# Reflections on History



## SueC (Jun 10, 2020)

I hope this is okay for discussion.

Art McDonald, Ph.D. (Pittsburg Univ.), had an interesting article online, entitled "How the Irish became White." Being Irish, I gave it a read, and discovered something that might be helpful in today's troubled environment.

He basically said that the life of Irish poor in their homeland in the mid-1800's, was similar to the life of a freed black slave here in the United States. They owned nothing, lived in shanties, worked for little or no wages and were often beaten for mistakes. As a result of the Irish Potato Famine (1845-1849), many of Erin's men brought their families to the United States, looking for a better life. When they arrived, they found that the only difference between them and the American freed slaves was the color of their skin. They lived in the same poverty, worked with the same low income and were housed in places that should have been demolished.

However, despite their similarities, which should have been instrumental in creating unity among both groups, the Irish - because they were white - decided to side with the oppressor of the black race, in order to advance themselves. As McDonald put it, the Irish forgot they were "green."

". . . ultimately, the Irish made the decision to embrace whiteness, thus becoming part of the system which dominated and oppressed blacks. Although it contradicted their experience back home, it meant freedom here since blackness meant slavery."

<link>

Another quote - "And so, we have the tragic story of how one oppressed "race," Irish Catholics, learned how to collaborate in the oppression of another "race," Africans in America, in order to secure their place in the white republic. Becoming white meant losing their greenness, i.e., their Irish cultural heritage and the legacy of oppression and discrimination back home. Imagine if the Irish had remained green after their arrival and formed an alliance with their fellow oppressed co-workers, the free blacks of the North. Imagine if they had chosen to include their black brothers and sisters in the union movement to wage a class battle against the dominant white culture which ruthlessly pitted them against one another."

Food for thought or writing fact or fiction, going forward. Just imagine . . .


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## dither (Jun 10, 2020)

Food for thought indeed.
Interesting post SueC.


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## Aquarius (Jun 10, 2020)

'An essential part of every human being’s earthly curriculum is getting to know the nature of suffering. That’s why in some of our lifetimes we find ourselves at the giving end of suffering and during others at its receiving end. When the persecutors and/or oppressors of this lifetime in a future one play the role of the persecuted and/or oppressor, it’s the same spirit/souls each time appearing in a different guise familiarising themselves with two aspects of the same lesson. For as long as one has no idea of the other one’s existence, human beings are bound to think of earthly life as something very unfair and unjust. What kind of a place is it where some are suffocating in wealth and good living while others are starving by the roadside?

‘It’s a double bookkeeping system if ever there was one! When viewed from that perspective, the macabre dance of killing and being killed represents nothing but an entry first on the debit side and then on the credit side of someone’s spiritual bankbook. This is constantly taking place in the process of attending to the many lessons of the earthly school of life’s curriculum. And that’s how the infinite wisdom and love of the Great Father/Mother have always been teaching His/Her beloved children of the Earth. Fortunately, the lesson of getting to know the nature of suffering is not meant to continue forever. And that no doubt is why God and the Angels gave humankind the Buddha legend such a long time ago. Its teachings are the instrument every one of you needs to bring their own part and that of your whole world of this lesson to its predestined natural end.

From a new part of my writings about the Buddha legend in preparation now.

* * *​


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## Neetu (Jun 10, 2020)

No one likes oppression and people will do whatever it takes to overcome it. The Irish were naturally white and had the advantage of gaining the acceptance of the dominant white race. Had they been of a different color, I am certain this would not have been possible.


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## dither (Jun 10, 2020)

Neetu said:


> No one likes oppression and people will do whatever it takes to overcome it. The Irish were naturally white and had the advantage of gaining the acceptance of the dominant white race. Had they been of a different color, I am certain this would not have been possible.



They, the Irish, as you say, " were naturally white "..... looking for a new start, in a new world,,,, " and had the advantage of gaining acceptance of the dominant white race ". And, again, as you say, " had they been a different colour "........ Would they even have shipped out? Who knows what might have been?
When push comes to shove it's dog eat dog. Law of the jungle applies. :|


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## SueC (Jun 10, 2020)

Neetu said:


> No one likes oppression and people will do whatever it takes to overcome it. The Irish were naturally white and had the advantage of gaining the acceptance of the dominant white race. Had they been of a different color, I am certain this would not have been possible.



But what if they had not been "naturally white?" No, that's not what I mean. I'm thinking, no matter the color, what would our history look like if the Irish were to stand with black people back then, instead of standing with the whites? What if color wasn't even a determining factor? What if it was something else entirely, like fallen arches, or baldness. 

This was not about the white race accepting the Irish, but more about the Irish abandoning their culture and wanting to be a part of the white movement, oppressing black people.

I believe it would have been a different history all together.


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## Neetu (Jun 10, 2020)

Sue, what if color were never an issue? What if white Europeans had not ventured into the east and exploited the Africans, the Indians and so many islands where there was poverty and want to establish their own power, ransack the resources and enslave the natives? What if is a good question and I wish it had been played out differently. The truth about human nature is that it seeks to control. I don't think the Irish (lovely people though they are, I know and have known many) could ever have, or would ever have identified with the slaves with black skin, fought against the white to elevate their position. Your hypothetical question is kind and thoughtful, but were such a thing possible, it would have happened. It wasn't, and it didn't. Sadly. 



