What?I think only Western nations can be really judged by diversity. Non-white majority countries have a different context in terms of race and ethnicity, that is particular to the culture and history of the respective nations.
It's a vague generality based on little but assumptions. I also don't think a substantially larger percent of white Europeans claim their countries aren't racist than white Americans. Of course this should be on a country by country basis anyway, but American exceptionalism is so strong that they often refuse to be compared to anything less than a continent.
Thank you for this post. I literally don't know enough to respond to every point of it. I think this is a great post, and very educational. However, there is one thing I'd like to respond to below.https://www.destatis.de/DE/ZahlenFa...AED11BE48BE5406EDFB140.InternetLive1#Tabellen
The idea that the German government doesn't track some differences in their population is false. We just don't use *race*, and most of us, myself included, will fight tooth and nails that it remains that way. And I have good company there, among them the central council of jews in germany. It has a *reason* that religious allegiance as a question in the census was already *highly* controversial here. If you think that it is the *right-wingers* that opposes racial tracking here, you've really got no clue. It's the left, *and* various minorities that in the US would be categorized with different races. Even the *census* itself is controversial here.
But the real reason that the US-race terms are useless here is another:
Europe is highly diverse and extremely fractured. If you leave us alone for 20 years, we'll manufacture 25 categories to seperate other groups in ways to discriminate against them, even if ten years ago there were no stereotypes at all.
Germany alone isn't homogenously German even if you only look at people that in the US would be uniformly German - ask a Bavarian if he's the same as a person from Nordrhein Westphalen, and you'll hear a "no" - and you could spend quite a while examining biases and, yes, racial stereotypes between both groups.
We didn't even need migrants from Africa to find people to have racist prejudice about - polish people ("lazy thieves that steal cars"), russian people ("criminals, violent, brutish"), italians ("lazy slackers that only care for sex and fun"), Sinti and Roma (I'm not even going to post the prejudices against them here, in case someone thinks I actually believe them, because some of that stuff is absolutely abhorrent), jews, several christian minorities (such as the Jehova's Witnesses). I could keep going just listing other *white* minorities that people in Europe have racial biases towards.
All of that would be "white" in the US. This isn't me saying that we have no racism here and that we're all equal. This is me saying that we've got plenty of racism here between whites, BEFORE we even get to various racist opinions against muslims, and their prejudices among themselves, or against blacks and asians. In other words, I'm literally and directly stating that it's quite bad over here, but not in the same way as it is in the US. It's a different continent. Applying the US understanding to it is missing the forest for the trees.
What in US terms is "one race" would often be over 20 different groups over here, meaning you'd miss wide ranges of racist prejudice entirely.
So why track that way, and not look at the actually relevant indicators? Why give legitimacy to "race" as a construct that is inherently meaningless and discredited since 1945?
[And for the person earlier claiming that there's totally no data anywhere, making us super surprised to have blacks here:
http://www.rki.de/DE/Content/InfAZ/...ilotstudie_Mapping.pdf?__blob=publicationFile
This little report lists african migrant numbers in quite a lot of detail. On page 59, for example, you'll find a graph detailing the home countries of the registered people of african descent living in Bonn, a single City in Germany). You can find a ton of stuff in there - which cities have most people of african descent, which city has most women of african descent (Hamburg), which city has the highest percentage of people from that continent (Darmstadt, with 1.1%), and so on, and so on.
Like, seriously people, we're not surprised about this kind of stuff.]
I know that. Feel free to track those things. What I'm saying is that when you don't track race specifically, you miss alot of relevant information about the larger global social construct that is race. What I would say is that you're tracking sub groups, and missing the greater groups by which humans have tended to socially organize themselves.What in US terms is "one race" would often be over 20 different groups over here, meaning you'd miss wide ranges of racist prejudice entirely.
So why track that way, and not look at the actually relevant indicators? Why give legitimacy to "race" as a construct that is inherently meaningless and discredited since 1945?
I'm convinced this thread was posted in poor faith. OP did not want to discuss, just put dirty Ewwropeans in their place.
