Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site kontron.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxt!houxm!ihnp4!pesnta!pertec!kontron!cramer From: cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) Newsgroups: net.women,net.politics Subject: Re: Discrimination and Affirmative Action Message-ID: <294@kontron.UUCP> Date: Fri, 28-Jun-85 11:51:33 EDT Article-I.D.: kontron.294 Posted: Fri Jun 28 11:51:33 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 30-Jun-85 00:11:53 EDT References: <509@gargoyle.UChicago.UUCP> Organization: Kontron Electronics, Irvine, CA Lines: 39 Xref: watmath net.women:6158 net.politics:9646 > >Mr. Carnes leaps from prejudice to an intellectual belief in the > >inferiority of another race or sex by acknowledging that he has to > >treat blacks and women with kid gloves, rather than treating them like > >anyone else. > > May I just interject a word into this interesting discussion of my > psychology. No one said anything about kid gloves. The point is > that ethnic group or sex is a significant datum about an individual. > Ask a woman or black or Hispanic whether they ever think about being > female or black or Hispanic. Does it ever cross their minds, do you > suppose? If so, why should it not cross our minds, and even > influence our actions? > It crosses my mind that my ethnic origin is German, a group which suffered significant discrimination during World War I --- but I don't let that knowledge rule my life, and I would resent *tremendously* if someone treated me a particular way for being of German extraction. > While I'm at it I would like to object once more to the use of the > terms racism and sexism to mean simply prejudice or "thinking of > people as groups" or whatever is the favorite usage of the deep > thinkers at National Review or The Wall Street Journal. Loose talk > is generally an index of loose thinking. Many blacks in the US are > for understandable reasons prejudiced against whites -- that's why I > am not given to taking casual strolls through many areas of Chicago's > South Side. But I have never heard of a black racist in the US, > unless there have been blacks who shared the beliefs of white > racists. Have you forgotten about the Black Muslim movement in the early 1960s? (The Black Muslims have since dropped a lot of the racial hatred involved in their beliefs.) > Richard Carnes, ihnp4!gargoyle!carnes If I understand Mr. Carnes correctly, he is arguing that racism is bad (because it supposes ethnic or racial inferiority), but prejudice is OK (because it supposes only difference). My, the left sure has made a lot of progress since Martin Luther King gave his "I have a dream" speech. :-)