• PotatoesFall@discuss.tchncs.de
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    17 days ago

    European kids are taught that racism is bad but not how real, systemic, subtle racism actually looks. We are taught that slavery and hitler is bad, so our bar for what is acceptable is very low.

    This is also why Europeans will get offended if you point out something subtly racist they did/said. They think you’re straight-up comparing them to Hitler and the KKK.

    • binarytobis@lemmy.world
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      17 days ago

      When I was in grad school I lived in an international student dorm where I was basically the only American. One day we had a party, and after a few drinks the Europeans started into this game they’ve all seemingly done a hundred times before where they started saying the most vile shit I’ve ever heard to each other while laughing. Like “OK, sure everyone in my country is drunk all the time, but it’s better than you guys letting in all those thieving gypsys!”

      So they did a full round of about 20 people throwing the worst racism/nationalism I’ve ever come across in real life at each other, including absolutely dunking on the only black guy as if he was a representative for all africans, then like a hive mind they all turned to me and someone went “At least none of us are as racist as these Americans!” followed by uproarious laughter. I ask myself internally all the time if my behavior is problematic, but it seemed like these people never learned that skill but instead were taught “USA=racist, everyone else is good” and never questioned it or themselves.

      For years this led me to privately think “Man, Europeans are way worse.” But then, you know, we elected Trump twice and the Klan came back dressed in camo.

      • BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today
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        16 days ago

        When my son was in college in NYC, he deliberately cultivated a circle of friends from all over the world, which gave him a lot of interesting influences and insights that most American kids wouldn’t have.

        After graduation, they were hanging out together, collaborating on projects (they are all various sorts of artists), and starting their careers, when he started to notice a troubling thread running through their conversations.

        He started to realize that the reason that all these international kids were in America studying the arts, is because they all come from rich families who can afford to send them to NYC for an education, and then fund their lifestyles as they pursue whatever career path they want. They have no real motivation for success, because the parents are going to pay the rent anyway. They were jamming multiple people into an apartment not because of affordability, but because it was fun to be with your friends all day. They just reproduced dorm living in a $5000 NYC apartment in Manhattan.

        But the real issue came when they’d be sitting around eating and talking, and he started noticing how class-conscious they were, and judgemental of people without a lot of money - like my son. He was listening to them disparaging normal people, and realizing that they are talking about people like him. Not HIM specifically, they thought of him as one of them, and liked him, but he realized that he comes from the world they were ridiculing. When he would defend a political policy meant to protect the middle-class, or to punish the wealthy, they would look at him like he was spontaneously speaking another language.

        He was starting to realize that maybe he had to cut off several of these “friends,” when Covid hit and they all went back to their respective countries. A few have been back to visit, and he’s decided to continue friendships with some, like his friend in Australia, and let some friendships go, like his friend from Portugal. He is still sad about the collapse of his international friend circle, but he acknowledges that he learned a lot about class and the way the wealthy think.

        He is a big Mamdani/ AOC supporter.

    • plantfanatic@sh.itjust.works
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      17 days ago

      Such a weird take, every single other thing isn’t binary, yet suddenly racism is? Self reflection and critical thinking are what’s lacking.

      Shouldn’t have to be taught to treat others with respect or how you would treat yourself.

      • Openopenopenopen@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        Shouldn’t have to be taught to treat others with respect or how you would treat yourself

        No disrespect, but I disagree. Respect is absolutely a learned behavior.

        what ever respectful means is a defined by your culture. What is considered respectful is different in the uk versus the us, at least that’s what thought this post was about.

        Kids absolutely need to be taught this. Kids don’t magically share, or treat each other with respect. You teach kids how to be respectful everyday.

        • Uruanna@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          You teach behavior and biases, but it’s well observed that kids naturally don’t see distinctions between groups of people until it is taught to them, and that kids do feel empathy naturally, and will feel upset about perceived injustices and such. Isolating a white kid so they don’t see a Black kid until they’re 15 is a learned thing, if they’re raised in a shared environment, they won’t see a difference. What you teach is how to act on it (like sharing), how to handle emotions about it. Restricting experience is teaching.

