Race - Should It Be Ignored?

[Revoltingest]

It would be nice. Living in a southern rural area of mostly Anglos, I'm sometimes called a Mexican. Not there's anything wrong with being Mexican, that is when one is dealing with normal folks instead of the 'Larry the Cable Guy' gang accusing me of coming to America illegally and taking their jobs.

Yeah, Indian & Hispanic folk I know often look like each other & also like us Scot/German mongrels.
There certainly are limitations & problems using race.

 

[Panda]

When giving a description skin colour and race can help.

 

[Nashitheki]

When giving a description skin colour and race can help.

Indeed, but there are some who will say all those of another race look alike to them.

 

[Panda]

Indeed, but there are some who will say all those of another race look alike to them.

True but those people are idiots.

 

[Revoltingest]

True but those people are idiots.

That's a bit unfair. If one spends time primarily with similarly appearing people,
then subtle differences among very different people will be far less obvious.
Facial recognition is a skill which improves with diverse use.

 

[Nashitheki]

Yeah, Indian & Hispanic folk I know often look like each other & also like us Scot/German mongrels.
There certainly are limitations & problems using race.

Along the eastern tidal marshes and west into the Appalachian hill and hollow country there are small communities of people who favor one another. Once I went to a marshland seafood festival where the natives looked quite different than the visitors, yet appeared eerily similar to each other. The males were mostly of medium height and rather portly while the women were tomato shaped with huge upper arms tapering to tiny hands, same with their legs and feet. The majority of them were sandy haired, chinless and some of them appeared to have no neck. Local history has these people living mostly isolated in the marsh since the mid 17th century.

 

[Nashitheki]

True but those people are idiots.

Could be, or maybe they cannot see all that good.

 

[The Sum of Awe]

Personality should be ignored as well

 

[dust1n]

When giving a description skin colour and race can help.

Indeed, but there are some who will say all those of another race look alike to them.

True but those people are idiots.

That's a bit unfair. If one spends time primarily with similarly appearing people,
then subtle differences among very different people will be far less obvious.
Facial recognition is a skill which improves with diverse use.

Unfair? Try idiotic.

 

[Revoltingest]

Unfair? Try idiotic.

"Idiotic" is such an over-used word.
I can say from personal experience that it became easier to recognize differences in Asian faces after I moved to a more diverse area &
married into a Chinese family. (Twernt any of those in the rural farming community in MI where I was a young'un.) Was I idiotic & then
became enlightened? Pish posh! I just became familiar with a new type of faces & its nuances. You wouldn't be calling them "idiotic"
just cuz yer too embiggened fer yer britches, would you?

 

[dust1n]

I noticed in an article about a crime that police released descriptions of the perps being sought.
We know they're female & young, & we have detailed descriptions of their clothing & hair.
But race isn't mentioned at all. Wouldn't this be useful to know? But if it's wrong, then is it
also wrong to give accounts of their gender?

12 Girls Haul Teenagers Off Subway by Hair, Steal Cell Phone: Cops | NBC New York

Are we too politically correct about race?

The main question overshadows your OP! 'Race' is different from shades of skin color. Skin color is useful for identifying criminal suspects. Race is arbitrary in such. But, race should not be ignored. Why? Because its imaginary existence still disenfranhises millions!

 

[dust1n]

"Idiotic" is such an over-used word.
I can say from personal experience that it became easier to recognize differences in Asian faces after I moved to a more diverse area &
married into a Chinese family. (Twernt any of those in the rural farming community in MI where I was a young'un.) Was I idiotic & then
became enlightened? Pish posh! I just became familiar with a new type of faces & its nuances. You wouldn't be calling them "idiotic"
just cuz yer too embiggened fer yer britches, would you?

Nah. Idiotic is to insuniate someone is idiotic for not being able to equate skin hues with arbitrary definitions of race, that which overlap in terms of skin hues. Every other insuination of skin color is pish posh.

 

[Revoltingest]

The main question overshadows your OP! 'Race' is different from shades of skin color. Skin color is useful for identifying criminal suspects. Race is arbitrary in such. But, race should not be ignored. Why? Because its imaginary existence still disenfranhises millions!

There are a great many people who, when we glance at them, we can agree that they're black, white or Asian.
Race exists. We have a president who says he's black. Government considers race an important trait to track.
Was Trayvon Martin not black? Was George Zimmerman not white? Why was there racial strife if they were
both the same? How was the race of each established? People quickly decided what each was, & it hasn't been
disputed. Certainly it's indeterminate at times, but we're in denial if we try to maintain it doesn't exist.

Nah. Idiotic is to insuniate someone is idiotic for not being able to equate skin hues with arbitrary definitions of race, that which overlap in terms of skin hues. Every other insuination of skin color is pish posh.

Say whuh?

 

[dust1n]

There are a great many people who, when we glance at them, we can agree that they're black, white or Asian.
Race exists.

What race of 'black', 'white' or 'Asian' do you talk about? I have never heard of those racists? Race does not exist. It's a phenotype, and nothing more.

We have a president who says he's black. Government considers race an important trait to track.

We both know that means nothing.

Was Trayvon Martin not black? Was George Zimmerman not white? Why was there racial strife if they were
both the same? How was the race of each established?

Trayvon Martin had a darker skin hue. Zimmerman had a whiter human skin hue. People with whiter skin hue (especially in the south, mind you) have traditionally discriminated against people with darker human skin hue. None of this speaks of the arbitrary ******** people use to do this by calling skin hues 'race.'

