I'll probably hear them talk, then revise accordingly.

I am Laslo.

Mike (MJB Wolf) said...

Another thread I can't really participate in because it doesn't update.

gahrie said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

The biggest harm will come when they convince most White people that they are White, rather than American. If you really do want to see White supremacy, keep convincing people that their skin color is important.

Todd said...

The problem with it is, it is just another thing to keep us apart. I should not "need" to be aware of your race. It should be irrelevant to current actions/events UNLESS it is but the left wants race (and sex) to ALWAYS be relevant unless they don't want it to be. It is "heads I win, tails you lose".

Blacks are more prevalent in some sports, you don't hear ANYONE saying that is not fair. Instead you hear that there are not enough blacks in hockey.

The left ONLY plays Calvinball and to the left everything is Calvinball...

Narr said...

When I was in the 9th grade, MLK was assassinated. The two sanitation workers--Walker and Cole-- whose deaths prompted the strike that brought him here happened just one block from my school; there's a marker there now.

I grew up in the tail-end of Jim Crow, and not among liberals I assure you; I encountered old black men who couldn't look even white teenagers in the eye after a lifetime of enforced subservience and humiliation. It sucked, people, and as bad as PC tries to make things now, we're all better off.

As for the highly-flawed MLKjr (whose life, works, and death I am quite informed about, thanks), I always have to remind myself of something I read that goes like this--

It is good for ethical principles that those who espouse them are not required to lead holy lives.

Narr
Maher's a lightweight, but like I said

Matt said...

The problem is colored peop...I mean, "people of color". There is no consistency on what offends them, on what constitutes racism, etc.

They constantly move the goalposts so that the "race issue" will never, ever be solved thus rendering the race obsessives obsolete and, more importantly, unemployed.

This is also why more and more people have no time for their neverending bullshit (rioting over and lying about assholes who earn their outcome through their own shitty behavior, constant racism hoaxes where the 'victim' is the one writing n*gg*r on the wall, the astronomical violence they perpetrate and never have to answer for because slavery).

I don't believe we're seeing an increase in intolerance or bigotry. We're seeing people who have been doing their best to get along with everyone getting fed up with the hypocrisy, double-standards and endless games played by our vaunted "minority community".

doctrev said...

Guys, you're never going to believe this, but the people who said that the Karen Pence hate crime was a hoax were absolutely right!!

https://www.redstate.com/streiff/2019/09/30/hate-crime-hit-karen-pence-immanuel-christian-
school-proven-false-will-anyone-apologize/

If only a skilled and experienced legal professional had the foresight to make an early prediction!

Bruce Hayden said...

This is a way to bribe Blacks, in particular, to ignore the 200+ years that the Democrats have been holding down Blacks, and more recently how their policies caused the breakdown of the Black family (from 25% when their War on Poverty was enacted to 75% today). And with that systematic family destruction, the advancing that Blacks had bee experiencing since WW II, stalled, if it reersed. Instead of building a career so many young black men, today, instead do and sell drugs get involved I gangs and ultimately end up dead or I prison.

So, the Democrats are bribing Blacks to continue voting for them, and do it by enacting positive discrimination. One negative consequence we have seen recently is a two level justice system where Blacks are given a pass for crimes that Whites do not get. Which just emboldens Black thugs and gang members. And, since it is highly racial, one more reason to avoid dealing with or esp living around Blacks. Just a continuation of 200+ years of explicit racism by the Democrats.

Le Stain du Poop said...

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/girl-who-claimed-hair-was-cut-in-racist-attack-admits-she-made-it-up/

Left Bank of the Charles said...

"If someone walks in the room, after a minute, I should not be thinking about color."

So Bill Maher does think about color, for the first minute.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

RE: Koch brothers.

the leftwing hivemind had no idea that Koch family donated big money to the hospital where Ruth BG is, and that the Koch bros gave big money to the NY Ballet - to the tune of millions.

& the Koch Bros gave big money to science and public broadcasting.

The Koch brothers didn't give big money to the DEMOCRAPS. So you know - they are pure evil and must be vilified at every turn. This is how the mob-left and the corrupt hivemind work.

Seeing Red said...

The girl lied about who cut her hair.

A very gracious statement of apology from the family.

Rick said...

no one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character.

Why let people lie like this? The left's program judges people by skin color and gender and has done so for decades. That's the entire principle behind white privilege and generic insults like "dead white males".