Wow. The cognitive dissonance is so strong I'm surprised you haven't created a portal to a parallel dimension.I think only Western nations can be really judged by diversity. Non-white majority countries have a different context in terms of race and ethnicity, that is particular to the culture and history of the respective nations.
They both have their flaws to them, I just think it's weird for Europeans to say "we don't care about color, we care about ethnicity" when you have football fans throwing bananas on the field on the regular when a black guy is playing.
It's weird because Europeans obviously participate in racism based on color, it's not like it's more nuanced than the racism in America or anything...Why is it weird? There's racist people who subscribe to that notion in Europe as well.
Wow. The cognitive dissonance is so strong I'm surprised you haven't created a portal to a parallel dimension.
What do you mean "worry about untouchables?" :/Is it legitimate for U.S. to decry the caste system of India when they don't have to worry about untouchables in the U.S.? Of course they do. This is a silly line of argument. Just because a country doesn't have a history of systematic racism, it doesn't mean they cannot point out unfair treatment of a group of people in other countries.
It's weird because Europeans obviously participate in racism based on color, it's not like it's more nuanced than the racism in America or anything...
Is there a lot of ethnicity based racism(more accurately, xenophobia, but the same for all intents and purposes here) in the US? Because if not, then this "nuance" is there. We're sadly drowning in it. Loads of racism against Turkish/Romanian/Polish/Croatian/... people.It's weird because Europeans obviously participate in racism based on color, it's not like it's more nuanced than the racism in America or anything...
Is there a lot of ethnicity based racism(more accurately, xenophobia, but the same for all intents and purposes here) in the US? Because if not, then this "nuance" is there. We're sadly drowning in it. Loads of racism against Turkish/Romanian/Polish/Croatian/... people.
If you look at the past few page(s?), I tried to explain why I feel like using the American concept of race in an European context does not work, even though there is discrimination based on skin color.
You described the American approach as descriptivist, but that only really works in a system which started out holding these views in a prescriptivist way, in my opinion.
When you look at racism/xenophobia(which I believe are inseparately linked in Europe) in a European context, using the American system is overly simplistic. Like also stated before, a "race" section on a census would be borderline useless when compared to a section asking about ethnicity/immigration history.
If you feel I'm wrong, I would love to hear more about your views. I'd especially appreciate if you could try to use examples and comparisons to make it easy to grasp, because I feel like there is a lot of potential for productive discussion here.
I absolutely agree that many Europeans look down on Americans when it comes to racism, and perhaps often unfairly. I believe that this is because you have such obvious and glaring issues that make international news. I remember hearing about Trayvon Martin on Austrian news, you know. Since we are immersed in our racism, which does usually not take as violent forms, I believe it is easy to feel like the US are objectively worse.Good post, (and thanks to Mass_Pincup above as well). I think this makes it clearer for me to understand as well.
I think the heart of the issue here is Americans feel like Europeans unfairly look down on them for their brand of racism as though the European form of discrimination is somehow more sophisticated, which is more what I was alluding to with the nuance comment. But I think from the American perspective the sort of "ethnic" racism that was imported from Europe has largely dissolved (we used to have plenty of "No Irish Allowed", anti-German, anti-Polish, anti-etc. things here but not really in my lifetime). You mention the simplicity of the American approach, and I get what you're saying -- but I wonder how it manifests itself in Europe. If somebody is anti-Polish, do they treat any slavic-appearing people with distrust, or do they wait until finding out they're specifically Polish? The American form of it is perhaps ignorant in the sense that if you're from south of the border you generally get treated as a "Mexican" regardless of where you're actually from, but it also more accurately reflects how people treat each other; a Guatemalan and a Honduran, at first glance, are going to be treated effectively the same way. Is that "worse" or just simpler?
I'm not claiming to have answers here, just sort of throwing out thoughts in hopes of organizing them and discussing it.