SueC said:


> But what if they had not been "naturally white?" No, that's not what I mean. I'm thinking, no matter the color, what would our history look like if the Irish were to stand with black people back then, instead of standing with the whites? What if color wasn't even a determining factor? What if it was something else entirely, like fallen arches, or baldness.
> 
> This was not about the white race accepting the Irish, but more about the Irish abandoning their culture and wanting to be a part of the white movement, oppressing black people.
> 
> I believe it would have been a different history all together.


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## TL Murphy (Jun 11, 2020)

It was not a matter of the Irish "joining" African Americans. The Irish are like anyone else, they sought whatever opportunity and  economic advantage that was available to them. Being white, not black, they simply did not suffer the same kind of oppression that blacks did, no matter what that idiot McDonald says. The biggest difference is that ths Irish had a choice. They came to America of their own free will ans arrived  poor but free. Africans had no choice and were not free and still do not share the same freedoms of white Americans. No one in their right mind would chose to live as African Americans were forced to live, even after emancipation. Being white in America means you are privileged. That's all there is to it.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

Sue, I would like to recommend a book to you— Homegoing by Yaa Gyaasi.It is going to break your heart, but please read it if you can.


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## RHPeat (Jun 11, 2020)

_*Bigotry is not confined to racism. *_

_It also includes: _
_*Ideology *– as religion and spiritual beliefs, Quakers, Jewish, Catholics, Primitives. 
*Body configuration* – as the crippled, every thing from hand injuries to the lame, canes wheelchairs and crutches, midgets and dwarves. 
*The loss of sensory abilities* – as the blind, deaf, and diseased with skin deformities. 
*Intelligence or what appears to be strange behavior *– as the mentally disabled, the extremely intelligent, Aspergers syndrome, Autism, Tourette syndrome, Dyslexia, speech impediments of any sort, even if it is from some accident that left the person disfigured. _
_*Culture and nationality *— Name any nationality or culture. Somebody doesn't like them for who they are. 

*If you wish to identify a bigot. Wait for them to say: dirty, stupid, unfit, inhuman: thieves, liers and cheaters as a group of people. *They will always use these adjectives when relating to their bigotry to make those they dislike to feel or look unable for society as a whole, when many hold jobs and do good work. _

*History as we know it today!*

_I used to teach the developmentally disabled; They were my clients; I worked for those that had Developmentally Disabilities — one of the job sites where they performed their duties was at a local laundry doing the gem-towels for a local gem. They were busy in the laundromat washing, drying and folding the towels. This gentleman arrives in a suit; he comes in and says why are these people in here, they shouldn't be allowed in here. Ranting on bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, bla, etc.  They should be all euthanized it you ask me. 

Oops! That didn't pass with me. "Hey stop it! came out of my mouth before I realized it. These were my friends he was speaking about. _

_I had to inform the bigot that they had as much right to be in the laundromat as anyone else doing laundry. The were doing real work as productive citizens in the community at large and they were doing the towels for the gem; which was just one of many different duties they performed each week. _

_That's right, because they were in "His space" and looked strange to him; he wanted to kill them all.  

a poet friend
RH Peat_


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## dither (Jun 11, 2020)

Neetu said:


> Sue, I would like to recommend a book to you— Homegoing by Yaa Gyaasi.It is going to break your heart, but please read it if you can.




I wonder if I could get that through the public-library-system, if they ever re-open that is.

Curious.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

dither, very likely. I got it through mine. My library has been closed also but they offer online digital downloads of many books during this lockdown. That’s how i read it. I dislike ereading, but I’ve learned to accept it during this crisis. 




dither said:


> I wonder if I could get that through the public-library-system, if they ever re-open that is.
> 
> Curious.


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## dither (Jun 11, 2020)

Neetu said:


> dither, very likely. I got it through mine. My library has been closed also but they offer online digital downloads of many books during this lockdown. That’s how i read it. I dislike ereading, but I’ve learned to accept it during this crisis.



Can't e-read right now, computer-problems.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

oh I’m sorry. Maybe when they open again. 



dither said:


> Can't e-read right now, computer-problems.


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## dither (Jun 11, 2020)

Will have a look Neetu.

It IS available on a e-read site that I use but I can't read on  there until I get my computer fixed.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

Of course, Biro. It’s a work of historical fiction tracking several generations within more than one family from Africa to America, the origins of both slave sellers and buyers, the English traders as well as the African leaders in villages and towns who supplied them. It is a very complex plot which interweaves all the factors that contributed to the slave export. Nothing is black and white; it takes you into a realm that challenges every principle we hold to be true. It starts with the story of one woman and spreads through entire generations over a few centuries.  



Biro said:


> Do we get a clue as to what it is about Neetu?


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## SueC (Jun 11, 2020)

Neetu said:


> Sue, I would like to recommend a book to you— Homegoing by Yaa Gyaasi.It is going to break your heart, but please read it if you can.