        • plantfanatic@sh.itjust.works
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          17 days ago

          You need to be taught to treat others the way you would yourself?

          Or are you teaching your kids who and what to respect? Because you’re doing the latter, not the former and are perpetuating these issues.

          This has nothing to do with culture at large, that’s justifications for rasicm, and that’s what you’re teaching your kids. The exact issue that’s trying to be pointed out.

        • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          what ever respectful means is a defined by your culture. What is considered respectful is different in the uk versus the us, at least that’s what thought this post was about.

          Umm that’s racism…. You’re describing what it means to be racist. If you need to be taught that only certain things/people/races/religion/colour are to be respected… that’s why people think black people don’t have livers.

          You are the issue mate, full disrespect. You are racist. If you choose be respectful to someone only to blend into those around you… you don’t deserve any respect.

      • Jerkface (any/all)@lemmy.ca
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        17 days ago

        Self-reflection and critical thinking are almost always defeated by social conformance among healthy well-adjusted humans. For a social animal, it is more important to agree with the group than to be objectively correct.

        • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          social conformance among healthy well-adjusted humans

          By racism you mean? Those are leaned behaviors that take over from being taught that others are different from you.

          Humans inherently care, and love each other. Anything else is taught by someone else who thinks they know what’s okay.

          The only objectively correct way to treat anyone else is how you treat yourself. Anything else is just learned hate.

          • Jerkface (any/all)@lemmy.ca
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            17 days ago

            Please don’t talk at me. You’re not really addressing or engaging with what I said. You have a point to make that’s got nothing to do with me, take it to the top level.

            • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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              17 days ago

              Of course people don’t like it when it’s pointed out that they were actually taught to be racist.

              You made a wildly racist remark in response to someone saying that everyone should be treated how they treat themselves.

              Of course you’re gonna get called out.

          • Demdaru@lemmy.world
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            17 days ago

            Humans inherently care, and love each other. Anything else is taught by someone else who thinks they know what’s okay.

            The hell you on about? I ain’t givin shit about anybody who’s not already in my friend circle and sure as hell last time I checked I am human. Empathy varies a lot in humans, some people are naturally caring, some don’t give a damn if most people around them die, most are somewhere between so chill out.

            The only objectively correct way to treat anyone else is how you treat yourself. Anything else is just learned hate.

            Let others reap what they sow. Extend some respect at first and give benefit of the doubt but if they aren’t worth it, they simply aren’t worth it. Anything else and you’re gonna get used, trampled and disrespected.

            And that extends to racist, homophobic or transphobic idiots who cannot argue for their stance. If a black person killed your dog and that was only black person you ever saw, yeah, fair you have bad opinion.

            But if you’re like one of my coworkers who hates gay folk cause it’s fun, not respect, die in a ditch.

      • BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today
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        16 days ago

        Critical Thinking Skills are the most important skills you can learn, polish, and employ on a daily basis. It is the proper way to think, and if you haven’t downloaded the Critical Thinking software into your brain, then your brain will invent its own chaotic adhoc thinking style, and you will be at the mercy of predators who will manipulate your mushy mind.

        I had an English teacher in the 70s who was really subversive, and taught much differently than normal. I was out of school for years, and as the Conservative movement was growing, I wondered why I wasn’t falling for it, despite listening to Rush Limbaugh at lunch nearly every day.

        Then I realized it was because I had strong Critical Thinking Skills that allowed me to recognize and resist propaganda, even really seductive propaganda like Limbaugh’s.

        Then I realized that the reason my Critical Thinking Skills were so good was because I had gone through three years of Mr. Clark’s English and Shakespeare classes, and he was only using those subjects as vehicles to teach us Critical Thinking Skills, and then practice them every day until they were just our default way of thinking.

        Mr.Clark literally taught us to think properly, and he did it entirely by his own design, outside of the purview of the school system. He was far more subversive than I ever gave him credit for. He was expertly manipulating our minds, as teachers are supposed to do, but he was highly effective, and we are lucky he was motivated by good.

        After I realized all that, I tried to contact him to tell him I was onto him, but he had passed away 5 years before. He may have been the most influential person in my entire life, and I wish I could have told him that.

    • BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today
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      16 days ago

      Trust me, A LOT of racists in America have no idea they are racist, and would be highly offended if you called them racist.

      “I’m not racist! I work with a black guy at work all the time. I don’t know much about him, I’ve never asked him about himself, but he’s a pretty good guy, one of the good ones.”

    • jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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      17 days ago

      That seems like how it is in the US too.

      “Racism is only a thing very bad evil people do. I’m not an very bad evil person. Thus I cannot have done racism.”

      • yucandu@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        Everyone always laughs at the people who complain about “woke” and asks them to “define woke”, but can you define racism?

        • jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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          17 days ago

          Colloquially, racism means prejudice based on the perception of someone’s “race” (ie: ancestry, physical characteristics such as skin tone).

          That covers things like assuming a black man knows about gangs and rap based only on their skin color.

          There’s also the institutional level where individuals might not really think or feel anything about race, but it still is a factor. Stuff like closing polling places in predominantly black neighborhoods, or individual police officers who are given a quota and only assigned to black neighborhoods. Housing in the US has a long history intersecting with the idea of race. “The Color of Law” was a pretty good read on it.

          Wikipedia puts it nicely:

          Racism can also be said to describe a condition in society in which a dominant racial group benefits from the oppression of others, whether that group wants such benefits or not.

        • Gutek8134@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          Racism

          Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race or ethnicity over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against other people because they are of a different ethnic background.

          From Wikipedia

          a belief that race is a fundamental determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race

          From Merriam-Webster

          harmful or unfair things that people say, do, or think based on the belief that their own race makes them more intelligent, good, moral, etc. than people of other races

          From Cambridge dictionary

          As for Woke

          chiefly US slang, disapproving : politically liberal or progressive (as in matters of racial and social justice) especially in a way that is considered unreasonable or extreme

          From Merriam-Webster

          a way of referring to the acts and opinions of people who are especially aware of social problems such as racism and inequality, used by people who think these acts and opinions have gone too far

          From Cambridge dictionary as “wokeism”/“wokery”

          • Windex007@lemmy.world
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            17 days ago

            The guy was obviously being a troll.

            But, there certainly isn’t a consensus on racism. Some vocal elements demand that for for something to be racist, there also has to be a racial power imbalance working in the favor of the person being racist… and they’ll use that distinction to explain how actions that would be evaluated as racist by the definitions you provided actually aren’t if the target is in a position of racial privilege.

            And, personally, I think that definition was literally seeded as a wedge by state actors for the explicit purpose of sowing discord, but here we are.

            • Soggy@lemmy.world
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              17 days ago

              That’s just misapplying an academic definition in a colloquial circumstance, which happens a lot in various disciplines. It’s like the “what is a vegetable” question: it means different things to a botanist, chef, and tax collector.

    • yucandu@lemmy.world
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      17 days ago

      I’m Canadian and this is how I was raised too. Racism = Hitler, KKK, and neo-nazis. That’s why it’s bad.

      So if you’re going to call someone racist, don’t be surprised if they think you’re comparing them to Hitler or the KKK.

      And if you’re going to say that there’s different levels of racism and some are only as bad as stepping on someone’s toes, don’t be surprised if people don’t really care.

      • SuperNovaStar@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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        17 days ago

        Only as bad as stepping on people’s toes

        Well, only as bad as someone who cares whether or not they step on some people’s toes, and doesn’t notice/doesn’t care if they step on other people’s toes.

  • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    My European cousins tried to explain to me that it was weird how no Jewish people died in the twin towers on 9/11, like they had all been warned. I had to patiently explain that I had friends who died in 9/11, some were Jewish, and that whatever his source was, it was likely nazi propaganda, and extremely disrespectful to repeat obvious bullshit.

      • themeatbridge@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        You just solved a 20 year old mystery that I didn’t even realize I was curious about. It was super weird, because these were relatively progressive, educated adults, and the audacity of the bigotry just sort of left me confused. This helps me understand a little bit better.

