“The lady doth protest too much, methinks” was originally a quote in Act III, Scene II of Hamlet. However, it has become part of modern usage to suggest that a person’s overly frequent and vehement efforts to convince others that something is not true can ironically help convince them that the opposite is true.
That is how I increasingly feel about the discussion of race and racism in Davis. The very suggestion that there might be a racial issue brings a strong cascade of denials.
One clear example was the mother who came forward on Tuesday at the Davis city council meeting – clearly at the end of her rope for attempting to deal with problems at her six-year-old daughter’s school.
While the mother did not provide specifics, things became clearer when the mother said, “She has learned to identify herself in ways of her ethnicity, which I didn’t teach her,” and “I was pretty surprised by some of the things she was saying.”
“Just this semester she began labeling herself as well as others,” she continued. “I’ve never taught her that before. She’s been teased regarding her hair, amongst other things.”
The mother continued, “She has also been treated differently by her teachers and her principal.”
It is very clear from this context that she is talking about race.
What is interesting to me is the response. One response is to separate the racial component and to call it “a bully problem.” Or, as one person put it, “You know she was bullied because of race how?” Later they would say, “How would identifying this as race-based help solve the bullying issue? How would that change what needs to be done?”
They would later acknowledge, “There could be a racial component, but I didn’t really see it in the story. Why are others so fast to jump aboard and claim racism?”
It was an interesting jump there because suddenly the discussion went from “based on race” to “racial component” to “racism.” Later they said, “ I just didn’t see enough in the story to come to the conclusion that it’s about racism.”
As another person put it, there are “a whole lot of good, decent people who aren’t racists and who don’t label people,” “a few racist (bad word),” and “a few people who label everyone and claim Davis is a racist community and claim every incident that might be racist based IS racist based.”
The problem that we have is that, for the most part, the individual above is correct – there are very few overtly racist people left in this community. It is no longer socially acceptable to favor segregation or discrimination on the basis of race.
What I see instead is much more subtle, and I think on Saturday at the Breaking the Silence event, Teresa Geimer hit the nail on the head. She said, “The light came on, if it doesn’t happen to you, these subtle things, you don’t see them. But if it’s happening to you, it’s a slap in the face each time.”
Ten years ago or so, I would have been like Alan Miller. I had not personally experienced differential treatment on the basis of race, nor had I observed it.
I remember my wife’s niece coming to visit, complaining about being followed by the police. When 2006 happened with the police issues, I came into contact with a large number of people of color and slowly their stories came together to form a very different picture of Davis than the one I knew previously or had personally experienced.
Many people of color, if not most, have a story about racial profiling or at least what seemed to them to be racial profiling. Many had stories of differential treatment in places of business. Many African-American students at UC Davis have told me that they feel extremely uncomfortable going into Davis because of how they are treated.
So, you may ask, how is a highly progressive community that voted over 85% for Barack Obama racist?
What I see is a largely white and upper middle class community that likes to think of themselves as progressive on issues of race ‒ they even take pride in voting for the first black President ‒ but closer to home things get a little tricky.
I think what is experienced in Davis is more subtle and subconscious. But it is there and, when it happens all the time, it becomes very noticeable and increasingly offensive. For a lot of people, they end up moving away from Davis because they feel more comfortable elsewhere.
The story I told on Saturday was about Eli Davis. In May 2013, Mr. Davis was mowing his lawn in front of his home in West Davis when a police officer approached him and asked him if he lived there and then requested ID.
By itself this would not have been a big deal. However, as Assistant Chief Darren Pytel has pointed out, often there is a long history in some of the complaints and it is not the current issue that is really the problem, but the accumulated history of police-citizen interactions.
Mr. Davis, by all accounts is a quiet, private and unassuming man. But something finally pushed him over the edge and compelled him to write about what to him must have been a huge indignity to be approached in front of his home and made to feel like he was being accused of being a criminal based only on his race.
As I pointed out, this was likely not the first time something like this had happened to him. The first few times, subtle as they were, he probably did what many of our readers have done in these articles – shrugged it off. But after ten, twenty, thirty times, as Teresa Geimer put it, it becomes a slap in the face each time until the breaking point.
