11-05-2012, 07:22 PM
cbelt3 wrote:
I had one expert tell me that 'Racist only counts when you're a white person discriminating against a black person". I calmly asked him if that was discrimination. And he said no.
Discrimination goes both ways, but racism does not. A member of a racial minority can absolutely act with prejudice and bias against a majority member simply because of race, and that is wrong. It's as wrong as someone in the majority discriminating against a racial minority because of race. However, the system of racial categorization is in itself biased against the 'lower races,' and is grounded in a theory of racial stratification and superiority. Race itself has no basis in biology or nature, as we all know. It's a particular historical construct that wasn't politically neutral when it was created, and isn't politically benign now.
As a result, though discrimination and prejudice are abhorrent no matter the race of the perpetrator, acts by majority members against minorities, on balance, convey greater damage and cause more harm than acts in the other direction. Perhaps this is what your 'expert' was trying (albeit poorly, it seems) to express.
Thanks, as always, for your many anecdotes. I would that my life and family were so colorful (pun somewhat intended)!