Thank you Neetu. Always looking to learn and I appreciate the recommendation. I think my daughter read that book in her bookclub, which I had not attended. Thanks again!


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## Dluuni (Jun 11, 2020)

RHPeat said:


> *Bigotry is not confined to racism. *
> If you wish to identify a bigot. Wait for them to say: dirty, stupid, unfit, inhuman: thieves, liers and cheaters as a group of people. They will always use these adjectives when relating to their bigotry to make those they dislike to feel or look unable for society as a whole, when many hold jobs and do good work.


Oh yeah, I know this. I've gotten it here. More aphobia than transphobia or racism, though sometimes I still stumble across somebody elsewhere out in the world telling me that my people were horrible savages. Racism is popular, transphobia doesn't play well lately so mostly it slips through the cracks, but people don't realize that they are being horribly aphobic by explaining how desire and attraction are necessary to being human ("inhuman"), something everyone has to start to understand eventually ("stupid"), and that people who don't show those traits are people they associate with criminality ("thieves, liars, and cheats").
They fight very hard to refuse to accept that that's a hurtful thing to say. They always do.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

Good luck on the computer repair, dither. Hope it's nothing too major. 



dither said:


> Will have a look Neetu.
> 
> It IS available on a e-read site that I use but I can't read on  there until I get my computer fixed.


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

No, it isn't, Ron, and I agree. We were just addressing the topic of color and race with regard to the subject introduced by Sue, but it is very true that bigotry extends far beyond skin color and race discrimination. 



RHPeat said:


> _*Bigotry is not confined to racism. *_
> 
> _It also includes: _
> _*Ideology *– as religion and spiritual beliefs, Quakers, Jewish, Catholics, Primitives.
> ...


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## Neetu (Jun 11, 2020)

You're welcome, Sue. It was, in fact, my daughter who introduced me to the book. 



SueC said:


> Thank you Neetu. Always looking to learn and I appreciate the recommendation. I think my daughter read that book in her bookclub, which I had not attended. Thanks again!


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## RHPeat (Jun 11, 2020)

Neetu said:


> No, it isn't, Ron, and I agree. We were just addressing the topic of color and race with regard to the subject introduced by Sue, but it is very true that bigotry extends far beyond skin color and race discrimination.



Neetu

The Irish weren't colored either, but they were discriminated against as well, as Sue says. The Irish were segregated into the slums with the black population as I'm sure the book that Sue is reading states. Believe me they felt the blade of self hatred that comes with indignation as an outsider, James Baldwin talks about this at great length. There's great interview with him on U-tube.

With the Irish — "Hell's Kitchen ran with blood", and the gangs were rampant as well due to the ghettos. Do some reading about New York Irish gangs after the potato famine, and you will discover what I'm talking about. This discrimination even involved members of my own family for generations that came from Ireland to New York to later settle in Iowa as quakers. That includes Bean's husband's family also. His father worked his way out of the slums after WWII where his family was stuck for generations in "Hell's Kitchen". The slander for an Irishman is a "Mic". And for the French it's a "frog." And I"ve been called both in my lifetime. Because I have Irish mother and French father. 

The privileged white Americans cannot be satisfied because of their fear of differences, and that clauses more discrimination beyond what is imaginable. It is the reason why it is still happening today. In the times of Rome, the Greeks were made slaves — the center of Western Civilization which the Roman's copied. Even slavery in American was not just blacks. Indentured servitude kept people in bondage until many of them died, and the native people were put on reservations and staved. the only good Indian was a dead one. How's that for discrimination. The Japanese Americans were held in bondage for the length of the war and lost everything their families owned. Fear does weird things to people. German immigrants were not put into concentration camps at all during the war. 

A similar kind of thing happened in Australia concerning English prisoners and the aborigines. And in Canada as well with the French and British controlling the Native peoples of the Americas. All children in both countries were take from their parents when they started to walk, and they were put into private prisons that were called "schools." Run by the Catholic Church, I might add. It was a sick bit of business. A lot of hate still exists in those cultures today due to the treatment that they received. Again two different colors of people as White and Red put into the same sort of situation as the Irish and blacks — in those countries. Some native families lost their native heritage. And interestingly the French are a minority in Canada. 

So in a way I was talking about what Sue started as a topic on. But times have changed since then in America. And now Asians as well as mideastern nationalities are discriminated against. Which I sure you can attest to as well. Basically it's anyone that is different than the privileged whites and that does include some whites that aren't privileged; as Sue stated in her original statement which included the Irish people. 

Like a said above with it's inclusive Due what Sue said — name a nationality and someone hates them for some bigoted reason. That includes the Irish as foreigners, and Native Americans as the indigenous people. If you lose a war you can become a lower class citizen in a country of the land of the free and the brave while using repeating rifles against bows and arrows. Ha! 

My point is — what Sue is reading about is not an isolated case with just the Irish. If you wish to talk about it. Let's put the whole hog on the table. America has some nasty history for us all to Baer witness too. You want color differences take on white and red as well as white and black. Take of the shape of eyes between American whites and Asian countries considered yellow. It's all the same horror story concerning loving peoples who care for family, home and nation. The answer is personal respect and not vindictive attack. 

