[Plantagenet]

The question is, for the umpteenth time...

Does Obama's SKIN COLOR exclude him from being a European?

AND as I've answered you, for the umpteenth time, skin color has nothing to do with it. Skin color does not exclude people from being Europeans. OK?

Look ---- no European country currently excludes people from citizenship based on their skin color, so the answer to your question is a big solid undeniable no.

---------------------

As far as Obama himself, lets start by agreeing that Obama is currently an American citizen.

Now, by "a European" I assume you mean a citizen of an EU country.

Actually, its not that hard for an American to become a European these days. Theres even a website about how to do it. It helps to have a lot of money, so Obama qualifies on that score, and you typically need European ancestors, which Obama has on his mother's side, so if he wants to be a European, the door is open for him to do it.

Maybe even you could be a European, if thats what you want. Check out the website Become a European

Now that I've answered your question, would you please answer mine. What country are you from noob?

Cheers!

[noobtube]

The question is, for the umpteenth time...

Does Obama's SKIN COLOR exclude him from being a European?

AND as I've answered you, for the umpteenth time, skin color has nothing to do with it. Skin color does not exclude people from being Europeans. OK?

Look ---- no European country currently excludes people from citizenship based on their skin color, so the answer to your question is a big solid undeniable no.

---------------------

As far as Obama himself, lets start by agreeing that Obama is currently an American citizen.

Now, by "a European" I assume you mean a citizen of an EU country.

Actually, its not that hard for an American to become a European these days. Theres even a website about how to do it. It helps to have a lot of money, so Obama qualifies on that score, and you typically need European ancestors, which Obama has on his mother's side, so if he wants to be a European, the door is open for him to do it.

Maybe even you could be a European, if thats what you want. Check out the website Become a European

Now that I've answered your question, would you please answer mine. What country are you from noob?

Cheers!

So, you are making my point that Americans are ONLY Europeans.

Africans are not Europeans.
Chinese are not Europeans.
Indians are not Europeans.
Arabs are not Europeans.

Therefore, none of them can be Americans because America is a European belief system, and only Europeans (and descendants) can belong. If you are not a European, you cannot be an American.

Americans make that abundantly clear in the news, TV, movies, politics, courts, police, and all levels of schooling (Rome and Greece anyone).

And, I have no country... a man without a land (for now).

[Plantagenet]

So, you are making my point that Americans are ONLY Europeans.

Actually, I didn't say that at all. I said exactly the opposite. I said people of all races and all ethnic groups are Americans.

And, I have no country... a man without a land (for now).

That is mysterious. Have you been condemned to live on a sailboat that is never allowed to touch land or something like that?

[Oneaboveall]

[Sixstrings]

edit: oh, nevermind, was replying to someone in this thread but I'll give it up, rant deleted.

I'll fill this space up now with trying to redirect the thread to the OP.

Some pertinent questions:

1) Is reverse racism really a problem?

2) A fair measure of when racism is really over, in America, is when people of color have something closer to the same net worth as whites. And then, you could say, okay affirmative action's job is done and we can end it now.

But what's really going on right now, is a shift toward top 1% and oligarch rule, and *everyone* on the lower middle and on down is just getting poorer.

So what would *not be fair*, is if there is a new upper class of people of color, and lower class people of color get benefits, but newly poor whites get left behind.

I don't want to "sound racist" or inflame racial tensions, so I'm trying to phrase this carefully, but they are real concerns, it's actually happened in South Africa with the working and lower middle class Boers, they're just forgotten about.

[PrestonSturges]

Are you conflating affirmative action with reverse racism? Because they aren't the same things.

I don't want to "sound racist" or inflame racial tensions, so I'm trying to phrase this carefully, but they are real concerns, it's actually happened in South Africa with the working and lower middle class Boers, they're just forgotten about.

Gee, a society organized along class lines (and what amounts to slavery) does not become egalitarian overnight. Poor whites can be relatively happy on the second or third lowest rungs of the ladder, as long as they have someone lower to exploit or terrorize. Then they are shocked when they discover there's nothing to keep them from falling a notch, and suddenly life is "unfair." Under those circumstances, people become extremely conservative hoping that will prevent further losses. Governments like people like that because they are so easily led by propaganda. That was an overall theme of 1984 - poverty equals patriotism, so the government wanted poverty at 80%.

[Sixstrings]

Are you conflating affirmative action with reverse racism? Because they aren't the same things.

I honestly don't know the difference. From my understanding, affirmative action means x number of spots for minorities, we're talking about a job or university. (so what happens when the minority is the majority, does affirmative action continue?)

What this can wind up meaning is that a non-minority doesn't get in, but may have been better qualified. Isn't that the "reverse racism?" It means not getting a job, because of your race and that the race isn't the specified one and all the slots for that race are already filled, right?

