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Re:A Facebook request: Write a code of tech ethics by tzs on Wednesday May 01, 2019 @11:00AM (#19797578)
I can tell at a glance if you are black. I cannot tell at a glance if you are rural white.

This is significant because white is the majority. It means that if I, as a member of the majority, wish to discriminate against those outside of the majority [1], it is easy for blacks. I can just avoid all of them.

For whites who aren't the "right" kind of white, I can't just use a simple rule. I actually have to look into the background. Furthermore, you can try to hide that background from me, hoping I mistake you for the "right" kind of white. Maybe I'll eventually find out you aren't, but if you have proven yourself useful to me in the mean time maybe I'll overlook that.

The black guy? He can't hide that from me, so he doesn't even get the chance to prove himself.

[1] I don't, but the writing is more natural from the point of view of one who does, so I shall role play a bigot in this comment.

Re:A Facebook request: Write a code of tech ethics by mieseratte on Wednesday May 01, 2019 @11:53AM (#19798276)
> I can tell at a glance if you are black. I cannot tell at a glance if you are rural white.

Sure, but that only works up until you open your mouth. I can tell poor-rural from wealthy-urban quickly.

Out and out racism is still at some level a problem, but the parent comment specifically states there exist socioeconomic problems that exist only for blacks attempting university that do not exist for other groups. I would love to know what problems exist specifically for blacks attempting university that are specific to that one group.

Having spent my youth in a place with a surprising amount of socioeconomic diversity I can tell you the wealth blacks had wholly different problems and outcomes than the poor ones did just like with the whites, and Hispanics. I couldn't tell you about other groups, we didn't seem to have any of them in the "poor" category.

And while whites haven't exactly had historical problems in the workforce solely based on skin color, this isn't a rule. My father is a blue-collar worker in the construction industry, and during the Recession he lost his "good" job and ended up working on a crew entirely comprised of poor blacks. I spent my summers and breaks working with him, performing unskilled manual labor. While not the rule, there was absolute "us" vs. "them" bullshit racism coming from the majority group.

This isn't a class of problem that is relegated to one particular group, and to pretend it does is simultaneously racist and patronizing.