You are not way off base. This is the exact same thing people have been arguing throughout this thread in regards to white people in Europe. There are a vast array of ethnicities that would all be considered 'white' through the US racial lens. The fact that you only want to apply race to Western countries or ethnicity to other countries because you don't like the result is the cognitive dissonance I am talking about.I don't understand. In the traditional sense of "diversity," which is the confluence of people of different countries, cultures, and races primarily only applies to Western nations. What people consider are "homogenous" countries non-white countries (not all homogenous), actually have plenty of diversity within them, because when these countries were formed many different people/cultures/ethnicities were joined in a single nation. Look at the Middle-east now, and parts of Africa. How do you judge how diverse they are? Race and ethnicity is a social construction that is not universally interpreted. I think the OP was talking about diversity in terms of the West, and the things he cited were Western sources.
Edit: Tell me if I'm way off base.
You have some very weird ideas about diversity. Travel distance and melanin content being more significant than culture and history.I'm trying real hard not to roll my eyes at people being all "Actually we're more diverse." I understand that cultural and even language diversities are valuable but that's not really the same thing. The differences between and history of the English/Scottish are valuable. But, in the present day, you can drive between England and Scotland.
I really don't understand the point here. Are you trying to say that nowadays, there is no real difference English and Scottish culture any more? Because that'd just be woefully ignorant.I'm trying real hard not to roll my eyes at people being all "Actually we're more diverse." I understand that cultural and even language diversities are valuable but that's not really the same thing. The differences between and history of the English/Scottish are valuable. But, in the present day, you can drive between England and Scotland.
I think it's pretty simple: using minority black populations as an example, countries or regions with more black people are going to have more problems with racism against black people because there are more black people to hate, furthermore large minority populations tend to inspire tension and fear in white communities (see white flight). This has lead us to a more pragmatic approach, versus the more idealistic policies of our kin across the Atlantic. Not that we weren't there ourselves not too long ago, and that we aren't still there to some degree, but the divide between Europeans and Americans in this thread on the need for real-world action vs. the importance of color-blind ideals is striking.
You are not way off base. This is the exact same thing people have been arguing throughout this thread in regards to white people in Europe. There are a vast array of ethnicities that would all be considered 'white' through the US racial lens. The fact that you only want to apply race to Western countries or ethnicity to other countries because you don't like the result is the cognitive dissonance I am talking about.
Id say melanin is the big one. In canada we call it visible minority, and its pretty much the only gauge for diversity.You have some very weird ideas about diversity. Travel distance and melanin content being more significant than culture and history.
Jesus christ just sit down somewhere.In other words, said countries once tried to wipe out their ethnic minorities and now decide to pretend that racism doesn't exist.
Good deconstruction of the thread. I agree.Thought-provoking discussion, I've enjoyed reading it. The info on how race-based social constructs are viewed in Germany and France was particularly interesting and eye-opening. It is easy to forget how different our cultures really are, threads like these are a good reminder.
I think it's pretty simple: using minority black populations as an example, countries or regions with more black people are going to have more problems with racism against black people because there are more black people to hate, furthermore large minority populations tend to inspire tension and fear in white communities (see white flight). This has lead us to a more pragmatic approach, versus the more idealistic policies of our kin across the Atlantic. Not that we weren't there ourselves not too long ago, and that we aren't still there to some degree, but the divide between Europeans and Americans in this thread on the need for real-world action vs. the importance of color-blind ideals is striking.
Racism inflicted on black people is just going to be less visible and less important to a society with a low black population, by virtue of the fact that the black population itself is less visible and almost certainly less empowered (supported by the low government representation cited in the op). Additionally, with a smaller population I don't think you are going to see the same impact from collective action (I should note this is conjecture, I didn't research this point). Consider the significance of social media in the modern fight against institutionalized racism, it seems to me like it would be much harder to stir the general public to action without a large, dedicated black population at the foundation to ring the bell, every time, and to provide valuable insight on just how common the type of racism in question really is. That is one of the most meaningful parts of a story like the Starbucks story, I think, for a largely ignorant white population: "Dear white people: this happens all the time." I confess that I am now being somewhat idealistic myself, but I think you'd have a hard time arguing that this collective expression amounted to nothing at all in that particular case, or many other recent cases, or that the repetition or volume of that expression isn't significant.