Was the officer in Eli Davis’ case racist? I don’t believe so. More likely, the officer used poor judgment in choosing to question a 60-something-year-old man mowing his lawn, and then compounded it by not taking the time to explain his actions and being more abrupt than necessary.
My point here is that I do not believe that Davis is so much racist as indifferent. I don’t think a lot of people are aware of how their interactions breed discomfort.
But, as someone pointed out to me this week, part of the problem is denial that we have a problem. And when the reaction to every single article dealing with race is denial, whether it is Ferguson or locally, that feeds into the community perception of indifference.
When a mother comes forward to complain about the treatment of her child, the instant reaction shouldn’t be – it’s bullying, not racism. The reaction should be that the mother feels that her daughter was wronged, let us figure out what went wrong and how to fix it. Anything else really just feeds into the perception that this is a community in denial and that the community doth protest too much, even when no one said it was racism.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
David, in my opinion you do doth protest too much about racism.
I anticipated that comment, but the analogy doesn’t work in the reverse.
Please explain.
The Hamlet analogy is that you protest that something isn’t true to the point where it actually draws suspicion that it is true. It doesn’t work in the reverse.
From wikipedia… “The quotation’s meaning has changed somewhat since it was first written: whereas in modern parlance “protest” in this context often means a denial, in Shakespeare’s time to “protest” meant to “vow” or “declare solemnly”, and thus the phrase referred to a positive affirmation.”. For what it’s worth…
I think a better analogy here is the boy who cried wolf.
I think by the Vanguard pressing every minimal and very borderline possible cases of racism that when an actual instance of outright racism occurs in Davis people will pretty much just say it’s just the Vanguard making a big deal over nothing.
BP, exactly. I think racism exists, but also a lot of items that might better be described as slights, mis-communication, bubbled interactions, cultural differences, suburban culture, etc, all get lumped into the liberal PC stereotypic accusation.
Put a sock in it. You cry a river on race when it suits you politically. When the UCD sentator declares her support for hamas, wanting to wipe out Israel you criticize those who critizice her more harshly than you criticize her own actions. So what is it? do members of the MSA and SJP have a special liscense to promote hate speech?
why is it permissible for mr. newkbahm to be permitted to tell people to put a sock in it? does that create a safe place for people in this community to dialogue? does that make people of color feel welcomed? immediately of course you try to turn the conversation back to ucd senator, and yet you want her conduct admonished but are unwilling to consider the broader picture in the community.
“does that create a safe place for people in this community to dialogue?” What dialogue is that DP? From the tone of this article I don’t see any dialogue – I see a rant, tell everyone why they should come around to greenwalds thinking on race – putting race as a higher priority in political thinking and attitudes and why they are wrong if they dont. That is a monologue, not dialogue.
Second, when I say race I don’t mean racial prejudice I mean racial prejudice as it applies to certain politically correct groups. The MSA could do just about anything, or say just about anything and the tone is “don’t publicly flog” them. But when it comes to blacks, latinos, or other groups, then the tune changes. – “people feel hurt” and we cant have “hurt feelings.”
then the overused cliched “community.” what community is that? Everyone except conservatives, republicans, or Jews that get attacked by the MSA SJP, or the ASUCD? the way community is used to makeoneself feel superior often feels like pure snobbery.
There is no agreed definition of community values because that often enters the political arena, and politics are not going to be agreed upon. You cant force me to come around to your way of thinking just as I cant force you to come around to mine.
a few thoughts.
you see a rant? i don’t. i see a very measured article. in what specific way do you see this as a rant?
“when I say race I don’t mean racial prejudice I mean racial prejudice as it applies to certain politically correct groups.”
you mean groups that are disadvantaged? it’s funny that you keep bringing back up the comments by the student senator – comments that the vanguard disagreed with, explained that they were wrong, but also felt that the reaction by the right wing press was over the top. i find it interesting because david is in fact jewish and once told me he visited israel as a youth and has a deep love and appreciate for it. my point is that his measured response there really isn’t that different from his response here, but you are consistently reading things into it that he did not write.