I think it's just time to get away from affirmative action. I agree with a *bit* of it, voluntary at this point, because obviously if an employer looks around the room and there are *no* people of color, or women, then that's a problem.

But once there is some diversity, then how fair is it to stick with hard numbers and preferential treatment for certain kinds of people, and then that discriminates in a "reverse" way.

Gee, a society organized along class lines (and what amounts to slavery) does not become egalitarian overnight. Poor whites can be relatively happy on the second or third lowest rungs of the ladder, as long as they have someone lower to exploit or terrorize. Then they are shocked when they discover there's nothing to keep them from falling a notch, and suddenly life is "unfair."

I should try to track down this Australian tv documentary on Youtube. It really did give me pause, because otherwise I'm generally a lefty, but watching that I was just like hm.....

US isn't South Africa, but at least over there, it really is a situation of some reverse racism. They're completely ignoring the poor whites. The government responds to people of color, but not to the working class boers. When the interviewer tries to press government officials on this, they just cite white vs. black institutional racism and won't even admit there's a problem.

Let me see if I can find this thing. Okay this isn't the one I saw, but here's another Australian documentary along the same lines:

Reverse Apartheid - White Slums South Africa
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cAvHnygutQA

There's a real problem over there, Preston, in South Africa. Dr. King never wanted to see this kind of thing happen, *reverse* racism coming from the other direction.

Oh, HERE is the one I saw, this is the one to watch, there are some specifics showing the government really doing wrong:

Are poor white South Africans being left behind?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFj0HdW2iDs

Some others:

Falling Through Cracks: Anti-white discrimination on rise in South Africa
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMrPQJoxaFE

'Reverse apartheid': South Africa's white slums
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_C2R12xQDDE

Listen to the quotes from people in that last video. They're saying that whereas America has affirmative action, the difference is that in the US minorities are the *minority*, whereas South Africa has extreme affirmative action policies but over there people of color are the large *majority*.

They're saying that they can't find a job, that they walk into a business and there "are just no jobs for whites."

People of color matter Preston, but white people matter too and the very difficult thing is how do you say that without everyone shouting Stormfront and Nazi? Even in these videos, all the people interviewed say they are not racist but that it's not fair they just can't get jobs, because of their race, because they aren't people of color.

[vtsnowedin]

Do I spell a whiff of [i][b]'racial hygiene'.

Not at all. The millenials are made up of all ethnic and racial groups. The recently arrived Hispanics grandparents went through the great depression (1929 to 1940) In Mexico and points south which was even tougher then here in the United States.

[asg70]

Boy is this thread going off topic...

Enough with the accusations of racism.

[asg70]

So you agree that the majority white population of the 1930's would be (by its genetic coding) also up to the job of surviving the oil crash? Because that same genotype survived the Great Depression? That's an interesting social theory.

No. I'm just not being "triggered" by that post the way you have.

[vtsnowedin]

Do I spell a whiff of [i][b]'racial hygiene'.

Not at all. The millenials are made up of all ethnic and racial groups. The recently arrived Hispanics grandparents went through the great depression (1929 to 1940) In Mexico and points south which was even tougher then here in the United States.

You spoke of genes, a theory of group selection that is meaningless in a few generations.

I spoke about it in a different thread and I don't know why you moved it here or didn't bother to properly label it.
Ghung's quote I was referring to is this.

In short, the US population is spoiled rotten and it will take a couple of generations to purge ourselves of our deluded exceptionalism.

There was nothing racial in Ghungs post or in my response.

[vtsnowedin]

I moved nothing. I found my post and yours moved to a thread called "Reverse Racism". I have no idea how that happened.

I responded to your assertion that because a certain genetic strain of Americans got us out of the Great Depression, that their grandchildren will get us out of the End of the Oil Age. It made no sense.

I sense the moderators (or someone with admin privileges) are accusing you or me of Reverse Racism

Well the moderator that moved it should cut it out or at least label their work so that I am not taken out of context.
and again this post of mine.

"Don't sell the millennials so short. They are the same genetic stock as their grandparents that lived through the great depression just have been raised without any adversity in their lives as of yet. Let hard times befall them and they will rise to the occasion in a time span measured in months or a few years not in whole generations."

Has nothing racial in it as all the races and ethnic groups endured and survived the Great Depression. You either have poor reading comprehension or just jump to conclusions without actually considering that I might be less racist then yourself and presume to know my hidden meanings.

[asg70]

This thread is exhibit A why doom has not arrived. People are amusing themselves with petty outrages rather than attending to basic survival.

