Zone1 A Simple Experiment That Can Demonstrate WHY You Don't See Racism While Others Do

[MarathonMike]

Your first statement is incorrect, there is no heightened sense of awareness. Did you not understand the analogy or do you not understand how our subconscious works?

Think of it this way - I probably have a much more expansive vocabulary that you. Do you understand the implications of my statement and do you agree or disagree? If you agree then doesn't that mean that I recognize certain things that you may not simply because I have a background that includes terms that a person who doesn't work in any of my fields wouldn't be exposed to?

Your perception and explanation of what I've described is just flat out wrong but I believe it's correctable if you're interested.

And the reason that you think that the 16 year old who was sent home due to her blond braids being deemed "unnatural" and a violation of the company's dress code is not a big deal and much ado about nothing is because you as a white male are not impacted. You don't think that being told that your hair color is unnatural for you as a 16 year old Black girl hurt her feelings and made her feel singled out and that she had done something wrong even though she hadn't?

I understood what you were trying to do with your tortured analogy perfectly and explained it clearly. You are angry that I have again dismantled your attempt to "prove" that Racism is everywhere if you just look closely enough.

I personally think there are far more important issues to focus on, such as keeping innocent little girls like the one in my avatar from being murdered in their car seat. It is totally unfathomable to me why you seem to care more about that silly kerfuffle about the 16 year old girls' hair than innocent black children being murdered every week.

 

[MarathonMike]

Let's make things clear for the ignoramuses who always want to bring up reparations and run their mouths about slavery. We are demanding reparations for these things(and it's not a complete list):

Slavery, black codes, convict leasing, the fraud perpetrated on blacks landowners after slavery, redlining, restrictive covenants, contract selling, the exclusion of blacks from New Deal Programs and GI Bill, Housing segregation, predatory lending, Human rights violations in law enforcement, medical racism, retail redlining, terrorism, and much more.

So it doesn't matter what you didn't own or what you say you didn't do. You guys are not in the decision making position. This is about the government.

When your argument is weak, make your fonts bold.

 

[longly]

It's irrelevant. Whites dye their hair and I'm sure there were white girls there with blond hair and brown roots.

It does not matter if you disagree, it is not your money; whoever pays the fiddler calls the tune. The only thing that matters is if the rule applies to everyone equally. If a white person dyed their hair green or made it look like a black person’s natural hair that would be violation too. Remember when Justin Beaver put his hair in corn roles, I think that is his name, and some blacks had a fit over it. His hair might have been a violation the company rules as well.

 

[IM2]

It does not matter if you disagree, it is not your money; whoever pays the fiddler calls the tune. The only thing that matters is if the rule applies to everyone equally. If a white person dyed their hair green or made it look like a black person’s natural hair that would be violation too. Remember when Justin Beaver put his hair in corn roles, I think that is his name, and some blacks had a fit over it. His hair might have been a violation the company rules as well.

Since dyed blondes with brown roots work in that building there probably is a double standard. As for Justin Beiber, he was not working for anyone but himself so his situation has nothing to do with what we are talking about.

 

[BackAgain]

Continue to fuck with me at your own risk and we'll find out who knows more about alleged "free speech" on a private site.

I asked you the first time, now I'm telling you stay off of my threads. Any further comments from you will be noted as harassment since you've done me the favor of acknowledging receipt of my first warning.

Lol. I have since posted. I’m still here. How is that possible?

Go figure.

Now, at the risk of further offending our dear OP member, I’ll contribute another snippet on topic.

It has already been stated on this very thread. But it remains true and very applicable: if you’re a hammer, things tend to look like nails.

Let’s put it another way. We tend to see what we expect to see. So, if you’re a black person who feels “victimized” by white people, then regardless of whether or not some white person has done anything even remotely “racist”(in the real world), you will probably “see” it anyway.

 

[Seymour Flops]

Lol. I have since posted. I’m still here. How is that possible?

