How did you learn what racism is?

Post Reply New Topic

That is a very illogical statement to make on a web forum specifically geared towards providing a place for people of a given neurological background to congregate and meet. Is saying that we are neurologically divergent or within the spectrum divisive? I don't think so; it's talking about a palpable difference between two people. The same is going on when people talk about how racism effects a person of color.

The term "persons of color" excludes white people not because it seeks to exclude white people out of disgust or apathy; it excludes them because there are issue that white people just don't face...or, if they face these issues, they face them as drastically different rates then other persons. The categorization doesn't seek to exclude others, but to include all those people being affected by a given issue or series of issues.

If a woman talks about her inability to find a gynecologist and receive quality care as being a "women's issue", it's not because she seeks to exclude men; it's because the issue she is talking about is one that applies almost exclusively to women, as well as being an issue that many women experience in a similar fashion.

If a wheelchair bound person talks about their inability to find an entrance to a building they can use being a disability problem, they're not saying that able-bodied people should be allowed to use the building, or that any issue an able-bodied person has in the building are inherently unimportant; they're talking about an issue that they will have that an able-bodied person wouldn't have.

Same thing here; when they're talking about hiring biases against Persons of Color, or police biases against persons of color....they're excluding white people because these are biases taking a form that white people don't experience. If the conversation switched to one of classicism (i.e. people being judged on their upbringing/wealth/where they live/etc), then a poor white person in a trailer park would certainly be included in that discussion, in the same way a wealthy person of color that lived in a gated community would be excluded. Likewise, if the conversation becomes one of neurodivergence and social stigma, I join that conversation because my ethnic background isn't liable to have a great effect on that.

Hopefully that made sense.

It made sense, but don't you think a well-to-do person might be interested in a conversation that "switched to one of classicism?"

This person could surely have a different reason than "a poor white person in a trailer park," but how would that preclude someone from having an interest? Interest doesn't need to be direct.

But is the phrase "people of color" discriminatory against whites? I don't think I know any "white" people, although I know many that range from near-white to very brownish. So the phrase lumps ALL people who don't meet the qualification of "people of color" into another class, because their ancestors did not come from Asia, Africa, or Mexico (and points South).

Should the above be called discrimination if used to exclude someone from a conversation/Constitutional rights, or other public socio-economic function...???......possibly; depending on the situation it would certainly be possible.

In the same manner there are many people that visit this forum that would NOT be "people of a given neurological background" that could, and do, have an interest in what we do, although they may not be able to participate in a "first person" manner.

That is a very illogical statement to make on a web forum specifically geared towards providing a place for people of a given neurological background to congregate and meet.

Is saying that we are neurologically divergent or within the spectrum divisive? I don't think so; it's talking about a palpable difference between two people.

The same is going on when people talk about how racism effects a person of color.

The term "persons of color" excludes white people not because it seeks to exclude white people out of disgust or apathy; it excludes them because there are issue that white people just don't face...or, if they face these issues, they face them as drastically different rates then other persons.

The categorization doesn't seek to exclude others, but to include all those people being affected by a given issue or series of issues.

If a woman talks about her inability to find a gynecologist and receive quality care as being a "women's issue", it's not because she seeks to exclude men; it's because the issue she is talking about is one that applies almost exclusively to women, as well as being an issue that many women experience in a similar fashion.

If a wheelchair bound person talks about their inability to find an entrance to a building they can use being a disability problem, they're not saying that able-bodied people should be allowed to use the building, or that any issue an able-bodied person has in the building are inherently unimportant; they're talking about an issue that they will have that an able-bodied person wouldn't have.

Same thing here; when they're talking about hiring biases against Persons of Color, or police biases against persons of color....they're excluding white people because these are biases taking a form that white people don't experience.

If the conversation switched to one of classicism (i.e. people being judged on their upbringing/wealth/where they live/etc),

then a poor white person in a trailer park would certainly be included in that discussion, in the same way a wealthy person of color that lived in a gated community would be excluded.

Likewise, if the conversation becomes one of neurodivergence and social stigma, I join that conversation because my ethnic background isn't liable to have a great effect on that.

Hopefully that made sense.

That is a very illogical statement to make

"People of Color" is no more inherently a divisive term then "Neurological Divergent" or "Neurotypical".

When we use the convenient shortcut of 'neurotypical' vs 'everyone else', absolutely. Such would constitute an claim to 'special' status rather than 'different' status. "People of colour" serves only to separate the world into the categories of 'white' vs 'everyone else'. The phrase itself is intrinsically divisive - and, I contend, inherently racist.

When you open with a conclusion like that, you can be certain I'll be hyper-critical should you fail to back it up.

It's truly staggering to me that people on the spectrum so frequently fail to see the spuriosity of identity politics

I'm going to assume you mean 'classism'.

In my opinion, that entire response was one made in bad faith; I do not feel you were looking for truth, but that you were looking to be right.

For starters, the vast majority of you responses struck me as being meaningful because you didn't actually address my arguments as they where written. Rather, you seemed to purposely manipulate your own perspective in order to force them into fallacious states.

If you want to nit-pick semantics, fair enough; congratulations, you used a dictionary. However the meaning of a word varies by the context of it's use. This is the basics of language.

