Tag Archives: Race and racism

Each tree had 56 oranges. If eight slaves pick them equally, then how much would each slave pick?

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That, apparently, is one of a number of questions on a math assignment being used in the Beaver Ridge Elementary School in Norcross, part of the Gwinnett County, Georgia, School District. It was said to be a cross-curricular activity. This is part of one of the newer ways of teaching math … use the math in context of real life situations, etc. etc. Unfortuantely, this attempt at linking math to history class looks more like a helpful exercise for future plantation owners … of the Antebellum period.

A vice principle has collected the assignment and filed them in the shredder.

Details here.

Also, it is no “how much would each slave pick” but rather “how many would each slave pick.”

MSNBC: Time to retire Buchanan (an open letter, reposted)

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I first wrote this on July 1, 2009. Finally, a possible result.

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Dear MSNBC,

I know it is appropriate to have a range of opinions among the talking heads representing a news agency, and MSNBC certainly does have a range. Pat Buchanan, regular commentator on two or three MSNBC news shows, probably serves at the most conservative individual in the MSNBC panoply.

But he has to go now. Continue reading MSNBC: Time to retire Buchanan (an open letter, reposted) →

Danny Chen’s Death: The Ultimate Hate Crime?

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Nineteen year old Private Danny Chen killed himself with a firearm in a combat station in Kandahar, Afghanistan after being taunted and verbally and physically abused in a decidedly racist manner by several of his fellow soldiers. Eight such soldiers, of C Company, 3rd Battalion, 21st Infantry, are now facing charges related to Danny’s death. The details of the charges have not been released.

Officials said …

… 1st Lt. Daniel J. Schwartz, Staff Sgt. Blaine G. Dugas, Staff Sgt. Andrew J. Van Bockel, Sgt. Adam M. Holcomb, Sgt. Jeffrey T. Hurst, Spc. Thomas P. Curtis, Spc. Ryan J. Offutt and Sgt. Travis F. Carden were all charged Friday with counts ranging from dereliction of duty to making a false statement to assault, negligent homicide and reckless endangerment.

It was not clear from the information provided whether the military believes the soldiers actually killed Chen, or whether officials are alleging that their mistreatment of Chen led him to take his own life.

More at the Washington Post

Forbes’ Gene Marks Needs To Check His Priv

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Gene Marks, you wrote an essay for Forbes that has gotten a lot of people rather upset. People are upset because you display insensitive unchecked privilege and, essentially, you blame an entire class of people as the victims of what is mostly not their fault but rather, your fault and the fault of the modal Forbes reader, as well as society more broadly, history, culture, economics, racism and all sort of other things that are largely beyond the control of the Poor Black Kids of the Inner City of whom you write.

I think you meant well, but you did not do well. There are many ways in which you display a marked lack of a clue about your topic. How so? Let’s start at the beginning of your essay: Continue reading Forbes’ Gene Marks Needs To Check His Priv →

Racial Bias in Presidential Pardons?

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The pardon process relies on the recommendations of a special office of the White House, which takes a number of factors (not skin color) into account overtly, including things like level of remorse or financial or family factors. The process was, wisely one would have thought, depoliticized by George Bush at the beginning of his first term, so that the professional pardon lawyers’ recommendations are routinely followed, plus or minus only small variations.

So, we therefore know that the fact that a white person is 400% more likely to be pardoned than a black person is not because of some yahoo racist president or evil chief of staff. Rather, it’s just how the legal system turns out.

Propublica did the study that gives us these results. Continue reading Racial Bias in Presidential Pardons? →

Cain’s Sexual Harassment Problems

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It does look like there may be something to the allegations, and there does seem to be some denial followed by backpedaling.

Herman Cain
Herman Cain

I would like to point out, however, that he was a male CEO, a person of power, wealth, and fame. This is often true of the men in the race, and in presidential races generally. When Norm Colemen was trying to get re-elected as Senator from Minnesota, very credible and verifiable details of his horrid “womanizing” (a term I never quite understood but whatever) behaviors came out, and no one noticed or cared or did anything about it except a few of us bloggers. It took years for the John Edwards thing to come out. As it were. Remember Gary Hart? Same thing.

Continue reading Cain’s Sexual Harassment Problems →

Is gun control racist?

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That’s actually not the correct question. The answer to “Is gun control racist?” is no, because if I ask you that question, you assume I mean current modern day gun control efforts in the United States. If anything, gun control is the opposite of racist, give who is most affected by lack of it, ans who most wants more of it, and the nature of the pro-gun lobby when it comes to issues of race.
Continue reading Is gun control racist? →

What a Difference a Century Can Make

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At the beginning of the 20th century, a traveler in Central Africa made mention of some strange people that he had come across. He was traveling among regular, run-of-the-mill natives…probably Bantu-speaking people living in scattered villages and farming for their food. But along the way, strange people came out of the forest. These strange people had sloping foreheads; they were short of stature, bow-legged and otherwise misshapen. They also clearly were, in the eyes of the traveler, of subhuman intelligence. The traveler described these people as a separate, subhuman race that lived in the forest. As I read this, I began to think that perhaps he was speaking of so-called “Pygmies” who live in this region, and as I began to think that, I started to get mad at this writer because so-called “Pygmies” do not look or act as he described.

Then, the writer totally surprised me by noting (I paraphrase) that “unlike the Pygmies, who live in these forests and are of perfectly proportioned shape and appearance, these subhuman creatures were rather grotesque.”

Continue reading What a Difference a Century Can Make →

Berkeley Campus Republicans: Native American Women are the Lowest Form of Life

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The Campus Republicans of the UC-Berkeley campus are having a bake sale with the cost per item set in relation to the buyer’s skin color and gender. White males would pay full price, but people who have very dark skin and are female get the food for less. Here’s the pricing structure:

  • White $2.00
  • Asian $1.50
  • Latino $1.00
  • Black $0.75
  • Native American $0.25
  • $0.25 off for all women

This is their way of demonstrating how admission policies at UC allow inferior people who should be valued less into college. The intention of the bake sale was to make people mad. That failed, and instead it made people look at the Campus Republicans of the University of California Berkeley and go “Oh, isn’t that cute. They have no brains but they can still talk and walk. Like those Japanese robots.”

From the cnn report:
Continue reading Berkeley Campus Republicans: Native American Women are the Lowest Form of Life →

Charles and Willie

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The Kennedy School of Government had banned all smoking within the building, but had not yet banned smoking just outside the doors facing the Charles River, to the south of the complex. An African American woman, about fifty years of age, took a light from me, and we stood in the falling snow enjoying our smokes. That was a heavy year for snow. It seemed that every day about the same time the two of us would be standing here in a blizzard.
Continue reading Charles and Willie →