        • idegenszavak@sh.itjust.works
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          17 days ago

          Before the modern internet it was really hard to fact check something. In 2001 in the eastern bloc it was still rare to have internet at home (in Poland only 10% of the population used the internet in 2001 https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/IT.NET.USER.ZS?locations=PL), and English language knowledge was very low, the compulsory second language taught in schools was Russian before 1990 (this was the case in Hungary, I guess it was common in other Warsaw-pact countries).

          I just looked up the snopes article now, I didn’t know the origin story an hour ago, but I suspected it was not true. If someone just heard this gossip around that time they didn’t really have an easy way to check it, and in their long term memory it was saved as fact.

          • BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today
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            16 days ago

            Before the Internet, we had to rely mostly on Critical Thinking Skills, which used to be overtly taught in decent American school systems (not Republican states).

            If someone in a bar said something as dumb as “No Jews died on 9/11,” most people would recognize that as almost certainly wrong, just on the face of it. Two enormous NYC office buildings, filled with primarily financial companies, in a city with one of the highest Jewish populations in the world, and not ONE of them was Jewish?

            Even if you could buy the ludicrous story that somehow EVERY single Jew was warned to stay out of the Twin Towers (and presumably all the airplanes, too), are we supposed to believe that wouldn’t somehow leak out in the non-Jewish world? Some Jew wouldn’t call a co-worker who is also a close trusted friend, and warn them to not go to work tomorrow? That someone wouldn’t contact the media? That would require us to believe that the entire Jewish community is such a strong monolithic block that they would hide this massive secret from the rest of the world, and simply let their non-Jewish fellow citizens perish that day, instead of warning the authorities and stopping it.

            Does that make any logical sense at all? It might if you are so virulently racist that you think the Jewish community would actually do that. But a thinking person would just look at them like they are either an idiot, crazy, or both.

            Of course, the real problem in the pre-Internet era, is that you couldn’t pull out your phone and slam the moron with sources and facts, so stupid arguments like this one would often end with a highly unsatisfying Agree to Disagree.

            • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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              16 days ago

              If someone in a bar said something dumb before the internet, most people actually believed it outright. I don’t know what school taught you critical thinking, you lucky bastard, but you’re in an enormous minority.
              Most people carried so many misconceptions around, from small to big, it’s not even funny. There was less connectivity in stupid people, so their bullshit wasn’t that refined, but it was absolutely more ubiquitous.

          • Optional@lemmy.worldOP
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            17 days ago

            If someone just heard this gossip around that time they didn’t really have an easy way to check it, and in their long term memory it was saved as fact.

            And yet - *gestures to everything*

    • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      Europeans don’t actually talk about Romani all that much. The whole situation is still a big problem, the discrimination is real, a lot of people have old uninspected misconceptions, there are people who have active hate in their heart, but it’s not a topic on anyone’s mind. It’s a small minority (~2% of population) that, ironically, lives in pretty compact communities predominately in south-eastern parts of Europe, and it’s just not a thought that crosses most people’s minds.
      The actual racism that exists in Europe is mainly comes against refugees from muslim countries, not Romani, you need to update your mental hatemap.

      • Comrade_Spood@quokk.au
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        15 days ago

        There is also a lot of gaslighting about racism in Europe. “We don’t see color,” type shit

        • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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          15 days ago

          Racism in Europe isn’t based on skin colour, it’s based on older, more weird stereotypes and history. There is no direct “white skin - not white skin” axis that US is known for, so technically we don’t see colours, we see light reflecting properties unachievable for an American

          • Comrade_Spood@quokk.au
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            14 days ago

            Are you white? And if so, have you ever asked non-white people if they feel they get treated with prejudice or discrimination because of the color of their skin?

            Yall like to say America is so different yet you also forget, America as a nation was founded through colonization BY EUROPEANS. We learned our racism from europeans because we were europeans.

            https://youtu.be/jgjujVEDo7Q

            • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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              7 days ago

              I am very white, yes, I am from a different group that is discriminated against, and yes, I have enough friends and acquaintances with not a white skin to compare. European racism is more subtle and not as one-dimensional as that meme from that cartoon, you know what I’m talking about. I know it’s hard for an American brain to comprehend this idea (see, this is only one of the ways to demonstrate the European racism).
              Colonisation of America ended hundreds of years ago and has nothing to do with all of that. All the problems both continents have right now developed independently

      • obre@slrpnk.net
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        16 days ago

        Are you using “hatemap” to mean Lodemike’s view of Europeans, or European’s view of minorities?