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

So now we're not sure racism is bad. Progress!

Anthony said...

as a culture, we gave up on the ideal of color blindness

Who's this "we", kemosabe?

A tiny subset of race baiters and their political and media enablers gave up on it, not the vast majority of the rest of us.

n.n said...

This woke BS actually inserted racism where none existed.

Color bias, not limited to race, is intrinsic. Prejudice is a condition progressed by bigotry (i.e. sanctimonious hypocrisy).

n.n said...

virginia-sixth-grader-now-says-she-falsely-accused-classmates-of-cutting-her-hair

Curiously, fortunately, while this story was carried by the national press, and proliferated on social media platforms, the story was not viable, and did not force catastrophic anthropogenic climate change, this time. Unfortunately, diverse precedents suggest that the rumor will persist and progress as a political myth, exploited by the diversity rackets including politicians and non-profit tax shelters.

Lucien said...

Shakshuka! Now my train of thought has been hijacked.

rehajm said...

When Maher was growing up the most liberal thing you could do was kill the guards in the bank you were robbing.

Dust Bunny Queen said...

"If someone walks in the room, after a minute, I should not be thinking about color."

So Bill Maher does think about color, for the first minute.

Well, unless you are literally blind.... you will notice things about people upon first glance. Hair color, clothing, height, how they walk, how they stand, shifty eyes, eye glasses, male, female, undecided.....and YES the skin tone/color and racial characteristics of that person. This is completely normal and is a atavistic survival mechanism.

Once you have scanned the room and can identify people by sight, you then move on to the nuts and bolts of "who are they". Without assuming that the ginger haired person is going to steal your soul or the black person is going to steal your wallet......a really good way to get to know people is to talk to them.

Not talk down. Not assume you know all about them by the above identifying characteristics, but actually talk TO the person.

It is insulting to people to make assumptions about them based on race or other characteristics.

Yancey Ward said...

"So Bill Maher does think about color, for the first minute."

Laslo, in his typical humorous way explained this in a way anyone should be able to understand.

Yancey Ward said...

Did WaPo apologize for the attempted slur on the Pences?

n.n said...

"If someone walks in the room, after a minute, I should not be thinking about color."

You should not be judging her by a color attribute, not limited to skin color, and only using it (e.g. tall, blonde, pretty) as a reference before her name is known, or she has accepted your proposition for a date.

bagoh20 said...

"So Bill Maher does think about color, for the first minute."

Lets call it "short term racism."

I understand what he's getting at. You can't avoid seeing race, but it shouldn't manifest in any special action or response. Being woke means repeating to yourself "I'm not racist" for at least 60 seconds.

gilbar said...

Should I start approaching white cars differently than I do black cars? What is the impact of different color cars that I'm missing here? Does color matter? How are colors and people different than colors and cars? Why, and how?


Here's your answers (these, from the guy that had Both a Black '70 'cuda, AND a White '67 Dart GTS)

White's WAY better in the Summertime, Much Cooler!
Black's WAY better in the Wintertime (the sun melts the snow off)
BOTH show the dirt way Way WAY too much,
Your best bet is a faded metallic blue (like my '73 gremlin), you'll NEVER have to wash it
Dirt is invisible on a faded metallic blue.

But;
As Martin Luther said...
Don't worry about the COLOR of your car, just make sure you've got the magnum option, with the oversized Valves, and the Special, Factory, HIGH VOLUME fuel pump. Oh! and positraction! don't forget the posi!

BarrySanders20 said...

Reporter: "No one is arguing that people shouldn’t be judged by their character."

Implied: "But they should also be pre-judged by their race."

In this lefty world, those who do not or will not prejudge are in fact the prejudiced ones.

Kevin said...

Maher seems to have gotten tired of being told about his white supremacy after having a black girlfriend and donating $1 million to Obama's campaign.

If those things can't get someone on the whitelist, he's not going to be down with the wholesale blacklisting.

Kevin said...

When Maher was growing up the most liberal thing you could do was kill the guards in the bank you were robbing.

Nice.

Howard said...

Blogger rehajm said... When Trump was growing up the most conservative thing you could do was have Daddy hire a doctor to get you out of Vietnam.

See how easy that is?

Szoszolo said...

Ask Clarence Thomas and Thomas Sowell how many times they've been dismissed as race traitors or Uncle Toms. Black conservatives are routinely told that if they disagree with other people's ideas of how they should think and act, they no longer rate being treated with civility and decency.

