Ferguson Megathread

[Yumyumsuppertime]

Facing a budget deficit, the town fathers of Ferguson have decided that it would be a wise move to increase revenue through increased ticketing, thereby bringing law enforcement into confrontations with local residents even more frequently. This has to be one of the most incompetent city governments in the nation, possibly as bad as Detroit in terms of sheer consistency of mind-bogglingly terrible moves.

God forbid one should get a ticket.

You are aware that your average tickets can run into the hundreds of dollars, and that this is a largely poverty-stricken area where many residents are struggling to put food on the table and keep roofs over their heads to begin with, right?

[Yumyumsuppertime]

Because clearly [Fill in Blank] While Black is just a fiction cooked up by social justice warriors and if someone colored gets pulled over by police for any reason whatsoever they need to shut up and bend over, right?

No I mean stop using the color of your skin as an excuse. Like the Martin Zimmerman incident someone automatically assumed it was a white guy who shot a black teen when the "white" guy wasn't white or with the more recent protest I heard people saying it's not about being black it's about police "tyranny" when they holding up signs saying black lives matter if we just stop using the color of our skin as a tool for everyday life then a big majority of fascism will go away. I'm tired of hearing "ethnic quotas" and such

1) Zimmerman didn't identify as white?
2) White people are the only people who can be racist against black people?
3) Where are you hearing about ethnic "quotas"?

[Gig em Aggies]

No I mean stop using the color of your skin as an excuse. Like the Martin Zimmerman incident someone automatically assumed it was a white guy who shot a black teen when the "white" guy wasn't white or with the more recent protest I heard people saying it's not about being black it's about police "tyranny" when they holding up signs saying black lives matter if we just stop using the color of our skin as a tool for everyday life then a big majority of fascism will go away. I'm tired of hearing "ethnic quotas" and such

1) Zimmerman didn't identify as white?
2) White people are the only people who can be racist against black people?
3) Where are you hearing about ethnic "quotas"?

1.) Zimmerman was Hispanic I think
2.) not to be rude or anything but from what I've seen most cases of rasicm come from some in the black community claiming the other party whoever they maybe did whatever because their black.
3.) Univeristies, businesses etc IE- the univeristy of Texas case where a white girl was denid admission because the school wanted to have more minorities

[Mavorpen]

1.) Zimmerman was Hispanic I think

Hispanic isn't a race. It's entirely possible to be white and of Hispanic descent.

2.) not to be rude or anything but from what I've seen most cases of rasicm come from some in the black community claiming the other party whoever they maybe did whatever because their black.

Then you're blind and should actually do research on this subject.

3.) Univeristies, businesses etc IE- the univeristy of Texas case where a white girl was denid admission because the school wanted to have more minorities

Oh fuck no. No, she was not. She was rejected because she didn't perform well enough. You do know she LOST that case, right? Why the fuck do people ALWAYS go back to this lie?

It is true that SATs aren't the only thing for going into a university. You will need a (at least) satisfactory GPA for the university, you will need a good resume and show that you are capable of handling the events and academics at the universities you are going to, you will need to do well in the interviews and among other things. However, getting a score required by the schools you are applying for is definitely something necessary, and Affirmative Action might give a less qualified black or latino student a spot in a university over a more qualified white or asian student, while universities would otherwise only accept the most capable and qualified for the university.

This doesn't JUST happen for minorities, you know. White people who are "less qualified" ALSO sometimes get spots over "more qualified" white people. Take Abigail Fisher, for example, a woman who's often brought up as an example of Affirmative Action gone amok. She claimed that she didn't get into her first school of choice because them damn minorities took her spot. However, when you actually look at the facts, the VAST majority of people who had either an equivalent or equal to aggregate AI/PAI score were white. Only FIVE out of 47 were minorities.

[Yumyumsuppertime]

1) Zimmerman didn't identify as white?
2) White people are the only people who can be racist against black people?
3) Where are you hearing about ethnic "quotas"?