Tofu is a better metaphor.
“you mean groups that are disadvantaged?”
who decided exactly what groups are disadvantaged when?
second the article has ranting diatribes in it example:
“But, as someone pointed out to me this week, part of the problem is denial that we have a problem. And when the reaction to every single article dealing with race is denial, whether it is Ferguson or locally, that feeds into the community perception of indifference.”
who decided what “community perception”. second this language is arguably not about dialogue. the message is clear: I’m right that we have a problem on race. if you don’t agree with me, you are in denial. and being in a constant state of denial feeds into “community perception” (people who agree with me) that people are being indifferent.
notice how he declares his views on what “community perception” is, who he views is in “denial” as established “facts” he does this all day long on his race articles especially. he cant help himself.
Notice too how the only way this “community perception” logic works is if the “community” doesn’t include the people who argue disagree with davids claims.
where in this statement is the attempt at dialogue? This is david greenwald talking down to his audience refusing to believe that those who come to different conclusions than him on race do so by examining the facts
people who have commented on this latest incident pointed to the facts on the table, and they believe the facts indicate a bullying problem. David doesn’t like that so he writes the above.
“who decided exactly what groups are disadvantaged when?”
are you looking for a history lesson here?
““But, as someone pointed out to me this week, part of the problem is denial that we have a problem. And when the reaction to every single article dealing with race is denial, whether it is Ferguson or locally, that feeds into the community perception of indifference.””
if that’s a rant, you and i have different definitions of the meaning of a rant.
“who decided what “community perception”.”
the people who are complaining about their treatment have a perception of this community that seems to be at odds with your perception.
“second this language is arguably not about dialogue. the message is clear: I’m right that we have a problem on race. if you don’t agree with me, you are in denial. and being in a constant state of denial feeds into “community perception” (people who agree with me) that people are being indifferent.”
the problem is your isolating that paragraph from the paragraph that comes immediately before and after:
he definitely has a view as to how it should be and its a restorative view – identify the wrong, figure out how to fix it. i don’t see a rant. i agree he’s admonishing the audience not immediately when these stories come up to poo poo the notion of racism,
I’m replying to the comments below. the comments below does not have a reply button.
“are you looking for a history lesson here?” no I’m not:
http://www.bizpacreview.com/2015/03/08/no-whites-allowed-blacks-only-hs-assembly-outrages-white-parents-so-how-did-principal-defend-it-185199
so just who is disadvantaged? or how about “Irish need not apply?”
2. “who decided what “community perception”.”
the people who are complaining about their treatment have a perception of this community that seems to be at odds with your perception.
umm, yes so just who decides what “community perception is?” you? david greenwald? or an inordinate number of progressives? or the loudest whiners on the dais?
Then you quote a larger portion of text, which doesn’t make your point look better. the opening sentence for example. The problem is “we’re indifferent.” In other words we dont care enough and you and david do. thats “our problem.” Again talking down to people making the people you are at odds with out to be inferior, and making a subjective analysis of those people into established fact. the trouble is, people like david do it so often you don’t even know when youre doing it.
SECond sentence: we’re not aware of how our actions breed discomfort. again: stating opinion as fact, and talking down to the people you are disagreeing with.
third sentence: denial – we’re all in denial. dismissing our analysis of the mothers claims- we didn’t simply look at her statements and come to a different conclusion than david did, we are just in denial.
Almost half my life I’ve been literally surrounded by people of color, and especially African Americans. This is not a foreign culture to me or one in which I’m uncomfortable or threatened. My brother was astounded the time we entered a predominately Black area in Chattanooga in a genealogy quest. I walked around the neighborhood easily engaging residents in conversation handicapped by a Yankee accent. Surprised residents responded with the same level of friendliness and helpfulness, even while muttering, “White people don’t come down here!”