A poet friend
RHeat


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## ppsage (Jun 12, 2020)

Hi Sue. In the first place I, at least, think this is a great topic, history always is, although it's probably inevitable that it ends up being treated anachronistically. Historians sometimes call a hypothesis such as yours a counterfactual, and there are actually ideas published about what makes one useful or not. Useful  counterfactuals let us understand more clearly the ramifications of events. They usually must confine themselves to quite specific occasions and decisions. What if Lincoln had survived the assassination attempt? Maybe as large as what if the Nazis hadn't invaded the Soviet Union? I would say that the one you propose is kind of fraught with difficulty, mostly because it contains massive sociological generalizations and leaves no realistic way to work through the historical contingencies arising therefrom. I might contend for instance, that in a historical context, there is no such thing as "the Irish in America." The potato famine refugees came to America over a decade or more, and only around doubled the population of persons of Irish extraction living in the U. S. Many had come over the course of the Eighteenth Century, many settled in the South, some were quite wealthy and owned plantations. (There is a famous fictional Irish family, whose story has recently been removed from Netflix, who even named their plantation Tara.) Many of the Irish who came during the 40's and 50's did not settle in N. Y. C. They worked on railroads or in the goldfields etc. and had little opportunity to interact with blacks at all. N. Y. C was, in the Civil War era, a very special case, the only place in the U. S. where a nascent proletariat was developing, labor strife having occurred there as far back as the Jackson administration. OTOH, important abolition societies existed in the old country who contributed to the movement here. And on and on I could probably ramble, but the point is that there is really no creditable way historically to create the supposed groups and to bring them into alliance, much less to trace their progress through plausible events to any reliable resolution. It's just too many actors, with too many juxtaposed motivations, with too much complication.


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## Neetu (Jun 12, 2020)

Ron,

Sue's point raised the question about color and identity. The Irish are/were white. Ultimately aligned with the white oppressors, they overcame the oppression. Yes, I do know about the Potato Famine, I do know they lived in squalor and degradation during the early immigration period. They were oppressed, yes. But I don't believe, for a moment, that the similarities extend to the level at which black slaves endured cruelty. Not only that, four hundred years later, in 2020, the Irish are not being incarcerated in thousands, killed in police custody, choked on the streets of America in broad daylight for a $20 counterfeit check, or shot inside their homes for no reason other than their color being associated with wrong-doing. There is absolutely no comparison, Ron, no matter which way you read history, what is happening to black Americans today, or even on the slave ships on which they were shipped like cattle and coal to the west, can be put on the same scale as the servitude of the Irish 400 years ago. There are degrees of servitude, and that of black Africans was like no other, not just in America, but in Europe as well. And yes, the cruelty of the whites against the Native populations of these conquered lands, and continuing discrimination, bigotry, inequity, deprivation also is a fact.
I don't think you and I are on different sides of the discussion. 

My initial response to Sue was about the fact of Irish whiteness which helped them overcome their period of oppression. 

An interesting read here, in case you have the time:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/17/us/irish-slaves-myth.html




RHPeat said:


> Neetu
> 
> The Irish weren't colored either, but they were discriminated against as well, as Sue says. The Irish were segregated into the slums with the black population as I'm sure the book that Sue is reading states. Believe me they felt the blade of self hatred that comes with indignation as an outsider, James Baldwin talks about this at great length. There's great interview with him on U-tube.
> 
> ...


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## RHPeat (Jun 12, 2020)

Neetu

We're on the same page. It is all corruption of moral values. I too have black people in my family. I know about the hatred because I've Been called the N word when with my grand daughter. Some man even threatened her life when she was 3 years old. Bigotry is still here and still trying to push black Americans down to poverty level. At the grocery store with my granddaughter in the shopping cart some bigot said to his wife about us, look what this guy bought, I wonder if they have anymore. Hey tell me about it. I've experienced it first hand. They hate before thinking, and that is outright dangerous. 

a poet friend
RH Peat


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## RHPeat (Jun 12, 2020)

Biro — you have some Big misjudgments in your statements. Name your sources if they are history. 

Mics = MacGrath, MacQuire, McSweeney, McCann, McCauley, McAwley, MacBride, MacCapbe, McCormack, MacCullagh, MacCarthy, MacDermot, MacElroy, MacEvoy, MacGee, MacGill, MacGinn, MacGovern, McGowan, MacHugh, MacInerney, MacHillhanny, MacKenna, MacLoughlin, MacMahon, MacManus, MacNally, McNamara, MacNulty, MacQuaid, Macquillan, MacSweeney, 

Just to mention a few. 
The Irish knew what they were saying. By the inflection and the tone. They were inferring their families were rubbish and ignorant, because they were outsiders. They actually were the workforce for the Railroad going west while the Chinese were coming east from San Francisco over the Sierras. Anther population that was discriminated against. None were allowed to have or acquire citizenship for over a hundred years in this country. Yeah, everyone knows there is a China Town, that is where the "Chinks" live. Another derogative naming. Usually accompanied by dirty or stupid or both. 

The two of them can say, "Thanks American for letting us build your Transcontinental Railroad while humping our backs with hammers and wheelbarrows so you fat boys can get richer."  And the US Government wrote the Native Americans off at the same time by giving away their lands as land grants to the Railroad (Southern Pacific). 

