Comments | uu_mom: "Is Race Part of Anti-Obama Fervor?"

uu_mom

"Is Race Part of Anti-Obama Fervor?" - vote your opinion

Sep 15, 2009 19:13

Is Race Part of Anti-Obama Fervor? I can't believe that currently the category with the most votes says that there has been no racism:
How much of a role do you think race plays in opposition to President Obama?
None 45%
A lot 36%
A little 19%
Racism is subconscious and many studies point out that children learn it at a young age. This is a recent ( Read more... )

racial, racism, obama, race

Comments 19

Um... anonymous September 16 2009, 03:32:59 UTC

55% -- a solid majority -- feel that there's some level of racism involved. Over 36% think it's a lot, rather than a little.

Can't say I'm surprised.

Re: Um... uu_mom September 16 2009, 22:06:59 UTC

45% is a lot and I ammended it from my hastily used word "common" to "category with the most".

A little, I'd say chalicechick September 16 2009, 05:18:09 UTC

I do think race has something to do with it ( ... )

Racism anonymous September 16 2009, 14:20:01 UTC

The protests actually began when Bush bailed out the banks- was that racism? Is it really that impossible to believe that anyone would object to nine trillion dollar deficeits ( ... )

Re: Racism uu_mom September 16 2009, 17:40:32 UTC

"Tea party protests" didn't actually start until 2009. I can't say there weren't protests in all other presidential administrations, but using a Hitler mustache and saying that they want to take their country back and other expressions are different than past protests.

Re: Racism chalicechick September 18 2009, 14:00:07 UTC

Bush/Hitler Comparisons were NOT uncommon.

CC

Re: Racism uu_mom September 18 2009, 17:53:04 UTC

Ok, that wasn't the best example, but what about this one showing Obama in African tribal costume or this one calling him "Uncle Sambo" or this one emphasizing his middle name and picturing him with a turban on his head or this one of Obama and friends as KKK (people have called him racist but I don't remember him calling anyone racist).

Thread 7

uu_mom September 16 2009, 21:57:36 UTC

Hmm, I just did a Google search on "obama racist OR racism OR racial" & got results of about 164,000,000 and then did one on "bush president OR george racist OR racism OR racial" (we had 2 Presidents named George Bush) and got the results about 16,200,000. That's 10 times as much for President Obama. Of course that doesn't necessarily prove anything either, but certainly race is an issue in this presidency since he's the first African American President & we live in a racialized country, but those who need more evidence; I just don't have the time to find it right now other than that the Tea Party movement is primarily white. Tim Wise has some good articles about race and President Obama: http://www.redroom.com/blog/tim-wise

anonymous September 16 2009, 22:46:22 UTC

I have to say I disagree completely when you say that racism is a subconcious thing. Choosing to mistreat someone on the basis of their race is a very concious decision, not "ducking out" by saying it was just your subconcious doing the driving.

Corsican153

uu_mom September 17 2009, 02:14:44 UTC

Do you know about the famous Michael Richards case - he spewed racist remarks and then denied being racist. He later apologized. During the Katrina Hurricane floods in Louisiana, newspapers reported photos of black people carrying bags as looters and white people as looking for food - they were not conscious of racism. Most racism is less overt than that and easy to give alternate reasons why they're acting the way they are. I think most people think they're not at all racist, but this Harvard test shows how people have biases they're not aware of. And there's good information on this site, too. People need to be educated about how racism is part of their life whether they're aware of it or not.

anonymous September 17 2009, 09:29:15 UTC

Well, I'll read up on the Richards case, though spewing racist remarks and then denying you are a racism, is called lying, in my book. Not subconcious. And I think, in the Katrina crisis, the difference lay in what it was people were taking, as in; people taking food, clothes or medical supplies were simply surviving. People taking televisions and hi-fi's? They're looting. In the case of a bag of course it's hard to tell. Irregardless of that, however, I do not believe that you can apply "Survivor" labels to white people, and "Looter" labels to black people, and NOT realise that you had done so. That's plain unrealistic. If there was racism in those news reports, then the reporters knew full well they were doing it ( ... )

uu_mom September 17 2009, 16:38:07 UTC

It's easy to rationalize that racist acts aren't racist at all in spite of our history in this matter. Snopes posts two cases from Katrina which are suspected cases that either can't be proven or have other explanations: http://www.snopes.com/katrina/photos/looters.asp
http://www.snopes.com/katrina/photos/whatswrong.asp

I'm going to Wacan.org to discuss this with you more.

Thread 6