Racism in the 21st Century.

1. 61

   lhubbardposted 13 years ago

   We are a country of color. We are a country of different cultures. We are a country like no other country. We are different in everything we say and do. Yet we fail to accept and embrace the differences.

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      Bredaviesposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      That is because people need scape goats..They need others to blame. They want to blame others for their misfortunes. Its a sad world but we can either sit and do nothing or try to change their minds.

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   2. 0

      just_curiousposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      I would disagree. There will always be a vocal minority rabble rousing. In my experience, the average American is color blind when dealing with others. I think when we stepped away from the belief that our culture was a 'mixing pot' and began advocating the idea that we should be a' salad bowl' we may have popped the top on a little can of worms, and the economic times we live in may have caused people to be a little less considerate when stating opinions; but all in all, we live in more harmony than most any other nation with a variety of cultures, colors and religions.

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      Jim Hunterposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      We are also a Country who has a black man for a President.
      
      I'd say we embraced our differences.
      
      The question is why do you think the US is a racist country?

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2. 0

   Home Girlposted 13 years ago

   I don't know about other countries, but in Canada I think multiculturalism is not working. Too many culturies live absolute isolated life here by their own traditional laws they try to cultivate here, to squeeze into Canadian life, with no support from other cultures that shuns them. Who is Canadian? Person who has citizenship papers? One who speaks English? One who works for "Canadian" company? I don't think I can answer any of it.

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3. 61

   SpanStarposted 13 years ago

   Fortunately there have been great strides in better relationships especially between Black Americans & White Americans but how quickly we forget just how deeply rooted racism is in America but the following events took place in our lifetime not 300 or 400 years ago.
   
   O.J. Simpson trail
   Rodney King beating
   Hangmen's noose in Jenna
   
      this is just off the top of my head.
   
   We Now In The 21st Century was able to get the first bi-racial male of Africa decent into the White House primarily through the votes of the younger generation and it looks like there are lots of American that just can not wait to get him out of office.
   
   Racism still lives and breaths here.

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4. 93

   habeeposted 13 years ago

   As a retired high school teacher, I can definitely say that the young generation is far more tolerant and accepting of different races and cultures than the older folks are. We, the older generation, are prolly better about this than many of our parents were. We're on the right track, it seems, but we still have a way to go.

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      livelongerposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Agreed. The trend is our friend.

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5. 38

   liswilliamsposted 13 years ago

   Coming from South Africa, I was really surprised finding out how racist the rest of the rest of the world was when I started to backpack after school. In fact I was pretty disgusted.

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      ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      That surprises me, seeing as South Africa is home to the Afrikaner Resistance Movement and various far right factions. Surely Thabo Mbeki and your government is a bit racist too?
      
      Would you have been making the same statement if you were a black South African? Which countries specifically did you feel were racist? And do you mean racist towards you or towards others?

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         liswilliamsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         yeah, we get that a lot. Just because of a history of the country you are judged without people getting to know the whole situation..funny. Take the world cup. People were really surprised at how well everyone got on together. And yeah I grew up with black kids, have black friends so no difference there. Racist in general. Ireland was one. Just how it goes
         PS. Mbeki is not the president
         Blessings

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            ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

            I'm not so sure that anybody should be surprised at racism in Ireland, not if you knew their history. It goes hand in hand with religious hatred, I would have thought that the issues in Ireland were well documented globally? It is a divided country afterall, and it hasn't always been, they have been throwing petrol bombs at eachother and blowing each other up for about four decades.
            
            I'm not so sure that I am delving too far into the history books with my reference to racism in South Africa, irrespective of whether or not you have black friends. It may be a million miles away from the comfort of Cape Town. The Afrikaner Resistance Movement threatended, and still threaten, to take up arms to claim land for whites and boars only, it has over 5000 members. Louis Theroux made a documentary about them recently.
            
            Your reputation isn't entirely unjustified though is it? There is still segregation, irrespective of whether or not you see it, not to mention the widespread oppression of black communities in Johannesburg. And then you have the violence, which you may wish to dress up and deny, from the comfort of Cape Town, but which is well documented and evidenced in videos throughout the internet.
            
            Feel free to witness with your own eyes the reason why non-South Africans have a negative perception of South Africa:
            http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPR08kZxkCg
            
            I'm not judging your country on events in the 70's, 80's, or early 90's. I am judging your country on events in the 21st century.
            
            As for your president, apologies I got the name wrong. Let me use the correct one, Jacob Zuma. He may not display direct racism, but the future of his party lies in the hand of racists. You are in the best place to witness at first hand the hatred being whipped up by Julius Malema and the blame aportioned on him for attacks by black communities on white farmers.
            
            Sorry but it looks like Zimbabwe or 1980's South Africa all over again in my eyes, if I were white in rural South Africa or Johannesburg I would desperately be researching my ancestory in order to stake a claim for a European passport.

