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BeABetterHumanBeing t1_j9bey7b wrote

Reply to comment by LiesInRuins in Gritting routes are ‘sexist’ says Cambridgeshire highways chief and ‘must change’ by Bald__egg

What was useful for me to understand is that 21st-century racists treat racism like some kind of taint that pollutes everything it touches. Of course, instead of thinking of it as acting via miasma or some other gobbledegook, this reasoning uses egregious abuse of statistics to achieve a pseudo-scientific foundation instead. The general gist is that anything that can be found to have a slight correlation with race must necessarily be racist.

The problem with the idea "you go where the market is" is that it doesn't inject a racist lens onto everything. It proposes a kind of decision-making that isn't fundamentally rooted in a racist worldview, and therefore is impossible for our dear 21st-century racists to grasp.

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Zandrick t1_j9cpz3w wrote

Yeah this is exactly right. I think if you look at the chicken place and decide it’s racist for using things like propensity to eat out and location to large thoroughfares, like the other guy was saying. But then conclude the chicken place is racist, it’s like you weren’t willing to accept any other answer.

These issues are correlated but pointing the finger of causation at the chicken place itself doesn’t make sense and doesn’t lead to any kind of useful solution.

Is relevant, because it’s what they seem to be doing in this article with sexism. Apparently only men are working these specific jobs? That’s not about the trains being built in the wrong location.

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ASpaceOstrich t1_j9if9f4 wrote

The chicken place isn't being called racist. That's where you're misunderstanding things. It's pointing out an ongoing symptom of systemic racism. Why do you think "propensity to eat out" correlates with race?

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Zandrick t1_j9ifdl1 wrote

I agree entirely, you should recognize it as a symptom rather than a root cause, that’s actually my point.

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ASpaceOstrich t1_j9ijkg8 wrote

That's what people who are discussing systemic racism and sexism are doing. Sure there'll be the obnoxious twitter types who just learnt a new buzzword to justify their own bigotry, but anyone who's opinion actually matters is referring to symptoms not a cause.

Don't let the twitter people drive you away from the actual progressive values. I did for way too long, but fuck those people. I'm not letting them dictate how I think any more.

Being aware of the systemic issues is a big deal because it let's you start thinking about useful changes. How can we solve the root cause? Can we even? Failing that, how can we patch the symptoms up, which in the long term may very well be the most practical way to solve the root cause?

We can't go back and undo racism, but we can attempt to negate its symptoms for long enough that it's no longer leaving scars behind. That's the point behind things like affirmative action.

Or in the case of the road salting example in the OP. They look at practices that people would just assume are put in place for the right reasons and discover that, due to prejudice at the time they were implemented, they aren't actually ideal. On a gut level "road salting practices were sexist" sounds absurd but then when you look at data and the goals and values of society when those practices were implemented suddenly it makes sense. Imagine if they were only salting roads in white neighbourhoods? That's the sort of issue the study has found.

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Zandrick t1_j9ilygi wrote

If a person can come away from a discussion with a statement “the way they salt the roads is sexist”. The discussion was a waste of time, because that statement is foolish.

Never get so high minded that you need to re-explain a simple statement with five paragraphs and a thesis statement in order to make that statement make sense. Just make the original statement make sense. The way they salt the roads is not sexist, that’s absurd.

“We should salt the roads differently because the way we do it now is not optimal.” Easy, truthful, means the same thing without accidentally calling into question anyone’s moral character.

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