White Pride / Racism

[Michellebell]

Oh I also wanted to say, I recently had a conversation online with my best friend from school growing up. She was also my Maid of Honor at my wedding. She's Chinese and we never really talked about race growing up, except to commiserate on how tough our mothers were on us. Anyway, I told her that I didn't think racism was a problem for us in our school. The girl that we voted "Best Looking" in our graduating class is black, and we just treated everyone as people. We had caucasians, Indians, Asians, some African-Americans, some Hispanic. Really our school was pretty diverse I thought. Anyway, she is convinced that racism WAS a big problem.

To me it was such an odd conversation. She said that white people were racist against her all the time, but I didn't notice it. So I'm wondering if racism is a lot in the minds of the minorities. I know that in the past it was truly awful but I really think people have overcome a lot of it.

[dualstow]

PointedStick, if you ever put an essay out on Medium dot com (or already have), please send me the link. I'd love to read it.

MichelleBell, my ex-girlfriend has a mother who came from Korea and married a Caucasian guy from the Air Force. She is also mistaken for full Asian by whites and Asians alike. Korean strangers just spontaneously speak Korean to her sometimes (and let her do laundry at the laundromat for free, but that's another story). She told me stories of racism on both sides, but it was interesting to read about your experience.

[Libertarian666]

Doodle, I think you are committing the error of confusing correlation with causation. I don't think you are concerned about physical race... I think you are concerned about culture. It's easy to confuse the two because we get our culture and all of our behaviors from our families... mostly.

My wife's best friend was taken in infancy away from the Afro-Caribbean land of her birth, and raised by European parents (actual EU citizens) in the USA. She is 100% "White" culturally, and she's physically mixed-race Afro-Latina. Who cares if she comes from a racial group that may have a statistical central tendency for lower IQ? My wife isn't friends with a group, she's friends with one person. And IQ is a very narrow measure of people. We know of many high-IQ serial killers. Kaczynski, Speck, Bundy, Manson...

Anyway, lower IQ is probably caused by bad culture anyway. If you raise a baby in a bad culture and environment, they're going to under-achieve. It takes work to raise a decent person. That isn't hard to understand. I have been to the land of her birth, and most probably the region and city where she was born, and it has ugly spots, for sure. Probably if she'd stayed there in the Caribbean with the mother who gave her up, she'd be less accomplished than she is today. She her IQ would register lower. So what would that IQ measure? Her genetics and innate (but unrealized) human potential, or bad upbringing?

So let's change the title of the thread to pride about British / Irish / European culture. I'm OK with that. I go to an Anglican Church, I'm an Anglophile.

"Another study, commissioned by the editor of the journal Science, looked at genetics and IQ. The Minnesota researchers found that about 70 percent of IQ variation across the twin population was due to genetic differences among people, and 30 percent was due to environmental differences. The finding received both praise and criticism, but an updated study in 2009 containing new sets of twins found a similar correlation between genetics and IQ."

See https://www.livescience.com/47288-twin- ... etics.html.

[ochotona]

"Another study, commissioned by the editor of the journal Science, looked at genetics and IQ. The Minnesota researchers found that about 70 percent of IQ variation across the twin population was due to genetic differences among people, and 30 percent was due to environmental differences. The finding received both praise and criticism, but an updated study in 2009 containing new sets of twins found a similar correlation between genetics and IQ."

See https://www.livescience.com/47288-twin- ... etics.html.

But who cares about IQ? It's not a predictor of anything! It's not the measure of a decent citizen or even of success in life! I just hate it when people throw out racially linked IQ measures as if IQ were a measure of human worth. This is such a 1920s Eugenics narrative, it's ugly, and it needs to stop. If anyone here is entitled to play the group IQ superiority card here, it's me, and 1/2 of michellebell, and I just won't do it. It's evil. You can't reduce a person to a number.

[Libertarian666]

"Another study, commissioned by the editor of the journal Science, looked at genetics and IQ. The Minnesota researchers found that about 70 percent of IQ variation across the twin population was due to genetic differences among people, and 30 percent was due to environmental differences. The finding received both praise and criticism, but an updated study in 2009 containing new sets of twins found a similar correlation between genetics and IQ."

See https://www.livescience.com/47288-twin- ... etics.html.

But who cares about IQ? It's not a predictor of anything! It's not the measure of a decent citizen or even of success in life! I just hate it when people throw out racially linked IQ measures as if IQ were a measure of human worth. This is such a 1920s Eugenics narrative, it's ugly, and it needs to stop. If anyone here is entitled to play the group IQ superiority card here, it's me, and 1/2 of michellebell, and I just won't do it. It's evil. You can't reduce a person to a number.

You are factually wrong. IQ is in fact an excellent predictor of life outcomes.

See https://www.iq-tests.eu/iq-test-Practic ... y-800.html for an analysis.

And as for who is entitled to play the group IQ superiority card, I think there are others here who have you beat. You are familiar with the Ashkenazi IQ advantage, I assume?

However, no one here is in fact playing that card. We are discussing social issues, not playing "My group has a higher average IQ than yours".