For example...



Divisive can indeed mean "forming or expressing division or distribution"....but it ALSO can mean "creating dissension" ([url="http://www.dictionary.com/browse/divisive?s=t"]definition[/url]).

It does not need to mean both at the same time every single time the word is used, and there is no reason to presume it does.....unless, of course, you wished to misrepresent me from the get go.

It's reasonable to think that; you certain engaged in a double standard from the jump.

For example take the first quote....



...and contrast that statement against the second quote.



So...when someone else says a statement that you take issue with? It's exposed to a "hyper-critical" analysis

...a form of analysis which you won't bother to use for your you own statements, where you take opinions and pass them off as fact in the smuggest, most condescending way possible.

This is the most drastic example, but by no means isolated; you dismissed things as "apple and oranges" without actually citing your reason for feeling the situations are inherently incompatible.

Again...this is your hyper-critical analysis

you're claiming you want to expose my statements to logical rigor.

..but that's not what happens; what actually happens is little more than saying "You're wrong because I said so".

You wanna call apples and oranges (and lemons )? Fine...but then you need to actually call it. If you are making the claim? Then it's on you to prove it,

and your assertion that I'm wrong isn't actually proof.

Making assertions you don't back up with meaningful facts or information is just noise.

Really though, if anything is proof of your intentions? This is...



Passive aggressively getting on me over a typo?

Real classy, dude.

I mean, we could talk about how the word "racism" is being attached more towards circumstances where racial bigotry is enforced by someone with power. It would also be worth noting that acknowledging racist categorizations isn't the same as empowering racism, as the division would exist with or without out implicit acknowledgement. If the division exists without our implicit acknowledgement, then it continues to effect the world.

But if you're thinking I was trying to argue that dividing people into group wasn't actually dividing people into groups

and that spelling errors have to be called out in a mocking fashion?

If that's the way you want to go?

Why bother responding to you;

it's clear intellectual honesty has no value in this discussion..

ZenDen, I'm going to have to take your response apart. Thank you, however, for responding to me in the same manner I spoke to you; it's nice to have an honest discussion about important issues without having to endure vitriol or acid.



Well, if we are talking about things from an angle of "I am interested in this subject matter, and I wish to effect this subject matter in some way"? There is nothing excluding you from having interest. The only thing you are truly excluded from is claiming that "interest" is the same as "personally relevant". For example: I am interested in seeing a cure for cancer....but I don't have cancer myself, nor am I a cancer survivor. Conversations around how cancer effects someone who suffers from some form of that are, by their nature, going to exclude me. Not because they seek to malign me or discount me, but because I know nothing about them...at least, not the way a cancer sufferer or survivor is going to know about them.

Cancer sufferers/survivors aren't going to exclude me (unless one of them is some sort of jerks, but jerks are everywhere so you run that risk where ever you are) from expressing interest and sympathy with their experiences, suffering, and issues. They're not going to reject me, all things being equal, from helping them with their difficulties. So we're talking about two different things.

Simply put, "interest" is not the same as "personally relevant"...and that's okay.



Hoo boy...a LOT to unpack here. So I'll try and give you a reader's digest version.

The long and short of it is that "White" is a modern invention. It didn't really exist, in any form until the last few centuries. At first, it was a way for aristocratic and affluent persons of a handful of European cultures to distinguish themselves from other cultures and ethnic background perceived as "less cultured" and "less dignified" and even "less human". Over time, it changed and morphed with the culture. So yeah...when you say "I don't think I know any 'white' people...'? YOU ARE CORRECT! Technically, none of us do...because "whiteness" is a relatively recent invention.

However....we are talking about how cultures and societies as a whole view the world. Your individual opinion, as well as my individual opinion, aren't really relevant factors. American culture and society, as a whole, treats Persons of Color (which we could LOOSELY define as "anyone perceived as not-predominantly European in ethnicity")differently then it treats people it perceives as White. Whether the term "White" means anything concrete isn't really as relevant as it should be.

And there are objective ways to confirm this bias. If you'd like, go and look up the incarceration rates for Black Males versus White Males. Then, compare those percentages versus census results; look up how much of the American population is a Black Male and how many are White Males. Discrepancies like this exist all over the place.

By the fact that you can look up population statistics by whether someone is "White" or "Black" shows us that these words DO mean something to the society we live in, even if those words mean nothing to any group of individuals.



As a White, Cisgendered, Heterosexual Male who hangs out with a lot of people who are....well...none of those things in some cases? I have never been excluded from a conversation on any topics related to social justice topics. So I'm not sure where this question comes from. It certainly doesn't represent my own, personal experiences. Is this something you have experienced, someone you know has experienced, or is this more of a hypothetical concern?



Exactly my point, actually; we've called ourselves out and said "We are within the Autisic Spectrum. This is what we are; it's not all of us, but it is a part of us. Come in and learn about us and hang out or whatever; just don't be a jerk.". We don't have to discard labels to make ourselves approachable, because we still allow people to join conversations. In fact, discarding the labels would actually damage communication considerably...because it would take a lot longer to parse who has first hand knowledge and who does not.

"People of Color" is no more inherently a divisive term then "Neurological Divergent" or "Neurotypical".