Butch Cassidy

How is he 'black'? He's mother is white his father (as far as we are aware) a 'black' Kenyan. That is mixed race.

mandymoochops

Might have been said in jest but you w*****r how dare you call me that :curse: you sweetheart can f**k RIGHT off

iaink

Hmmmm, let me think.....

dbd33

In US politics anyone who is not obviously white is black. It doesn't matter if he's a quadroon or octaroon a Eurasian or whatever, if he doesn't look white, and Obama plainly does not, he's black. Oreo maybe but politically black.

on edit, Thanks Iain!

Butch Cassidy

So where do hispanics, asians, east indians, cree, navajo etc fit in that system?????.


My original point was (and still is) that we all make judgements based on appearances and thus far MMC, Iain and yourself are all backing me up.

dbd33

Native aboriginal indian people have no place in the system.

Hispanics are Hispanics.

Asians, in the US sense, are Asians.

People from the Indian sub-continent are not (yet) important in US politics.

But then you know this. The really important identifiable groups are whites, blacks, Jews and Hispanics. Obama's the candidate because he's black, he loses the Democrats some Jewish and Hispanic votes but may retain the black vote and expand the white one.

livermanl

But if you had to find that same girl as a police officer because either she is a criminal or a target of a criminal then the use of the word 'black' may or may not depending on where you are at that time eliminate so many people from your search. Would this mean that all police officers are racist because they need to be quick?

I understand what you are saying though and it does need to be taught to the new generation but taring everybody a racist because they use race as a description just isn't fair...Much like if i said 'that fat woman' it may not be nice and there are better ways of saying it but it is true none the less.

dbd33

I'm not backing you up in the sense of saying that I judge people by their colour.

dbd33

That girl is not about to become a police officer. Since she has been working in a hospital primarily dealing with gun shot wounds she has developed a greater fear of the police than I've ever had.

On point, the police here are not allowed to describe a suspect by colour, I expect they do so amongst themselves but I've no way of knowing if that helps them or not.

Butch Cassidy

Ah, but you are 'judging' his heritage and racial designation by appearance. (and yes self-identification I will concede)

dbd33

Assessing his heritage isn't forming a judgement about him unless one holds a prejudice concerning people of that heritage. I don't think black people are anything in particular except black.

iaink

Now you are offending me. How am I making any sort of judgement based on his appearance?

You might be doing that, I certainly am not. "Black" in this sense is simply and adjective that describes what he looks like, not what he is capable of, or anything else about him other than his appearance.

[on edit] ^^^What he said!

Butch Cassidy

No offence was meant Iain.
I merely meant that 'we' are 'allowing' people to be labelled based on appearance.
To extend my earlier argument with reference to West Indians (talking area of birth only here) I would suggest that there are few people in the world who could claim to be 100% of one 'nation'. Therefore why do we need to label based on 'race'. It is not a matter of being PC it is a matter of accepting 'humanity' and moral values as more relevant than the colour of your skin, the church you worship in and the way you vote.

Jingsamichty

I hope you're exaggerating, dbd33. A person's skin colour is a primary piece of identification, in exactly the same manner as gender, height, build, hair colour. No more, no less.

If the cops aren't allowed to use skin colour in this manner, then I suggest that someone needs to be told to stop being so damned hyper-sensitive.

livermanl

What DB said is correct in the sense that police are not allowed to use the words black/white...but they can say caucasion lol spelling and the like.