Go figure.

Now, at the risk of further offending our dear OP member, I’ll contribute another snippet on topic.

It has already been stated on this very thread. But it remains true and very applicable: if you’re a hammer, things tend to look like nails.

Let’s put it another way. We tend to see what we expect to see. So, if you’re a black person who feels “victimized” by white people, then regardless of whether or not some white person has done anything even remotely “racist”(in the real world), you will probably “see” it anyway.

Which is really the point of he analogy in the OP, but the OP doesn't get it still.

 

[MarathonMike]

Let’s put it another way. We tend to see what we expect to see.

.....or what we are "conditioned" to see.

 

[irosie91]

.....or what we are "conditioned" to see.

gettng back to neuroscience----that which the human brain SENSES---ie reaches
the conscious mind----is very modified by systems of 'filtering' or 'gating'---
the result is that what does reach the conscious mind is a tiny fraction of
the incoming signals into the brain----AND an important consideration is
the AWFUL TRUTH----which is----the 'white' brain and the 'black' brain
WORK THE SAME

 

[irosie91]

People aren’t racist toward you. They dislike assholes.

not nice MizMolly, Im2 is one of ours

 

[irosie91]

You can have him. Talk about not being nice, have you not read his nasty posts?

be patient-----anyone CAN IMPROVE

 

[Mac-7]

Having no understanding or interest in anyone other than blacks, everything is racist. If someone has absolutely no interest in blacks, it's racist. If someone is incredibly selfish and thinks, acts with no interest other than self interest that's racist.

Many white people just don't care. They don't care about black anger or angst. Hurt feelings no longer matter. Blacks are avoided and ignored. Black crime is only relevant due to the race, ethnicity of the victims.

My real estate agent is half black and a very competent and hard working person

She has earned my respect and reaps the financial rewards from it

But i am not a guilt-ridden white lib whose heart bleeds for anyone black or white who is a screw up or a deadbeat

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

I understood what you were trying to do with your tortured analogy perfectly and explained it clearly. You are angry that I have again dismantled your attempt to "prove" that Racism is everywhere if you just look closely enough.

I personally think there are far more important issues to focus on, such as keeping innocent little girls like the one in my avatar from being murdered in their car seat. It is totally unfathomable to me why you seem to care more about that silly kerfuffle about the 16 year old girls' hair than innocent black children being murdered every week.

Surely you jest, why do you think you have the ability to anger me especially when all you've done is demonstrate your complete lack of understanding?

Can you see the air we breath? No, but you know it's there right?
Can you see the wind blowing? No, not the actual wind but the movement of the trees means it is blowing right?
What about the germs that cause us to get sick? We can't see them but if we could we could avoid them right?

There are two reasons that you don't see/agree with the amount of racism there is in the world around us in the United States.

Number one is because you don't want to see it because you don't believe it exists, so it could be dangled in front of face and you'd close your eyes or turn you head or walk away, to plug your ears with your fingers and blab 'lalalalalalalalalalalala' so you don't have to hear about it.

Number two is because you don't possess the ability to recognize racism except the most blatant, in-your-face type because in addition to reason number 1 above, it's not something that you are familiar with.

When I first started school at Embry-Riddle, I could identify every commercial aircraft that was flying at the time. I'd spend time with my friends and fellow classmates, lounging at the beach both at the end of the runway at LAX and in Daytona. We could identify them by first of all knowing what types of aircraft each of the airlines had in their fleet, the engine configurations, such as the T-Tail on the Boeing 727 with the engines in the back versus the wings, or the Lockheed L1011 which could land itself but also had a rear engine that went through the empennage in an S configuration with the engine intake on top of the fuselage and the exhaust on the bottom rear. These days I probably wouldn't recognize anything other than a 747 which I'm sure are even flying anymore or a 727 and particularly since Airbus has a significant share of the market these days but I digress.