From this long-term association with people of color, I developed very deep friendships with several, a friendship that allowed us to speak very candidly about racism in private moments together. Naturally, I heard the same stories that have been related here; negative encounters beyond the element of chance, a feel of bias emanating from the person in power.
When I asked how this racist radiation was identified, the response was unsatisfying. I was told you just “feel it.” Deep feelings are hard to articulate. I remained skeptical, as least as to the DEGREE of the racist encounters, and attributed it to an example of self-fulfilling prophesy–you see it because you come expect to see it.
As a WASP, my racist encounters were nil. Then, I spent extended time in a culture where Caucasians were in the minority and the controlling government was staffed primarily by one ethnicity. I had the need to obtain permits and forms from this government, and these ethnic group vested with authority. I was a veteran government bureaucrat, well practiced in obtaining favors and attention from other persons in authority.
It was then my epiphany moment. Despite my being especially courteous, deferential, and patient with my routine request for service, I was getting jerked-around. It was not just one guy having a bad day, this was pervasive throughout the office. Almost a game of tag, and I was “it.” As my disenfranchised friends described, “You could feel it.” I felt it, and most importantly had a much better understanding of what racism really is, and most important, it exists in every human culture and sub-culture.
And that final comment also reveals while we will continue indefinitely, in vain, in the quest to eliminate racism. All the discussion has been one-way, we-they, the dominate are racist towards the oppressed. That’s only HALF the identification of racism. And only a half-solution towards addressing racism in this or any culture.
Making lots of people very unhappy but beyond really caring, the oppressed are also deeply infected with racist behavior. Why is it that nobody ever OPENLY wondered how the accused racist is depicted as an a totally bad person, while the accuser is always without sin? Never once does a victim of racism admit or acknowledge to the slightest personal failing, and that is simply not reality.
If you want to make a person claiming racism extremely uncomfortable, ask if he/she is capable of being just as racist as every other human being that ever walked this planet. Their reaction you will find very illuminating in an otherwise solution pattern currently filled with darkness. When we move from YOU are racist to WE are racist, a solution follows.
But never in my lifetime.
This may be the best post I have read on the Vanguard on this topic… maybe the best I have read on any blog on this topic.
My experience comes close to this, and my final perspective is 100% the same.
I remeber an article that David wrote about his opinion that Davis has a racism problem. When challenged to give examples, he cited time walking with his adopted son and getting “looks” from other residents.
This response would seem to fit into the “I just feel it” category.
I think to accruately assess the existance of true actionable racism for each encounter we need to filter out:
1. Behavior bias
2. Inacurately identified “feelings” (e.g., having a bad day or feeling especially vulnerable and have a hypersentive reaction that falsly atributes racism to a normal human encounter.)
3. Victim mentality
I have written quite a bit about all of these things. My opinion is that much of the amped-up racism narrative that seems to have exploded at the same time we elected our first black President is the beginning of the withdrawal synmptoms of those addicted to the nasrrative.
Racism exists because of inate human tribalism. The egalitarian utopian goal of social justice crusaders has this fatal flaw. Top-down social engineering to force this level of social “enlightenment” does not work very well simply because of human nature.
Here is my remedy for racism… wait.
That is it… just wait.
Because our youth think all the old folk are idiots for making such a big deal out of something they rarely experience. They have reframed their tribalism impluses to transcend simple racial differences.
The old farts will die off and so will the addiction of the racism narrative.
But we will still be biased and tribal. My guess is that in the future, lacking tattoos and piercings will be the new source of those “feelings” and “looks” that make a person feel like he/she does not fit in.
PC, very well put. Thanks for that.
1000-times more helpful than the original article in working towards a resolution.
Whoa! One of LadyNewkBahm posts disappeared just after I read it. Hope it was her/his ‘second thoughts’, and not other editing.
Seeing a documentary on Selma, 50 years ago. Racism 50 years ago was like Ebola, Smallpox, and the Bubonic Plague, compared to measles now. Measles isn’t good, but we have “vaccines”. Outbreaks are rare, but manageable. And outbreaks, when they occur, are screamed out in the media, all to “sell papers/air time”.
Sometimes I wonder about the Vanguard’s motivations, as well.
