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Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Race, Class, and the Case of Nesselroad-Slaby
Posted by The Dean of Cincinnati
Recently, a philosophy student at the University of Arizona—former Cincinnatian Wes Dempster—wrote the following paper about race in Cincinnati. It earned an A+
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11 Dec 2007 at 11:22 am | #
In full disclosure (which is what journalists do) Wes “the nihilist” Dempster was your best friend and best man at your wedding, isn’t that correct?
The paper is terrible, whatever grade he earned. Why is this newsworthy?
11 Dec 2007 at 12:14 pm | #
"(the aptly named)......Charles White”
I’m giving it an F simply for that awful, awful attempt at humor in a supposedly academic paper.
11 Dec 2007 at 01:30 pm | #
F, the Dean doesn’t claim to be a journalist. Who cares what his relationship to this guy is?
I think it is an interesting read. In one of the most segregated cities in the nation we should consider the dynamics of race and how they effect our criminal justice system.
11 Dec 2007 at 05:41 pm | #
Hmmm… believe the grade assessments of anonymous blog trolls or the University of Arizona.
I think I’ll go with the latter.
From the outside looking in, the institutional racism in Cincinnati is clear as day.
11 Dec 2007 at 05:42 pm | #
F,
Are you a stalker?
11 Dec 2007 at 07:25 pm | #
People are either rude or jealous. All this hate makes me sick. Can’t anyone comment on the content.
11 Dec 2007 at 07:36 pm | #
Justin Jeffre: F, the Dean doesn’t claim to be a journalist. Who cares what his relationship to this guy is?
If any writer has a personal or professional relationship with any of the Beacon’s staff, it should be disclosed, particularly if the relationship is as close as F indicates.
Dean, please answer F’s question.
11 Dec 2007 at 08:05 pm | #
anon 7:36, please explain why this would be relevant. It’s not like the article is a glowing review of 3CDC and the Dean sits on the board. There is no business relationship.
Would you like us to come up with a friend meter that indicates how good of a friend we are with each individual writer? If more than one of us knows an individual do we all need to disclose how good of a friend they are to each of us? That is ridiculous!
Unlike the Enquirer, we disclose things when it’s appropriate. Here it’s irrelevant.
This post is about “Race, Class, and the Case of Nesselroad-Slaby”. It is about unequal justice in Hamilton County. It is not about how well the Dean knows the author. Focus anon!
11 Dec 2007 at 09:28 pm | #
Basically, I wrote this Dempster dude off at line 3 of the first paragraph. Memo to Dempster: it’s Assistant Principal, not Assistant Principle.
With reference to his smug comments about Wal-Mart, Dempster, at any given outing to shop for items for my home, I see a healthy mix of individuals. Many are affluent, many are on a budget, many are poor, many are smart shoppers in that they’re stretching their dollars, & these individuals are in a very wide variety of colors, cultures, beliefs, faiths & customs. Therefore, your little dig at Wal-Mart is without merit to the woman who left the foster kid in the car. Dempster, everyone who shops at Wal-Mart aren’t on a State Card.
Someone at U of A somehow overlooked the misuse of Dempster’s “Principle” or were just as stupid. Can’t use spellchecker on the writings, you don’t have my immediate attention & I’ll have to think about taking you & your writings seriously. “Assistant Principle”, really.
11 Dec 2007 at 11:30 pm | #
The notion that Dempster purports to be true is avante garde in Cincinnati. The idea that Nesselroad-Slaby was not charged simply because she is white is laughable. Dempster states several times that he is not writing to determine Nesselroad-Slaby’s guilt, but seems more than willing to argue that she should have been found guilty, by bemoaning the idea that black women in similar situations faced charges. Further, he contends that background should not be included in such decisions. I suppose determining whether to charge someone should never depend on how many other times they broke the law?
One other comment....should a paper that identified Nesselroad-Slaby as a an Assistant “Principle” really get an A+. What grade would you give in your English class, Dean?
12 Dec 2007 at 05:29 am | #
It seems as though many of the people responding want to close their eyes to the obvious fact, that institutionalized racism,
and classism are alive and operating in Cincinnati. This is not just one isolated incident, the race, or status of the person who committed the crime is often the deciding factor in how the case is determined. Vera Z
12 Dec 2007 at 05:31 am | #
A typo does not diminish the strength of a paper. But you already know that.
No more comments will be posted on that matter. Take on the subject, or remain silent.
12 Dec 2007 at 08:43 am | #
The thing I like best about this paper is that racist actions are assumed to have racist intent.
One thing I dislike about arguments and discussions on the Beacon, or with white people in general, is that before you get to what happened, you have to even convince white folks that a POSSIBILITY of racism was even in existence.
White folks that post here are not going to like this article and of course will give it an “F” because it doesn’t take the polite route of excusing the white people mentioned specifically for doing and saying racist things - and it doesn’t politely excuse the overall racial climate in Cincinnati or white denial of that racism.
It assumes what white people, especially in Cincinnati don’t want to hear: racism is not a figment of the black imagination - racism not only exists but is perpetuated by the continued denial whites that they participate in racism.