I and some others have taken the time to learn more about African American history to better understand our laws, how and why they came to be, and through the process have uncovered many other things. For example, most of my instructors since I've been in Washington State have been white males. Learning about the concealed carry laws in the United States began with the discovery that gun control in the U.S. was implemented for the specific purpose of criminalizing the taking up of arms by Black people in defense against the Klu Klux Klan.

My white instructors taught me this, with no bias in one direction or the other, just simply this is our history, this is how we got to where we are today, with you not being able to live in the state you were born in and grew up in, because you needed to be able to protect your life and the state of California response was "too bad so sad".

At a prior point in my life I was sent one summer to temp at a very interesting company while still during my university years. The (white) gentleman, from Charleston South Carolina no less, when he discovered that I had an interest in aviation and was attending Embry-Riddle, would take the time to explain things to me regarding his investigations, how he founded his company and how he lost part of his leg in a plane crash and as a result vowed he was going to do whatever was necessary to find out why his plane crashed. He also told me about a case they had investigated where they simulated the conditions under which an aircraft lost power and crashed in a thunderstorm. The investigators took the exact same model of the aircraft that crashed and they simulated the up & down drafts that the aircraft would have been subjected to during a thunderstorm which the pilot had been unable to get out of. Amazingly, at least to my eyes, they discovered that when the aircraft was put into an extremely nose high attitude, that the fuel began running from the engine, due to gravity, and that the engine would eventually die of fuel starvation. The pilot being unable to get the engine restarted, lost his life when the plane crashed.

All of this information came out during the hearing when my boss gave testimony as an expert witness on airplane crashes and aviation safety. Their findings were sent to the FAA, the aircraft was grounded and an Airworthiness Directive was issued to the manufacturer of the aircraft, with instructions to correct this defect in the design so that the fuel continued to flow to the engine irrespective of adverse nose high attitudes.

One of my current mentors, another white male, gave me a start in one main area of my current line of business. It will be 10 years next year that company has been in business and when we talk we talk about a lot of general topics but pretty much always include work things, business things, family things, just like friends do.

I don't know what they perceive when they view me because I've never asked them except for at times they have acknowledged that the "good old boy network" was probably in my way on various occassions. Other people that I have worked with who may not have been able to elucidate what they witnessed and how or why it may have been racism or race related, but knew that what they witnessed was disturbing enough that they asked "what can I do? how can I help?"

I have a very low opinion of individuals who will lie about facts, or pretend that things are anything other than what they actually are and this whole gaslighting thing that goes on these days, I suspect that this has been going on forever, it just didn't have an adequate name previously but now we know.

The flip side of not having the ability to see racism when you encountered it is the ability you all have to take the Black people who are communicating with you on this site and perceive us as anything other than who we actually are. We've told you who we are but you all for some reason either think we're lying or that in your minds it's just not possible for us to be who we say we are. And it hasn't escaped my attention that you will often refer to me and IM2 as "success Black Americans" but then add that it's because we have benefited in some way or another from something that was allegedly not available to others (yes I mean white people by others).

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

You didn’t pay shit

What do you think happens when Black Americans pay the same amount of income taxes as whites but are restricted from using certain of the services that those taxes pay for?

Did you see the movie Hidden Figures?

 

[Foxfyre]

I'm not sure why, but this thread I posted a while back is continuing to get responses so it's prompted me to post something that my sister explained to me last week.
Zone1 - 14 Small Ways You Can Fight Racism Every Day

Her explanation shone light on the topic of racism against Black people here in the U.S. that I and a handful of other Blacks here on the site comment about and the inability of many whites to understand or recognize it.

Let me start by saying sister is very smart and it's not easy for me to explain the hows and whys of what she does, but she's a board-certified educator who runs programs that educates and certifies students in certain areas. And she's one of a kind in her particular role but one of the things that they teach the students is how to recognize and combat bias, of all kinds, but of course racism is a part of it as well. So the following is one of the examples she used and I thought it was perfect.