Lynchings occurred all too often from the Civil War to until ~ 50 years ago. Extremely rare, but well-publicized, today. People got incensed and self-righteous when a “noose” was found on the football field cross-bar. Yet, it was “un-occupied ” by an effigy, much less a person.
Much of what I’ve seen “reported” here is of the measles, common cold variety. Re: the MM student, there are so many other elements: exposition of genitals, striking, cutting of hair that disturb me more in the behavior than in the ‘motivation of race’.
“People got incensed and self-righteous when a “noose” was found on the football field cross-bar. ”
they should have. the coach who got up on saturday talked about how that made the black coaches feel. does that matter to you? does it matter that it says to the black coach, you’re not welcome here, regardless of whether there was something hanging in the noose.
a few weeks ago a judge in mississippi gave a speech where he talked about lynching:
“In Without Sanctuary, historian Leon Litwack writes that between 1882 and 1968 an estimated 4,742 blacks met their deaths at the hands of lynch mobs. The impact this campaign of terror had on black families is impossible to explain so many years later.”
“The common denominator of the deaths of these individuals was not their race. It was not that they all were engaged in freedom fighting. It was not that they had been engaged in criminal activity, trumped up or otherwise. No, the common denominator was that the last thing that each of these individuals saw was the inhumanity of racism. The last thing that each felt was the audacity and agony of hate, senseless hate: crippling, maiming them and finally taking away their lives.”
here’s the whole speech: http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2015/02/12/385777366/a-black-mississippi-judges-breathtaking-speech-to-three-white-murderers
why do i bring this up? because lynching wasn’t just murder, it was terrorism. it was a weapon designed to induce terror to keep the weak in their place.
hanging a noose was a reminder that while lynchings have gone away, the terror remains just beneath the surface.
i raised a biracial daughter and i just fear that the five or six people who come on here have never really experienced what it is like to a racial minority. not a white person in a black neighborhood, that’s a big difference, but an actual vulnerable minority in this community. seeing it through my daughter’s eyes, i don’t know that i would have done it again. i’m not sure she came out of it unscathed. but people like ladynewkbahm don’t give a damn about people like my daughter and that makes me sad. on the other hand, i think a lot of people here – barack, frankly, alan miller, hpierce, are good people, they just haven’t experienced this stuff first hand.
“barack, frankly, alan miller, hpierce, are good people, they just haven’t experienced this stuff first hand.”
No, Jews never experience hatred directed at their people. Antisemitism is a myth. The Holocaust is a myth. #gagmewithaspoon#
DP assumes that we “haven’t experienced this stuff first hand”. Massive assumption on your way to giving yourself the moral high ground, something progressives love to do. Don’t you ever feel your stances are patronizing certain minority groups?
I’d really like to know how your daughter turned out. Is she happy, adjusted, educated, employed? Or was she so traumatized by Davis, did she move to Cuba or Pakistan? I hope the former.
One of the main points most posters brought up was “We need more information”, but David seems preloaded with his conclusion.
What was this “labeling“? If a student meets a new student, and they don’t know their name, and says “The white girl scored a goal”, that’s racist? Really??
And now, in David’s World, teasing is also racist, though I haven’t seen the nexus. I’ve seen kids at the start of school use terms to describe fellow students until they learn their names, and then the “labels” aren’t used. Teasing is typical child behavior.
The label “mowing while black” was used to describe a polite interaction between a police officer and a citizen of the city as part of the “piling on” rhetorical strategy to prove the latest complaint. Then David “piled on” black students feeling uncomfortable downtown into being racism. And if you find flaws in his or the parent’s logic, or ask for more information, then that’s more proof of racism? Isn’t this indoctrination?
I understand that those that traffic in grievances don’t have open minds or large vocabularies. I had a friend decades ago who worked in some neighboring communities which were 98% white while here as an undergrad. He got a strange look or two, and felt a bit out of place. He extended his hand in friendship, volunteered, bought some clothing more in tune with the local populace (cultural norms), and he quickly was invited to several local functions. My friend is black, but I don’t recall him ever going to the least common denominator, his observations were much more nuanced and subtle. He laughed and joked about the transformation. He is now highly successful.