1.) Zimmerman was Hispanic I think
2.) not to be rude or anything but from what I've seen most cases of rasicm come from some in the black community claiming the other party whoever they maybe did whatever because their black.
3.) Univeristies, businesses etc IE- the univeristy of Texas case where a white girl was denid admission because the school wanted to have more minorities

1) Whatever he was, he seemed to identify as white.
2) That didn't actually address my question.
3) She wouldn't have been admitted in the first place.

[Gig em Aggies]

1.) Zimmerman was Hispanic I think

Hispanic isn't a race. It's entirely possible to be white and of Hispanic descent.

2.) not to be rude or anything but from what I've seen most cases of rasicm come from some in the black community claiming the other party whoever they maybe did whatever because their black.

Then you're blind and should actually do research on this subject.

3.) Univeristies, businesses etc IE- the univeristy of Texas case where a white girl was denid admission because the school wanted to have more minorities

Oh fuck no. No, she was not. She was rejected because she didn't perform well enough. You do know she LOST that case, right? Why the fuck do people ALWAYS go back to this lie?

This doesn't JUST happen for minorities, you know. White people who are "less qualified" ALSO sometimes get spots over "more qualified" white people. Take Abigail Fisher, for example, a woman who's often brought up as an example of Affirmative Action gone amok. She claimed that she didn't get into her first school of choice because them damn minorities took her spot. However, when you actually look at the facts, the VAST majority of people who had either an equivalent or equal to aggregate AI/PAI score were white. Only FIVE out of 47 were minorities.

3.) actually that's mostly why the case made the headlines if it was just because she didn't pass then it would have been a different story all together.

[Mavorpen]

3.) actually that's mostly why the case made the headlines if it was just because she didn't pass then it would have been a different story all together.

No, it made headlines because it was a Supreme Court case that was centered around a major issue.

NO court at ANY level took her claim seriously. They ALL said the same thing: she was fighting imaginary enemies. She didn't perform well enough in school so she bitched and moaned about "EBIL MINORITIESSS!!!" when the vast majority of people who got in over her were white.

There is no quota in the University of Texas system. I know how the system works. After all, I GO to a university that's a part of the system. The only people who sincerely believe she had a case were those who knew nothing about how it works here.

[Gig em Aggies]

3.) actually that's mostly why the case made the headlines if it was just because she didn't pass then it would have been a different story all together.

No, it made headlines because it was a Supreme Court case that was centered around a major issue.

NO court at ANY level took her claim seriously. They ALL said the same thing: she was fighting imaginary enemies. She didn't perform well enough in school so she bitched and moaned about "EBIL MINORITIESSS!!!" when the vast majority of people who got in over her were white.

There is no quota in the University of Texas system. I know how the system works. After all, I GO to a university that's a part of the system. The only people who sincerely believe she had a case were those who knew nothing about how it works here.

I go to college to but that doesn't mean I know how their admissions policies work. And no if was just because she didn't pass then it would have just been in the Austin area not national if race wasn't brought in like it was.

[Mavorpen]

I go to college to but that doesn't mean I know how their admissions policies work.

Then that's really damn sad and, frankly, hard to believe. Unless your parents did everything for you.

And no if was just because she didn't pass then it would have just been in the Austin area not national if race wasn't brought in like it was.

How about you actually read what I posted?

No, it made headlines because it was a Supreme Court case that was centered around a major issue.

Nowhere did I say that it was just because she didn't pass. You're entirely right that it was because she brought RACE into it. This does NOT in ANY way mean that she actually had a case just because she CLAIMED that she didn't get in because of minorities. I explained it better here:

No we fucking won't. Because Fisher's case had utterly jack shit to do with race. Why the fuck do you people who keep bringing her up not bother to do the BARE minimum of research on that topic? If you'd do only a LITTLE research on how the college admissions system here in Texas works, you'd know that Fisher was nothing more than an unexceptional student who threw a tantrum because she didn't have good enough grades to get into her first choice of university. Instead of coming to terms with this fact, she decided, "THEM DARKIES TOOK MAH SPOT!" is clearly what happened.