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               liswilliamsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

               I stopped reading the papers, looks like you haven't. Have you been to S.A? Comfort of Cape Town hey?,yet more judging sorry to disappoint you buddy, but I do mission work too. Often go into townships. Thanks for the link, but I'll pass. I live here, I see things with my own eyes. You seem passionate about this subject, maybe you should write a hub about it or maybe you should join a debating team. That's my last say on this matter. Feel free to insult someone elses' country though!

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                  ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                  At no stage have I attempted to insult a country, if you believe that I have then you are perhaps overly sensitive. I have been to Cape Town.
                  
                  I don't read newspapers, and neither would I learn much about South Africa in British newspapers. I learn plenty from my relatives in South Africa though, who I converse with on a near-weekly basis.
                  
                  The link that I provided was a documentary produced by the BBC, amongst the worlds most credible and impartial news sources; if you have seen it all before then why are you afraid to watch it? I would be more than happy to hear your justification of that video if you wish to defend your country against my "attack". 
                  
                  If I were to write the Hubpage, would you comment on it?

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                  1. 69

                     tonymac04posted 13 years agoin reply to this

                     OK I have watched the video and it is pretty stark. Couple of comments though.
                     Firstly the security company that Theroux used is called Mapogo a Mathamaga and was started in the '80s, if I remember correctly, by black people who had a vested interest in maintaining apartheid. The company is still the favourite of white racists who see it as a way of keeping blacks in their place.
                     Secondly - I think it is quite unrealistic of anyone to expect that a country that has had almost 500 years of racist domination of whites over blacks will within less than a generation be free of racism
                     Thirdly - racism, as opposed to prejudice, is when prejudice is allied with power, and the blacks in the main still lack power or perceive themselves to lack power as so much of their lives has not changed since 1994. The capitalists still wield the preponderance of economic power. There is a large and growing gap between the wealthy and the poor.
                     So many things that are problematic.
                     BUT and this really is a big BUT! The maturity of the politicians, in the miain (ridiculous people like Malema excluded) is a sign of hope. I don't see any significant Zimbabweisation here. The press is still free and vocal, some government institutions like the resernve bank, the revenue service, the statistical agency just to name a few, function well, as does the judiciary.
                     There are hiccups, no doubt, but the people are resourceful.
                     There is also a determination on the part of the people to make our hard-won democracy work.
                     The racism that still exists is usually condemned quite strongly and the AWB might have around 5000 members but in a country of nearly 50 million that is a drop in the ocean and not likely to be more than an irritant.
                     In the past 10 days the police have uncovered at least four arms caches and arrested a number of people in connection with them It is not entirely clear what the arms were being collected for or by whom at this stage. I suspect right-wingers but that might not be the whole story.
                     As for the scare stories from the media, remember the media will try to stoke up interest in their stories because that's what sales depend on.
                     There are pockets of very violent crime, but these are in the main known and the po9lice are making inroads.
                     The fact that the World Cup went without a single major incident is testimony to the ability of the police to control things.
                     I can testify on my own behalf that I feel considerably safer in South Africa now than I did before 1994.
                     I go into townshps quite frequently to visit friends and have encountered no animosity. In fact I have been welcomed.
                     So yes, I say again, there are problems, but the country is in a lot better shape than many other countries. I love living here, I love the people and even the politics, which get up my nose from time to time, but otherwise can be quite entertaining.
                     Wow - a long rant, but I really think that there is a sort of racism from the outside world which would love to see us fail because we are a non-racial and non-sexist democracy. Racists don't like to see black succeed - and they are here.
                     Sorry for the rant - but like Liz I get a bit uiptight about people predicting doom and gloom without really understanding the issues, which are complex.
                     I try to bring some of these to light in my Hubs for that reason.
                     And if you do write your Hub I will most certainly comment, as I have on other Hubs about South Africa.

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                        ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                        I have apologised to Liz over email for being a little strong in my wording.
                        
                        I take on board everything that you have said, and respect it, and to a certain degree believe it. The only part which had me shaking my head in disagreement was this bit:
                        
                        "BUT and this really is a big BUT! The maturity of the politicians, in the miain (ridiculous people like Malema excluded) is a sign of hope."
                        
                        That ridiculous person named Malema has been described by your president as the future leader of South Africa. Here is a man that has been convicted of hate speech and sings songs about shooting the boer population, who your current president believes will become the leader of your country. The African National Congress Youth League has also publicly threatened violence to prevent the prosecution of your president and also stated quite clearly that he supported the idea of "eliminating" the Democratic Alliance opposition party.
                        
                        He is currently the leader of the youth wing of your governing party. Does that not concern you? That your liberal and mature government may be preceeded by bigots and racists who would set your country back decades and could well target you as a white skinned man?
                        
                        Would the media remain free under his leadership? He has been known to throw foreign journalists out of press conferences for asking standard questions, in fact he ejected a BBC journalist for not much at all.
                        