People quickly decided what each was, & it hasn't been
disputed.

So... that doesn't speak of its components.

Certainly it's indeterminate at times, but we're in denial if we try to maintain it doesn't exist.

I don't maintain that the fiction doesn't exist and that it doesn't affects people. I personally have no idea what the **** you or anyone else is talking about when they refer to race. I have no notion of it.

Say whuh?

Was just saying that it is short-sighted to insuinate that just because someone doesn't see the 'obvious' differences in 'races' like the person insuinating does, doesn't make the 'unseer' "idiotic." If anything, it's the distictor who backs his claim...

 

[Revoltingest]

What race of 'black', 'white' or 'Asian' do you talk about? I have never heard of those racists? Race does not exist. It's a phenotype, and nothing more.

To say race doesn't exist, & then call it a phenotype is contradictory.
How would one identify a phenotype which doesn't exist?

We both know that means nothing.

Don't include me in that knowingfulness, bub.
Racial politics exist because people identify themselves & others with certain races.

Trayvon Martin had a darker skin hue. Zimmerman had a whiter human skin hue. People with whiter skin hue (especially in the south, mind you) have traditionally discriminated against people with darker human skin hue. None of this speaks of the arbitrary ******** people use to do this by calling skin hues 'race.'

Are you saying that Martin & Zimmerman are the same race, & differ only in skin hue?

So... that doesn't speak of its components.

Say whuh?

I don't maintain that the fiction doesn't exist and that it doesn't affects people. I personally have no idea what the **** you or anyone else is talking about when they refer to race. I have no notion of it.

Perhaps I'm just more observant.....it's a gift.

Was just saying that it is short-sighted to insuinate that just because someone doesn't see the 'obvious' differences in 'races' like the person insuinating does, doesn't make the 'unseer' "idiotic." If anything, it's the distictor who backs his claim...

Clear as mud.

I don't think we're going to agree on this.
I can tell white folk from black folk from Asian folk most of the time.
You can't tell any difference. So be it.
But I'd wager that most cops can discern race most of the time, & if this description is useful
in identifying someone being sought, then it ought to be mentioned in the description.

 

[LeftishBritInPA]

This is a subjective question. On the one hand white prejudice has taken it's toll on many people of color, and thus the mention of race can often be detrimental to those persons of color who are affected by it. In some subtexts, race is, essentially, a white power structure organized to compare other "races" in inferior light. In these cases, ignoring race makes sense because it leads to a more homogenous society.

Some events, however, we must make an exception. Stories must be told that must not be forgotten. This categorical imperative applies to victims of White Slavery and the Holocaust. The irrefutable truths of millions enslaved for hundreds of years in White Servitude and millions exterminated by a nationalist madman; these facts must not go unforgotten in the world. I do hate to seem to deviate slightly in my ideology, but I'm not an extremist in any context.

 

[Revoltingest]

This is a subjective question. On the one hand white prejudice has taken it's toll on many people of color, and thus the mention of race can often be detrimental to those persons of color who are affected by it.

I suspect that this feeling is behind the politically correct tendency of not mentioning a suspect's race if he/she is black.
But race will still be inferred from the description of skin color. Interestingly, the article which caught my eye skipped even a
description of skin color. At least on blond was involved, which further suggests that a gang of Swedes committed the crime.
This seems unlikely.

In some subtexts, race is, essentially, a white power structure organized to compare other "races" in inferior light. In these cases, ignoring race makes sense because it leads to a more homogenous society.

But it can make it harder for authorities to find "persons of interest".
Tis a trade-off.

Some events, however, we must make an exception. Stories must be told that must not be forgotten. This categorical imperative applies to victims of White Slavery and the Holocaust. The irrefutable truths of millions enslaved for hundreds of years in White Servitude and millions exterminated by a nationalist madman; these facts must not go unforgotten in the world. I do hate to seem to deviate slightly in my ideology, but I'm not an extremist in any context.

Makes sense to me, except that "The Holocaust" had victims & perps of the same race, despite Hitler's bizarre "master race" notions.

 

[Nashitheki]

This is a subjective question. On the one hand white prejudice has taken it's toll on many people of color, and thus the mention of race can often be detrimental to those persons of color who are affected by it. In some subtexts, race is, essentially, a white power structure organized to compare other "races" in inferior light. In these cases, ignoring race makes sense because it leads to a more homogenous society.

Some events, however, we must make an exception. Stories must be told that must not be forgotten. This categorical imperative applies to victims of White Slavery and the Holocaust. The irrefutable truths of millions enslaved for hundreds of years in White Servitude and millions exterminated by a nationalist madman; these facts must not go unforgotten in the world. I do hate to seem to deviate slightly in my ideology, but I'm not an extremist in any context.

Which holocaust do you speak of ? Surely not the one that began in the Americas in 1492 and is still going on today.

Do you know why Africans were brought to the Americas as slaves ?

 

[Revoltingest]

Which holocaust do you speak of ? Surely not the one that began in the Americas in 1492 and is still going on today.

The biggest holocausts were in China & Russia.
Gosh darn, we humans have had a lot of those mass murders over the centuries!

 

[Nashitheki]

The biggest holocausts were in China & Russia.
Gosh darn, we humans have had a lot of those mass murders over the centuries!

Too bad that mentality still exists today.