[Michellebell]

PointedStick, if you ever put an essay out on Medium dot com (or already have), please send me the link. I'd love to read it.

MichelleBell, my ex-girlfriend has a mother who came from Korea and married a Caucasian guy from the Air Force. She is also mistaken for full Asian by whites and Asians alike. Korean strangers just spontaneously speak Korean to her sometimes (and let her do laundry at the laundromat for free, but that's another story). She told me stories of racism on both sides, but it was interesting to read about your experience.

I know we're getting off topic, but actually most Asians can tell I'm mixed. Usually it's caucasians who mistakenly think I'm full Asian. Caucasians ask me all the time what my ethnicity is, but it's always meant in a nice way. They seem genuinely curious.

I read an interesting article recently by an African-American woman who was saying that white women are so racist because they always want to touch her hair. She had a photograph in the article and her hair was just so fuzzy and, sorry to say, touchable! I was reminded of how my stepmother, who is a blond, told me that she went to China and all the women there were touching her hair because it looked so different from theirs. There was nothing racist or unkind about any of that. Again, I think this goes along with my belief that a lot of the more recent accusations of racism is in the mind of the person of ethnic minority.

As far as IQ goes, I'm sure you could find a difference in averages between ethnicities. I scored nearly perfect on my math SAT, so I fit that Asian stereotype pretty well. (I don't know my IQ, I just know that I'm good at math but always lagged more in reading and also common sense growing up) In my nine years teaching, every single Asian student I've had has been naturally very good at math, whereas the white and black students have been much more varied in their abilities. I am not sure that IQ correlates with life success so much though, although I admit I have never looked into it. I think that our life choices are by far the most important. I'm going to be bold and say that I think that many African-Americans glorify a more rebellious culture, and that is what holds them back the most. Some actually criticize the ones that act too "white" or like "Uncle Toms" just because they work hard or are educated or speak with proper grammar. I think that if they were to abandon the whole "gangsta" mentality they would do much better. The African-American teachers I work with are wonderful people who are very easy to get along with. But I have no interest in going to a bad side of town with a lot of drug dealers and such, which also happens to have a lot of African-Americans living there.

[Pointedstick]

Thanks Dualstow! There's no way I could actually start writing as though I had any wisdom worth sharing. It's only very recently that I even came to understand the value of wisdom in the first place. I still don't have very much of it.

I think we all know fuck-ups from groups that have on average high IQ, and superstars from groups with low IQ. Knowing that Africans have low IQ scores on average may explain why Africa is a poor continent, but it doesn't do a lick of good in my everyday interactions with African-Americans or Africans (I actually have an African childhood friend from the little village I spent some time in). I repeat my assertion that the more someone cares about this kind of thing, the more of an asshole they're like to be. It's interesting in a general, helps-explain-the-state-of-the-world sort of way, but it's of little use when applied to our day-to-day lives, and likely to be actively detrimental to the ability to be accepted in civil society. This isn't just because liberals have turned it into a taboo subject: it's because measuring and categorizing people by traits you believe to be inborn or genetic makes you an asshole.

Obligatory SlateStarCodex IQ post that you should all read if you haven't yet: http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/09/27/ag ... q-worries/

[farjean2]

Speaking of the Asian experience in America I sometimes have to point out to my wife that if she thinks her race makes her stand out she should get to feel what I do when I visit her country (Philippines). In America nobody gives a second thought about seeing an Asian in public but when I'm walking down the street or in a store in the Philippines you can feel eyes staring from all directions. It's an interesting experience being the center of attention but knowing you are in a country with lots of terrorists and kidnap-for-ransom gangs can make it feel a little uncomfortable.

[Michellebell]

Another thought exercise...how many people upon visiting Japan would be disappointed to find out that instead of being a unique country full of Japanese people and Japanese tradition was instead overrun by pasty white people blasting beach boy music from their Cadillacs. That when asking natives to describe Japanese food they would shrug their shoulders as if the question was incomprehensible...that Shinto temples suddenly had been converted into churches and native festivals were only celebrated with trepidation for fear of excluding the white Christians and in respect the Japanese would instead decorate their cities with Christmas wreaths and images of santa. Would you consider this a positive expression of diversity?

Japan desperately needs immigration, for so many reasons. It's a society dying a slow death. I love the Japanese and Japanese culture, but the problems that country and culture faces are huge and probably unsolvable without an influx of people with new ideas. Japanese culture is very polite and orderly and friendly ... but underneath that great skin is a dark reality of people living miserable, isolated lives under the thumb of the culture and industry. The suicide rate is among the highest in the world. Many young Japanese have dropped out of society altogether, gaming away in their parents' houses, waiting for death. I know many, many Japanese people and nearly all of them would love to leave Japan permanently and move to the U.S., despite our crime, crappy public transportation and crazy mix of culture.

I don't know many Japanese people but the few I've known have seemed pretty similar to the Chinese and Korean people I've known. I also read an article by a teacher who taught in both the U.S. and South Korea and have some thoughts about Asian culture. My mother said that in South Korea, as a child, the teachers would hit them everyday. I asked my mom if she got hit too, and she said, yes, everyday. I said, "Why? wouldn't you have learned to follow the rules so you wouldn't get hit so much?"

