General Urban Kitchener Updates and Rumours

[danbrotherston]

I discussed this in my racism thread, but most of these are actually people looking for roommates, and I don't think it's unreasonable and it's probably not even illegal for people to be choosy and biased about who their roommates are.

That being said, I really am tired of the "society seems 100% ok with racism, as long as you're not a white male"...it's such a blatantly false claim. Leaving aside the general imbalance in power, it is the case that white males getting in trouble are notable explicitly because it is rare when they are punished for racism (and sexism). And in fact, people of visible minorities often have to be above perfect in order not to suffer consequences.

Think for example, how many white men in board rooms can get away with making racial jokes...do you think that black men could get away with the same behaviour. If you really think so, you should investigate why you think so, because the reality is the opposite.

I am not referring to people looking for roommates of a certain kind.

I am referring to homes (whole houses), condos, apartment (small buildings) looking for Indian families of certain castes or Chinese families.

This is not something that falls in line of being "reasonable" but indeed is super racist. FaceBook does a decent job of deleting these posts for violating terms of service, but they continue to pop up.

And it's not 'false' that it's OK to be racist if you're not a white male. It happens, and it's sad. My opinion is that everyone can be, and is, racist.

At least I can speak from a 'non-white' point of view, being my heritage in indigenous, on my father's side.

As for boardrooms, I have no idea what you're talking about. At least where I work, any sort of racism isn't tolerated. Doesn't matter what your background is.

I'm not accusing you of anything here. I know what you claim to be referring to. I am saying that most of the examples of FB Marketplace posts where people are angry about an explicit racial preference that I have seen seem to be people looking for roommates.

You can disagree that this is the case--I don't think either of us have a systematic survey of these posts, I'm just speaking of my impression from what I see surfaced most often.

As for whether it is "okay" to be racist if you're not a white male. I am not saying that people of colour cannot or are not racist from time to time (although I would say that the traditional systems of power in our society means that racism by white people is uniquely harmful), all I am saying is that the belief that white people are uniquely and solely punished for being racist is clearly false--they are no more likely to be punished for being racist as anyone else.

I'm glad you work somewhere where racism is not tolerated. It's good more places are getting like that. But not everywhere is like that. I have worked with people who made racist jokes, and expected that to be okay--and it was, they were as white as I am.

Here's question for you, have you seen mechanisms at your workplace actually take effect? Have you seen people suffer consequences for acting in a racist way? Until you see that it's all just lip service. My employer required me to do all the usual diversity training, I worked with many BIPOC colleagues, some of my managers, and my CEO were people of colour. And yet, my colleague still felt comfortable repeatedly making explicitly racist "jokes".