America — What we want we take; what we need we use up and discard. It's still happening today.  The biggest issue with Native Americans today is "LAND!". If you want to know why read Tomas King's book "the Inconvenient Indian." Learn about the "Red Man" too. You know the one I'm talking about. 

What was it Custer Said, "The only good Indian is a dead Indian." They didn't even rate slavery. They had no value, at least slaves were worth more alive than dead. The indigos people were exterminated. I think they call that genocide. And it is still going on today by poisoning their reservations. That's because they never had any value to the whites at all, and still don't have any value. You think blacks have it bad? Check out some of the reservations where the Native Americans live in Wyoming and New Mexico. One X-president is out building them houses for them, Jimmy Carter. Look it up on the internet, under his name.

a poet friend
RH Peat


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## Olly Buckle (Jun 12, 2020)

Them and us allows people to do things to them they would not dream of doing to us. Seems like just about every organised society has slavery up until about a couple of hundred years ago. The slavers who captured African slaves for shipment to America were Africans themselves, in about 500AD Dublin was probably the biggest slave market in the world, the South American cultures were into it big time. It doesn't happen with hunter gatherers where the group is small enough that everyone is us, not them. I don't see it as strange at all that the American Irish 'sold out' to the system, what do you want to do? Stay one of them or become one of us?


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## Neetu (Jun 12, 2020)

Ron,
It’s an awful feeling and there is really no word that can adequately describe the wounds such people inflict.


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## RHPeat (Jun 13, 2020)

Biro

I'm just interested in your sources so I can read them as well. I'm interested in what you are saying, but I have also very different information from other sources. And the internet is not to be trusted when it come to thing that seek to be hidden from public eyes. And Yes, America is great for keeping the poor locked down. In fact the rich are trying reduce the size of the middle classes and reduces their educations as well to control them more. 

a poet friend
RHPeat


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## Olly Buckle (Jun 13, 2020)

> Chink's or Chinkie is a universal worldwide nickname for those people and their food.



Yes, it is a way of making them them and not us. Unfortunately we have a world where the leaders in both Britain and the US seem intent on this, it is a first step toward different treatment for us and them. It is also pretty universal among racists and elitists. Japanese slang for you ,for example, translates roughly as 'Hairy barbarian', making you definitely one of them.


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## Olly Buckle (Jun 13, 2020)

> The Japanese were taught that Westerners were sub human and not worth the shite on your shoe. One of the reasons for the extremely bad treatment of captured servicemen in the war.



Historical, my generation grew up under American occupation, mostly a lot of white guys who looked down on them, but there was a lot of fraternisation with black American servicemen, underdogs together. I have met with the odd right wing, racist Japanese, but my main experience is that stopped in about 1946 when the whole education system was taken over.

Just a thought, did they ever bus white kids to black schools in Southern states?


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## dither (Jun 13, 2020)

Biro said:


> And so on.   You could actually turn every word and every action and event into a racist, anti something and all that would be achieved is that you cripple yourselves with anxiety.




Where's it all going and where/when will it all end? imo.


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## midnightpoet (Jun 28, 2020)

How far back does this go, this human need to be better than someone else?  You can say the Greeks looked down on the Romans, the Romans looked down on the barbarians, the barbarians became oppressors when the Normans routed the  Anglo-Saxons, who before looked down on the Celts...(ect)

Actually this goes back even further, to groups of hominids fighting over carrion on the African savanna.  Which, of course, makes this whole thing about being "better" than someone else rather ironic.

I know I'm over-simplifying the above (not to mention being somewhat inaccurate), but it's a human thing to cling to tribalism, to the us vs them attitude, to think we're somehow better that the other person.  I wish I could say things are better, but I'm not too hopeful about it.  Social progress tends to be slow, unfortunately.


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## qwertyman (Jun 28, 2020)

midnightpoet said:


> How far back does this go, this human need to be better than someone else?  You can say the Greeks looked down on the Romans, the Romans looked down on the barbarians, the barbarians became oppressors when the Normans routed the  Anglo-Saxons, who before looked down on the Celts...(ect)
> 
> ... it's a human thing to cling to tribalism, to the us vs them attitude, to think we're somehow better that the other person.  I wish I could say things are better, but I'm not too hopeful about it.  Social progress tends to be slow, unfortunately.



Agreed.

I think it’s about time the ‘globalists’ acknowledge ‘tribalism’ is here to stay.  There’s nothing wrong with tribalism, it’s a natural state, as is sub-tribalism. The globalists should sit down and stop trying to force their philosophy on others who don’t need it.
Tribes can be supportive of other tribes they can also be, and often are, hostile. The task is not to force us all into one large tribe but to concentrate on peaceful co-habitation.


NOTE: I am presenting ‘tribal’ in its widest association.