She said, "No they would have us stand in a line and hold out our hands and answer questions. If we got an answer wrong, WACK!" I was shocked. I asked her if she hated school, and she said that, no of course she loved school because she loved to learn. I'm still a bit dumbfounded. If school was preferable to her over home given that type of environment, I really wonder how awful her home life must have been.As a teacher, the whole story just made me cringe. We want students to be willing to take on challenges, to take risks. They learn best when they try new things and stumble a few times on their way to mastery. That kind of punitive teaching will get students to memorize facts quickly but it will discourage any sort of inventive thought, not to mention probably turn many students off to learning in the long run. That might explain why so many inventions have come from America. Asians have always emphasized academic excellence but what good does education do if it only teaches everyone to think exactly the same way?

Also, the pressure can be overwhelming, to say the least. Many Asian parents expect their children to be #1 or else they are a failure and a disgrace to the whole family. Well, that means the vast majority of Asian children are feeling like failures. I did very well in school but found the pressure so burdensome that I actually had a very serious suicide attempt myself when I was 20. Fortunately I lived and felt like, after that, I was such a disappointment to my family anyway, I could finally just expect less of myself, and they would have to deal with it (my family had really high hopes for me professionally and thought I'd become a doctor or scientist like my mother and father - but I only wanted to be a teacher). Actually my father always treated me so well and encouraged me to do whatever I wanted with my life, but my mother's side of the family had a bigger influence on me because the pressure was just so high. Nowadays we get along well though.

The article I read about the teacher who taught in South Korea and America said that American students asked a lot of questions, whereas the Korean students often held their heads down, didn't ask questions, and seemed downright devastated if they didn't answer questions right or master concepts the first time they tried.

I know that this all sounds doom and gloom. I think that it is very good that Asians have good work ethics but they would do much better if they had a more balanced perspective on life. Plus they can celebrate their culture in terms of their artwork, music, food, and devotions to their families. Here in America I think a lot of people are going too far in the other direction though and are expecting too little. The schools are lowering expectations for both achievement and behavior all the time. So a balance is of course the best thing. The nice thing about the internet is that it is becoming easier and easier to learn about different types of people and cultures. I think we should pick and choose the better aspects of our different cultures to hold onto and try to dismiss other aspects that are not as helpful.

[dualstow]

The Japanese work themselves to death often enough that they have a word for it: karoshi. They’re just beginning to address it.

[doodle]

I repeat my assertion that the more someone cares about this kind of thing, the more of an asshole they're like to be. It's interesting in a general, helps-explain-the-state-of-the-world sort of way, but it's of little use when applied to our day-to-day lives, and likely to be actively detrimental to the ability to be accepted in civil society. This isn't just because liberals have turned it into a taboo subject: it's because measuring and categorizing people by traits you believe to be inborn or genetic makes you an asshole.

What about policy at a national level? Should this information affect that? For example where blame is placed due to student achievement gaps, dropouts, workplace participation and affirmative action. etc. etc.

Ultimately, the IQ differences are not as consequential to me as the question of diversity and whether it is a strength or a weakness within a nation.

Take diversity in a microcosm...say a condo association trying to create bylaws. Would having 20 year olds and 80 year olds on the board, as well as a variety of different cultures make the association more harmonious of fractious? Perhaps this is why in general when people freely associate they choose to do so overwhelmingly with those similar to themselves. Again, I don't see why this natural desire should be condemned any more than natural human sexuality. The problem that I see is that there is active government policy advocating diversity in this country when it is dubious whether this truly benefits our nation....especially when this diversity becomes so great that no clear majority exists.

[Kriegsspiel]

Twitter Removes Verified Status From Users For Racist and Hateful Posts

One of my readers mentioned, a few weeks ago, that he’d been denounced as a racist in the course of a conversation. In that conversation, which touched on affirmative action, he happened to ask whether there was any evidence that affirmative action programs actually worked, as a way to decrease disparities in educational success between white and black populations in the United States. Asking that question was enough to get him accused of racism.

Notice the very peculiar logic here. If it’s a good idea to decrease disparities in educational success between white and black populations in the United States—as I believe it is, and as I have every reason to think the reader in question believes it is as well—then it would make sense to try to figure out whether current efforts in that direction are actually doing what they’re supposed to do, wouldn’t it? If affirmative action programs don’t accomplish this goal, then it would be helpful to find that out, so that they can be replaced by more effective programs, wouldn’t it?

Try to make this point in a conversation like the one my reader was involved in, though, and you can count on having such perspectives dismissed out of hand. I’ve been in similar conversations myself, and can vouch for that. At best, you’ll get a discussion, by turns angry or labored, about the virtues of affirmative action programs, which pretty consistently will not include the evidence you’ve asked for. At worst, you’ll be told that even thinking about asking such a question proves that you must have a Klan robe in the back of your closet and a Confederate flag on your living room wall.

http://www.ecosophia.net/one-drop-fallacy/

Noticed an interesting series of things on the internet.