                        I agree that my suggestion of a return to apartheid may be a bit strong, and I apologise for that. But I can see plenty of similarities between Mugabe and Malema; and the latter probably isn't much more than a decade away from becoming your leader. He is openly racist against whites, condones violence, wants to eliminate the opposition, and wishes to censor the media; am I talking about Mugabe or Malema here?
                        
                        That would concern me, but if it doesn't concern you then fair play, I would have nothing further to add to that. And your world cup was great, with the exception of those silly noisy things.

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                        Ralph Deedsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

                        Interesting comment. I was involved in South Africa apartheid issues in my job at GM's corporate headquarters. I once entertained a couple of executives from DeBeers or some other big South African mining company at a speech by GM's President. Everyone was quite polite to the visitors, but in the car on the way back to their hotel I told them that they should not mistake their friendly reception with support for apartheid. This was a couple of years before it ended.

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6. 93

   habeeposted 13 years ago

   Think how boring and bland the US would be if it were made up of nothing but WASPs! lol

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7. 59

   Rajab Nsubugaposted 13 years ago

   America is not racist, capitalism is. I think we can redirect the blame that is not the people but the system.

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      Stump Parrishposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Rajab, here in the Bible Belt a large portion of the people are still quite racist. It's not as blatant or as obvious asit once was but it's still there. We still had large public KKK rally's here in the early 80's and that kind of ignorant hatefulness doesn't disappear in 20 years. it will take at least 3 more generations of bigots dying of old age before it will substantially decline.

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         Rajab Nsubugaposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         I think we are still on the same page Stump Parrish, it could be a different cast though.

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8. 38

   liswilliamsposted 13 years ago

   sent you an email

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      ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Thank you for your email, replied

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9. 69

   Ralph Deedsposted 13 years ago

   There is plenty of racism in America and elsewhere in the world. However, divisiveness fomented by religious extremists of many stripes at this point in history may well be a greater problem.

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      Rajab Nsubugaposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Ralph, religious divisiveness is still segregation. To me racism is a compound word.

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      china manposted 13 years agoin reply to this

      Hi Ralph - I would say that racism and all the other segregations of the 'us' from the 'other' come from the same internal source - and religion (not some belief in a god) is a manifestation from the same place.

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         Ralph Deedsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

         Could be. There are striking similarities among fundamentalists of all stripes--preoccupation with sexual purity and rules, suspicion of other religious groups, and even worse as we see in the Muslim suicide bombers.

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10. 77

    skyfireposted 13 years ago

    I'm from a country where people pretend to be united yet they're so disconnected with region, religion, caste and language. For example, politicians in my state hate mass migrations that happens between state because they fear loss of culture, religion, regions control. Oh wait, they don't mind sending their kids to get green card in other countries. On one hand they have very strong opinion against people who do migrate to their state  and on the other they also don't mind talking about patriotism. We've lot of blacks here from south africa, kenia for law and science studies, people in this country do discriminate them for their color/looks(yeah for real) but when they get treated like that in US/UK then they cry with ton of rant and even create a movie or documentary against it. Hypocrites are not hard to find in this land. People in my country also hate brits for ruling this land and they justify this hatred by saying that they ruled us so it's our right to look down on them now. Seriously ? i mean you're going to kick someone because his/her great-great-great-great-great pappa ruled this country ? All racists are hypocrites in one way or the other. I can't help myself from saying 'get a life' to these people.

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    S Leretsehposted 13 years ago

    I’m for stamping out racism and hate. It’s UGLY. But who’s practicing racism and hate? My observation and research says is certainly is NOT white people.  Integration is not a Constitutional right, but rather a creation of Congress in 1964.  Since 1964, my research tells me - conclusively - it is the white population that has followed the rules. In the area of violence, they have not taken advantage of NEW freedoms to go into the black communities and do violence against them.  Nor have white people done violence against blacks who hv moved into white communities. The site I link below shows a grand total of 52 acts of verifiable act of violence against blacks by whites over 40 years. 
    http://theinjusticefile.blogspot.com/20 … -1964.html
    
    And those acts of racism in the work place, those who claim racism, have been - and continue to - seek redress in the court system (a million or more non-whites, mostly blacks, have gotten rich with discrimination payoffs). White people have followed the rules as best as possible. All over the South there are black mayors and black police chiefs (curiously, black violence seems to be immune to this “advancement”).

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       Ralph Deedsposted 13 years agoin reply to this

       That is pure b.s. as usual.

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          ryankettposted 13 years agoin reply to this

          My thoughts exactly.

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    ryankettposted 13 years ago

    Trivial racism in the street pales into insignificance when compared to the wholesale persecution of a race. Whilst I can provide numerous examples, the persecution of the Palistinians by the Zionest Jews of Isreal is certainly amongst the most significant examples of racism that you will find in modern times.

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