It also doesn’t equivocate whiteness. Most white folks here insist that blacks quantify statements of whiteness - most whites, some whites, a lot of whites, but definitely not all whites but refuse to do so when referring to the “black community”.
I like this paper. It assumes that a spade, is quite literally, a spade.
12 Dec 2007 at 08:56 am | #
Justin Jeffre: anon 7:36, please explain why this would be relevant.
Disclosing personal relationships or even the appearance of personal relationships affecting editorial choices should be of concern to any publication.
It’s not like the article is a glowing review of 3CDC and the Dean sits on the board. There is no business relationship.
That may be, but it’s crucial for any legitimate publication to maintain the appearance of editorial integrity.
Case in point, consider the current discussion. If F is correct, it appears the Dean published a friend’s term paper without disclosing their relationship. When challenged, his co-editor and friend, Justin, jumps in to defend the Dean and repeatedly denies that the Beacon has done anything wrong. Meanwhile, neither confirms or denies F’s allegation.
The result is that now both the Dean and Justin appear to be hiding something, even if it’s something relatively minor such as publishing a buddy’s term paper. This appearance (and this resulting back & forth) could have been easily avoided by a simple one-sentence disclosure.
The point is that some rules exist for good reasons, usually as a means of avoiding potential problems. Editorial disclosure is one such sensible rule and worth being followed by self-respecting reporters, whether they be seasoned professionals or stubborn amateurs.
12 Dec 2007 at 10:55 am | #
Justin, what’s sauce for the goose is also sauce for the gander.
To slam the Enquirer for not doing something and then to not do that very same thing is an act of hypocracy, and smacks of a do-as-I-say-and-not-as-I-do mentality. Hiding behind that ‘hey we are not reporters” line makes it difficult to take you seriously as an alternative news outlet. You can’t have it both ways.
You and the Dean seem to have a very hard time admitting that you ever make mistakes (which we all do, being human and all). As a result you and the Dean come across as being very defensive at times. Just food for thought.
12 Dec 2007 at 11:22 am | #
Everybody relax. Wes “the Nihilist” Dempster is the same guy who believes that “knowledge is impossible” and “the concept of truth [is] irrelevant”. So no big deal. It’s just a term paper and they eat this crap up in philosophy grad school where, incidentally, everybody gets A+ for just showing up.
http://www.cincinnatibeacon.com/index.php/content/comments/on_truth_and_the_impossibility_of_knowledge/
12 Dec 2007 at 11:43 am | #
By the way, Jason, I’m not a stalker. I just have a memory. Not too long ago “the Nihilist” had his own blog listed on your blogroll. He had a lot of personal information in his blogspot profile.
I also recall 2 years ago the two of you starting a campaign to boycott the elections, localrefusal.org. You then flip-flopped. A quick google search returns this little “reminder”:
http://frontier.cincinnati.com/blogs/gov/2005/10/former-mayors-club-leads-anti-tax.asp
12 Dec 2007 at 12:34 pm | #
all these egos makes it boring
12 Dec 2007 at 01:05 pm | #
1. All states in existence prior to abolition were slave states.
2. Clermont County has nothing to do with the City of Cincinnati, and Dempster makes the same mistake as Smitherman in confounding the two (or Clermont and Hamilton County).
3. Slaby’s skating has more to do with socio-politics in Clermont County than race in either county.
4. Dempster is highly selective in writing that “only 7” of the 15 were armed with guns; most of the others also were armed. Thomas, Owensby, arguably Irons and possibly even Wheeler would be the only real ‘victims’ here.
5. Dean is a self-described “media activist” and as such has an agenda, is not required to be(or demonstrably capable of being) objective.
6. Dean asked elsewhere about what is meant by “segregation:” go here to read the Census Bureau’s description as Dempster touches on this subject as well:
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/housing/resseg/ch1.html#A
and here to read a critique of the Census Bureau’s method and widely-published and discussed at the time study by UW-Milwaukee that re-thinks the question:
http://www.uwm.edu/Dept/ETI/integration/integration.pdf
When Smitherman et.al. cry “segregation” in Cincinnati it’s usually tinged with an air of redlining, blacklisting or other forms of discrimination, when in fact it’s a result more of economic well-being, housing choice availability, and neighbor affinity (whom we choose to live near).
12 Dec 2007 at 01:37 pm | #
This is the sort of shit that makes Cincinnati look so bad to the rest of the country. Our race issue is like the elephant in the living room. It’s big, smelly and obviously not going to go away on its own, yet here we are pretending it doesn’t exist. Take a trip to a city without our racial issues and you will see how big of a problem it is. People avoid this city because of all the backasswards republicans pretending their not racist when it is so obvious they are. Whites are so oblivious! (p.s. I’m white so no I’m not being a bigot.)
12 Dec 2007 at 02:55 pm | #
I find it interesting--and sad--that so far my paper has been criticized for having been written by someone who has a personal relationship to the Dean, for a parenthetical observation (construed as a bad joke), a footnote (construed as a sweeping claim bout the income level of all Wal-Mart patrons), and a typo.
Then, Tired of Whiny Minorities criticizes me for purporting as true some unidentified notion that is, on his/her view, “avante garde [sic] in Cincinnati.” Interesting also that Tired of Whiny Minorities is one of those who berated me for misspelling “Principal.” Still, I’d be curious to know just what notion I discussed that is so ahead of its time in Cincinnati.
As to Tired of Whiny Minorities’ question regarding whether the number of times a person had been convicted of crimes in the past should bear on whether to charge someone with a crime unrelated to any previous charges against that person, I should say not. A more significant point, however, is the vicious circularity of the argument that the fact of blacks being convicted of crimes at a higher rate than whites somehow supports the conclusion that blacks are not being unfairly targeted for criminal prosecution. Here the premise lends prima facie support to the opposite conclusion, which was my point in the paper.
I think the discussion about whether my paper deserves serious consideration in light of my unfortunate typo warrants some attention. Jones, I do appreciate that you brought the typo to my attention, and I have made the necessary correction to my file in case the paper is ever republished. You should be proud, as six people reviewed the paper before it was posted at the Beacon, three of whom hold advanced degrees in English, and you were the first to spot that particular error. Still, if I only committed one typo out of about 2500 words, that’s only a .04 percent error rate (I can live with that).
Perhaps the Dean will award you with special recognition for your outstanding achievement in anal-retentiveness. Of course, a cursory review of your previous blog entries reveals that you will not be winning a spelling bee anytime soon. Last week, for example, you wrote, “I cannot believe you have gotten so petty & so juvenile over decriptions [sic] of criminals.” Decriptions? And, a couple weeks earlier: “He also had a rather bizzare [sic] camoflage [sic] backpack he toted into the Courthouse on that fateful day.” Two in one sentence—back-to-back even! Anyway, is this really what we want to get into, viz., catching each other’s typos on the naïve assumption that the substance of what an individual means to articulate is somehow reflected in her spelling prowess?
It is sad, though, that you will stop reading anything once you encounter a typo. I suppose you have never read a book (other than perhaps a children’s book) cover to cover, since almost invariably a book that contains more than a few hundred words will contain at least one typo. By the way, if you find a typo in this blog entry, good for you! But I hope you will try to look past that to the substantive points I’ve made, which, after all, is what these symbols we call words--together with syntax--are meant to convey.
12 Dec 2007 at 05:47 pm | #
Congratulations, Wes. You just wrote 500 words about a typo. Who said typos were trivial?
12 Dec 2007 at 06:10 pm | #
Channel 5 just showed footage from the August 10 “riot” at the Justice Center. The video showed a white guy, taken from his cell. He used racial slurs against a black female officer (Moore) that repeatedly shot him with what was referred to as a high powered pepper ball gun and a tazer they said was 50,000 volts. He was also being choked. He was clearly tortured by the group of jailers even though he was restrained in a chair. Anybody know anything about this riot? Is this kind of treatment routine? For everybody? A certain group?
12 Dec 2007 at 06:21 pm | #
I find it interesting--and sad--that so far my paper has been criticized for having been written by someone who has a personal relationship to the Dean
This is false. The merits of the term paper were not criticized because of a relationship with the Dean. The Dean’s editorial oversight was criticized for apparently failing to disclose a personal relationship to a Beacon writer.
Along those lines, it’s reasonable to ask two questions: 1) Did the author submit his paper to the Beacon for publication because of a personal relationship with the Dean?, and 2) Would the Beacon have published it if not for
a personal relationship?
Those questions then lead to whether the term paper meets the publishing standards of the Beacon or whether the Dean simply wanted to fill the space and a friend came along with a paper about race in Cincinnati.
As for the quality of the paper, like all of The Nihilist’s scribblings, it is empty, pretentious, and apparently designed to enhance the self-importance of the author rather than to enlighten the reader.
12 Dec 2007 at 06:45 pm | #
This is a play right out of the Tom Callinan Playbook. Anyone remember his short lived blog at the Enquirer? The Dean was the first to (very rightfully) challenge Callinan’s slovenly stewardship at the Enquirer. Callinen shot back coy little one liners, excuses and then ultimately took his ball and went home. He looked quite the fool (which he was).
Dean & Justin, consider this; If you had just admitted that you should have put a disclaimer on the article (which you should have) you would have completely cut off your opponents & various trolls attacks. Instead, you fed the beast and now you have flame war # 25,762 on The Beacon. You will be wrong occasionally, so best own up to it when you are wrong, instead of fueling your enemies attacks.
12 Dec 2007 at 08:11 pm | #
I’m not sure I understand why the fact that my friend wrote this paper is relevant.
I mean, how does that relationship have a bearing on the subject matter?
It does not. The Enquier’s relatioinship with 3CDC has everything to do with the subject of their posts about 3CDC.
But Wes and I have no business together. No shared economic interests. He doesn’t even live in Cincinnati. A guy I know wrote a paper about Cincinnati, and I thought people in Cincinnati might like it.
I mean, how many of you think some random person would send me a college paper? And, if a random person had, would that change the matter?
Besides, I have allowed all these comments, which have more than compensated for the alleged missing disclaimer.
When is The Enquirer, to whom you insist I be compared, going to give me ink in their paper?
12 Dec 2007 at 08:26 pm | #
Michael: what “race issue”? You mean the overwhelming predominance of Blacks as victims of personal and property crimes?
12 Dec 2007 at 10:12 pm | #
Anons 24 & 25 get it Jason. Don’t you get it yet, or are you just being difficult.
This “paper” has no merit. It was written for a teacher who knows nothing of Cincinnati by a guy who hasn’t been here since the riots. The only reason it’s here is because you want to make Wes feel important.
So gracious of you, your excellency. You really are being generous to the public when you do not censor any and everything you do not personally agree with. We are all so indebted to you for the Beacon.
12 Dec 2007 at 10:25 pm | #
I find it amusingly sad how everyone is willing to discuss anything and everything but what the article says.
So like Cincinnati.
12 Dec 2007 at 10:45 pm | #
F, if you would like to be the person to detrmine what has merit and what doesn’t, start your own independent media project.
Anon, Dan LaBotz used to write a monthly column for City Beat. He and Greg Flannery are friends and they didn’t disclose this in his weekly articles. I don’t see any problem with this and we never said this was a problem.
If Flannery had been on the board of 3CDC and LaBotz was writing a glowing review of 3CDC’s schemes, that should’ve been disclosed. This was not the case. Do you see the difference?
When the Enquirer failed to report important details about the Fountain Square deal-like the $100 million dollar parking garage revenue stream city council handed over to 3CDC-it is because their President is on the board of 3CDC. There was no balance in their “reporting”. The Enquirer writes glowing reviews of their schemes and they continue to fail to give important information and they fail to get any response from critics of 3CDC.
When the Dean posted an article from a friend that wrote what I think is an interesting and very relevant article about race and class in Cincinnati, it was not the same situation at all and I think that you all know this.
I would’ve posted this article if it came from someone I didn’t know or even an anonymous person, like funnelcake for instance.
12 Dec 2007 at 10:54 pm | #
Deborah, I couldn’t agree more. This is a common tactic that a few of these blog trolls use when they don’t like the topic we are talking about. They always try to change the subject and attack us. They don’t seem to have the capacity or the courage to debate the issues presented here.
You should be careful about such sweeping generalizations about white people and commenters here. These are just a few people no matter how many anonymous names they use.
13 Dec 2007 at 10:41 am | #
The race issue I was referring to was not necessarily crime against any blacks’ person or property Urbanists, more that I personally know several people in the outlying predominantly “white” suburbs who are closet racists. While I understand that personal experience does not always correlate with what is actually going on, I think combining what I have experienced (i.e. racial slurs and stereotypes) with what I have read in the paper as well as the issue of being the first (and only one that I know of) city in the US to have race riots in the 21st century shows that Cincinnati has deep rooted race issues. (If anyone can find any evidence of another race riot I would be interested to know where)
13 Dec 2007 at 11:13 am | #
White people?!
13 Dec 2007 at 12:28 pm | #
Nihilist, I usually kind of like your stuff but I don’t see any way you can construe “(the aptly named) Dan White” as anything but a hugely inappropriate “joke” in what seems to be an academic paper.
If the Supreme Court would have wrote: “We hereby decide in the case Brown v. Board of Education (or should it be Blacks v. Board of Education; yowsa, yowsa, yowsa)”; they would have lost all credibility. A good rule of thumb is to avoid goofy humor in a serious paper.
13 Dec 2007 at 01:27 pm | #
I find it amusing that the biggest perpetrators in this regard have been JJ, Jason and Wes himself. The three of you have written more “off topic” words on this thread than anyone else. Why are you not “debating the issues”? Don’t you have the “capacity”? This whining is a “common tactic” on your part.
In fact, there is someone who has attacked Dempster’s paper head on, Urbanist II. Why don’t you have the “courage” to respond to even one of his 7 points?
13 Dec 2007 at 02:24 pm | #
F, I stand by my statements. We responded to the ridiculous comments from anon and his other personalities, but have tried to bring the topic back to the article. Yeah, we probably shouldn’t have bothered.
We didn’t take the thread off topic and we will handle the moderating thank you very much. You are off topic and are the one that started the whole off topic discussion in the first place. I won’t bother to point out your off topic and petty comments above.
Would you care to comment on the article anymore?
I did not write the article and it is not mine to defend. I do think it’s good and relevant. I think the criticisms here have been very weak.
13 Dec 2007 at 04:03 pm | #
trey, I think if you consider the definition of the word apt, and Don White’s last name in connection with the subject of the paper, you will see that my comment was in fact apropos—hardly on par with your “yowsa, yowsa, yowsa” remark. If you found the tone of the remark inappropriate for an academic paper, I suggest you go to a library and pick up a scholarly journal in either philosophy or literary studies. For that matter, read some Supreme Court decisions. I think you may be surprised at the tone you’ll find therein. That said, I appreciate your general compliment regarding my “stuff”.
F, as my paper is the topic, I do not think I need to defend myself for condescending to respond to the main thread of criticism leveled against it. As to Urbanist II’s attack (as you say), here is my point-for-point response:
1. Okay.
2. In my paper I specifically wrote of the Cincinnati area, which includes Clermont and Hamilton County.
3. Slaby’s position within the white hegemony is not separable from the socio-political sphere.
4. I selected what I judged to be a balanced source for my information, which I cited in the paper. At any rate, the point is minor and does not undercut my argument.
5. True.
6. I don’t really understand the point that Urbanist II is making here, so I can’t respond.
Happy? (It hardly seemed worth writing to me.)
13 Dec 2007 at 06:03 pm | #
JJ,
It is you who have declined to comment on the article, instead taking pot shots at your favorite (off topic) whipping boys: the Enquirer, Greg Flannery and 3CDC. I have been entirely on topic and I stand by my comments, to wit (Mr Depmster will notice the high-brow, high register language):
1. Mr. My Main Man attempted to construct the authority of Mr. Dempster on the subject by alluding to his former residence in the city, his academic credentials as a graduate student in philosophy and the grade he recieved on the paper. Mr. Dempster’s biography became an issue at precisely this point.
2. All papers get A’s in graduate school. There is serious grade infaltion. A’s are average. If you get B’s you are considered to not really want to be there.
3. The paper appears because of personal connections with Mr. My Main Man, not because it has intellectual merit of it own.
4. This is obvious in that it is a term paper written for the consumption of a philosophy professor who knows nothing of Cincinnati, her politics, history or demographics.
5. Mr. Dempster provides scholarly journals in philosophy and literary studies as models to be compared against, not political science, sociology or even history as would be appropriate for a subjcet like this. This is, however, entirely in keeping with the ethos of the Cincinnati Beacon which regards its editors as having competence as no more than ordinary, “grass-roots” citizens and not experts of any kind, although, when put on the defensive, Mr. My Main Man may allude to his credentials as a MA in English Literature and to his having been the first student in the history of Breadloaf to take a double load at Oxford, whatever that has to do with anything. Also, Mr. Patton is a retired engineer. Mr. Jeffre has no special qualifications, although he does have an exceedingly pretty voice.
6. Mr. Dempster has not resided in Cincinnati (or Clermont or Hamilton counties) since the riots and is only slightly less ignorant than the professor who awarded the paper an A. Plus.
7. This is especially in evidence in Mr. Dempster’s unexcusable reproduction of the myth that “only 7” were armed, as Urbanist II points out. This is an lie perpetrated by activists and pushed into the national media. He cannot pass blame onto his source on this point. He wrote it. It is false.
13 Dec 2007 at 06:53 pm | #
Boy there sure was a lot of mess to wade through to get to the end of the comments. I agreed wholeheartedly with the points made in Wes’ paper. I have lived in Cincinnati since I was a small child and did not find anything in the paper to be surprising except for the mention of the Morton case. I grew up with Miss Morton and called her as soon as I read this as she and I were not in regular contact at the time and I had no knowledge of the incident referenced in the paper. I do believe if she was rich and white (which she is neither), there would have been no prosecution. When she gave me the details on what happened with Tylisha(sp?), it was very easy to understand how it happened. I used to comment here a long time ago and could not resist commenting, especially since a personal friend of mine was referenced. Thank you Dean for sharing the paper with us.
13 Dec 2007 at 07:01 pm | #
F, you are incorrect. I said I liked the article and I think it’s relevant. I said I would have posted it without knowing who the author is. See off topic comments #16, 17 and 22. they have nothing to do with the merits of his article and once again, it was your comments that started all the off topic nonsense.
I wasn’t taking pot shots at 3CDC, the Enquirer and Flannery. I said I saw no problem with Flannery and City Beat not disclosing that he and LaBotz are friends because it is irrelevant.
I used the example of Margaret Buchanan’s Enquirer failing to disclose her relationship with 3CDC while they were writing glowing reviews of 3CDC’s schemes because that is what anon was referring to when he tried to act like we were being hypocritical. I was contrasting the two, to show anon that he was wrong, get it?
1. I think he is certainly qualified to comment on the subject.
2. That’s not really true. Not all papers get an A in graduate school.
3. As I have already stated I like the paper and I am not alone. I would’ve posted this even if it had been sent anonymously, so you are incorrect. It doesn’t matter if he and the Dean are friends, he grew up in Cincinnati and wrote an interesting article about unequal justice in the area.
4. It is obvious that the paper is relevant to our broken criminal justice system. It’s relevant on a national level and to the greater Cincinnati area. The president of the NAACP has stated similar ideas and despite the fact that you disagree with these sentiments, there are many others (like myself) that agree with them.
5. Are we to believe that you, an anonymous commenter has some sort of credibility or expertise? I think not.
6. It doesn’t matter that he hasn’t resided here since the riots. I think that it is ignorant to say that because he no longer lives here he can’t have an understanding of what is going on here.
7. If this has been reported by the national media and therefore has widely been accepted as fact, how can you say it is inexcusable to reproduce it because it is a “myth”? You all haven’t provided any evidence to the contrary, have you?
14 Dec 2007 at 06:12 am | #
http://www.cincypost.com/2002/11/30/census113002.html
http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stories/2002/12/16/story3.html
http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/housing/resseg/ch5.html
14 Dec 2007 at 07:07 am | #
You should be careful about such sweeping generalizations about white people and commenters here. These are just a few people no matter how many anonymous names they use.
yeah, like that’s not off-topic or relevant to the conversation at hand.
I’m tired of getting this type of warning from you and from others. I know it’s an uncomfortable feeling for you, as a white guy, to feel lumped in with a bunch of racists, but it’s just as uncomfortable for me to get lumped in with all the other horrific stereotypes people come up with as well in regards to black folks.
You’re going to have to learn to do what black people do - realize that if the shoe doesn’t fit, it aint you shoe. But don’t expect me to constantly quantify or modify my statements to some, all, or a few white people, just to make you feel better.
14 Dec 2007 at 07:25 am | #
I was not aware, Deborah, that Justin or myself had ever lumped you with a bunch of horrific stereotypes.
Are you suggesting it would be appropriate for us to do so?
14 Dec 2007 at 10:28 am | #
ThatDeborahGirl brings to mind an argument made by Beverly Tatum.
Tatum accepts David Wellman’s definition of racism: “[a] system of advantage based on race.”
A racist, then, is someone who benefits from the system of advantage that is racism.
She claims that all whites benefit from racism and no blacks benefit from racism.
Ergo, all whites are racist and no blacks are racist.
The best a white person can do, on Tatum’s view, is to actively work to disrupt systems of white hegemony, but as long as that system is in place, the white person is still a racist.
14 Dec 2007 at 11:24 am | #
Michael: why paint the City of Cincinnati with what you describe as racists in “outlying suburbs.”? It’s the same problem Dempster has trying to associate anything in Clermont County with Cincinnati: just because Cincy is the biggest city doesn’t mean everything that happens around it has anything to do with it.
Dempster: my point is that “segregation” doesn’t mean less than 50/50 distribution of race, so it’s kind of lazy for you to say Cincy is segregated particularly with regard to anything having to do with -Slaby. It’s probably in your paper so your prof would have something to tick off his/her list of socially liberal white guilt buzz words. Ditto “white hegemony,” “15 in 5,” etc. This particular citation, while not “undercutting your argument” also does nothing to support it and should have been edited out.
And if by “white hegemony” you mean “white skin privilege” I fail to see what that, as an issue, has to do with how -Slaby was treated? Assuming you understand you can’t compare different cases ((white) mother negligently kills her daughter in one county with (black) woman allows dog to die in her yard in another county), I really, really struggle with what anything having to do with -Slaby has to do with a) Cincinnati or b) race. The problem of course is no one, White, Black or Other will get the same kid glove treatment, so if Black or Other “racism” will be cried.
Cincinnati did not have a “race riot:” no Whites fought against Blacks. A bunch of kids on spring break and non-resident, underemployed malcontents saw an opportunity to act out in Downtown, Over-the-Rhine and the West End. Property damage and some (unfortunate) personal injuries. As someone who was there that week don’t presume to tell me otherwise.
Justin: I don’t live in Arizona so I don’t presume to “understand what’s happening” there. Dempster might be “aware” of what’s happening here by I hardly would call it “understanding.”
“Widely accepted as fact” by whom?
14 Dec 2007 at 03:06 pm | #
Cincinnati’s proximity to KY and KY’s past are a post hoc logical fallacy of gargantuan proportions.
The City fighting, but ultimately losing to, the KKK every year in court for years is hardly evidence of institutional racism.
The 15 police shootings suffers from a correlation/causation problem with respect to insitutional racism.
The comments about Marge Schott, as they apply to institutional racism, are an ad hominen that would get you thrown out of any philosophy graduate program that cared at all about its reputation.
You’ve tainted the well so badly that when you get to comparing the actual events what you have to say there is of absolutely zero value whatsoever. You did more to hurt the fight against racism with that paper than anything I’ve read in a very long time.
14 Dec 2007 at 03:39 pm | #
Eric, what you say is interesting. May I ask--since you are clearly well versed in logic and, in particular, what constitutes a legitimate argument vis-à-vis racism--if the confluence of place, institutions, personalities, and events does not constitute a milieu of racism, what does?
Is there such a thing, in your view, of a racist environment? Or are racist acts atomic in the sense that they take place in isolation from historical, cultural, and sociopolitical systems of oppression?
I await your instruction.
14 Dec 2007 at 04:25 pm | #
Nihilist:
“Systems of oppression”?
nice flight into the abstract.
Eric just refuted concretely every bad fact you based your paper on. A moral desire to recognize racism in the abstract makes you a “good person” but it doesn’t substitute for an analysis. Deborah claimed the moral feel-good post hoc when she said
14 Dec 2007 at 04:30 pm | #
Nihilist, can’t you just say it was a dumb joke instead of hiding behind a bunch of fancy talk? Remember, this is the day and age when political careers end if you get caught making sophomoric jokes. Remember George Allen and “maccacca”. I think your teacher was wrong not to correct you on that faux pas in this sound-bite era.
14 Dec 2007 at 05:46 pm | #
Racism is race-based classism, be it thought, spoken, written or acted upon.
Nothing more. All this nonsense about power, privilege and systems is just that.
A racist environment? Sure if you have 2 or more racists within proximity of each other. So what? Still has nothing to do with -Slaby.
14 Dec 2007 at 05:50 pm | #
Urbanists, if you grew up in Arizona, lived there most of your life and followed the news there, you would have a pretty good idea what was happening there.
Trey, wasn’t the maccacca joke racist, not sophomoric?
14 Dec 2007 at 06:35 pm | #
The Dean of Cincinnati says:
14 Dec 2007 at 07:25 am | #
I was not aware, Deborah, that Justin or myself had ever lumped you with a bunch of horrific stereotypes.
*sigh*
Well, now you know.
As kind and well intentioned as you and Justin are, even you two can set my teeth on edge sometimes with your notions of what the “black community” should be.
Lesser on the scale from horrific though. Maybe “insensitive” or “well meaning but missed the mark”.
14 Dec 2007 at 06:49 pm | #
Deborah, I didn’t know I had a notion of what the black community should be. And I don’t believe that I have lumped you in with any stereotypes.
14 Dec 2007 at 07:46 pm | #
DeborahGirl is big on perpetuating stereotypes but doesn’t want to be one. I do admire her worldy experience though. Even I, a white person with unfettered access to so many of them, can’t claim to know what they all think, feel, believe. It’s been my experience that they often think, act, feel, differently from each other. But then that’s just me. I’m sure DeborahGirl must have much more experience with the innerworkings of white people than I or she wouldn’t make such claims.
14 Dec 2007 at 08:04 pm | #
Justin is right. The “aptly named Dan White” remark wasn’t sophomoric, it was racist. It’s time we talked about “reverse” racism. The racism that says a city 40% African American is segregated. Racism isn’t about abstractly and indirectly benefitting from racism. Racism is the doctrine of race, the belief that a biological classification of humanity into racial subgroups is real and significant. Educated people know it is false. But by this definition Jason My Main Man is an archracist, believing, as he does, that “treason to whiteness is loyalty to humanity”. Jason, more than anyone I know, believes in the concept of race and race war, as the treason line presupposes.
14 Dec 2007 at 08:46 pm | #
Quote me.
14 Dec 2007 at 09:59 pm | #
F, you’re being disingenuous again, you know I didn’t say that. Please tell us how you are suffering from “reverse racism”.
14 Dec 2007 at 10:42 pm | #
JJ
What didn’t you say?
For my part, I never said I suffered from racism. Wes said I suffer from racism simply for being white. I said Jason was the biggest racism-sufferer I know. He needs to take two chill pills and call the doctor in the morning.
14 Dec 2007 at 11:22 pm | #
The Dean of Cincinnati says:
Quote me.
You know what...I swear, my last post started out a lot longer. And I decided to edit it down for sheer brevity but one of the things I left out went something like this:
And Dean, I know that the second I say that despite being a decent guy, sometimes you miss the mark in the sensitivity department you’re going to demand that I spend an eternity searching the Beacon archives searching for a specific quote or that I bring up a specific instance of when you’ve said something that I found offensive or insensitive.
It’s what you come close to sarcastically asking but don’t when you say “I was not aware, Deborah, that Justin or myself had ever lumped you with a bunch of horrific stereotypes.”
In other words, asking me to quote you is no different from anyone else here asking you to prove that had Slaby been black she would be in jail. You’re asking me to prove how something you wrote or said made me feel and you’re asking me to prove WHY I shouldn’t have felt that way or how I took you wrong.
You’re asking me to prove and explain, with examples dating back over TWO YEARS of me posting here (not to mention comments posted at Nate’s Blog, my own blog, or anywhere else) things you’ve written that didn’t sit right with me.
I could...with you and with Justin (I seem to recall one of his campaign pieces that I found, not offensive, that’s too strong a word, but off the mark)...but that will take a lot of time and effort I really don’t want to spend only for you to spend time explaining how I’ve taken you out of context or that’s not what you meant or why I shouldn’t have felt the way I feel.
I guess what I’m saying is this: I think you and Justin are good guys with good intentions - that means a lot, it really does. It doesn’t mean that you understand the subtle ways that even you two kind, well-meaning individuals, have your own assumptions, stereotypes and that sometimes, they’re more apparent than you think.
I guess I’m asking that you challenge what you think you know...about yourself, about racism, about bigotry, about even more subtle forms of these things.
Just like most things that have to do with race, it’s seen and felt better than it is explained. And I just don’t have the words to explain this any better than I have.
14 Dec 2007 at 11:51 pm | #
In a paper about white privilege, to me it did not seem inappropriate to note the whiteness of the white prosecutor who decided not to prosecute the white woman. Nor, for the record, did I hope that people would laugh about the fact that the white guy in question is named White. I did, however, find his name apt in the context of my discussion.
I never would have guessed that noting the whiteness of a white guy named White would be construed either as a bad joke or as racist. Maybe if his name was Don Cracker or Don Honky, and I said, “the aptly named Don Cracker” or “Don Honky"…
But seriously, he is white, his whiteness is at issue, and his name is White. I’m sorry that this fact does not seem to have been deemed worthy of a parenthetical remark by ether trey of F, but I respectfully disagree.
15 Dec 2007 at 06:32 am | #
I didn’t ask you to explain anything. I asked you to show me where one of us has made sweeping generalizations about black people. Apparently, that is too tall a task—just something you would prefer to complain about, and maybe we never did it in the first place.
15 Dec 2007 at 06:33 am | #
I don’t think middle-class white guys can “suffer” from racism.
15 Dec 2007 at 07:49 am | #
Justin: having an idea of what’s going on” is awareness, not understanding.
F: “Racism isn’t about abstractly and indirectly benefitting from racism. Racism is the doctrine of race, the belief that a biological classification of humanity into racial subgroups is real and significant.”
No, racism is about concretely and directly benefitting from racism, the subordination and subjugation of what are in actuality equals on the basis of race or ethnicity.
the belief that a biological classification of humanity into racial subgroups is is genotypical and phenotypical, but has nothing to do with the use of race as a class indicator.
Dean: so at no time can (has) a White been denied employment, housing or public accommodation because of his/her race? How can you seriously write that?
Dempster: your paper utterly fails to demonstrate how, in Clermont County’s justice system, -Slaby’s race granted her privilege. It’s more about -Slaby’s lawyer being a Clermont County Commissioner overseeing Prosecutor White’s (no joke, pun or racism-just coincidence) budget, and economic class issues.
Finally- it really, really has nothing to do with Cincinnati.
15 Dec 2007 at 07:55 am | #
I did not write that. What are you even talking about?
15 Dec 2007 at 08:17 am | #
TDG - Having an OPINION that Slaby’s race and/or social status affected her treatment in the court system—and I believe with the Dean that it did—is in no way similar to saying that the Dean actually STATED something that was racist, or insensitive to you specifically or the “community” in general. Fact vs. opinion or conjecture.
You ask:
I guess I’m asking that you challenge what you think you know...about yourself, about racism, about bigotry, about even more subtle forms of these things.
Are you serious? With your sweeping generalizations about white people--which by the way don’t require a time-consuming search, scroll up--you ask someone else to examine their own bigotry. What a laugh. You ought to book a gig at the Funny Bone!
It’s my opinion that you and any other woman that posts on the Beacon, and claims to be black, gets a pass on whatever they say. Never questioned about their bias, bigotry, or prejudice, while any white woman--me--is open season and suspect by virtue of race alone. In my opinion you’ve been treated with kid gloves, just like you expect.
15 Dec 2007 at 09:29 am | #
<sarcasm>Yes, cincysuz, my commment #61 (and the preceding exchange) proves your point exactly.</sarcasm>
15 Dec 2007 at 11:07 am | #
Which point? I think I made several <sarcasm?>. If you’re referring to the last paragraph, sarcastically, I stick with my point. Though Deborahgirl calls you a (loveable) racist, you respond to her with the utmost respect. And that’s nice. If I make the same inference, I get, and expect, when I make an accusation with which you strongly disagree, a barrage of insults in return. And like I said, I expect nothing less. But, that’s the dif. I don’t think it makes you a racist, just that you treat people differently based on race. You’re nicer and more respectful to black people (or people that say they’re black because who really knows). I understand it though, because any white that disagrees on any point with any black person on here is routinely accused of being a racist and that shuts down the discussion. No cross-race difference of opinion allowed. Not in Cincinnati. But I admit, it is a good strategy for always winning an argument.
15 Dec 2007 at 01:00 pm | #
cincysuz,
TDB just said I sometimes make generalizations. You enter into nasty and fantastical psychological “profiles” of me based on weird assumptions.
That is a huge difference, which I don’t think relates to melanin.
15 Dec 2007 at 02:10 pm | #
See. I rest my case.
15 Dec 2007 at 02:24 pm | #
Please, do rest your case.
15 Dec 2007 at 02:38 pm | #
Nihilist, F prefers to use the name Honky Hank.
Urbanist, I believe he has both, so we’ll just have to disagree.
cincysuz, we don’t launch a barrage of insults, but you do.
15 Dec 2007 at 05:50 pm | #
Nah. Now in her post #42 and #59 TDG did exactly what you say I do--a psychological profile and I will add, based on weird assumptions. I guess that because she implies that you are a couple of well-meaning idiots, too dense to understand the subtleties of race and your own racism, then it’s okay. Most people would find that insulting, but not you. Why?
It IS all about the melanin.
16 Dec 2007 at 08:00 am | #
Dean: did you not write “I don’t think middle-class white guys can “suffer” from racism.”?
So you think ONLY middle class White guys are immune from racism, and all other classes of White guys and White women can and do suffer from racism?
16 Dec 2007 at 09:04 am | #
cincysuz,
Do we really need to collect your typical tirades, and compare the diction? Seems pointless, since you already know. Or, at least, you should, since they are your words.
Urbanist:
“F” said I was a “racism-sufferer.” My comment, that you are fixated on, should only be referenced in that context. Middle class white guys—of which I am one—do not “suffer from racism” in the manner described by F.
If you disagree, begin by making clear you use the same context for the discussion.
16 Dec 2007 at 12:04 pm | #
You modify your responses based on the race of the poster.