According to the current logic employed here, the scenario I recently described where I was bullied by a friend decades ago wasn’t bullying (to which I finally halted) – and my friends who were starting to bully – being that they were black, were all guilty of racism.
Throwing spaghetti / Crying Wolf doesn’t make an argument stronger, it does just the opposite.
“David seems preloaded with his conclusion.”
i don’t get that sense from reading this. what i saw in his comments the other day is he doesn’t believe we will get more information. the other thing i see is him being upset by the immediate reaction against any small indication that there was a racial component here. every article that mentions race, no matter how nuanced it is, gets a huge push back from a very small contingent of people. we don’t have the ability to investigate these matters and even if we did, most of the time they would have nuanced results. so the bigger question is – how do we handle this? i don’t think we solve that problem by stating at the onset, it’s not racism.
when my daughter was a young student she would get all sorts of comments and some had racial components. were the little kids racist? probably not. but where did they get those words from? who taught them those words? this is how it starts, and how it stops is by saying – never again – and meaning it. teaching kids that it’s not okay to bully but it’s especially not okay to do so using racial terms and epithets. until we’re ready to embrace that, i don’t think we’re really going to solve this.
“gets a huge push back from a very small contingent of people.”
The number of people who comment in the Vanguard is a small contingent of people. The unscientific example of people who all have a similar psychological defect (the need to post on the Vanguard) seems to me pretty much split between . . . whatever you want to call this divide. It certainly IS NOT racists vs. non-racists.
“teaching kids that it’s not okay to bully”
Is that like teaching poodles it’s not OK to roll in shit? My experience with bullies is they are usually victims perpetrating what has been done to them on others. That can’t be unlearned in school by teaching.
“The number of people who comment in the Vanguard is a small contingent of people. ”
lol, and that number gets even smaller when you subtract out the vanguard editorial board, who does the lions share of the commenting.
The individual with the highest comment count is not a member of the editorial board.
“And now, in David’s World, teasing is also racist”
actually, i wonder how carefully you read the commentary, he said very specifically it wasn’t. he writes, My point here is that I do not believe that Davis is so much racist as indifferent.
i wonder, how carefully you actually read this commentary if that’s your takeaway point.
What I see, DP, in addition to your fine observations, is that we get this “One with Ferguson” undercurrent in the recent articles David has mentioned. Davis is NOT anything like Ferguson, not predominately Black, and is highly educated, although maybe ignorant about real life.
The children mentioned in the original article are too young to be racist or prejudiced, although their parents may sure be. And children parrot things they do not understand, like songs and jokes, and TV shows they have no business watching.
Ask any young child why they did something – anything: “I don’t know”..
This sounds like the PD needs another officer in this town.
“Davis is NOT anything like Ferguson, not predominately Black, and is highly educated, although maybe ignorant about real life.”
actually i think you’re exactly correct. davis isn’t anything like ferguson. but there are still its own set of problems and part of that may be related to your comment about ignorance about real life.
“This sounds like the PD needs another officer in this town.”
not completely sure what this means, but i understand that the officer in the eli davis matter no longer works for the pd.
I have friends that live in Dixon and tell me that they often feel looked down upon when visiting or shopping in Davis.
I think much of what we hear as being racism is simply Davis snobbery.
i think some of what looks like racism is in fact elitism. but you end up in this place where in the end racism, elitism, its still a problem.
” in the end racism, elitism, its still a problem.”
And again I ask: Is elitism a problem similar to racism? How should it be addressed? Or can we all just call elitists “assholes” and go on with our day? Or should there be legislation? “Anti-Elitism Affirmative Action” if you will — giving opportunities to those who have been the victims of elitism in Davis.
So again, we have labeled Davis “racist” and now Davis “elitist”. True or not, what has the labeling gained? What good has it done?
actually if you read the column, david did not label davis as racist.
in fact he writes: “My point here is that I do not believe that Davis is so much racist as indifferent.”
i find this an interesting exercise of people either not reading the column or reading into what they assume it’s going to say.