She said to me "you know how when you decide to buy a new car, and you do your research, and you're narrowing down your options until you decide okay this is the car I want and then suddenly you start seeing that type of car that you selected EVERYWHERE you go?" "That particular car was always there, you just weren't paying any attention to it, it wasn't on your radar". But once you became interested in that particular model your subconscious, which picks up everything we perceive, started serving them up to you as an item of interest and suddenly (it appears) you began to notice them everywhere because they are now "on your radar" as you are now able to identify them whenever you encounter them. (this is probably what prompted the birth of the car clubs, but I digress..)

The light bulb came on and this explanation makes perfect sense. One of the things that struck me about some of the responses here on this board, particularly in response to the thread about the 16 year old who was sent home because her employer claimed the blond coloring that she had mixed in with her braids was "unnatural" and thus a violation of the company's dress, was the accusation that we (the Black members here) have to scour the internet looking for news stories of racism to post about. When the reality is that there are instances of racism all around us everyday. WE recognize them because we are familiar with how they manifest, while I would imagine that just like the example car that you have no interest in that passes you every time you go out, yet you never see it. And you never see not because the vehicle is not there, but because it's something that's simply not on your radar therefore many of you have the luxury of never seeing let alone acknowledging the racism that still exists in our country unless it's the blatant, in your face type, that you see on the news.

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

People aren’t racist toward you. They dislike assholes.

Wait a minute.

MizMolly is white and IM2 is Black.

MizMolly just referred to IM2 as an asshole, has MizMolly been sanctioned for violating Zone 1 rules? No she hasn't

Does this meet the definition of racism perhaps? Why do whites get to violate the rules frequently and with impunity while the Black members are sanctioned for every little offense?

I'm not going to waste any more of my time doing legal analysis for people who don't have the capacity to under even basic concepts unless they're feigning stupidity in order to not be held liable for any behavior that has racist tones or motivations.

 

[The Duke]

If you have to heighten your sense of awareness to detect micro-aggressions everywhere, then maybe it isn't a big deal. Just like the girl with the blonde braids thing that blew up into a national scandal. Much ado about not much imo. The Systemic Racism I saw in Alabama in the early 60s was definitely a big deal. Thank goodness that's been gone for a couple of generations and Black citizens enjoy all the freedoms and rights to which they are entitled. You are clearly a beneficiary of those freedoms that your parents and grandparents may not have enjoyed.

Oh, they still had slaves up in Alabama well past the 60s.

They just called 'em "Nannies" and "Butlers" and "groundskeepers" n stuff.

I was really shocked when I went up there because it's not like that here.

I was staying with a cousin (who never would do anything like that) and then we went over to a neighbor's

house and I found all this out.

 

[Foxfyre]

I'm not sure why, but this thread I posted a while back is continuing to get responses so it's prompted me to post something that my sister explained to me last week.
Zone1 - 14 Small Ways You Can Fight Racism Every Day

Her explanation shone light on the topic of racism against Black people here in the U.S. that I and a handful of other Blacks here on the site comment about and the inability of many whites to understand or recognize it.

Let me start by saying sister is very smart and it's not easy for me to explain the hows and whys of what she does, but she's a board-certified educator who runs programs that educates and certifies students in certain areas. And she's one of a kind in her particular role but one of the things that they teach the students is how to recognize and combat bias, of all kinds, but of course racism is a part of it as well. So the following is one of the examples she used and I thought it was perfect.

She said to me "you know how when you decide to buy a new car, and you do your research, and you're narrowing down your options until you decide okay this is the car I want and then suddenly you start seeing that type of car that you selected EVERYWHERE you go?" "That particular car was always there, you just weren't paying any attention to it, it wasn't on your radar". But once you became interested in that particular model your subconscious, which picks up everything we perceive, started serving them up to you as an item of interest and suddenly (it appears) you began to notice them everywhere because they are now "on your radar" as you are now able to identify them whenever you encounter them. (this is probably what prompted the birth of the car clubs, but I digress..)