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## TL Murphy (Jun 30, 2020)

debunked myths about slavery: https://www.history.com/news/5-myths-about-slavery?li_source=LI&li_medium=m2m-rcw-history


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## SueC (Jun 30, 2020)

midnightpoet said:


> How far back does this go, this human need to be better than someone else?  You can say the Greeks looked down on the Romans, the Romans looked down on the barbarians, the barbarians became oppressors when the Normans routed the  Anglo-Saxons, who before looked down on the Celts...(ect)
> 
> Actually this goes back even further, to groups of hominids fighting over carrion on the African savanna.  Which, of course, makes this whole thing about being "better" than someone else rather ironic.
> 
> I know I'm over-simplifying the above (not to mention being somewhat inaccurate), but it's a human thing to cling to tribalism, to the us vs them attitude, to think we're somehow better that the other person.  I wish I could say things are better, but I'm not too hopeful about it.  Social progress tends to be slow, unfortunately.



One summer I gave up my normal job and worked for a summer youth program. It's focus was low-income children, many of them immigrants, and it was my job to recruit, interview and give them a summer job. When all that was over, I was to supervise them at the job sites - cleaning schools, working in libraries, etc.

All of the rest of the staff were teachers, and one Asian man was very helpful to me in understanding the type of families I was dealing with. He, in the city we lived in, was instrumental in helping other Asian families adjust to life in the Midwest. He said black people were abusive to Asian people and when I said I was confused by that generalization, he said that white people demean black people and so the black people had to demean other newcomers, to show their strength, that they were superior to someone. He said they hated Asians, just because they were new and they were not like them. I was amazed I had not seen this before.

Isn't it funny how we condemn injustices and prejudice, but it seems a typical pattern for humans, no matter who you are or where you live; whether you have money or not. It's helpful to try and understand how a group of people feels, but I wonder if it will always be this way. It's kind of disheartening, isn't it?


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## TL Murphy (Jul 1, 2020)

SueC, the world isn’t like it used to be. For eons the population on the planet was stable - something around a million people. Agriculture and eventually the industrial revolution allowed exponential rises in human population. Antibiotics and vaccines caused another population explosion. When I was a kid, the world population was around 3 billion. Now it’s almost 8 billion.  It has nearly tripled in my lifetime. If we are to survive as a species, we are going to have to change some old behaviours. We can not continue to display the darker side of “human nature.”  As society becomes more and more complex, so do the affairs of human interaction. We can talk about the natural origins of racism all we want but we are now at a point that if we continue these imbedded behaviours we will simply wipe ourselves out.


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## TL Murphy (Jul 1, 2020)

You're probably right, Biro. But being human I would like to see the species survive. And to do that I believe, collectively, we have to change. You?


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## midnightpoet (Jul 1, 2020)

You can look back at the development of agriculture, then the rise of cities, then city-states ,and the rest of history becomes one war after another.  I can see how overpopulation and crowded conditions give rise to frustration ,anger, and violence.  But yes, we need to reconsider the old traditions and behaviors, and many need to be thrown into the dust bin of history.  Learning to respect each other and our differences can help improve things, but many cultures have traditions that (for example) hate other cultures, but even though it's a cliche, positive change often only start with a reflection in the mirror.  Easy to say, of course - but looking at yourself realizing your errors and attitudes need changing is hard (but not impossible).  

"Tolerance" is a word I've often heard is an ideal ,but what does one culture do with another that keeps violating human rights and dignity?  What does one country do if another won't stop being belligerent?

"The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind." Bob Dylan, of course, but it doesn't need to be the final answer.


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## SueC (Jul 1, 2020)

TL Murphy said:


> You're probably right, Biro. But being human I would like to see the species survive. And to do that I believe, collectively, we have to change. You?



One of the things I have noticed recently is that many, many people in the US seem to have forgotten the concept of "melting pot" that was used to describe residents of this country in the past. These individuals seem to think the only appropriate American is white - not Hispanic or African or Asian. What happened to that idea, that melting pot, where we celebrated the idea that we appreciated everyone!

"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" Emma Lazarus

Those words have always evoked such emotion in me, thinking of how comforting it must read to those "tempest tossed" individuals who make it to our shore. Tim, you are right. ". . . the world isn't like it used to be."


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## Jp (Jul 5, 2020)

This whole situation in USA, that is now spreading to other countries, has me not even able to write about it.I have history too, and folk I cherish of all colors do too. We say that the Africans were enslaved by whites and that the Irish were indentured servants and the the poor in England were also indentured servants. This is the terminology of the day, but was it reality for the three groups, and what exactly does this word slave mean?

Does in mean all of the things that modern educational sources have advanced or does it mean its definition.

The dictionary says a slave is a person who is legal property of another and is forced to obey them. Wikipedia says that the Irish People were never slaves and states the whole thing is a myth, but what they do not tell you is that, yes, in America, when the Irish arrived they were not slaves in the modern sense of the word as there was a possibility of some date of release, but they neglect to mention the 1.2 million white Irish, English, etc that were abducted from there home lands and turned into slaves, by any sense of the word, during the Barbary slave trade. Moreover, don't forget to ignore the Ottoman Empire. Now lets got back to that terminology again modern pundits would have a slaves condition be inescapable by time alone, so naturally all Irish 'indentured servants' were not slaves by this logic, ignore the definition. There is more to this story though, you see the Irish threw out the Brits from their country. Yeats, Lady Gregory, and Joyce to some degree helped give back the Irish People some of their identity, and for a time they threw out the Brits, later simply gaining 'home rule,' in a battle against Goliath they could not win. This small victory led to massive hatred of the Irish, the racism of it's day. When these indentured Irish hit American coasts they had their backs to the wall. They ran from a place that was in the middle of a war, but found the hatred had followed them (ever wonder why Irish were so hated), these debts that had to be paid were in many cases they key to even what we would consider with modern soft terminology, slavery.Say you wanted to pay that debt so you signed up for the Mexican American War only to be sent out again and again until you died in the bloodiest war ever on American soil. 


