Racism Emerges As Europe Reacts To Obama : NPR

[Owen Densmore]

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
   http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and  
knowledgeable.
     "The big difference here is that the United States has been  
thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These  
countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about  
race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own  
bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries  
are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought  
about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that  
there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as  
in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in  
lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my  
friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if  
Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

     -- Owen



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[Scott R. Powell]

I'm surprised that the writer of the NPR article didn't cite this from last Sunday's Independent -

Austria beats about the bush

Having cornered the world market in grotesque abduction and incest cases, Austria took a clear lead in the unedifying contest to see who could come up with the most racist reaction to Obama's election. Klaus Emmerich, the top political commentator on US affairs for broadcaster ORF (Österreichischer Rundfunk), was asked on air for his reaction to the Illinois senator's victory. "I do not want the Western world to be directed by a black man," he said, "And if you say this is a racist remark, I say you are damn right it is." Speaking after the programme, the veteran went even further, asserting that Obama's win was "a highly disturbing development" because "blacks are not as far advanced in the civilisation process nor in their political progress". What do they put in the water down there?

I'm also a little surprised by Julian Bond's statement. While some Europeans may be relative newcomers when it comes to "conversing" about race, they are no strangers to dealing with things racial or ethnic quite ruthlessly.

As a prominent Nazi physician said, quoted in Robert Jay Lifton's The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide, Basic Books, 1986 - "Everything I know about racial theory, I learned from the Americans."

Cheers,
Scott Powell

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and knowledgeable.
   "The big difference here is that the United States has been thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

   -- Owen



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[Robert Holmes]

IMHO, the notion that europeans are "relative newcomers to the conversation about race" is just plain silly. The UK has been colonized by the Romans, the Jutes, the Angles, the Saxons and the French. We've been having conversations about race for a *very* long time.

Robert

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and knowledgeable.
   "The big difference here is that the United States has been thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

   -- Owen



============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
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[Robert Holmes]

And the Vikings. Mustn't forget the Vikings -- Robert

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]> wrote:

IMHO, the notion that europeans are "relative newcomers to the conversation about race" is just plain silly. The UK has been colonized by the Romans, the Jutes, the Angles, the Saxons and the French. We've been having conversations about race for a *very* long time.

Robert

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and knowledgeable.
   "The big difference here is that the United States has been thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

   -- Owen



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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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============================================================
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[Douglas Roberts-2]

And the Moors.  Don't forget the Moors.

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:14 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]> wrote:

And the Vikings. Mustn't forget the Vikings -- Robert

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]> wrote:

IMHO, the notion that europeans are "relative newcomers to the conversation about race" is just plain silly. The UK has been colonized by the Romans, the Jutes, the Angles, the Saxons and the French. We've been having conversations about race for a *very* long time.

Robert

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and knowledgeable.
   "The big difference here is that the United States has been thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

   -- Owen



============================================================
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
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--
Doug Roberts, RTI International
[hidden email]
[hidden email]
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell

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[Owen Densmore]

Aren't these a bit different than conversations about race?

In all the cases below, there were wars involved, and the conquerers  
did not trouble themselves about conversations about race.

     -- Owen


On Nov 13, 2008, at 12:40 PM, Douglas Roberts wrote:

> And the Moors.  Don't forget the Moors.
>
> On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:14 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]
> >wrote:
>
>> And the Vikings. Mustn't forget the Vikings -- Robert
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]
>> >wrote:
>>
>>> IMHO, the notion that europeans are "relative newcomers to the
>>> conversation about race" is just plain silly. The UK has been  
>>> colonized by
>>> the Romans, the Jutes, the Angles, the Saxons and the French.  
>>> We've been
>>> having conversations about race for a *very* long time.
>>>
>>> Robert
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore  
>>> <[hidden email]>wrote:
>>>
>>>> Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
>>>> http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
>>>> Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.
>>>>
>>>> I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful  
>>>> and
>>>> knowledgeable.
>>>>   "The big difference here is that the United States has been  
>>>> thinking
>>>> about and dealing with race since we were founded. These  
>>>> countries in Europe
>>>> are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are  
>>>> much less
>>>> familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have  
>>>> always
>>>> thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."
>>>>
>>>> I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I  
>>>> thought
>>>> about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided  
>>>> that there
>>>> just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.
>>>>
>>>> I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in  
>>>> lifestyle.
>>>> But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends  
>>>> here, I see
>>>> the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.
>>>>
>>>> I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.
>>>>
>>>>   -- Owen
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ============================================================
>>>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>>>> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
>> ============================================================
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
>> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> Doug Roberts, RTI International
> [hidden email]
> [hidden email]
> 505-455-7333 - Office
> 505-670-8195 - Cell
> ============================================================
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

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[Robert Holmes]

Not quite. It's more about assimilation than simple conquest. There's a good discussion of this in the intro to Hugh Thomas's "The English & the Normans", page 6 onwards (it's available online through google book search at http://tinyurl.com/6ljma5

Though if you want to limit it to purely the anglo/african issue, it doesn't seem unreasonable to date this to the start of the 19th century (Abolition of Slave Trade Act 1807, Abolition of Slavery Act 1833). Presumably race cropped up somewhere in the parliamentary 

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 4:20 PM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Aren't these a bit different than conversations about race? 

In all the cases below, there were wars involved, and the conquerers did not trouble themselves about conversations about race.

   -- Owen

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[Prof David West]

There is no such thing as race.

(At least anymore, not since the Neanderthals died out, and maybe not
even then, if they could beget fertile offspring from matings with
modern man, something we do not know.)

There are ethnicities.