Bill Befort said...

We call colorblindness a 60s attitude,but in fact the 60s were precisely the time when racial preferences and quotas became public policy, monitored by public agencies and ratified by the courts. Hubert Humphrey assured us that his Civil Rights Act could not be perverted to such uses, but in fact it started happening almost immediately.

Bill Befort said...

We call colorblindness a 60s attitude,but in fact the 60s were precisely the time when group preferences and quotas became federal policy, monitored by public agencies and ratified by the courts. Hubert Humphrey assured us that his Civil Rights Act could not be perverted to such uses, but it started happening almost immediately, first with respect to race, then to sex. We've seen half a century of increasing discordance between the persisting American ideal of individual equality before the law and the growing reality of group preferences. Now the advocates of race and gender quotas hope to see the old ideal vanish altogether.

Earnest Prole said...

Hey, I've got a great idea: Let's convince a generation of young men that their defining essence is their Evil Whiteness. What could possibly go wrong?

sg51 said...

If blacks are no longer blacks, they are no longer victims.

cubanbob said...

This is all so confusing. Before it was colored people. Now it's people of color. Before it was the character of the individual. Now it's the characteristics of the individual. I gather that as of today we are all representatives of our race, sex, gender, orientation, ethnicity, creed and religion when dealing with those who aren't in our grouping or subset. So therefore we as representatives should add the honorific Ambassador to our names when addressing another representative.

Kay said...

Colorblindness is fine. I just hate when people claim to be but are actually not.

rcocean said...

Reading the comments. What a bunch of out-of-touch boomers. You old farts continue to live in your "I never see Color, I told off Racist Grandma in 1969, and I'm not a bigot" world. It'd be sad, if it wasn't so dumb.

Joanne Jacobs said...

When my daughter was in second grade or so, she told me she'd met a girl her age on her grandmother's street. She said:

She's my age.
She's nice.
She can ride a bike without training wheels.
She has a dog.
She has a younger brother.

I'd seen a girl riding a bike in the neighborhood. I asked, "Is she black?"

My daughter thought for a second. "Yes," she said. She could see color, but didn't think it was in the top five in importance.

When she was in fifth grade, she identified a light-skinned black man as "Asian." I tried to explain why I knew he was "black," even though his skin was not much darker than mine. " I wondered why I thought it was important to teach her how to see color in a post-Crayola way.

Saint Croix said...

The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

It's a denial of individuality and common humanity. It defines a class of people as an other and ask that we judge them on that basis.

The Democrat party spend decades demonizing black people, for votes. And now they are demonizing white people, for votes. There's nothing "liberal" about this.

Saint Croix said...

And the Babylon Bee cracks me up.

Saint Croix said...

Resisting Whiteness 2019

traditionalguy said...

Be realistic. If the screening guards at Auschwitz had to judge new prisoners getting off the box cars by the content of their character, it would have taken forever. State Tyrannies need efficient death camps. So the Progressives are thinking ahead.

Maillard Reactionary said...

"There white/black interactions carry none of the charged elements so invariably found in the US."

Give it time, viator, give it time. Canada is run by cultural Marxists and with them its always Who and Whom.

William said...

Postscript to an earlier remark: No one can prejudge you here on your race, sex, or class. All our pixels are created equal in this egalitarian utopia. Nonetheless, one notes that the comments are moderated and that some here have built up a fair amount of animosity towards some other members of the community. And note that that animosity could not possibly be based on verboten grounds....The human race simply is not very good at getting along with the human race. Disagreement is inevitable and beating your opponent to death is what gives life its savor.....Class differences are nowhere near as sharp and bitter as they were in the 19th and early 20th century. Nobody gets their nose out of joint about Papists. I presume race differences in future generations will be less anger provoking, but I know with absolute certainty that someone else will be getting the short end of the deal and the sharp end of the stick.

chuck said...

> The question was, what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that liberals these days insist upon?

There are a lot of polite fictions that will melt away in the fires of racial politics. For one thing, the crime rates and violence associated with various ethnic groups will come into public play. There are lot of cracks waiting for someone to hammer in a wedge issue and politicians are just the ones to exploit the opportunity.

chuck said...

Maher grew up in a Christian nation, he is now living in a Leninist one. Different messages.

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

There is no harm in seeing color. It is there for the seeing - as is an accent there for the hearing, etc.

