I am not offended by your line. Your line is why I got involved in this thread to begin with. People only see real racism as one sided. Racism is everywhere in everyone. You brush off the r-word as just a word. Yet the n-word is racial. I still think that they are just words. If you combine the two definitions, they could be interchangable.

 

Your other example is also offensive.

 

Racism is an act, against someone based on their skin. It is not a joke that uses the n-word. If a joke using the n-word is racist, the a joke using the r-word is also racist. But we have been so brain-washed into beleiving that racism is only one sided that we are missing the bigger picture and problem.

 

Acceptable racism involves poking fun at people that are caucasion.

 

Unacceptable racism is poking fun at people that are not caucasion.

 

This is what the media continues to push.

 

This is why jokes about a white president are acceptable and jokes about a black president are not acceptable.

 

Remember - Sticks and Stones may break my bones. WORDS will never hurt me.

 

You are missing my point entirely. I never said that one type of discrimination was better than another. Use of the r-word does not refer to a race, so by definition, is not racism, though it certainly can be discriminatory and just as wrong. There are many examples in this thread of actual racism that exists between blacks, whites, and hispanics. I don't doubt that and it is all wrong. We are arguing semantics here. If you don't see it, I can't help it and it is a futile effort.

I went to Frankfort High School in the 70's and we were considered the black school. One of my best friends was on the football team and wrestling team with me he's black I'm white. We hung out alot and I remember us going to my house for something and my grandmother who lived next door called my mom at work to tell her I had a black person in the house. I also remember playing Dayton in football and we had to walk about four blocks through the neighborhood to the field. The things people yelled from their front porches at our black players was disturbing. I also remember leading our team thru Richmond Madisons tunnel before a game and I was called some pretty good racial names. My buddy that I spoke of earlier was running beside me laughing, and said I don't think they're talking to me this time.

 

 

Alert the presses! Lock up the women and children! Hide the valuables!

 

Sad, ain't it?

 

The rest of your story is interesting to me also. Do you (the collective BGP audience) feel (as I do) that people who have had the privilege of participating in sports are, as a whole, "ahead of the curve" with respect to the racism issue?

I think people that played sports were integrated before the rest of the country.

You are missing my point entirely. I never said that one type of discrimination was better than another. Use of the r-word does not refer to a race, so by definition, is not racism, though it certainly can be discriminatory and just as wrong. There are many examples in this thread of actual racism that exists between blacks, whites, and hispanics. I don't doubt that and it is all wrong. We are arguing semantics here. If you don't see it, I can't help it and it is a futile effort.

 

We are arguing semantics but you want to put this on me not getting it. I would say that you do not. If the r-word does not refer to a race, how does the n-word refer to a race.

 

If somesone says r-word - what is the first race that comes to mind. Do you associate the word with a race. What does an r-word look like in your mind?

 

There is not difference in the two words. They both have racial conotations. They both can be hurtful.

 

Can a white person be called a n-word? Can a black person be called r-word?

 

Before we can begin to get rid of the real problem, we have to understand what real racism is and that everyone is guilty.

 

I will be done here, just as you think I will never get it, you will not understand my points. So be it...

 

I have enjoyed this discussion and agree that BGP, requires you to read everyones point of view. In a room, this would have just been a loud shouting match.

Here's something that I remembered today. While this may not have been discrimination but it certainly was race based. I can remember back in the early to mid 1960's that all black people were required to take a blood test. This was to see if a person had Sickle Cell Anemia. It was once believed that this was a blood disease that only affected people of African American decent.

 

I, to this day, still remember that little blue card my mom had carry for all of us.

I have encountered it plenty of times around the various basketball parks I've played at.

I was called a cheese cracker once in middle school. I thought it was hilarious. Honestly, I've been fortunate enough for racism to not take much of a tangible form in my life. I find the concept to be humorously inane. I sometimes like to jokingly refer to my prejudice against left-handers... because it's really not that different. Just plain dumb.

The one thing I never understood about slavery and the "Jim Crow" era is how could someone think that someone was inferior. Then on the other hand have that same person cook their food, clean their house, and better yet, raise their children. :idunno:

The one thing I never understood about slavery and the "Jim Crow" era is how could someone think that someone was inferior. Then on the other hand have that same person cook their food, clean their house, and better yet, raise their children. :idunno:

 

Very Well Said!

 

:thumb::thumb::clap:

I'll add one more to the list though it was one I was witness to, not aimed at me. A football team I followed went to the state playoffs one year. Team A (mine) was pretty racially diverse. Team B (Host team and opponent) was all white and historically so.

 

When Team A arrived to their locker rooms, there were racial slurs all over the blackboards and a proud sign that stated "the KKK welcomes Team A to Team B."

 

I had heard such stories before about Team B but never witnessed them until then. The saddest part is this was not long ago, 1990 if my memory serves. :irked:

The one thing I never understood about slavery and the "Jim Crow" era is how could someone think that someone was inferior. Then on the other hand have that same person cook their food, clean their house, and better yet, raise their children. :idunno:

 

For some, it was religious instruction that stated one race was marked by God for servitude to the other.

 

For some, I liked the line from Gene Hackman in Mississippi Burning. "My daddy said, 'If you ain't better than a _______ son, who are you better than. I was left with a bitter old man who never understood it was poverty that was really killing him." People believe, in any case, that they are better when they have nothing left to show for or about themselves.

For some, it was religious instruction that stated one race was marked by God for servitude to the other.

 

For some, I liked the line from Gene Hackman in Mississippi Burning. "My daddy said, 'If you ain't better than a _______ son, who are you better than. I was left with a bitter old man who never understood it was poverty that was really killing him." People believe, in any case, that they are better when they have nothing left to show for or about themselves.

 

Maybe you can answer this question then. Since this was religious instruction. What race was considered to be the one marked by God for servitude?

All too often we are told that racism still exists either subtlely or rampantly depending on the source of the information. I would be curious to hear some personal experiences that are racist in nature. I'll only preface my observations by saying that, other than my workplace, I do not have many non-caucasian friends since my neightborhood, like most is mostly segregated. So I have not personally encountered any blatantly racist behavior. What are others experiences?

 

Is that not a personal experience that is a result of racism??

Maybe you can answer this question then. Since this was religious instruction. What race was considered to be the one marked by God for servitude?

 

In Southern Culture it was considered that the African race was the descendent of Ham and marked for servitude.

 

Not all Christian Faiths believed in Slavery. The Mennonites and Quakers were staunch abolitionists however the mainstream denominations by the 18th century on (Episcopal, Presbyterian, Baptist, etc) all began to make biblical cases for the practice of slavery.

 

A great resource for this debate is the book Slavery, Sabbath, War and Women by Willard M. Swartley. He does a lot of primary source discussion and utilizes the arguments of such Christian leaders as John Henry Hopkins an Episcopal Bishop of the 19th century and others such as Thorton Stringfellow of Richmond, VA and George Armstron of the Presbyterian church in Norfolk, VA.

 

The book is intended to outline the common arguments (biblical I might add) for the practice of slavery and indirectly race superiority. These arguments are counterbalanced in each section by the positions of those in the opposite camp.

 

Hope that answered the question you were asking but I'm not sure.

Our God is color blind in a colored world. :cool:

 

It is sad that man can't be the same too. :idunno::idunno: