I think the word itself has suffered from vocabularic extremism and is now so broad and encapsulating that most any thought, action, or consequences with a negative tie to even a consideration of race is being considered racist. It's a word begging for distinctions. We have words like "embezzlement" that is a narrower form of the term "theft." With "racism" so egregiously broadened at personal emotional whim with no consideration for meaning, some distinctions with definitional boundaries might help alleviate some of this one size fits all mentality. Heck, maybe it's not racism but not only wrong but worst than racism. Why minimize it by calling it racist? There needs to be clear cut necessary conditions so that we can weed out the things that we might otherwise call racism.
Out of curiosity, how WOULD you define the term?
I'm not sure I do in fact see the danger in false accusation here, aside from hurt feelings, since unlike theft or embezzlement, racism in and of itself is not a crime in any nation I am aware of. But if you were to define the term, how would you do it? And what would you sub-terms be?
Well, I don't rightly know exactly.
I wouldn't include "hatred" as a necessary condition. One can be racist and not in fact hate. Of course, a racist that hates would still be a racist. So, in that regard, that would not be a limiting factor.
I think I would include dislike. That seems like a reasonable inclusion. Of course, when I do that, many examples of purported racism is eliminated. For instance, if an action incidentally yields a negative result towards a race, any genuine lack of dislike towards the affected race would eliminate racism. I'm sure that wouldn't go over too well, but the point is to have a semblance of traditional meaning.
I think it must be a natural inclination to broaden the scope of a words meaning. I wouldn't say I've went boating just because I bought a boat, but "boat" is the root word, so if it was subjected to extremism, it would be manipulated--much how "atheist" has been and subsequently evolved. Some people think that a lie of omission is a kind of lie. It's not. It's a kind of deception. Perhaps equally as cringe worthy, but we cannot always go by the root word alone to associate meaning at our whim.
Racism includes certain things, but to act as though every facet imaginable is encompassed is to broaden current usage beyond its original scope. "Racism" is being used so broadly it's almost beyond belief. People even joke about how everything is racist. No, it's not. It's just an egregious use of it.
Consider a person that has no qualms with another race. Back in the day, that person wouldn't have been considered a racist since there's no genuine dislike of a member of that race. That's pretty narrow, but if the definition is narrow, then for illustrative purposes, a person that has other race related issues (good or bad), the person would not be a racist per se but be something else.
If Republicans do underhanded things that affect Democratic voters, it seems disingenuous to say the target is race in times when the Democrats are black. If it negatively effects blacks, and it's because they're black, then that's one thing, but if it's because they're Democrats, that's something else entirely.
I know this is falling on deaf ears, but I just think the accusations of racism must rise in an atmosphere where everything remotely related to race is included. Surely it's a bit broader than my quick stab at it, but I'm a firm believer that the meaning of words is a function of something more than what people want them to mean.
