Could "Separate but Equal" have worked............

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Race is biological. Culture is social and economic. They are quite distinct.

ruveyn

Hence my confusion. Is the original poster advocating keeping the races separate, or keeping the cultures separate?

Is he concerned with "cultural fusion", or "racial fusion?"

To clarify, Panda: "culture" is a code-word for "race." It is no longer considered socially appropriate to complain that other races are inferior, so racists instead will denounce a particular "culture" (identified as "gangsta culture," "MTV drone," etc) that is understood to refer to what they previously would have called "n****rs."

I don't see russell suggesting applying a policy to the entire world.

Here's a question. If America goes several more decades without solving the race problem and becoming truly post-racial, how would you feel, in theory, about the country fragmenting into: one territory for Whites, one territory for Blacks, territories for Native American tribes, and a multiracial territory for anyone who wanted to live there?

^ I was just asking if it was a viable system.

The USA after all did become the world's greatest power in all facets between 1865 and 1965............ and by an amazing coincidence maintaining "Separate but Equal" for most of those years....... ........ So it must have worked on some level. We won both WWars and developed the world's dominant economy despite clinging to such a backwards system, so its worth asking if it may be more viable than our current system?

(although mabye I should now call it "Distinct but Equal.") I need a new temporarily-PC code word.

Also, funny how the USA began to slip a little bit after 1965....... makes you sort of wonder???

Really, we haven't been quite where we were for a few decades now.

I think the pig really did fly.

Yeah, that likely wouldn't work. How would taxation issues be accomplished? Distribution issues? Even further, what about the background culture? Wouldn't that background culture hamper efforts towards proper distribution AND increase the cost of efforts of blacks to provide equal services to whites?

Yes ... and the Amish are another example here. Years ago, I belonged to a certain recreational club with property in a primarily-Amish county, and my efforts to welcome Amish people to some of our public events were politely ignored by our Amish neighbors. They were definitely not interested in "cultural fusion", and I believe their desire for maintaining "cultural segregation" should be respected.

As to matters of race: One of my daughters was once engaged to a black man, and I very strongly discouraged that potential marriage out of concern for the "cultural confusion" their children would eventually have to face. So, I still ask:

What is meant here by "Would it have 'worked'?"

If the goal is to protect bigotry, then no, nothing will ever do that successfully ... and I am glad about that.

Umm...... you haven't shown that separate but equal was responsible for US successes, and there is no reason to believe that US successes at the time were attributable to separate but equal. The US was one of the world's dominant economies before the Civil War, much of our growth as an economic power was driven by the north, as well as industrialization, which did not require high levels of education.

The question really isn't worth asking because the rejection of separate but equal and grounds for it are relatively well-known. That is that separate but equal reduces social cohesion by being in practice unjust to parties on the grounds of race (as well as the mere act of separation), that separate but equal in practice makes little sense as a means of distributing human capital improvements, and that there are not really benefits to it.


Not really, everybody knows what you are talking about. The justification does not appear to exist.


No, I don't really think so. The attribution doesn't seem reasonable given that there were a large number of trends around that time period, from hippies, to greater economic development, to new generations, and certainly a good amount of social movements.

I am going to have to say that given all of the trends, I would really guess that the real issue is economic driving socio-economics for a lot of the major issues, with perhaps social shifts due to the emerging political ideas of the day.


And I think you are likely just a racist looking for justification of those ideas. Now, we might argue whether or not the races are actually equal, but deep-down, the real question is going to focus on a person-by-person judgment I'd think.

^ I guess its perfectly fine to be a segregationist and not want to fuse your culture if you are Amish?

Surprised the diversity activists don't jump them more and make them bus disaffected youths from town into their schools or something.

The Amish set a bad example for sure by not mingling.

One factor that people really should start noting is that after World War II the industrial base of much of Continental Europe was destroyed. Americans were the only people with the infastructure to supply the world with certain types of manufactured goods. The rebuilding of continental Europe's industrial base introduced a new set of dynamics ... shall we say comeptition with the Americans?

People should just get over skin color already, it is just skin pigmentation for goodness sakes. Unless you are trying to describe someone to a cop cause you just witnessed a crime you shouldn't think of someone as black or white. The entire thing is stupid.

Distinct is synonymous with separate.

^ The commoners won't pick up on it, not for a few years at least.

That gives us time to think of something better.

There are a lot of criticisms to be made of the Amish, but the reason why their separatism is at least tolerated is because they were a group that already existed in a particular (sparsely populated) area and have just chosen to keep more or less to themselves. Southern Segregationists wish to take a large portion of the population that already lives there and prohibit them from being a part of the mainstream culture, and to deny them basic legal rights. There is a difference.

You do know that those words aren't always euphemisms for n****rs right? There are people who are smart enough to distinguish between genetics and subcultures. How is "MTV drone" even supposed to look like a euphemism anyways? MTV is more associated with suburban whites than anyone else.

Subcultural values in the ghetto are a much bigger issue than racism against blacks nowadays. Although nerdiness is generally seen as a bad thing in general, it's even worse in the ghettos where getting an education past high school is considered nerdy. f**k political correctness, I tell it like I see it.

Ace: I've seen multiple racists on here make reference to MTV as a euphemism for blacks. Why they think it makes sense, I have no idea, but I've never watched MTV.