[KaiserJeep]

I was going to make a new thread, but this one seems appropriate. First of all, this is the problem:

Just since 1989, surely within the lifespans of most of us, the family wealth gap, measured by race, has drastically increased. Note in the chart above that average white families have about $650,000, while Blacks and Latinos have less than a quarter of that.

The above chart leaves out an important point, which is that most families also have debt, mainly mortgage debt, sometimes credit debt, from charge cards or education loans. When you measure net wealth ((Savings + Assets) - Debts), the disparity is even more striking, White families have a net worth of $171,000, TEN TIMES that of minority families at $17,300.

That would be because Whites are repressing Minorities in this country, and things are rapidly getting worse, not better. The primary means that this is done is via housing. In fact I became aware of this when I was using a popular real estate application, and hunting for homes in Wisconsin. I will not name the application, as I don't want to be sued. Certain homes, mostly in the inner city areas of Milwaukee, Sheboygan, Green Bay, Racine, Kenosha, Oshkosh, etc. had the first picture in each series bordered in Red or Blue. There was NO EXPLANATION for this in the software or the menu help text. In fact, I only figured out what it meant by visiting those neighborhoods.

The Red borders represent "redlined" minority neighborhoods. The Blue lines represented Senior communities where people with children are being discriminated against. For those of you who don't understand the classic term "redlining", here is an older FHA map of New Orleans, LA:

Right up until 1968, for the 100 years since the Civil War, the US Federal Housing Authority discriminated against minorities, by "redlining" areas occupied by minorities where only "sub-prime" loans would be insured by the FDA, at predatory interest rates. The red areas in the above map were almost exclusively Black and Creole, and many have not yet been rebuilt from the storm damage, because - wait for it - the property owners can't get good mortgage financing, TODAY.

My third mortgage - the initial one I got here in Silly Valley in 1986, was a sub-prime mortgage, 11.75% interest on a loan balance of more than $120,000. It hurt a lot, every month, on my relatively small paycheck. After three years, when the bank understood that I could compete in the Valley and even get promoted, I got a much better loan. I would re-finance twice more, each time lowering the interest by at least two points, before my final 15 year loan, which I paid off.

POTUS Johnson officially ended FHA racial discrimination in 1968, via the Fair Housing Act. However, racial discrimination in the USA for mortgage financing is alive and well, and as I have explained, the practice is even enshrined in the real estate applications of today.

For 262 years, the bodies of Black slaves represented wealth. In fact in 1862, the value of Black slaves in the USA was about $3 Billion, which exceeded by a considerable margin the value of the fledgling stock markets in NYC and Chicago. In fact the Civil War was fought over this wealth, and what do you suppose the Confederacy put on it's currency:


For 262 years, Black slaves built America, and the White people kept the wealth generated by them. Then in 1867 when the war was over, 101 years of official US Government discrimination in mortgage lending began. Since 1968, another 50 years of racial discrimination, this time imposed by mortgage lenders, has happened. Today, popular real estate apps clue you in the "good neighborhoods" with stable property values.

Now you understand Michelle Obama's famous remark: "Every day I wake up in a house built by Black slaves."

Now look around the neighborhood you live in. Would you move if a Black Family moved in? Or are you completely confident they won't, because you know the local mortgage lenders are protecting your property values?

Perhaps you have done your own share of oppression. This struck me when I started to consider the differences between the spectrum of skin colors in my present Silicon Valley neighborhood, and the "redlined" areas of Nantucket Island and the state of Wisconsin.

[Plantagenet]

I was going to make a new thread, but this one seems appropriate. First of all, this is the problem:

...That would be because Whites are repressing Minorities in this country, and things are rapidly getting worse, not better.

Whoa.

Lets start by looking at Hispanic wealth. No one knows exactly how many Hispanic illegal aliens are in the US but the number is huge...maybe ca. 15 million. These are people who cross the border with absolutely nothing---their personal wealth is nothing. When you average in 15 million people with zero wealth together with US born Hispanics, its not surprising that the wealth of Hispanic families in the US is lagging behind.

And that has absolutely nothing to do with whites oppressing Hispanics.

Cheers!

[KaiserJeep]

I'm calling you out Plant, for denying racism. Firstly, in the past decade, Hispanics surpassed Blacks as the largest Minority grouping. Note this was in the 2010 US Census, and we are talking only about 42 Million legal Hispanics. Even if I believe your 15 million number - and I do not, because I know that at least a third who were illegal originally now have gained some resident status or are actually citizens today - the numbers wont be significantly changed.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have employed Hispanic laborers whose status I am unsure of more than once here in Silly Valley.

BTW, what is your explanation for the reduced wealth of 40 million Blacks, most of whoom have been here for 300+ years?

