Before we get in to a battle of terms definition, let me stress my point again: Racism is either present on the individual, or in the letter of the law (if it is that that you call institutional, fine, I would say institutionalized). So, to avoid split hairs on the terminology, I can object only the notion of "systemic" racism . My point is that there is no middle ground. Racism is always real, concrete, tangible. It generates action that segregate and oppress people, either because it is coded in law or policy (institutionalized), or because someone simply feels that way. And of course that I do not that deny that, in the past, laws have explicitily oppressed black people (probably still in some parts of the world).
The fact that our favelas and your ghettos have a racial distribution which is tilted in one direction is a known and sad reality. I think no one will disagree that It derives directly from:
i) the fact that letter of the law was previously openly racist basically everywhere;
ii) people in positions of power were allowed to be openly racist;
iii) those populations came from their original lands with zero possessions and zero education. So you obviously have a heritage, a social problem that you must face. But you do not solve or even address it by hiding behind some vague and useless notion of "systemic racism". Those empty concepts are only useful for different kinds of people to hide behind it: incompetent/corrupt politicians (something is wrong? blame systemic racism), closet racists, incompetent/stupid academics (I cannot identify or describe or analyze a phenomenon, so I create a ghost called "systemic racism" that I loosely define and that can explain everything). My problem with this concept is simply that: I think it is useless to tackle real world problems.
I just need one simple example: South Africa. There are still huge social problems and racial inequalities there. They were inherited from previous times were racism was institutionalized. Does a concept like "systemic racism" is of any help in South Africa? Flagrantly no. What would work -- surely in a long, difficult, painful process -- would be to address the real world problems, agricultural reform, education and access to jobs ( and to train the police, probably a problem there as well). The rest is propaganda. Talking about systemic racism does not save one single little kid that is co-opted by the drug dealers in the favelas.
I agree with so much of what you say, but we still disagree, fundamentally, that there is or isn't systemic, institutionalized (if you prefer) racism. Is that what you're saying? I can't believe you think South Africa is a good example...of what? You can give me agricultural reform, education, access to jobs, but are you really willing to say that institutionalized racism, in South Africa of all places, isn't really the problem? I think we are clearly not understanding each other.
Moxie, you are very good with words, so please see how strong is the assertion that the police institutionalizes violence against non-whites. This says that the police, either officially or at least semi-officially, purposely targets non-whites. What does the black police officers have to say about this? Do they agree? I cannot say that I am a "law and order" person, but at least I admit that the police job is a difficult and inherently violent one. Problem is that, if your general population is x% racist, your police force will be around x% racist as well. It is a human institution, it will reflect the society where it lays. Again, fight the racism in the individual, and you fight the racism in the police (but there is more to the question, obviously). Also, if your police force is untrained and/or truculent, and on the other hand there is racial socioeconomic disparity, obviously you will have cases like GF's again and again.
Just before I get into the police, let me say this. We are an international forum, and how we talk about race issues in our various countries is likely proximate, but not completely the same. As to your bolded above, in the US, this is a very complex and historical issue. However, to make it simple, cops have basically always been white. After slavery, there was a long period of Jim Crow Laws. (You can look it up.) It was a way of still keeping black people down, even after Emancipation. Police, in many ways, were just created to to keep black people down. And to protect white people from them. And this is why we get the horrible results we do. In your bolded above, you say, (with a real shock,) that I'm saying that police, officially or semi-officially target non-whites. Of course they fucking do. How can this even surprise you? You may not know this, but there was a policy of "stop-and-frisk," in NYC. It was totally racially targeted, and has been stopped for that reason. See a black person, stop them. Find a bit of weed or illegal knife, and they're in the system. Can't pay the bail? Spend loads of time in jail, with no charge. White people, with a bit of weed or a knife or gun or ripping off all of us in the stock market? No stop. Free pass.
To me, it is lazy thinking to diffuse the whole thing by roping in closet racists and incompetent academics. In my world, we're starting to get down to the granular, so define your terms. And to say that talk about racism doesn't save a kid from drug dealers in favelas? IMO, you're certainly not going to save him if you DON'T talk about it.
We strongly agree that this "emblematic" case deserve (peaceful) protest,
at least per se. But the crucial point is how representative is this episode (which is the point that one post from
@calitennis127 addresses, and I still need to reply to, but analyse data takes effort). If people don't have at least some common ground on that, the rest of the conversation is completely useless.
"At least per se?" WTF does that even mean? How representative is this episode? Keeping it current, and black people killed by cops for no reason in the US: George Floyd, Eric Garner, Philando Castile, Breonna Traylor, Tamir Rice, Amadou Diallo, Michael Brown...I really could go on, sadly. You can try to find common ground with Cali if you want, but...**spoiler alert**...he's a racist. Keep anaylizng the data, if you like, but there is a human component, and if you keep missing it, that's on you.
