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[sockgumbee]

"My flaws also are more easily forgiven because I am white. Some complain that affirmative action has meant the university is saddled with mediocre minority professors. I have no doubt there are minority faculty who are mediocre, though I don't know very many. As Henry Louis Gates Jr. once pointed out, if affirmative action policies> were in place for the next hundred years, it's possible that at the end of that time the university could have as many mediocre minority professors as it has mediocre white professors. That isn't meant as an insult to anyone, but it's a simple observation that white privilege has meant that scores of second-rate white professors have slid through the system because their flaws were overlooked out of solidarity based on race, as well as on gender, class and ideology." By Robert Jensen

So a friend of mine, a 'white' guy married to a Chinese medical doctor who lives in the south sent me a book he wrote about "White Privilege" which goes into how people of color (AND OF COURSE OTHERS) from colonization on were always couched in terms that dehumanized them. In this way it was easier for people to enslave them, practice cultural genocide, and control their resources.

I know that in my tribe/family, people with lighter skin can have it both better and worse depending on the circumstances/situation. I have a nephew who tells people he is Italian so that he can pass and get white privilege. He lives in a large urban center away from most of the rest of the family.

[johnr]

I have a baby stroller that constantly veers to the left.

[smart_e_pantz]

I have a baby stroller that constantly veers to the left.

It's not the stroller.  Your baby is just trying to tell you that hu's a Democrat!

[rockprof]

I have a baby stroller that constantly veers to the left.

Maybe the strolling baby's left leg is shorter than their right.

[johnr]

I have a baby stroller that constantly veers to the left.

It's not the stroller.  Your baby is just trying to tell you that hu's a Democrat!

I'm so proud!

[scheherazade]

What sucks is when the wheel keeps falling off the stroller.  That can't indicate anything good, can it?

[voxprincipalis]

I have a baby stroller that constantly veers to the left.

I wonder whether the stroller will take a more centrist approach when it is no longer a baby.

VP

[beacon1]

Some babies never grow up....

[daurousseau]

"My flaws also are more easily forgiven because I am white. Some complain that affirmative action has meant the university is saddled with mediocre minority professors. I have no doubt there are minority faculty who are mediocre, though I don't know very many. As Henry Louis Gates Jr. once pointed out, if affirmative action policies> were in place for the next hundred years, it's possible that at the end of that time the university could have as many mediocre minority professors as it has mediocre white professors. That isn't meant as an insult to anyone, but it's a simple observation that white privilege has meant that scores of second-rate white professors have slid through the system because their flaws were overlooked out of solidarity based on race, as well as on gender, class and ideology." By Robert Jensen

So a friend of mine, a 'white' guy married to a Chinese medical doctor who lives in the south sent me a book he wrote about "White Privilege" which goes into how people of color (AND OF COURSE OTHERS) from colonization on were always couched in terms that dehumanized them. In this way it was easier for people to enslave them, practice cultural genocide, and control their resources.

I know that in my tribe/family, people with lighter skin can have it both better and worse depending on the circumstances/situation. I have a nephew who tells people he is Italian so that he can pass and get white privilege. He lives in a large urban center away from most of the rest of the family.

I don't have a nephew so I'm not qualified to comment on race, color, culture, genocide, humans, China, faculty, colonization, minorities, saddles or the future. Sorry. You'll just have to read my book about the granularity of real numbers if you want my opinion.

[drknowitall]

I don't get it.  Someone makes  a comment about the privileges associated with racial hierarchies and the discussion that ensues is about - baby strollers?   Please, someone fill me in on the joke.

[sockgumbee]

I don't get it.  Someone makes  a comment about the privileges associated with racial hierarchies and the discussion that ensues is about - baby strollers?   Please, someone fill me in on the joke.

Maybe it's
1> the equivalent of nervous laughter.

2>the equivalent of an uh, a pause for thought--to put thoughts together, collectively.

3> a red herring--a way act as part of the discussion without talking about the matter at hand.

[jonesey]

I don't get it.  Someone makes  a comment about the privileges associated with racial hierarchies and the discussion that ensues is about - baby strollers?   Please, someone fill me in on the joke.

Maybe it's
1> the equivalent of nervous laughter.

2>the equivalent of an uh, a pause for thought--to put thoughts together, collectively.

3> a red herring--a way act as part of the discussion without talking about the matter at hand.

4>Maybe this topic has been beat to death in several other threads.

[virmundi]

Beaten to death? I beg to differ. Unless, of course, by "beaten to death" you mean treating the issue as though it does not exist and proceeding to post on issues that are not relevant to discussing the issue of white privilege.

[jonesey]

Beaten to death? I beg to differ. Unless, of course, by "beaten to death" you mean treating the issue as though it does not exist and proceeding to post on issues that are not relevant to discussing the issue of white privilege.

There's an entire section dealing with diversity; you're in it.  "Diversity in the Workplace." 

Look around, you'll see "White Privilege" all over the place, if not in specific thread titles, certainly in the body of the discussion themselves.

[johnr]

I don't get it.  Someone makes  a comment about the privileges associated with racial hierarchies and the discussion that ensues is about - baby strollers?   Please, someone fill me in on the joke.

Maybe it's
1> the equivalent of nervous laughter.

2>the equivalent of an uh, a pause for thought--to put thoughts together, collectively.

3> a red herring--a way act as part of the discussion without talking about the matter at hand.

4>Maybe this topic has been beat to death in several other threads.

Well, mostly I just didn't know what the OP wanted of us.  No questions were asked, no opinions sought, no discussion was encouraged.  Instead we were treated to some random musings followed by a non sequitur concerning the OP's nephew trying to pass as an Italian in a large urban center. 

I guess I could have let it pass, or answered with an, "Ok?". Instead, I thought I'd follow up with another non sequitur.

And, I guess you could argue that poorly constructed arguments and sloppy writing should get a pass because they are posted to the Diversity in the Workplace thread and we need to be sensitive about such things. However, as a teacher, I spend my career trying to get students to write well thought out, well supported, properly constructed theses that follow logically from one paragraph to the next.  I guess I got carried away.