The indentured servants, the poor, who lived for the land owner were the bottom end of a spectrum of oppression,the Irish simply don't match a modern ideal of slavery, and Africans the other end of that same oppression. What is more pressing is why is that we are being led away from talking about oppression and instead focusing on semantics? It might just might have to do with the money that was once the East India Trading Company would end up being traceable to the world banks, which in turn would end up owning the majority of news networks, which in turn would keep us from realizing that one cannot fight oppression divided. United we stand, divided we fall.


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## Jp (Jul 5, 2020)

I do not know this white privilege speak of, unless you are saying wealthy white privilege, and in that case it would be a class privilege. My grandmother survived the depression eating flower and water and what ever they could manage to grow, had no money to speak of but were so poor they didn't notice how bad things got for those who had forgotten old world skills. My father was raised like that,and he was a cheap skate if you ever saw one. The only example of white privilege one could peg on me is the school system in America and how it is funded, and all that for me was thrown out when I got a superintendents wife fired from my elementary school, but that is semantics. The American school systems funding based on tax base needs changed, I agree. For me, there is no such thing, I worked hard after having an even harder start and built my own business. Self employed is a hard road that no one tell you about. No one tells you, you need to get them credit cards when you are 18 and build them up so you can have credit because if you continue down this road you will be considered high risk with no credit due to the reason posted on the envelope – AVOIDING THE CREDIT SYSTEM.  Well, long story I worked hard saved my money, bought a house, flipped it for double and walked out will 100,000 cash in my pocket at 35 years old. All mine and the wife’s we earned it.  And then, we go to buy a house and get the screwing of a lifetime when we have to back out and loose everything, except the cash to buy an rv and 2 weeks rent after month paying bills and tying to buy another house. So here we were, living in and rv trying to get a job, because we now lost our business too,and there is not one scrap of help. When the rv electric box broke and we did not have the money to fix it, we lived in the North without power and heat. I lost 50lbs from hunger, finally got jobs thanks to covid, because now we are essential. Have been paying back debts that we built up, the rv needs that power fixed (but thank god for extension cords) and jumbles of wires that might one day kill me in my sleep (seriously). I most likely will be able to begin to repair the rv and start to re-coop our lives in the next few weeks, 1 year later, 50lbs lost, and much more tied for the work. If white privilege exists, I too want some.


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## bdcharles (Jul 5, 2020)

Jp said:


> This whole situation in USA, that is now spreading to other countries, has me not even able to write about it.I have history too, and folk I cherish of all colors do too. We say that the Africans were enslaved by whites and that the Irish were indentured servants and the the poor in England were also indentured servants. This is the terminology of the day, but was it reality for the three groups, and what exactly does this word slave mean?
> 
> Does in mean all of the things that modern educational sources have advanced or does it mean its definition.
> 
> ...



Yes, but modern North Africans and the descendants of Barbary people aren't still trying to oppress the Irish today. You can't say the same of contemporary USA's treatment of the descendants of its slave population. This is the issue.


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## Jp (Jul 5, 2020)

Bdcharles, of course the Irish descendants are not being oppressed to this day. But if a person of Irish decent was born into generational poverty and tied to get out he would face all of the same hardships as any race in America. I will not argue weather African Americans still face racism today. They do, but we live in a would where a camera is always rolling on this or that issue and when a group of folks that show up a rally to oppose another group of folks, it looks like on camera that the group that hates the other group is a larger portion than it is.  So one cannot use the fact that despicable groups actively hate another race as proof of an overarching racism within the country. There might be builtin profiling in the police force here in America based on their current training and that needs to end, but even police actively hating a group (even if that is what they do) does not prove an overarching racism against African American people. There are always going to be a small percentage of people that hate this group or that group for whatever reasons, and that is sad, sickening, and vile. The issue is not weather there is or is not some level of racism with the country, the issue representing a minority opinion within certain white folks as representing the whole of even the majority. There is generational poverty and there is a part of that that does need to be changed, and that is the American school systems funding method. That is, however, not racism but a structuring of things against the poor. If you look at most of these issues with a careful eye, ones that do not call upon the fact that there are some groups of white people that are racist, I bet that one would find that in almost all if not all circumstances that it is an expression of Elite vs poor. I know that the next argument is that most of the wealth in this country is held be whites, but that too is a misnomer. 


Let me start with it is like a race where several groups had sandbags tied to their feet, and even when they lost the sand bags they remained behind. Then there is the fact that whites equal (using random year census) 76 percent and there is little mystery as to the fact that statistics look the way they do. 


