A few thoughts on the latest round of White Guilt discussions

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I mean, here's the deal, one of the things that drew me to Discordianism is when I read the PD, and came to this section:


http://www.principiadiscordia.com/book/56.php

Particularily this passage:

        Western philosophy is traditionally concerned with contrasting one grid with another grid, and amending grids in hopes of finding a perfect one that will account for all reality and will, hence, (say unenlightened westerners) be True. This is illusory; it is what we Erisians call the ANERISTIC ILLUSION. Some grids can be more useful than others, some more beautiful than others, some more pleasant than others, etc., but none can be more True than any other.
It was a complete head-nodding experience.  Yes!  It was something I always felt and knew but had just never saw expressed and laid out that way.  And I truly believe there many more out there who hold that same philosophy.  Sorry, this looks all funky, my iPad always seems to fuck up when I cut and paste from other sources.

I've noticed that no one has addressed this point.

What point?

I think the point was "everywhere I look I see evidence for this belief I hold" but I may have picked up bad signal wrt RWHN from you spags.

Typically that's called confirmation bias, but that still, while relevant to this discussion, seems to hold little connection to the quoted article.

[Dildo Argentino]

I've since learned to make an effort to think about my thoughts, words, and reactions.

Well actually, there is still plenty of room for improvement.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

I've since learned to make an effort to think about my thoughts, words, and reactions.

Well actually, there is still plenty of room for improvement.

That is true for almost all people, myself no exception, and I am suspicious of anyone who thinks otherwise of themselves.

[Juana]

I've since learned to make an effort to think about my thoughts, words, and reactions.

Well actually, there is still plenty of room for improvement.

a) that's implied.
b) fuck off.

[East Coast Hustle]

I've since learned to make an effort to think about my thoughts, words, and reactions.

Well actually, there is still plenty of room for improvement.

Do you need to go back in your hole?

[Epimetheus]

Everyone carries preconceptions, misconceptions, and cultural baggage that, if they examine it, is probably contrary to their personal ideals. Anyone who claims they don't is claiming to be a perfect person, which is something I don't believe is possible, and claiming to be a perfect person seems like a great big enormous warning sign of someone with some kind of massive delusional personality disorder.

This is a great post and I am saving it for posterity.

[East Coast Hustle]

I'm just amused at the part where RWHN is seriously arguing that he doesn't carry any ingrained prejudices around.

I mean, of all the people.

[Faust]

Give me an example of a bad meme you haven't been able to deflect.

1. Strangers are dangerous, way more dangerous than people you already know.
2.  Hispanics who wear baggy clothes are gang bangers who will probably shoot you as soon as look at you.
3.  Black men will do something bad to you if they have the chance.

There's others probably, but these are the ones I personally am aware of and try my damnedest not to react to.  I realize that your comment was directed at Garbo, but you're simply acting like a supercilious, condescending asshole right now.

OK out of curiosities sake I tried this to see if I could identify some of mine, I come from a skewed background though, I went to primary school in London I was the only white lad and the rest of the class were made up of Indian or African descent. Where I worked race creed and gender don't matter it's all about your education level and how much funding you can secure.

So we'll start with that:

The more money you can bring in to the company the more successfull you are as a person.
Higher Level education qualification = better then.
If you are young, you probably don't know what you are doing.
If you are a practicing Catholic your views are probably opposed to mine.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

From my perspective, this whole thing is getting muddled.

On the one hand, I think its possible for some (but not all) people to grow up in an environment where specific types of prejudice may not take hold. For example, growing up as a JW instilled in me a very equal view of races because they strongly believe that all races are equal, all made by God and will equally inherit the earth. On the down side, I picked up a very strong prejudice against everyone else in the world that wasn't a JW. All you worldly women just want to take my virginity and you men want top addict me to drugs! Not to mention the orgies and Dungeons and Dragons!

I mean, when I interact with people race doesn't seem to affect my viewpoint of the person nearly as much as a cross around their neck, christian idioms in their speech or any behaviors that label them as Christendom (the worst of the worldly people in the JW universe). I find that I am immediately distrustful of some overt Christian individual, compared to almost anyone else.

I think we all have prejudices, they aren't all the same particular kind of Horrible... but it seems very unlikely to survive this existence without picking some up.