Here's how this works: In Texas, we have a system where if you get in the top 10% of your graduating class, you get to go to any college or university in Texas that you want, no questions asked (with the exception of schools that do not rank their students). She, with her 3.59 GPA, did not fulfill that. For her and the remaining applicants, they were judged on two things: grades and test scores, and a "personal achievement index" that is based on extracurricular, services like volunteer work, and "special circumstance" which takes into consideration things like socioeconomic status and race.

Now, before you throw a tantrum at the "race," part, you have to understand one crucial fact: the "race" part, played a very, very, very small part in the admissions. In fact, of those who the school offered "provisional" admissions to, only one African American and four Hispanics with a lower total AI/PAI (basically the measurements I mentioned above) than her were accepted for the "provisional admission"). But here's the kicker: the rest of the applicants, 42 in total, who had a total AI/PAI score equal to or lower than hers, were white. That's right, a whopping 10.6% of those accepted using the provisional system were minorities. That means that her competition was overwhelmingly white.

Not only this, but there's something even more damning about her case: 168 African-American and Hispanic applicants had combined AI/PAI scores identical or higher than Fisher's and they were rejected. Just think about that for a second. In your little fantasy world where there is rampant discrimination against whites and in favor of minorities in the university admissions system, why would this happen?

I am utterly sick and tired of people holding Fisher up as a poor, wronged girl who was horribly discriminated against because she was white. No, she was denied admissions to a college because of mediocre grades. And that happens all the time. Her situation was nothing new, especially in Texas. And the sad part is that you people would know this if you took 10, just 10 minutes of doing some actual research concerning how the system works here in Texas.

Abigail had utterly no reasonable grounds to stand on in this case. She was literally upset that not even 10 minorities got accepted instead of her. Let me guess though, that's 10 too many, right? I mean, who do minorities think they are, getting into college when those spots should be reserved for white people only, right?

[Yumyumsuppertime]

No, it made headlines because it was a Supreme Court case that was centered around a major issue.

NO court at ANY level took her claim seriously. They ALL said the same thing: she was fighting imaginary enemies. She didn't perform well enough in school so she bitched and moaned about "EBIL MINORITIESSS!!!" when the vast majority of people who got in over her were white.

There is no quota in the University of Texas system. I know how the system works. After all, I GO to a university that's a part of the system. The only people who sincerely believe she had a case were those who knew nothing about how it works here.

I go to college to but that doesn't mean I know how their admissions policies work. And no if was just because she didn't pass then it would have just been in the Austin area not national if race wasn't brought in like it was.

If it were about race, then she would have won, as even though universities are allowed to use race as one of several factors in determining admissions, actual quotas of the sort you mentioned have been deemed unconstitutional. And now we're getting way off-topic.

[Alien Space Bats]

IOW, Republicans do best among people with just enough education to be professionally successful on an individual basis, but not quite enough to really understand how the world actually works.

I would say quite the opposite. The Republicans are endorsing the societal philosophy that worked in America since the founding of the country. That is life, property and liberty. An ancient philosophy that stems from the English common law.

The Progressives are the one who want enforce something that is traditionally foreign in America and dont fit to the culture of the nation. They want to copy Europe which is not bad bt they just dont understand that the German/French system of welfare cannot work in the US. The US is not a collectivistic society.

So I somehow doubt about the statement that Progressives know better how the world works.

TRANSLATION: My ideology says that reality should be different from what the polling data suggests; therefore, the polling data must be wrong.

Oh, and kudos for not understanding what progressivism is.

[Alien Space Bats]

I would think the correlation has more to do with MAs and PHDs chosen career field being tied to government spending. Both pretty much wish to teach. Money wise a large number of MAs end up worse off than their BA counterparts, my bank hires a lot of BAs and is willing to see if they have the ability to work up to banker. We don't hire MAs, getting a worthless undergrad degree is forgivable doubling down and getting a a worthless grad degree not so much.

Having run into a tremendous number of college students/graduates who think that a single undergraduate class in economics or political science qualifies them to understand everything there is to know about the world, I rather prefer my explanation.