Lets take my wife's tribe as an example, she is Pequot and like all Native American tribes an Indian. Her tribe sat on ground close to major cities that grew up, so to were other wealthy Indian tribes close to sources of income via some level of native work, be gambling or whatever.  These wealthy tribes are fine monetarily (maybe not so much in other ways, that is a different topic), but the tribes that did not end up with profitable land were in all maters poorer than there richer counter parts. This is where things get sad, how do you deal with generational poverty (obviously we need to fix anything that takes things out of level playing field), but in the end this is the truly hard issue.



Biro, no sadly I have not been to either, would love to tho. 


I hope the Irish are not hated elsewhere, but this is a largely American topic. Today, who hates the Irish? Few, but even then I have heard them in trade work referred to as Irish Mexicans even though they are most definitely not from Mexico, though maybe catholic. First, Irish gained some level of hatred within the new country with the British of the time, within what was to become America, and then they gained even more hatred with Saint Patrick's Battalion and their ties to Catholics. Leading to a whole catholic vs protestant moment within early America.


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## Jp (Jul 5, 2020)

My sources are not online, it is from a lecture by Mark C Conner PH D on the Irish identity. Again, terminologies, either way this in fighting caused... for Americans what happened in over the pond doesn’t mater after the cause was set in motion. I love Ireland and it’s retaking of its myths back from the edge of doom, and I suggest you research because history professors agree that the Irish were as I speak of in early America. This is because your thinking that the Irish traveled to a formed country, when in fact they traveled to people with all the baggage of the time. Short lived on your side of the pond and slightly longer lived here.


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## Jp (Jul 6, 2020)

The initial part was a disdain for the Irish, as they were during the period of 1700 to 1850 being billed as less than human by human traffickers largely funded by the East Indian Trading Company. This was then compounded with the fact that some Irish immigrants defected to the side of Mexico with their as it was seen Protestant brothers and we went down the slippery slope. It was only after the 1850s that Irish largely self immigrated, but by then racism had already reared its head. As we know eventually this all fell away as we would hope all things like this one day do.


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## Jp (Jul 6, 2020)

The company had a lot to do with Americas, at least early Americans. For our purpose here, of the little surviving records that scholars are currently studying, the Saint Helena records on South Carolina have proven that the company was shipping slaves to the Americas, the majority of these records were of African origin but there were records from all over the world. This is more than, oh well, they were not responsible for everything situation. It is a situation where when the biggest company in the world at the time is condoning the practice then everyone jumps on board kinda deal. Other than the slave trade and there funding/ condoning of it, there is also the matter of the control and transportation of indentured servants. Although, history sees this nothing wrong with the practice that went on, or at least it is not treated as an issue. As a side note, this company/ British Parliament literately caused a revolution in giving American politicians and merchants the common cause to oppose British rule. The Tea Act, directly led to what happened in the summer of 1773, when two ports (New York and Philadelphia) turned back two company ships and refused berth. In the VA port they landed the ships, unloaded the tea, but did not pay the tax. And finally, in Boston they landed the three company ships but refused to allow the tea off. Dec 16, 1773 the radicals dressed up as Mohawk and dumped all of the casks of tea in to the Boston Bay. An event known as the Boston Tea Party. This led to, no taxation without representation. That was followed by what came to be know as the Intolerable Acts of 1774, and still yet more in 1775 which led to the start of the Seven Year War and American independence.


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## Joker (Jul 12, 2020)

(I should preface my perspective by saying I'm white.) I've always found the racism thing so stupid and weird.

I was born in the late 90s and spent my childhood in a racially-diverse suburb of Orlando. My schools were almost comically mixed, I'd say probably 1/3 white, 1/3 black and 1/3 latino (very few asians). For the most part, everyone had mixed friend groups and no one even thought about it. I think the first time I ever even thought about race in a contemporary sense was when Obama was running the first time, and even at the time it wasn't treated as WHITE McCain vs BLACK Obama, it was just an interesting tidbit that he ended up becoming the first black President. Pre-teen me didn't think much of it - why couldn't and shouldn't a black man be President? (I later came to disapprove of his Presidency as a whole, but that's another issue altogether.)

Then I got older and started hearing horror stories not just from the history books, but from people in the flesh. My dad almost got the shit beat out of him by Klan members in the 80s because he was caught with a black friend near their little tiki torch hideout. In Northern Virginia! (We moved back in the early 10s and the place is only half white now, probably less.) It seems everyone over 40 has all these crazy stories about this crap.

I won't claim that Gen Z is completely racism-free - and it's not just white nationalists but black nationalists and La Raza types and so on - but I think we're a _hell _of a lot better than Gen X and the Boomers. Hell, even the Millennials are completely obsessed with race now. 

I think it's all so fucking stupid. Race definitely informs people's background, but it shouldn't your whole personality. I _probably _wouldn't be into NASCAR and heavy metal if I was a black woman, but those hobbies are way more important to me than being born with a pale penis. I don't care if you're white, black, latino, gay, straight, Christian, atheist, a man, woman or pink with purple polka dots - if you use your demographics as a cudgel or your primary personality trait, you're a loser. You should probably find a hobby.

/rant


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