The potential for error arises in pre-judging an individual to hold certain beliefs, attitudes, or behaviors. The prejudice may be statistically correct, but always is disrespectful of the individual.

When done by public servants with public money (e.g. a school district) it is particularly repugnant, as it disrespects every tax payer.

Gk1 said...

This just sounds like a winded liberal realizing they have botched the race card to the point it no longer scares the normals. So they need to stop, catch their breath, and find another tactic because this scam is no longer working. Fuck Mahrer and they colonic horse he rode in on.

Maillard Reactionary said...

The Crack Emcee said in part:

"...I blame white people.

By insisting they won't do reparations, they push blacks further and further over the edge, because reparations are based in the American sense of justice, which whites are betraying today - so why would anybody want to be with them now?"

My first reaction is to think that our old friend Mr. Crack is making an attempt to be humorous. But I fear I may be mistaken.

Crack, if you're serious, you are one sorry guy, and nowhere near as smart as you think you are.

If there's one thing that is guaranteed, guar-ran-teed, to further alienate black and white Americans from each other, it is "reparations". Reparations for what? You were never a slave, my family were never slaveowners. Christ, they were Irish--the "niggers of Europe" until the late 20th century--poor, and only got here a generation after the whole mess was settled in a sea of blood. And were happy to get whatever work they could, which was always the worst available, when it was available.

It's not "white people" picking these old scabs and constantly telling American blacks that they are victims. It's liberals, Leftists, and there are plenty of black ones, too-- you've heard of Al Sharpton, Louis Farrakhan, Eric Holder, and just about every black Democrat in Congress, perhaps? None of them care about poor American blacks, all they want is power.

White people, aside from a handful of crackpots, have no problem at all with blacks who buy into the American social contract. But in order for this to be possible, both sides have to act in good faith and not walk in with a massive chip on their shoulder and a pre-wounded ego that needs to be salved.

I hope you were kidding. If so, my apologies and consider the preceding jeremiad to be addressed to evil race-baiters of all colorations.

If you were serious, you need to get over yourself and quit blaming others for your problems. You know, like adults do.

Iman said...

Maher has a face only a blind mother could love...

mockturtle said...

Joanne observes that children don't care or even seem to notice color. This has also been my lifelong observation and completely destroys the theory that racial phobias are genetic in nature.

Lee Moore said...

I think the argument against "seeing color" is the same as it was in the 1960s - that if you take note of color, you are liable to make stereotypical assumptions about the individual and treat him (or her or xit etc), merely because of those assumptions, differently from someone of a different color, which color provokes different stereotypical assumptions.

The flaw in the argument is that there are no neutral tone actual humans. All humans have an actual color. Likewise all humans have an actual height, speak an actual language with an actual accent, have feet of an actual size, have eyesight that is like this and not like that. Real people have real characteristics, and if you try to look past the actual characteristics, you're not looking at the individual, you're looking at an abstraction.

Now for some purposes - such as the law - where we'd like to fade out the individual characeteristics that are not relevant to assessing guilt in the particular case, a partly abstract human is not a bad thing. So we fade out race, or sex, or height, unless there's a witness saying "it was a tall black guy" and those particuars become relevant.

But for day to day dealing with people, all of their actual characteristics are relevant both to who they are in their own heads, and for the purpose of composing a representation of them in other people's minds.

The entertaining point in all this of course is that the rational justification for seeing color, as well as for seeing height, hearing voice and sniffing smell and a thousand other things, is that each of these particulars is a real aspect of the actual individual. Precisely the opposite of what "see color" folks are on about - which is "see only color and then pop this one dimensional abstraction of a person into a box marked "identikit black token people", or a box marked "identikit white token people" and so on.

Thus returning full circle to treating people according to a one dimensional racial stereotype. Which was what "don't see color" was originally intended to escape from !

Bobb said...

"what’s the harm in the seeing-color approach that Democrats for the last 170 years insist upon?"

tim in vermont said...

I have black friends and sometimes they are just friends, but sometimes they are black. Sometimes things come up that we see completely differently, and to pretend that that is not true is ridiculous. Some things about black culture and white culture are just different. Watch “Black Jeopardy” sometime then read “Things White People Like.” I think Maher is lying either about actually having close black friends, (Maybe he is not close to them?) or how he sees them.

n.n said...