However, at the same time, the 'programming' issue seems to be the same issue that the OP is ranting about. That is while a tribe of people that pick up an Cause may have some really good ideas and intent, they also likely have some bad/dumb/brken programs as well. The flaw seems to be that many times people have a hard time separating 'agreement on a good idea' and 'agreement of my whole reality tunnel'.

For example, I am embarrassed when I see Native American graphics being used  sell shit that has nothing to do with Native Americans (Lucky Strike, American Spirit, the various sports teams etc). As Purpleeris said, sticking their head on a cigarette pack is as repulsive as sticking the head of someone you killed on a stake and dancing around with it.

I find snake oil salesmen repulsive, no matter what they're selling (faith healing, sweat lodges, ancient Chinese medicine). But, my dislike for them lies not in the exploitation of a culture, but in the exploitation of the rubes.

I think that there are many points that I would agree with Nigel and Garbo on, about the general topic, but I differ in some of the details (cause we all have different reality grids/tunnels). Therein lies the huge flaw in various activist causes. It generally starts with a Big Tent and ends with a Tea Party. 

[AFK]

Because it's not really relevant to the issue at hand? I had a head-noddy moment with it, too, but it has nothing to do with whether or not I've picked up shitty memes.

I think it is highly relevant to the discussion of prejudice.  The idea of different cultures having different reality grids, but that no one set of grids from any one culture is True.  So, with that understanding, it would be completely counterintuitive to trade in prejudice.

It's relevant to whether a person is *actively* and *intentionally* prejudiced. Passive and unintentional prejudice - those shitty memes - are not particularly related to it.

Sure it is, if one holds as a core value equality and fairness to all peoples, then one would actively identify and reject signal which would cause one to make irrational judgements.

[AFK]

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the second coming of Jesus H Christ.   

Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Here before us we have the perfect man; he carries no misconceptions, preconceptions, or misjudgment of his fellow men and women.

Hallelujah!

It doesn't take a perfect person to be a fair person.

The danger of being convinced that you are perfectly fair and unprejudiced is that it means that if you do have prejudices, say toward potheads or rednecks or rich white women or people who don't wear helmets, you will never be able to see, acknowledge, and repair those aspects of your perception. I am very uncomfortable with people who claim to lack prejudice, because I've never found it to be true, and those people are the most incorrigible in terms of their prejudice because they, secure in their knowledge that they are unprejudiced, believe their prejudices to be objective truth.

Again, I claim no perfection at all, and reject the idea that what I've been talking about infers perfection.  I can be perfectly unfair to people, individuals, but not because of what I think they are, but because of how I'm interpreting what they are doing or saying in front of me. 

edit: RWHN's request.

Not good enough Net.  Delete it now. 

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Also, a polite request, I no longer post pictures of myself here out of a desire to protect my anonymity for professional and personal reasons. In fact I'll be emptying my photobucket account to ensure anything I have posted is gone. It would be greatly appreciated if the WOMP was removed and my visage deleted from WOMP vaults.  I hope that my request will be heeded promptly.  Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Done.

It's gonna fuck up Twid's comic, though.  That was the funniest scene in the whole damn thing.

[The Good Reverend Roger]

Give me an example of an event you're totally unaware of.

Coyote's tomohawks.

[Elder Iptuous]

nobody? 

So...
i was thinking about the racism thing, and suddenly it struck me that racism appears to be self reinforcing due to a prisoners dilemma setup in any given encounter.  of course, with iterated prisoner's dilemma, then altruistic strategies prevail and you get to have your non race member friends, but with someone you've never met, it isn't iterated and so greedy strategy prevails. (which is exactly what we see)
thinking about it in these terms gives me little hope that racism will ever be overcome to any extent.

it seemed like such a clear description that i googled it looking for analysis of race relations in this context and was surprised not to get any results out of the hat.
perhaps i am overlooking something?

[The Good Reverend Roger]

nobody? 

So...
i was thinking about the racism thing, and suddenly it struck me that racism appears to be self reinforcing due to a prisoners dilemma setup in any given encounter.  of course, with iterated prisoner's dilemma, then altruistic strategies prevail and you get to have your non race member friends, but with someone you've never met, it isn't iterated and so greedy strategy prevails. (which is exactly what we see)
thinking about it in these terms gives me little hope that racism will ever be overcome to any extent.

it seemed like such a clear description that i googled it looking for analysis of race relations in this context and was surprised not to get any results out of the hat.
perhaps i am overlooking something?

I think you're reading too much into it, myself.  I think it's just plain old xenophobia and pecking order shit.