Emphasizing individualism as opposed to collectivism is "white"? In what parallel universe?
Here's some definitions of "racism" from The Seattle Public Schools:Cultural Racism:A truly great moment in public education.Seattle has more dogs than children in the public schools.Maybe this is one of the reasons.Via LewRockwell.com Blog
Those aspects of society that overtly and covertly attribute value and normality to white people and Whiteness, and devalue, stereotype, and label people of color as “other”, different, less than, or render them invisible. Examples of these norms include defining white skin tones as nude or flesh colored, having a future time orientation, emphasizing individualism as opposed to a more collective ideology, defining one form of English as standard, and identifying only Whites as great writers or composers.
Institutional Racism:
The network of institutional structures, policies, and practices that create advantages and benefits for Whites, and discrimination, oppression, and disadvantages for people from targeted racial groups. The advantages created for Whites are often invisible to them, or are considered “rights” available to everyone as opposed to “privileges” awarded to only some individuals and groups.
Tuesday, May 16, 2006
Racism In Seattle Public Schools
Would you want your children to go to schools where this is the ideology?
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5 comments:
Having a "future time orientation" is racist? Am I interpreting this correctly that schools should teach in the here and now and not speak in terms of the future? So all people of color don't believe that they have a future and therefore shouldn't plan for it? I've heard/read that so many black males are killed in gang related incidents and so many more are incarcerated that many black people feel that black males don't have a long life expectancy or won't have opportunities (since their locked up). I've never researched the statistics behind this so I really don't know. I think ALL Americans are responsible for their own futures and anyone can change their "station" in life or improve their current situation through the choices that they make--and that includes getting an education and setting goals for the future. As far as the "individualism vs. group" idea, unfortunately this was taught 15 years ago in the teacher credentialing program I went through. This is supposedly somehow tied to slave dynamics. From what I learned, slavery was abolished with the end of the Civil War.
I've always considered myself to be more in the range of Beige. In fact, when faced with people that are actually from Africa, of which I have a few students from Ghana, they consider our African-Americans to be "white". So I think that "white" is a relative term and furthermore it appears that the good educators of Seattle have some serious problems with semantics. Not to mention that their speech could have been lifted right from a Hitler diatribe circa 1938 if you simply substitute "Jew" or "Gypsy" or any other minority for "white". Funny how it sounds really biased. Such is the bucolic world of the tragically liberal.
Last time I checked, we live in a representative republic, not a feudal system of serfs and lords. It is in the best interest of ALL Americans to ensure that all citizens have unfettered access to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. Even a poor student of American history understands that this was not the case here until very recently.
If the author and posters here believe that there is NO advantage to being "white" (displaying obvious caucasoid physcial characteristics) in America, please provide me with facts to support this.
--Cobra
Darren is right! (I suppose I'm not the first to use that very obvious pun this way.) Although I can't argue with Cobra's statement, Seattle's definition really turns off middle-of-the-roaders like me. Racism has been a tragic fact in American history, and it still exists, but what Seattle has done has the same effect as the little boy who cried wolf. Rather than helping to solve the problem, it causes people to ignore the real thing.
Any advantages that accrue do so because people are members of the "majority"--not because they're white. It's reasonable for a society to promote the views and expectations of most of its citizens as "societal" norms.
That's not racist. Racist is saying that others are inferior because of their race. Racist is saying white people haven't earned what they have or get strictly because they're white.
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