Frankly: I have friends that live in Dixon and tell me that they often feel looked down upon when visiting or shopping in Davis.
How can you tell if someone is from Dixon? By the Dixon HS letter jacket that the person is wearing?
You stumbled onto the point. How can you tell? You cannot in any definitive way. But if the Dixonite feels looked down upon, then that is all that matters, right?
two contrasting thoughts.
first, i have always sensed that the woodland-davis rivalry is one-sided. woodland hates davis. most people in davis , don’t give a crap about woodland.
second, there is the chant from the basketball game from the soccer article – that’s alright, that’s okay, you’ll be pumping our gas some day.
I don’t discount the mother’s accusations of racism, but I don’t necessarily agree with her assessment not knowing all the details, understanding that how one perceives things can be very subjective. We all have biases, and believe it or not, racism is also practiced against white people (I was once the victim of racism)!
That said, there is an important element of this discussion that is missing. Racism is actually permitted by private citizens, depending on the circumstances. People can form private clubs that exclude a certain ethnicity or don’t allow a certain sex to be a member. Freedom of association allows for this. What is not permitted is the gov’t practicing discrimination. The fact of the matter is people often congregate together with like ethnicities or like backgrounds, etc. Essentially man tends to form “tribes” if you will. You can see this play out particularly in high school, where cliques are formed – the jock clique, the pretty girls clique, the ethnic clique, the religious clique, the nerd clique.
“Racism” can be subtle, just as any other sort of discrimination between citizens can be subtle. I may not like people with tattoos, or people who drink alcohol, or people with blond hair. I bring my own personal biases to every situation I find myself in. This makes “racism” a very loosey-goosey term that means different things to different people. Here are some definitions of racism:
1. “poor treatment of or violence against people because of their race”
2. “the belief that some races of people are better than others”
3. “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race”
4. “racial prejudice or discrimination”
5. “a policy, system of government, etc., based upon or fostering such adoctrine; discrimination.”
6. “hatred or intolerance of another race or other races.”
Here is the kicker. Freedom of speech allows the Fayyez’s of the world to shout discriminatory comments based on religion. Freedom of association allows Jewish people to form an all-Jewish study group or Muslims to form a voting block at ASUCD. Both freedom of speech and association allow people to be racists if they so choose. But 1) the gov’t may not discriminate on the basis of sex, religion, ethnicity; 2) because the schools serve the public and are essentially an extension of the gov’t, the schools must not tolerate discriminatory conduct of students that is disruptive to keeping order in the schools. Students are free to exclude a student from playing with them on the basis of race, or refuse to eat lunch with someone they don’t like for whatever reason.
My concern here, and I have stated this in the past, is that the “race card” is used far too often. It is brought up so frequently, and in inappropriate situations, and in every interaction between gov’t and citizens, that people are starting to turn a deaf ear. That is dangerous, because when truly unlawful discrimination takes place, it very well may be ignored. And there is no question unlawful discrimination does occur.
“My concern here, and I have stated this in the past, is that the “race card” is used far too often. ”
i think if that’s true, that’s a good thing it’s used too often because for too long we as a society were not nearly sensitive enough to racial issues. that said, what i see happen is we have interactions that involve race and then it becomes difficult to see through the subtleties of the human interaction. so if you’re white, and you don’t deal with this on a daily basis, it’s easy to point to other explanations . if you’re black, you deal with these things on a daily basis, and you’re not willing to give the benefit of the doubt. that’s the place where my daughter is. is that a good thing? no. but to me that simply means we have to treat the other stuff more than we do. what tends to happen is we get bogged down in the debate rather than trying to identify and fix the harm. a harm happened, we don’t solve it by debating whether it was racial or just bullying.
“My concern here, and I have stated this in the past, is that the “race card” is used far too often. It is brought up so frequently, and in inappropriate situations, and in every interaction between gov’t and citizens, that people are starting to turn a deaf ear. That is dangerous, because when truly unlawful discrimination takes place, it very well may be ignored. And there is no question unlawful discrimination does occur.”