And that's without considering all of the Randroids out there who've developed their whole political and economic ideology from a single reading of Atlas Shrugged. Seriously, they're as bad as the kiddie communists: You'd be better off trying to develop an understanding of the world from reading the back of a cereal box.

[Alien Space Bats]

Zimmerman didn't identify as white?

Zimmerman was Hispanic I think

For the umpteen-millionth time, "Hispanic" is NOT a race, any more that "Arab" is. It's a multi-racial ethnicity, meaning that there are "White Hispanics", "Black Hispanics", "Asian Hispanics", and so forth.

As it turns out, somewhere between 85-90% of Hispanics report themselves as "White" on U.S. Census Bureau forms.

So here's your homework: Write the following sentence 1000 times.

"'Hispanic' does NOT mean 'non-white'"

[Jamzmania]

Zimmerman was Hispanic I think

For the umpteen-millionth time, "Hispanic" is NOT a race, any more that "Arab" is. It's a multi-racial ethnicity, meaning that there are "White Hispanics", "Black Hispanics", "Asian Hispanics", and so forth.

As it turns out, somewhere between 85-90% of Hispanics report themselves as "White" on U.S. Census Bureau forms.

So here's your homework: Write the following sentence 1000 times.

"'Hispanic' does NOT mean 'non-white'"

For all intents and purposes in the US, Hispanic IS a race.

People usually make a distinction between Hispanic and white.

[Alien Space Bats]

For all intents and purposes in the US, Hispanic IS a race.

People usually make a distinction between Hispanic and white.

And people usually make a distinction between being Arab and being white, too. That doesn't mean that they are right.

I will repeat myself: "Hispanic" is NOT a race, any more than "Irish" was 150 years ago.

[DnalweN acilbupeR]

For all intents and purposes in the US, Hispanic IS a race.

People usually make a distinction between Hispanic and white.

And people usually make a distinction between being Arab and being white, too. That doesn't mean that they are right.

I will repeat myself: "Hispanic" is NOT a race, any more than "Irish" was 150 years ago.

still doesnt fit into the oft-repeated "hillbilly/redneck KKK racist white" narrative

[Coccygia]

Not as much as they like to insist. The biggest problem black people in this country have is their own crappy behavior and total refusal to accept any responsibility whatever for it. Please not I am not talking about all blacks, but only a minority, although they get most of the attention in the media. (The squeaky wheel does the least work and gets the most grease. Or the 10% that cause 90% of the problems.)

"The biggest problem black people in this country have is their own crappy behavior..." (Emphasis mine)

"Please note I am not talking about all blacks, but only a minority...."

You can't have it both ways.

Talk about a "false dichotomy". There isn't any contradiction here.

[Alien Space Bats]

still doesnt fit into the oft-repeated "hillbilly/redneck KKK racist white" narrative

... And?

<pause>

Look, living in Southeastern Michigan and married to a Greek-American woman from Chicago, I can tell you that you don't have to be a "hillbilly/redneck KKK"-type white to be a thoroughgoing racist. There are LOTS of Hyphenated-American whites who suffer the disease. My wife's grandfather, a Greek immigrant, despised "n-gg-rs", and his is not the only tale of racist expression I have heard coming out of the Greek community. Detroit's famous Hamtramck neighborhood was massively Polish until racial prejudice-driven white flight emptied out almost all of its white population. I grew up with Serbian-Americans who had a very dim view of blacks, and have heard tales of racist sentiment among their Croatian-American counterparts in Chicago. And are we REALLY supposed to believe that Italian-Americans are above racism?

Not every racist in American is named Billy Bob Cracker. There are lots of racist Millers and Jorgensens and O'Malleys and Kowalskis and Banaceks and Malkoviches and Fontinis; that's one reason why I think that the argument that George Zimmerman "couldn't POSSIBLY have been racist" because he was (half) Hispanic more than a little idiotic.