Some ethnic markers are physiological (result of population inbreeding -
originally enforced by geography, later by culture) but that fact does
not establish "race" as a legitimate categorization criteria for humans.
 At most it would justify something analogous to breed.

"Racism" is either an extreme form of ethnocentrism or a disguised form
of specie-ism.

Ethnocentrism  is not unique - pretty much every ethnic group believes
themselves to be "special," "better," "right," etc. vis-a-vis every
other ethnic group.  And xenophobia seems to have very deep genetic
roots.

Extreme forms of ethnocentrism can express themselves by advocating
genocide (which despite the root, is not always based on physiological
or genetic markers, e.g. Semite versus Semite).

Specie-ism arises when you deny that some ethnicity (and historically
women) are human - they are not of our species.  Long before the US was
founded, European conquerors denied human status to various conquered
peoples - they were literally considered to nothing more than a
human-like specie of animal.  Pre-Linnean taxonomies are pretty
informative on this point.

Europeans, interestingly enough, redefined the concept of slavery by
making it a relationship between "man and animal" instead of "man and
man" as most other cultures thought of it.  Slavery could be justified
if sub-Saharan Africans were not people, but not otherwise.

Virulent ethnocentrism seems to arise mostly as a function of numbers.
When an ethnic group becomes sufficiently large in relationship to the
dominant ethnic group, the latter gets hostile.  In France ethnic
tensions are focused on Arabs and not Blacks because the former
constitute a large percentage of the population in France while blacks
are still a significant minority.  In England, south Asians are targets
of ethnocentrists far more than Blacks - again because of the relative
numbers.  In Germany it is the "Turks."

European disgruntlement with Obama - to the extent that it may exist -
is grounded far more in a fear of cultural change (he is a Democrat and
a Liberal after all) and is articulated by reference to skin color only
because he exhibits no other obvious ethnic markers.

davew


On Thu, 13 Nov 2008 16:20:53 -0700, "Owen Densmore"
<[hidden email]> said:

> Aren't these a bit different than conversations about race?
>
> In all the cases below, there were wars involved, and the conquerers  
> did not trouble themselves about conversations about race.
>
>      -- Owen
>
>
> On Nov 13, 2008, at 12:40 PM, Douglas Roberts wrote:
>
> > And the Moors.  Don't forget the Moors.
> >
> > On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:14 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]
> > >wrote:
> >
> >> And the Vikings. Mustn't forget the Vikings -- Robert
> >>
> >>
> >> On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 12:13 PM, Robert Holmes <[hidden email]
> >> >wrote:
> >>
> >>> IMHO, the notion that europeans are "relative newcomers to the
> >>> conversation about race" is just plain silly. The UK has been  
> >>> colonized by
> >>> the Romans, the Jutes, the Angles, the Saxons and the French.  
> >>> We've been
> >>> having conversations about race for a *very* long time.
> >>>
> >>> Robert
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore  
> >>> <[hidden email]>wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
> >>>> http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
> >>>> Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.
> >>>>
> >>>> I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful  
> >>>> and
> >>>> knowledgeable.
> >>>>   "The big difference here is that the United States has been  
> >>>> thinking
> >>>> about and dealing with race since we were founded. These  
> >>>> countries in Europe
> >>>> are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are  
> >>>> much less
> >>>> familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have  
> >>>> always
> >>>> thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."
> >>>>
> >>>> I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I  
> >>>> thought
> >>>> about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided  
> >>>> that there
> >>>> just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.
> >>>>
> >>>> I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in  
> >>>> lifestyle.
> >>>> But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends  
> >>>> here, I see
> >>>> the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.
> >>>>
> >>>> I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.
> >>>>
> >>>>   -- Owen
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> ============================================================
> >>>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> >>>> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> >>>> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >> ============================================================
> >> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> >> Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> >> lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Doug Roberts, RTI International
> > [hidden email]
> > [hidden email]
> > 505-455-7333 - Office
> > 505-670-8195 - Cell
> > ============================================================
> > FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> > Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
> > lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
>
>
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[HighlandWindsLLC Miller]

Related to Julian Bond's statement, I would only say that what is familiar can appear of less harm -- we get used to our own forms of racism, and when confronted with anothre, as in Europe, it will/may appear worse, but could really just be different. Common human reactions. Many blacks I have spoken with over the years felt Europe was better .. particularly northern Europe.

Peggy Miller

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[Douglas Roberts-2]

AP story:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iEyLuiVkdd-f1RM5wnoR0kF4WbvgD94FHP480

--Doug

--
Doug Roberts, RTI International
[hidden email]
[hidden email]
505-455-7333 - Office
505-670-8195 - Cell

On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM, Owen Densmore <[hidden email]> wrote:

Just to let Doug know the US is not the only bastion of idiots:
 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96949439
Bigotry, apparently, is not uncommon in Europe.

I was surprised by Julian Bond's statement.  He's both insightful and knowledgeable.
   "The big difference here is that the United States has been thinking about and dealing with race since we were founded. These countries in Europe are relative newcomers to the conversation about race. They are much less familiar with confronting their own bigotry."  Bond adds, "I have always thought that European countries are more bigoted than the U.S."

I recall considering leaving the US after Bush was elected.  I thought about the problems I'd seen in Italy and elsewhere, and decided that there just might be as many problems outside the Bubba infested US as in.

I think of Europe as being more sophisticated, certainly in lifestyle.  But then my sampling is biased.  But if I think of my friends here, I see the same sophistication.  Hard for me to say if Bond has it right.

I'd be interested in our European Friamers observations.

   -- Owen



============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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