I do think European posters often bring interesting feedback to the subject of racism in America, but I think the perspective the op and many posters in this thread provide for these discussions is valuable. The way the murder of black people by our police has been repeatedly referenced in this thread is a good example of a serious - and sensitive - American race issue that (most of) the European posters who mentioned it should maybe think a little more about before lobbing it out there. Maybe I'm off base, but I feel this is exactly the sort of thing op is talking about. Do you really think your cops are less racist, or do they just have less guns and less corruption in their power structures? It is the combination of these ingredients that is deadly. The fact that you are missing one or two doesn't mean you don't have the other problem: institutionalized discrimination based on skin color, not ethnicity. Let's just say I'm skeptical that this isn't a problem in these countries.
Thought-provoking discussion, I've enjoyed reading it. The info on how race-based social constructs are viewed in Germany and France was particularly interesting and eye-opening. It is easy to forget how different our cultures really are, threads like these are a good reminder.
I think it's pretty simple: using minority black populations as an example, countries or regions with more black people are going to have more problems with racism against black people because there are more black people to hate, furthermore large minority populations tend to inspire tension and fear in white communities (see white flight). This has lead us to a more pragmatic approach, versus the more idealistic policies of our kin across the Atlantic. Not that we weren't there ourselves not too long ago, and that we aren't still there to some degree, but the divide between Europeans and Americans in this thread on the need for real-world action vs. the importance of color-blind ideals is striking.
Racism inflicted on black people is just going to be less visible and less important to a society with a low black population, by virtue of the fact that the black population itself is less visible and almost certainly less empowered (supported by the low government representation cited in the op). Additionally, with a smaller population I don't think you are going to see the same impact from collective action (I should note this is conjecture, I didn't research this point). Consider the significance of social media in the modern fight against institutionalized racism, it seems to me like it would be much harder to stir the general public to action without a large, dedicated black population at the foundation to ring the bell, every time, and to provide valuable insight on just how common the type of racism in question really is. That is one of the most meaningful parts of a story like the Starbucks story, I think, for a largely ignorant white population: "Dear white people: this happens all the time." I confess that I am now being somewhat idealistic myself, but I think you'd have a hard time arguing that this collective expression amounted to nothing at all in that particular case, or many other recent cases, or that the repetition or volume of that expression isn't significant.
I do think European posters often bring interesting feedback to the subject of racism in America, but I think the perspective the op and many posters in this thread provide for these discussions is valuable. The way the murder of black people by our police has been repeatedly referenced in this thread is a good example of a serious - and sensitive - American race issue that (most of) the European posters who mentioned it should maybe think a little more about before lobbing it out there. Maybe I'm off base, but I feel this is exactly the sort of thing op is talking about. Do you really think your cops are less racist, or do they just have less guns and less corruption in their power structures? It is the combination of these ingredients that is deadly. The fact that you are missing one or two doesn't mean you don't have the other problem: institutionalized discrimination based on skin color, not ethnicity. Let's just say I'm skeptical that this isn't a problem in these countries.
How do you not mention Canada, tge number one US hater on Earth
Also the first country to study multiculturalism and implement it. Were the only country on EARTH which allows provinces (quebec) to leave.
That is because we studied multiculturalism which is the study of how to organize multiple cultures, ethnicities, and races.
And this started with Kymlicka and at that time we were like 90% white. However there was the distinction between anglo and Franco's which Kymlicka focused on.
I know that. Feel free to track those things. What I'm saying is that when you don't track race specifically, you miss alot of relevant information about the larger global social construct that is race. What I would say is that you're tracking sub groups, and missing the greater groups by which humans have tended to socially organize themselves.
Thought-provoking discussion, I've enjoyed reading it. The info on how race-based social constructs are viewed in Germany and France was particularly interesting and eye-opening. It is easy to forget how different our cultures really are, threads like these are a good reminder.
I think it's pretty simple: using minority black populations as an example, countries or regions with more black people are going to have more problems with racism against black people because there are more black people to hate, furthermore large minority populations tend to inspire tension and fear in white communities (see white flight). This has lead us to a more pragmatic approach, versus the more idealistic policies of our kin across the Atlantic. Not that we weren't there ourselves not too long ago, and that we aren't still there to some degree.
I like this post.
This is another good point, I'd be interested if you could expand more on Canada's implementation on multiculturalism and diversity.