The issue is not color (i.e. low information attributes) bias, but color judgments and value assessments ("diversity"), not limited to skin color, when those attributes are not significant in context. It is normalization of color blocs (e.g. racism, sexism, fetusism, "Jew privilege", etc.).

mockturtle said...

Skylark asserts: Some things about black culture and white culture are just different.

You're referring to culture, not race. A black person raised in an all-white culture will not be culturally black. And vice versa.

Michael K said...

I told a black friend, who is an orthopedic surgeon, that Farakhan is right about us being "Ice People."

The book "The 10,000 Year Explosion" explains that white skin evolved as humans moved out of Africa where there are no seasons and no need for clothing, into colder Europe where vitamin D deficiency develops fro lack of sunlight on skin. The use of clothing and the seasons required less melanin to allow more vitamin D synthesis in skin.

We laughed about it but he ordered copies of the book for his daughters. The shade of skin color is the same in Asia. The farther north, the lighter the skin. Blue eyes, however, evolved in Europe alone.

JamesB.BKK said...

I am often in situations where I am the only person of European extraction present / participating. I am also often thinking, "It sure is great that these people let me participate in activities with them. I will use good behavior."

Michael K said...

And were happy to get whatever work they could, which was always the worst available, when it was available.

A friend of mine became a professor of OB/GYN at U of Alabama at Tucscaloosa. He got to know another faculty member whose family had owned a plantation and had slaves before the Civil War. He described how they would haul cotton bales to a bluff over the river. They had slaves push the bales over the edge to fall to the landing where the steamship would tie up to load.

They used slaves to push the cotton bales, which weighed several hundred pounds, over the edge. Top catch them, at the bottom, however, they used Irish laborers. Slaves were too valuable for that work.

wildswan said...

"The shade of skin color is the same in Asia. The farther north, the lighter the skin."

The Inuit are lighter skinned than the Swedes?

JamesB.BKK said...

Being ice people meant big penalties, such as death for example, if one was expelled by the group for not doing its will. Easy to surmise (but perhaps incorrect given some of the evolutionary biology mumbo jumbo out there "in the scientific literature" as that charlatan Jordan Peterson might declare) that this resulted in a people easily susceptible to conformity when shame tactics are used and also highly trustworthy, and therefore trusting of the intentions of others.

It is pleasing to see that there are limits, such as shown by the howls of laughter and memery (production of memes) when pagan European and European-extracted adults plaster their used and abused and disabled end-times screeching 16-year old humans shield truant all over the place in order to manipulate us into giving up our rights and property. It is a bit sad however to see high trust cultures learning hard lessons from the actions of low trust culture types and morphing into low trust cultures.

wildswan said...

The problem with "seeing color" is what does that tell you? How is that person going to act toward you? How should you act toward them? Does "seeing color" tell you that? Only if you think there's only the one narrative - of oppression. People who insist on "seeing color" also usually seem to think that there's just the one narrative, just the one way to act toward each other.

exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...

"Nobody gets their nose out of joint about Papists."

You haven't read trad guy's comments very closely, I take it.

Kevin said...

Not seeing color was not ever the true sentiment of Democrats, ever. It is the province of Republicans and conservatives, who have never believed that the color of one's skin denoted a person's mind, life or soul. Republicans were the Abolitionists in this country, following in the tradition of Wilberforce in the UK, and in MLK Jr.'s own words, he was looking for a time when skin color didn't define anything. The Democrat party is corrupt, along with the media who propagate the lie that Republicans and conservatives are the racists. Democrats are the racists, and have made their racism the hallmark of their party's raison de etre, which, I pray, will ultimate lead to their "la fin" as a political party.

tim in vermont said...

"The Inuit are lighter skinned than the Swedes?”

Once you get to near constant ice and snow cover, dark skin and dark eyes once again becomes an asset.

tim in vermont said...

Phyl Linnott is one of my favorite musicians, taking the concept of “Black Irish” to a whole new level.

readering said...

Hope AA blogs on the new decision on affirmative action at Harvard out of District of Massachusetts.

tim in vermont said...

" A black person raised in an all-white culture will not be culturally black.”

So we are talking about how to deal with unicorns rather than horses.

Narr said...

These hosses is dead.

Narr
I'll try a livelier thread

PaoloP said...

Maher did not answer the question, but the question itself is preposterous: it's absolutely evident that in Identity Politics people are NOT judged by their character, but by their membership in some group. The fact that "we do see colors" is, of course, what should be overcome by more important factors.