[Outcast_Searcher]

I was going to make a new thread, but this one seems appropriate. First of all, this is the problem:

...That would be because Whites are repressing Minorities in this country, and things are rapidly getting worse, not better.

But why cherry pick the data starting at a low point like 1983?

Longer term, the trend is FAR from so obvious.

See the chart from the "History" section, where a century ago, the numbers were much more like they are today.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_in ... ted_States

Now, if you consider that 1983 was about the time the current wave of computer technology (i.e. more knowledge / info. were a strong key to gaining prosperity), and all the sudden the cause looks a whole lot more like "opportunity knocks" than some theory of white suppression of everyone else.


Somehow, I expect that culture and educational opportunity had a lot more to do with that graph than some attempt to keep nonwhites down. You sound about as rational re that accusation as people who claim that the entire GOP is racist, since there are racists in the party.

[KaiserJeep]

The major reason for what I am talking about is the difference between home and land ownership. This was caused first by slavery, because Black slaves have been here since before this was a country. They were owned by Whites, who caused them to labor for no wages, and kept the wealth they generated. Then another century of legal discrimination occurred before the Civil Rights Era. Since then, another 50 years of discrimination that most Whites will not even acknowledge.

Wealth begats wealth. In fact more than 2/3rds of Middle Class wealth is in the form of housing and land. You are free to own anything anywhere, and in many places in the USA today, if a Black family shows up at a Real Estate office, they will be told that the house they inquired about was already sold, and shown houses only in Black neighborhoods, where housing does not appreciate, and given only expensive sub-prime loans.

This is still happening. In the real estate bubble that burst in 2008, the average White family lost 16% of the family wealth, while the average Black family lost 53%. Whites have since recovered and even made gains, Black families are still down by a third, TODAY.

Discrimination is still happening in jobs as well, in fact has not changed in the last 25 years. Nor do Black college graduates build wealth as do Whites. Mostly this is because they spread the wealth around the family and extended family, while White graduates don't do that, and don't have to do that, they are seldom the first to have an education in their family. But when they apply for a loan, Blacks are 500% more likely to be offerred a sub-prime, very expensive mortgage, in an (unofficially) red-lined neighborhood, where home equity grows slowly, if at all.

Because, you understand, they are living "on the wrong side of town".

Here you all are, the beneficiaries of White priviledge, arguing that what I am talking about is not real. If you have a NetFlix account, look for the 2018 documentary series "explained", the episode titled "The Racial Wealth Gap", and watch it. It will explain this in 16 minutes.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Because, you understand, they are living "on the wrong side of town".

Here you all are, the beneficiaries of White priviledge, arguing that what I am talking about is not real. If you have a NetFlix account, look for the 2018 documentary series "explained", the episode titled "The Racial Wealth Gap", and watch it. It will explain this in 16 minutes.

Yet, somehow, for the first 30+ years of my adult life, I lived on "the wrong side of town" in a neighborhood that went from roughly 98% black in the first part of my tenure there to a wonderful rainbow neighborhood which was perhaps 20% or so white at the end.

And somehow, it seems to me, I did a lot more supporting, befriending, and generally helping my neighbors than suppressing anyone. Regardless of what they looked like or how rich (or not) they seemed.

I've read plenty of books and articles about the whole white privilege theories. However, correlation isn't causation, even if that's inconvenient. And trying to make the improving the enemy of the good doesn't change the fact that despite problems, both socially and economically, minorities are making real progress in the US -- despite all the folks who want to make politically hay denying it.

Is there ANY place for personal responsibility here? I realize that's a far different thing than assuming white privilege is the root of all evil.

[KaiserJeep]

What I challenge is the idea that things are improving. Black families are down in average wealth by a third since 2008. The racial wealth disparity is increasing, more rapidly as time passes.

Tell me if you will, how two runners in a race can ever be equal as long as one has a 300 year head start. I believe the answer is that they cannot, ever, barring a truly impossible level of performance from the one starting from behind. This case is like that. You benefit from having a White skin, they suffer because they do not. The reasons are historical and not anything to do with you, your attitudes, or your actions.

Discrimination for Blacks is real, still present, and with attitudes like yours, the opportunities they have will never equal yours. So how can they ever truly be your equal, in spite of your egalitarian viewpoint?

I do understand your point, BTW. I mentioned that I have lived in a racially integrated neighborhood since 1986. Yet even here in California's SF Bay Area, the Blacks almost all live in Oakland, and it's not a good place to live. Nor is Watts, for that matter. Not to mention, Harlem or South Chicago or East Boston or Washington DC or East St. Louis, or much of Philidelphia.

I don't think Black people live in those places because that is their preference. I think that White people force them to live there with discrimination. The impact of this discrimination is cumulative and their plight is worsening over time. Doesn't that fit the definition of things are not improving?