Besides, as I have said here for close to a year now, unless someone is a declared white supremacist/separatist, it's inappropriate (and counterproductive) to call them a racist. Why? Because it rather misses the point: It's not racist PEOPLE who are the problem; it's racist ATTITUDES, racist IDEAS, and racist BEHAVIOR that are hurting us so badly. Once we realize that people who AREN'T racist can harbor ATTITUDES and IDEAS that ARE (eg., people who listen to rap music are "thugs", black men are inherently criminally dangerous who possess preternatural strength (and can therefore only be safely controlled through the use of overwhelming force [eg., a chokehold] or — worse — become so uncontrollably dangerous in a confrontation that shooting them is the only way to stay alive), black women are natural inclined towards promiscuity and are careless/thoughtless when it comes to child-rearing (hence, the "welfare mama" meme [which has, strangely, now utterly displaced the older "Aunt Jemima" meme], blacks would rather steal or take handouts than work, blacks much more likely to be drug addicts than anybody else, people who wear hoodies and/or baggy jeans are worthy of suspicion, etc., etc., etc.), THEN AND ONLY THEN will we actually begin to start making progress towards eliminating racism in America.

IOW, it's not a certain kind of person that's the problem; it's a certain set of attitudes, and even people who swear (and fervently BELIEVE) they're not racists can (and often do) both cling to and perpetuate said attitudes.

[Anglo-California]

For all intents and purposes in the US, Hispanic IS a race.

People usually make a distinction between Hispanic and white.

And people usually make a distinction between being Arab and being white, too. That doesn't mean that they are right.

I will repeat myself: "Hispanic" is NOT a race, any more than "Irish" was 150 years ago.

Generally by the terms Hispanic and Latino, "mestizo" is implied, because they certainly aren't talking about Castilians.

[Anglo-California]

still doesnt fit into the oft-repeated "hillbilly/redneck KKK racist white" narrative

... And?

<pause>

Look, living in Southeastern Michigan and married to a Greek-American woman from Chicago, I can tell you that you don't have to be a "hillbilly/redneck KKK"-type white to be a thoroughgoing racist. There are LOTS of Hyphenated-American whites who suffer the disease. My wife's grandfather, a Greek immigrant, despised "n-gg-rs", and his is not the only tale of racist expression I have heard coming out of the Greek community. Detroit's famous Hamtramck neighborhood was massively Polish until racial prejudice-driven white flight emptied out almost all of its white population. I grew up with Serbian-Americans who had a very dim view of blacks, and have heard tales of racist sentiment among their Croatian-American counterparts in Chicago. And are we REALLY supposed to believe that Italian-Americans are above racism?

Not every racist in American is named Billy Bob Cracker. There are lots of racist Millers and Jorgensens and O'Malleys and Kowalskis and Banaceks and Malkoviches and Fontinis; that's one reason why I think that the argument that George Zimmerman "couldn't POSSIBLY have been racist" because he was (half) Hispanic more than a little idiotic.

Miller is an Anglo-Scottish name, not a German one. Müller is the German cognate.

And Zimmerman was half-Hispanic, half-Jewish.

[Alien Space Bats]

Miller is an Anglo-Scottish name, not a German one. Müller is the German cognate.

There are quite a few Muellers who simplified their names into Miller (enough, in fact, that you appear to have correctly recognized that the person I was thinking of is German-American).

But beyond that, why are you picking nits?

And Zimmerman was half-Hispanic, half-Jewish.

"Jewish" is not a race, either. Racially, most Jews are considered to be white.

That said, again I ask: Why are you picking nits?

[DnalweN acilbupeR]

Miller is an Anglo-Scottish name, not a German one. Müller is the German cognate.

There are quite a few Muellers who simplified their names into Miller (enough, in fact, that you appear to have correctly recognized that the person I was thinking of is German-American).

But beyond that, why are you picking nits?

And Zimmerman was half-Hispanic, half-Jewish.

"Jewish" is not a race, either. Racially, most Jews are considered to be white.

That said, again I ask: Why are you picking nits?

So what was the assumption that the killing of Martin was racially motivated based upon again?

[Mavorpen]

still doesnt fit into the oft-repeated "hillbilly/redneck KKK racist white" narrative

... And?

