Ladies and gentlemen–we have a mind-reader in our midst!
Isn’t faster better? Kind of like ripping a bandaid off? 
Why is it better, rather than doesn’t matter? Will racism suddenly disappear? Are all non-whites collectively morally superior to whites?
Or are minorities less racist against other minorities? If not, are we ready for minority racism against each other?
No, racism will not suddenly disappear after white people are no longer a majority. But, if California is a precedent, the racism that springs out of the “threat” of white people being worried about no longer being a majority will go away, when most realize that the “threat” is not really anything to worry about, and those who still cling to that idea are too few to be much of a bother.
So what kind of thinking underlies the perceived “threat” of becoming another minority group?
A HS classmate whose family was one of a handful of non-Italian-American families when they moved into Bensonhurst sometime in the late '60s/early ‘70s and violently bullied/robbed by some of the Italian-American teens* involved in the Yusef Hawkins’ murder noted how dramatically his neighborhood changed when most of the working class Italian-Americans who lived there for decades started moving out to Staten Island and the suburbs of New Jersey and Long Island during the mid-late '90s.
While there are still some Italian-American presence in Bensonhurst today, they are nowhere nearly as dominant a presence there as they were ~2 decades ago. The large influx of Chinese and Eastern European immigrants has meant the neighborhood now has a strong Chinese and Eastern European presence.
He also says the neighborhood is much safer nowadays as the “neighborhood criminal element” he and his neighbors had to put up with before the late '90s left with most of the Italian-Americans who moved out to Staten Island and the suburbs of New Jersey and Long Island.
- He noted they were known by his family and neighbors as "the neighborhood criminal element."
** His family is of Eastern European origin.
I don’t even know what my agenda is “supposed” to be.
I do know that I am far more comfortable in more diverse communities. I’m living between a very diverse area and a very non-diverse area, and feel socially more comfortable in the former, even though I’ll be retiring to the latter, for other reasons for living there, basically for the natural world there. Its lack of diversity is a drawback to me, because it feels unreal to me.
Or alternatively, someone who read posts #22 and #24 more carefully than you did @marvin100
In my particular enclave of southern CA the racist comments I see (mostly on community Facebook message boards) are primarily generated by one ethnic group against another and even toward their own group! In the aftermath of the election I was astonished at the number of people with Hispanic surnames cheering the outcome and castigating the campus protests. These same people use ethnic slurs against people of their own ethnic background who have been accused of crimes or other transgressions. I suspect in the future we won’t see as much “color” based racism, but the intolerance will always be there, perhaps segregating along economic/educational distinctions.
Inter-ethnic/racial bigotry is unfortunately, nothing new. For instance, my current neighborhood historically has had a large Italian-American population.
However, they tend to strongly disassociate themselves from other Italian-Americans in neighborhoods like the pre-late '90s Bensonhurst/Dyker Heights, Staten Island or Ozone Park due to a combination of SES differences and where in Italy they originated*.
- Ones in my current neighborhood mostly originated from the more prosperous areas of Central and Northern Italy rather than Southern Italy/Sicily.
However, typical political disagreements (e.g. on economic policies) seem to be less divisive than those based on race or ethnicity, which tends to be more of a hot button (probably because race or ethnicity is based on who you are, not what you do). Note that members of minority groups can be conservative on many not-race/ethnicity-related issues (on some such issues, some minority groups are more likely to be conservative than white people), but such affinity to conservative politics based on that often gets overridden when conservative politicians do or say things seen as unfriendly to minorities.
It won’t get rid of color based racism (think about Apartheid in South Africa, where a white minority ruled over a much larger black majority. The reality is that there is plenty of inter ethnic tension and bias, a local town had an area that historically was black dating back to the revolution, and in the last couple of decades with the influx of Mexican and Central American people has caused major friction between the two groups, much of it ugly and racial. In the 19th century, the first major influx of Jews were from Germany, when Russian Jews came in the late 19th century the German Jews looked down upon the newcomers, as being ignorant peasants, etc…
Racism might be more compartmentalized in a society where no one group is the majority. In recent times, some towns in NJ and NY state have become hotbeds of controversy as they became hubs for Hasidic Jews and they came to become a majority, and the Hasidim took over local government and did things that others felt were discriminatory, like slashing spending on public schools (and often openly arguing that since their kids didn’t use the public schools, they shouldn’t have to pay such high taxes), this was especially true in towns like Lakewood in NJ where the public schools tended to be kids who were of black or hispanic background…and similar things have happened elsewhere, complaints of anti white bias in areas dominated by other groups. The thing to keep in mind is that even if the country is no longer a majority anyone, locally you still can have imbalances thatg cause problems, too.
Re: #72
Seems like what you describe may be more of a problem when there is a high level of segregation at the neighborhood level (or perhaps smaller cities as well).
http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-most-diverse-cities-are-often-the-most-segregated/
Yes, I think it is very helpful when kids grow up and attend school with lots of different folks from all cultures. It helps them realize that everyone has interesting traditions and there are nice folks of all cultures.
The awareness of race starts so young. People say children do not see color but that’s just not true. They pick up things from the cradle, and our response should start there.
When my Asian-born daughter was little I noticed little things…such as the fact that our local YMCA play-room at the rec center AND my daughter’s pre-school had only white dolls. Of course, you would expect no dolls depicting Asians, (they do exist) but no dolls of color at all, and mostly blonde. Does that not send a message what “normal” people are supposed to look like? Also, some dolls depicting Asian people were pathetically caricatured. So I spent a lot of time searching and buying nice-quality dolls of every hue and ethnicity that I could find that were nuanced and attractive to donate to various pre-schools. (They were not very available locally.) Some of the recipients seemed confused and/or bemused by my doing this. Some reported back that they children (of every/any race) preferred white dolls and never played with dolls of color. I said, “so be it!” …it was important to me, whether or not children played with those dolls they could see them representing the human race and that the whole spectrum is considered, at least those limited play settings as “normal.” Some may consider this just a little progressive fluff, but IMO we’ve got to start somewhere!
Sorry about the typos (#75.) I was in a rush to pick up DD from school!
@inthegarden makes a really good point about racism or feeling uncomfortable around others not like ourselves, and that is that kids learn this early, and it isn’t taught the way parents think it is. I think kids are born without any prejudice per se, put a bunch of toddlers together who are all different and you won’t see the kind of issues you would when they get older. Kids pick up their attitudes from their parents, and it has little to do with what the parents ‘teach’ them, ie “the only race is the human race’ or “that little girl over there simply has dark skin/eyes that appear slanted/etc”, kids pick up from the parents how comfortable they are with people who are different. If the parents only hang around people who are the same as themselves, that sends a message (and obviously, for a lot of people that may be because that is the nature of where they live, how segregated things are), the old expression is attitudes are caught, not taught, and the old 'do as I say, not as I do” doesn’t work. Kids pick up on a ton of subtle (and not so subtle) clues from people around them, especially parents and other family members.
My sister told me one day that she finds my kids very unusual in that they act like all people are equal. I said I’m so glad she’s noticed because H and I really believe it.
D was very frustrated when she was in preschool because the kids in her 3/4 year old class were rattling off ethnicities and both H and I are of the same ethnicity so she’s not multi-ethnic like most of the kids in her class. After pondering hard for awhile, her brow cleared and she proclaimed she’s xxxx ethnicity and Catholic! It pleased her immensely to feel she “fit in” better that way.
D wasn’t a fan of dolls, ever. She liked Leggo, stuffed animals and rough housing. We’ve always had a wide rainbow of friends and neighbors.
Does or did your sister live in an area that was more segregated or some such, and thus less conducive to such influences?