The Black Friend Defense

[Crazy Eddie]

yeah, that's what I did.
A long time ago, I noticed that when I see a black man with a white woman, I would instantly judge her badly. It didn't last long, but I did have that flash of prejudice. No idea where it came from. But over the years, every time it came up, I examined it for a bit, and pretty much wore it out.

The other polarity, of course, makes me horny.

Great example - our prejudices are our prejudices, and it is our individual duty to maintain tactical "situational awareness" of triggers to our own prejudices and consciously examine them into oblivion.
A couple of years ago I hired an outside IT company to manage and configure our network hardware and security software. The company came highly recommended by people I know and trust, and I had good conversations with the owner, Patrick and made arrangements for him to come see us.
When he showed up for our first face-to-face meeting and site inspection, I was amazed at myself for being shocked that he turned out to be a 6'5", imposing presence of a black man. Heck - he didn't SOUND black, after all. And something within me was wondering how this black guy ever became so expert in network security science, as if that was a field that was somehow out of bounds for a black person (he had done a lot of work for CIA and other fed agencies, as well as Fortune 500 companies - heck of a resume). Of course I KNEW better, but there was something within me that I had to re-examine time and again for like six months before it faded away. FWIW, that guy is now someone whose very presence inspires nothing but huge confidence and a feeling of utter safety when he's around - like some guardian angel, rather some stereotype of a "big 'ol black guy". Funny that my mind didn't jump to "big scary looking black guy" until I met him in person, eh? That's a problem.

FWIW, I absolutely love Patrick and all the (almost all white) people he has gathered around him to form his Company - the greatest resource of its type that I could ever hope for in a rural area like this. They're like brothers and partners to me.
I still think of Patrick though, when I find myself making assumptions about latinos, blacks, asians, short people, tall people, young people, curly haired people, blue-eyed people, and in fact ANYONE.
I realize that any time I meet anyone, I make ten thousand assumptions about them before I have two facts about them in hand. Without every individual making an effort to maintain awareness of our prejudices (which I think are unavoidable) and making a conscious effort to examine them, bigotry will never be reduced.

Exactly what I'm talking about. Everyone has prejudices, everyone makes snap judgements about people they don't know. If we're being fair, we know that we're being misjudged as well as we misjudge, so we make a conscious decision NOT to take it personally and try to move on past that (nobody's perfect).

Prejudice is understandable as long as you're willing to admit it to yourself and set it aside when confronted with new information. Racism, IMO, is the clinging to prejudice DESPITE evidence. I separate these things because the choice to ignore the evidence and cling to those prejudices is usually grounded in a positive agenda that is, generally, harmful to society as a whole.

 

[Keith&Co.]

So, this guy owns a Chinese restaurant. He's white, but his girlfriend and his ex-wife are Chinese.
Recently, someone decided to use public records and publish the identities of people who've donated money to David Duke, in response to his appreciation of Trump's reaction to CHarlottesville.
His customers and some employees began to boycott his place.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...ed-david-duke-kkk_us_59a893f9e4b0b5e530fd6be5

Defending himself: In response to accusations of racism, Grigsby told The Mercury News, “My girlfriend and my former wife were both Chinese. Anybody who knows me, it’s like the United Colors of Benetton in our restaurant. We’ve had every ethnicity.”

My son observed: It's not even 'a black friend' defense. He's using the 'black customers' defense!

- - - Updated - - -

All this from the guy who thinks using the term "conservolibertarian" constitutes a valid argument. Amazing.

Where has he actually used that term as an argument?
Not just an observation or a label, but an actual argument?

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

never mind, no reasoning with the unreasonable.

 

[Toni]

I have a hard time believing that one was innocent concern

Small town Utah with big Mormon families. Just about 90% of her students are related to people she's taught before, or knows from Sunday School. So she always tries to help the kids feel welcome by reminding them they know someone who's done this before.
"I knew your cousin" or "I taught your sister last year" or "Was that you i saw at the parade?" Whatever she can think up.
If she can't do that, she tries to find some sort of connection. "I see your daddy at the Drug Store" or "Your mommy is my grocer," sort of thing.

She has been bitten a few times with those, though, because of divorce, remarriage, estrangement... The parent delivering child has to point out that the dad is no longer allowed within 50 feet of the kid, or that's not her actual daddy, or explain why mommy and child have different last names...

She sees this kid, instantly figures she has never had a relation in her class, half the script is tossed out. She kinda panicked. She meant to ask 'what does daddy do?' when her stereotype made her think that might also be a loaded question. This is what her mind offered under that stress.

I am sure that in most respects your grandmother was a lovely, well intentioned person. But what her mind offered under stress revealed something about her prejudices that were hidden deep enough that she might not have been consciously aware of them herself. She could rely on her little script as long as she only encountered what was familiar, what fit the script. It's something we probably all do, to some extent or another.

It's the same kind of thing that makes parents draw their kids a little closer when they are near a group of (whomever), or ask questions more closely of certain kinds of friends than they would of 'regular' people.

It's the same kind of thing that allows shopkeepers to follow certain customers around the store, to be a little more certain if something goes missing that they knew who likely did it.

Not that your grandmother's attempts to establish a connection with her students by naming some connection wasn't kindly intended. I'm sure it was. But I'm also sure that it served to reassure your grandmother even more than it might have reassured her students.