The light bulb came on and this explanation makes perfect sense. One of the things that struck me about some of the responses here on this board, particularly in response to the thread about the 16 year old who was sent home because her employer claimed the blond coloring that she had mixed in with her braids was "unnatural" and thus a violation of the company's dress, was the accusation that we (the Black members here) have to scour the internet looking for news stories of racism to post about. When the reality is that there are instances of racism all around us everyday. WE recognize them because we are familiar with how they manifest, while I would imagine that just like the example car that you have no interest in that passes you every time you go out, yet you never see it. And you never see not because the vehicle is not there, but because it's something that's simply not on your radar therefore many of you have the luxury of never seeing let alone acknowledging the racism that still exists in our country unless it's the blatant, in your face type, that you see on the news.

It's a two way street though NewsVine. You can't have people accusing others of racism on television every night, have rules set down on message boards and by school boards and by pretty much every institution as to what is and is not politically correct, what is permissible and what is not re skin color. . .

You can't have people saying that they are somehow due reparations because of their skin color. . .

You can't be fired or forced to resign or forced to take sensitivity training due to some un PC-word or whatever--think the hapless rookie fireman who brought cold watermelon as a treat for his coworkers, some of which were black, and was fired for stereotyping. . .

You can't deal with trying to protect your child from insane CRT in school curriculum or see unrealistic policies like no movie can be nominated for an Oscar if a person of color is not one of the prominent characters or see politicians or executives appoint black people to positions whether or not they are the most qualified. . .every advertisement and television program has to include at least one or more black people. . .

You can't have cops or citizens investigated exhaustively to determine whether their self defense against a black person was a 'hate crime' or fire an errant or incompetent black person without risking an investigation or lawsuit for discrimination.. . .

. . .you can't have all that as commonplace in our society. . .
Without being forced to see skin color first before you see a person's character, qualifications, aptitude, personality, creativity, talent. And that tends to make tacit racists out of people who otherwise would never be.

Until we as a society are allowed to treat skin color no differently than we do eye color or hair color, racism will be a fact of life in America. That won't be because people are racist. It will be because they are forced to be.

 

[Mac-7]

What do you think happens when Black Americans pay the same amount of income taxes as whites but are restricted from using certain of the services that those taxes pay for?

Did you see the movie Hidden Figures?

Did that happen to you?

Of course not

You live in the past and vicariously through your ancestors

 

[NewsVine_Mariyam]

IM2 is a useless waste of oxygen. A detriment to the human race. That's just my opinion.

He's a stupid racist turd.

And in spite of all that ALLEGEDLY, he has one up on all the clowns on this site.

It's not mine to disclose so if you can't refrain from disparaging other members in the thread, please don't post.

 

[TheParser]

1. In my opinion (opinion!), the "racism" problem is insoluble.

2. Maybe the OP's prospective landlady did not like African Americans (or Asian Americans or Hispanic Americans for that matter).

3. But maybe the landlady lied about a vacancy because she was afraid of losing her job and apartment house.

4. Maybe she has non-Caucasian friends; maybe she patronizes non-American food restaurants; and maybe she has even insisted that her church welcome non-Caucasian worshippers.

5. But she is terrified that if the OP moves in, then others of that ethnicity will move in, too.

6. And she is terrified that soon some new tenants' relatives will move in; there will be loud parties; drug dealers will come around; dangerous dogs will roam around, etc.

7. And there will occur "white flight."

8. After all, we know that African American celebrities almost all leave their family neighborhoods for nicer and safer areas.

9. In my opinion (opinion!), African Americans will always be subject to discrimination -- even when Caucasians are reduced to a small minority (sometime in the next century) and Hispanics become the largest single group and possibly the majority of Americans.

10. Yes, it is very sad. But -- as you young people say -- it is what it is!