Reply #135: no, it's not the case that everyone has experienced the reality of race and racism

[fishwax]

And even more absurd to suggest that everyone has an equal amount of experience with race and racism and that the only difference is in the type of experience. That's laughable. The fact is that white people don't really have to think about race or their relationship to race and racism if they don't want to, and I don't think it's the case that white people have all experienced racism. Some may have experienced personal acts of racism, but that's different from systemic racism. Getting your feelings hurt is not the same as having your rights and/or your humanity denied. And watching a situation in which someone is a victim of racist behavior is not "just a different perspective of the same general experience" as actually being a victim of racist behavior.

So the idea that "It's just a different perspective of the same general experience" is silly beyond belief. Frankly, the suggestions that African Americans and white Americans have had the same American experience, and that they just have a different perspective of that same general experience reveals a profound cluelessness that would likely be offensive if it weren't so difficult to take seriously.

And no, once again, racists don't have experience recognizing, reacting to, and dealing with racism. Swinging a hammer doesn't give you any sense of what it's like to be a nail. Punching someone in the face doesn't give you experience with being punched in the face.

That's what I was arguing about. And I never said that she meant "exclusively qualified" or "only factor", but I was arguing that that would mean that that one factor by itself would "lend weight" to the argument without even considering other factors, by that logic. So if a black person and white person were discussing whether this OP was or wasn't an instance of racism, one would automatically think that the black person's opinion held more weight from knowing that alone, and nothing else. Because the white person couldn't have experienced racism (at least not in the same way, though of course living in this society leads everyone to have had to deal with race and racism from some perspective or other).

Yes, of course that one factor would lend weight to that person's opinion. That doesn't preclude the possibility that there are other factors that could do likewise for differing opinions. And saying that a person's experience lends weight to their opinion doesn't mean that you turn off your brain to all other factors of their argument or that their ethnicity is the only factor you use in evaluating what they are saying.

"What I'm intersted in how you would do it between two different minorities? What if a Hispanic and a black person were arguing about whether some comment was racist towards Asians. Who would you automatically give the weight of the argument to, just knowing that? Or, would you not infer anything only from that information alone and wait to hear their arguments from their different perspectives? (The "you" isn't referring to you literally of course). I just find it a curious excercise of logic that doesn't hold up. And not very helpful when discussing issues of race or racism."

This, too, is kind of silly, MellowDem. The fact that two people have a certain expertise about a given subject doesn't mean that they will necessarily agree about everything related to that subject. But disagreement between experts doesn't negate the reality or the value of expertise. :shrug: