> The cure for discrimination is forgiveness. The cure for violence is forgiveness. The cure for hatred is forgiveness.
> The only way anything stops is for people to have the humility and wisdom to say “this will stop with me.”
This is how I used to think. It’s reminiscent of the thinking of the Dalai Lama, Gandhi, John Lennon, and countless others who have had noble idealism which sadly isn’t congruous with reality. Here is a quote which demonstrates the logical endpoint of this idea:
> Hitler killed five million [sic] Jews. It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs.....It would have aroused the world and the people of Germany.... As it is they succumbed anyway in their millions.[1]
That is the logical conclusion of this idea, take your own life in hopes you’ll posthumously be considered worthy of having been spared, and worthy of having anyone intervene to spare you. Because unilaterally, arbitrarily deciding to forgive a transgressor who’s still motivated by their transgression grants permission and submission to their goal.
There is historical precedent for a similar notion being more realistic and effective: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa. But what makes it more realistic and more effective is that there was significant, forceful pressure which motivated the transgressors to seek mutual reconciliation. To some extent, they were also willing participants.
Personal anecdote time: like probably many here, I was bullied as a kid. It was a shockingly regular occurrence for me to be violently attacked, sometimes even by people I don’t think I’d ever interacted with before they were beating me. I had a timid and peaceful demeanor even when some of my family strongly encouraged me to defend myself. Eventually this led to a group of ~20 kids kicking me on the ground while I covered my head and neck and hoped to make it out alive. I was 13-14 years old, I had endured beatings on a lesser scale too many times to count. Of course I knew I couldn’t defend myself from 20 kids, so I took another beating. But the next time I got jumped, by one kid, I punched him straight in the face. I didn’t even know I had it in me to do, but instinct took over. Then I got up, saw the kid who attacked me was embarrassed but physically okay, and I walked away. That was the last time anyone ever laid hands on me outside a sporting context with established consent. Now I can forgive those kids, because they’ve stopped beating me.
I don't mean to pick on your personal story, but it would only be relevant if you found your bullies 60 years later, punched them in the face, and that somehow fixed your broken character.
In the real world, your bullies are no longer the same people, and punching them 60 years later won't address your past or future problems.
Huh? Actual discrimination and hate and violence are also active and ongoing. That was my point. You can’t forgive someone for transgressions they’re determined to continue. I can forgive people for something that happened to me 25 years ago because it’s in the past. That’s the relevance of my story. I can’t forgive people who are going to do the same to me tomorrow. And no one forgiving them while they still pursue that aggression is going to “end” anything other than their own dignity or their own lives.
> You can’t forgive someone for transgressions they’re determined to continue
My understanding is that hate and violence in the last few decades have been steadily declining. At the same time, self-reported perception of those has been increasing since ~2014.
Maybe there's eluding racism we can all feel but cannot measure.
Or maybe a side effect of changes to social network recommendation algorithms is that we're now building echo chambers and polarizing people.
Today there's less hate, but more talk about it. And drastic measures aimed to decrease it have a high likelihood of changing the trend.
When white people have kids, they have to give their children the birds and the bees talk when they reach an appropriate age.
When black people have kids, they have to give them the same talk, and also the one where you need to be really careful about acting a specific way around cops lest they unalive you because police officers view blacks as more aggressive than whites because of prejudice.
As long as my kids have to live in a world where they need to be given that second talk? I don't care about how put-upon you are by people actively reacting against racism.
Hmm, while I was an exchange student in the US, I got that exact speach house from a friend's father ("hands on the wheel unless asked to do otherwise, stay friendly, no sudden moves"). However, I was very white (a geek who didn't get out much) and he was a white Mormon. That was in 1997 and since my friend had obviously heard that speech many times before, I just assumed that's what all kids are taught over there...
Did he tell you about how you shouldn't act suspicious when you walk into a convenience store lest the employees stalk you? Did he warn you that attempting to sell a house in this country will automatically result in a lower sale price from your own agent than if you were white? There are literally hundreds of these examples.
> shouldn't act suspicious when you walk into a convenience store lest the employees stalk you
I understand it's tempting to blame it on racism, but please go talk to non-white store owners. They do the same thing, it's not about the race.
You have to pick which battle you're going to fight.
Either racism today is the major problem. Or there's racism in the past that lead to poverty in the present. Those are two different lenses dictating two different strategies.
You can choose to feel righteous and fight ever-elusive racism.
Or you can chose to be pragmatic and fight poverty.
Being righteous is definitely more pleasant and convincing to the masses, but it rarely produces better results than being pragmatic.
How would you know it's not a self-fulfilling prophecy?
Have you considered that giving the talk and installing the idea that "cops are your enemy" might cause your kids to run away or resist the police, thus unnecessarily escalating what could be a perfectly civil interaction?
Because people aren't pulling themselves over and and shooting themselves. They aren't invading their own homes and shooting themselves. They aren't kneeling on their own chests and asphyxiating themselves. And the simple fact of the matter is that this is a RESPONSE to how cops have treated minorities for generations. Pretending that educating children on how to act around people who have a preconception that the color of your skin causes you to be a threat is racist gaslighting.
There's a speed trap in Louisiana that I passed through for over 30 years. I've never seen a white person behind the wheel of a car with a police car nearby unless it was a traffic accident, I've seen tons of white motorists pass through the area far above the speed limit, and the community is 60% white. Meanwhile, I saw black folks pulled over literally every day. Please whitesplain to me how being wary of the cops in that stretch is the fault of black folks.
> Because people aren't pulling themselves over and and shooting themselves. They aren't invading their own homes and shooting themselves. They aren't kneeling on their own chests and asphyxiating themselves
Are you aware that for every example you brought up (Rayshard Brooks, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd) there's a recent example of the exact same thing happening to a white person and getting no national attention whatsoever?
Your cherry-picking and emotional response is what leads to polarization in society.
> how cops have treated minorities for generations
> The only way anything stops is for people to have the humility and wisdom to say “this will stop with me.”
This is how I used to think. It’s reminiscent of the thinking of the Dalai Lama, Gandhi, John Lennon, and countless others who have had noble idealism which sadly isn’t congruous with reality. Here is a quote which demonstrates the logical endpoint of this idea:
> Hitler killed five million [sic] Jews. It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs.....It would have aroused the world and the people of Germany.... As it is they succumbed anyway in their millions.[1]
That is the logical conclusion of this idea, take your own life in hopes you’ll posthumously be considered worthy of having been spared, and worthy of having anyone intervene to spare you. Because unilaterally, arbitrarily deciding to forgive a transgressor who’s still motivated by their transgression grants permission and submission to their goal.
There is historical precedent for a similar notion being more realistic and effective: Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa. But what makes it more realistic and more effective is that there was significant, forceful pressure which motivated the transgressors to seek mutual reconciliation. To some extent, they were also willing participants.
Personal anecdote time: like probably many here, I was bullied as a kid. It was a shockingly regular occurrence for me to be violently attacked, sometimes even by people I don’t think I’d ever interacted with before they were beating me. I had a timid and peaceful demeanor even when some of my family strongly encouraged me to defend myself. Eventually this led to a group of ~20 kids kicking me on the ground while I covered my head and neck and hoped to make it out alive. I was 13-14 years old, I had endured beatings on a lesser scale too many times to count. Of course I knew I couldn’t defend myself from 20 kids, so I took another beating. But the next time I got jumped, by one kid, I punched him straight in the face. I didn’t even know I had it in me to do, but instinct took over. Then I got up, saw the kid who attacked me was embarrassed but physically okay, and I walked away. That was the last time anyone ever laid hands on me outside a sporting context with established consent. Now I can forgive those kids, because they’ve stopped beating me.
1: Quoting Gandhi, source: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/gandhi-on-the-holocaust