I don't intend to disrespect your grandmother. I didn't grow up in Utah, but I did grow up in a pretty rural, pretty white county where a lot of people in my little section of the county were related to me with a few degrees of separtion and that those who didn't actually share a blood kinship probably went to school with one of my parents or uncles. At the county fair, I was instantly recognizable to people of my grandparent's generation as I bore a striking resemblance to my grandmother. People made all kinds of assumptions about me based on my parents, my grandparents, uncle, and even my older sibling. I was fortunate as they all had a good reputation. More than one of my school teachers had gone to school with or was close church friends with a near relation. I always knew that if I got lost on a country road (as if!) or had any kind of trouble out in the country, all I needed to do was to go to the nearest farmhouse and tell them who my dad was and they'd know who to call and I'd be safe. It was years before I figured out that a big part of that safety was my skin color.

Prejudice = pre + judge: forming a conclusion before actual facts are known. It cuts both ways.

I got the benefit of the doubt. Because I am white, because of my family name was associated with hardworking, honest people, because people recognized me and connected me to people they respected. It took me moving far away from home to realize that I had benefited even though I always knew that some kids never caught a break for the exact reasons I got all of them. It was much easier to see how they got the bad breaks than to see that I got the good ones.

 

[Malintent]

What!?

I have a hard time believing that one was innocent concern

Stereotypes are often applied without real intention of harm. This is the reason I generally consider racial prejudice and racism to be related but different phenomena. EVERYONE has prejudices, just by virtue of the need to make personal judgements based on imperfect knowledge. But prejudices can be eliminated by experience and critical thinking, once you learn more about the people you about whom you are making a judgement (and is also the reason people who recognize their own prejudices will deliberately reserve judgement until they know for sure what's going on). Racism is a mental framework in which encourages and amplifies prejudices and makes it very difficult to replace them with real information. It's like Flat Earthers or Creationists: any new information they encounter will be re-interpreted to fit into their existing biases about how the world is supposed to work.

stereotypes are useful tools to quickly group and categorize. Prejudices are the result of "successful" utilization of stereotypes... successful in utility.

I am prejudice against people in ski masks and all-black clothing sneaking around my back door. Should I be "more fair", throw out my stereotypes, and invite that fine chap into my home for some tea?

Our ancestors lived to produce us because they had prejudices against the sounds in the forest they could not see. The stereotype was, "that's a fucking lion.. maybe it isn't, but to be sure, let's get the fuck out of here".

If your day to day experience is that white people are trying to harm you, then you should expect to be prejudiced against white people... for your survival.
If your day to day experience is that black people are trying to harm you, then you should expect to be held in disdain for being prejudiced against black people...

 

[Crazy Eddie]

stereotypes are useful tools to quickly group and categorize. Prejudices are the result of "successful" utilization of stereotypes... successful in utility.

I am prejudice against people in ski masks and all-black clothing sneaking around my back door. Should I be "more fair", throw out my stereotypes, and invite that fine chap into my home for some tea?

There's a difference between judgement and PREjudgement. You can judge a person's actions and choices based on context -- where they are, what they're doing, how they're acting, etc -- but that requires having actually observed them for at least a couple of seconds to a minute to size them up. PREjudgement -- aka prejudice -- is when the assumption is built in for that person before you have had any chance to observe them at all. An observation isn't a prejudgement, because that depends on context.

THIS is a difference that black people get wrong all the time. I've had a lot of friends tell me they didn't get hired at such and such a place or were treated suspiciously because they were black. In some cases I have to point out "No, it's because you showed up at the place with your pants sagging below your waistline, wearing a backwards fitted cap and a plain white t-shirt two sizes too big and an enormous gold chain with a Wu-Tang pendent on it. Even if he didn't think you were a gang banger, he definitely thinks you're dressed like one." Ten minutes later someone tells me her hotel refused to book a reception hall for her wedding and I tell her "Yes, that's just prejudice." Because in the latter case I know her to be very articulate and very intelligent (she's a lawyer handling mostly copyright cases and contract disputes) but she has a very thick Mississippi accent that white people in Chicago sometimes misinterpret as "ghetto."

Prejudice isn't always inaccurate, since a lot of the time it's based on experience. But prejudice involves the spurious connection of one particular trait with a specific set of behaviors and traits that are not causally linked. So prejudgements are more likely to be wrong than they are correct.

tl;dr: Don't jump to conclusions. It's better to judge people by what they're actually saying and doing, not by who you think they are.

Our ancestors lived to produce us because they had prejudices against the sounds in the forest they could not see. The stereotype was, "that's a fucking lion.. maybe it isn't, but to be sure, let's get the fuck out of here".

That's not how that works. That's not how ANY of that works.

If your day to day experience is that white people are trying to harm you, then you should expect to be prejudiced against white people... for your survival.
If your day to day experience is that black people are trying to harm you, then you should expect to be held in disdain for being prejudiced against black people...

That's ALSO not how any of that works. Because in BOTH cases, statistically speaking, your prejudices will be wrong, since the majority of black AND white people either side will encounter are entirely harmless anyway.

In nature and in modern society, you judge a threat based on a person's actions. You might prejudge that a white boss is more likely to be racist or unfair to black employees, but acting as if this is a confirmed fact is likely to cause a lot of problems, especially if the boss ISN'T a racist and is trying his best to be fair. Prejudices are certainly forgivable to the extent people are willing to put them aside and make replace them with more accurate judgements.