It's a strange situation all around. It's not even a Spaniard being a racist shithead. It's a woman from El Salvador, which most likely has experienced racism herself, acting as if she was in a higher position than him in the "food chain", so to speak. Even if she was caucasian, a racist shithead isn't going to give two shits about your skin color as soon as you speak and he realizes from your accent that you were born in Latin America.
BossAttack I really don't want to come off as rude or anything, but there are some problems with your OP I'd like to adress.
First of all the diversity in Europe and it's countries isn't as bad as you want it to make here. A lot of people don't get tracked, I think this has been pointed out to you already but still. That 2.4% Turks in Germany for example is laughably low and false. Just an example, I live in Cologne, where theres even something called "little Istanbul", and it's not the only area where the residents are like 90% of turkish origin. My best friends are from Korea, Singapore, Turkey, Ghana, Portugal, Spain and a few from Germany. Most of them live 15 minutes away by feet or less. All of them count as Germans that have been living here since birth, not "PoC" or anything else. You would probably call 50% of them "white". They aren't.
The fact we have so many cultures and languages in Europe alone makes that diversity argument invalid.
Then you wanting to have Europeans look at American racism issues trhough the perspective of an American while you yourself just go ahead and look at European racism issues through an American perspective is really, really flawed.
A lot of racism in Europe is nationality based. People that voted for Brexit don't just hate muslims, they also hate "white" people from Poland or anyone from that region. I remember a report about a German family being bullied out of her neighbourhood in the UK after brexit was happening. I think someone else called it Intra-white racism, and I'm pretty sure you had no idea that this is even a thing.
I won't say there is no racism in Europe based on skin colour at all, my stepfather for example had problems being black especially in East-Germany, but it's not the biggest factor.
I don't have anything useful to add and it is not limited to this topic, but we Euros honestly love doing this, even if it's totally off-base. It seems like that's our designated role to play in the eternal US-Europe internet debate danceMy issue is the air of superiority too many people in this thread have. And, I'd surmise, is a small part of the reason this thread was created.
I don't have anything useful to add and it is not limited to this topic, but we Euros honestly love doing this, even if it's totally off-base. It seems like that's our designated role to play in the eternal US-Europe internet debate dance
who in this thread is arguing that there is no racism in europe?I'll admit I was off base somewhat with my earlier comment, but I do wanna come back to say yes it absolutely does stand out to us.
Like, when I see some ERA members go off about "America, get your shit together" it makes me laugh. Most black people don't get shot at on a daily basis. It shouldn't happen at all, but those are the extreme cases. Most of the time we're dealing with more subtle racism, institutional and "microaggressions" and what have you. So when we (or at least I) see European people act like America's just totally fucked but their countries are great, it doesn't line up with what I've heard WRT to how black people are often treated in other countries.
It's not just Europe. Asian countries have the same issue, though there are other factors to consider there.
so this post will veer a bit off-topic, but we sort of unanimously decided globally that Americans are the butt of every joke and this extends to the real world as well. I'm not making this upI'll admit I was off base somewhat with my earlier comment, but I do wanna come back to say yes it absolutely does stand out to us.
Like, when I see some ERA members go off about "America, get your shit together" it makes me laugh. Most black people don't get shot at on a daily basis. It shouldn't happen at all, but those are the extreme cases. Most of the time we're dealing with more subtle racism, institutional and "microaggressions" and what have you. So when we (or at least I) see European people act like America's just totally fucked but their countries are great, it doesn't line up with what I've heard WRT to how black people are often treated in other countries.
It's not just Europe. Asian countries have the same issue, though there are other factors to consider there.
Hello, I am from the Europe. Can confirm that our neuro-network of sync-ness has deemed the quoted post to be on point.so this post will veer a bit off-topic, but we sort of unanimously decided globally that Americans are the butt of every joke and this extends to the real world as well. I'm not making this up
on the internet, this phenomenon reaches far beyond Era. The Americans (usually by far the biggest group on most sites) are assigned the role of the misguided oaf, and we enlightened foreigners get to lecture you on every aspect of your lives. It's the age old two-man act, I wouldn't have it any other way. We don't admit to being wrong about anything, ever