And in the same post, you have also accurately pointed out that “racism” is sometimes a subjective assessment of what actually occurred with reasonable people seeing the situation differently. So how does one decide what is “too often”. What you see as “playing the race card” I may see as a legitimate case of possible racism that should be explored to the degree possible.
I come at this issue from a different perspective. I believe that any case in which someone believes there has been racism involved in the public sphere should be examined. This means that there will be many cases that will be questioned. What is truly interesting to me is why those who feel that it is “being brought up too often” are not content to simply skip the article, or forgo commenting on it. Why is it that these people feel the need to weigh in on an article that they feel has no merit at all ? It seems to me that if some chord were not being struck, one would simple ignore the article. There are many articles on the Vanguard, the Enterprise, The Sac Bee, The Wall Street Journal, and The New York Times that I simply do not care enough about to read, or to discuss or comment on even if I did read them. What is it that is so important to the “race deniers” that they keep coming back to discredit the concerns of others ?
If an assertion of racism has more holes than a piece of Swiss cheese, why not point it out? Sorry, along with these often inane or half baked claims of racism comes requirements for PC training, education, various remedies, “understanding”, etc.
I look forward to the column where allegations of racism directed against Europeans or European-Americans is discussed and examined, and where you weigh in.
We’ve had such honest yet half baked logic in the past two articles on this topic. David basically wrote, even if racism wasn’t being enacted or exhibited, isn’t it a good thing to discuss? Meanwhile, up above, we’ve had several people agree that what happens in Davis is elitism, not racism, and what’s the difference? What’s the difference?!?! If it’s elitism, then call it that and quit flogging us with foggy claims of racism!
TBD
“I look forward to the column where allegations of racism directed against Europeans or European-Americans is discussed and examined, and where you weigh in.”
Why look forward to it ? Why not write it yourself and see who weighs in ?
On another note, I find this quite ironic because I while I have not written an article on it, I have commented several times on the treatment of my self identifying as “white” ex husband ( a Turk ) who was discriminated against on a number of occasions due to misidentification based on the color of his skin rather than on his race or ethnicity. I was there when this happened many times when we lived in the Southwest.
Of course racism can be directed at any group by any group or individual. That does not mean that the history and current status in this country does not have a predominant pattern that still colors relations today.
“The very suggestion that there might be a racial issue brings a strong cascade of denials.”
This is not true, and that is not a denial.
Racism *might* be an issue, to assume that may be destructive. As well, I see racists, others see race-ism as somehow “part of” or the level of racism “greater in” Davis.
I see no value in assuming racism nor in branding the community. But for some reason there is this “other view”. I don’t understand it, it makes no sense to me, and I find it ultimately destructive.
Oddly, no one in this forum or on either “side” of the argument exhibits actual racism.
Hmmmmm . . . . .
“It is very clear from this context that she is talking about race.”
It is very clear to those who choose to see race in everything.
“Ten years ago or so, I would have been like Alan Miller. I had not personally experienced differential treatment on the basis of race, nor had I observed it.”
David, [edit] You are dead wrong on this. I post non-anonymously and you seem to feel there is nothing wrong with people posting anonymously. Those of us who use our name are open to being criticized or abused, and I will continue to use my name.
But YOU David, have lost your right to use my name. Let me make this clear: you are not to use my name in any articles you write without asking me first. You are welcome to quote me without using my name to make a point, but DO NOT use my name.
Do not use my name and declare publicly your belief on what I have or have not experienced.
[edit]
[moderator] edited for language
For anyone who wonders what was edited, it is the symbol of two sets of outside fingers of the right hand lowered while one particular finger remains upright, word-wise beginning with the sixth letter of the alphabet and three more letters, followed by the 21st letter in the alphabet phonetically, carried out in the full spelling to three letter. In fact, the two letters, the 6th and the 21st, said in succession, should clearly state what I was conveying to the editor of the Vanguard.
I stand by my statement, including the deleted expletives.