<pause>

Look, living in Southeastern Michigan and married to a Greek-American woman from Chicago, I can tell you that you don't have to be a "hillbilly/redneck KKK"-type white to be a thoroughgoing racist. There are LOTS of Hyphenated-American whites who suffer the disease. My wife's grandfather, a Greek immigrant, despised "n-gg-rs", and his is not the only tale of racist expression I have heard coming out of the Greek community. Detroit's famous Hamtramck neighborhood was massively Polish until racial prejudice-driven white flight emptied out almost all of its white population. I grew up with Serbian-Americans who had a very dim view of blacks, and have heard tales of racist sentiment among their Croatian-American counterparts in Chicago. And are we REALLY supposed to believe that Italian-Americans are above racism?

Not every racist in American is named Billy Bob Cracker. There are lots of racist Millers and Jorgensens and O'Malleys and Kowalskis and Banaceks and Malkoviches and Fontinis; that's one reason why I think that the argument that George Zimmerman "couldn't POSSIBLY have been racist" because he was (half) Hispanic more than a little idiotic.

Besides, as I have said here for close to a year now, unless someone is a declared white supremacist/separatist, it's inappropriate (and counterproductive) to call them a racist. Why? Because it rather misses the point: It's not racist PEOPLE who are the problem; it's racist ATTITUDES, racist IDEAS, and racist BEHAVIOR that are hurting us so badly. Once we realize that people who AREN'T racist can harbor ATTITUDES and IDEAS that ARE (eg., people who listen to rap music are "thugs", black men are inherently criminally dangerous who possess preternatural strength (and can therefore only be safely controlled through the use of overwhelming force [eg., a chokehold] or — worse — become so uncontrollably dangerous in a confrontation that shooting them is the only way to stay alive), black women are natural inclined towards promiscuity and are careless/thoughtless when it comes to child-rearing (hence, the "welfare mama" meme [which has, strangely, now utterly displaced the older "Aunt Jemima" meme], blacks would rather steal or take handouts than work, blacks much more likely to be drug addicts than anybody else, people who wear hoodies and/or baggy jeans are worthy of suspicion, etc., etc., etc.), THEN AND ONLY THEN will we actually begin to start making progress towards eliminating racism in America.

IOW, it's not a certain kind of person that's the problem; it's a certain set of attitudes, and even people who swear (and fervently BELIEVE) they're not racists can (and often do) both cling to and perpetuate said attitudes.

As it stands, we can't even have serious, in depth discussions about race in the mainstream. If you bring up white privilege, the response is, " why do you believe all white people go around calling black people the n word and actively discriminate against them?!" If you bring up racial bias in the criminal justice system, the response is "why do you believe all white cops are KKK members looking for an excuse to hunt down and shoot black people!?" It's a less flashy method of parroting "anti-racist is a code word for anti-white!" where if you recognize that any white person can hold racist beliefs, you must therefore believe that all white people are racists who might as well belong to the KKK.

And it reaches the level where it ends up being a childish refusal to accept responsibility for anything involving race. And so you get terms like "white guilt," where they convince themselves that they don't contribute to the problem. Of course they can't. They aren't racist. They don't belong to a white supremacy group. To recognize their own prejudices and biases is to admit to contributing to the problem. To admit to contributing to the problem is to admit to guilt. And to admit to being guilty places them on the same level as slave owners, since they were the ones responsible for the hardships black people face. The Western interpretation of "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil" right about sums it up.

[Mavorpen]

There are quite a few Muellers who simplified their names into Miller (enough, in fact, that you appear to have correctly recognized that the person I was thinking of is German-American).

But beyond that, why are you picking nits?


"Jewish" is not a race, either. Racially, most Jews are considered to be white.

That said, again I ask: Why are you picking nits?

So what was the assumption that the killing of Martin was racially motivated based upon again?

The conclusion that was drawn by Zimmerman that Trayvon was possibly up to no good due to the unfortunate crime of being black.

[Jamzmania]

So what was the assumption that the killing of Martin was racially motivated based upon again?

The conclusion that was drawn by Zimmerman that Trayvon was possibly up to no good due to the unfortunate crime of being black.

Considering that there's absolutely no evidence to back that up, I'd say that's pretty irrelevant.