          • obre@slrpnk.net
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            14 days ago

            Nalivai closing with “you need to update your mental hatemap” seemed like a petty jab at you considering that they had just described that anti-Romani prejudice is a problem, but I wasn’t sure exactly how they meant it.

      • droans@lemmy.world
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        16 days ago

        Oxford states that the first known use of Gypsy was in 1514. It was popularized by Edmond Spenser and Shakespeare and has its entomological root from the Middle English word gypcian due to the misbelief that Romani people were from Egypt.

        So, to answer your question, no. The only Europeans in the Americas at this time were the Spanish.

  • Omodi@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    As an American the most openly racist thing I’ve experienced in person is someone from Europe talking about the Roma. I think we just talk about racism more.

    • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      I would wager a guess that you actually read on reddit someone experiencing that. Or someone talking about someone else experiencing that.

      • Omodi@lemmy.world
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        16 days ago

        You would be wrong. I meet two people at college and they were both extremely hateful.

  • Stefan_S_from_H@discuss.tchncs.de
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    17 days ago

    What German kids in the 19th century got taught:

    An 1845 German children’s book called “Der Struwwelpeter” has a story about three boys teasing a dark-skinned boy. Saint Nicholas is punishing them.

  • SCmSTR@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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    17 days ago

    Itt:

    Americans are dumb af and know it, but Europeans are dumb af and don’t know it.

    OH HOW THE TURNS HAVE TABLED

    • REDACTED@infosec.pub
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      16 days ago

      I might have missed the part where we voted into EU parliament a highly racist figure that yells about walls, random ethnicities and threatens others based on their skin color. Can you tell me more? I’ve not noticed Europeans by majority voting for people like that.

  • rapchee@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    lol “im from poland and i never heard of racism” suuure i wonder what they call romani people …

    • szczuroarturo@programming.dev
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      15 days ago

      You mean cyganie. Thats pretty much just the coloquial name for romani pepole. Belive it or not other than ocasional old lady trying to scam you they never were that much of a problem in Poland nor they were treated particulary bad. In fact they are romanticised a bit in Poland.

      Now they are still treated with wary beacuse obviusly they are. Its pretty hard to not be when most interaction general population have with them are them trying to scam you. Is the reason for them doing so beacuse of some historical racism in the south? Maybe. i dont know nor do i care .

  • peopleproblems@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    Americans aren’t anti-intellectual. We have a VERY high percentage that ARE.

    The fascist portion of politics is staunchly anti-intellectual, but most of their supporters wouldn’t know what it looks like.

  • four@lemmy.zip
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    17 days ago

    History in school focuses on European history, which doesn’t really have much racism in it (it has other not-fun stuff). And until fairly recently, especially for eastern Europe, there weren’t that many people of color, so you wouldn’t really encounter racism as an issue. I mean, your parents would say some wild stereotype about black people, but no one would bat an eye, so you wouldn’t know that it’s bad. With internet and general globalization it’s changing now, but there’s still a long way to go

    • Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip
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      17 days ago

      … So those lessons on the many centuries of European colonization** included zero self reflection on the racism involved?

      • Uruanna@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        History lessons are a bunch of names and dates that you have to learn by heart. We went there, we made this place, we came back with this shit, we made a church. Here’s a family tree. Even when learning about battles and borders, we don’t get to ask “why were they here? Why were we there?” We just know that we were at war because this king and that king disagreed. Sometimes, at best, one of them just wants control of this location or someone’s wife banged the wrong duke, but that’s almost only for intra European conflicts - and Jerusalem.

        Ethnic social issues came very late. Jews and other wandering populations are completely ignored.

        • Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip
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          17 days ago

          History lessons don’t have to be that way, that’s just the way they’ve decided to present these topics to remove the horrible shit their countries did during them

      • tjsauce@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        People avoid self-reflection until the last possible moment. It’s unideal, but unsurprising, especially when one sees themselves as uninvolved.

        • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          Is it really self reflection when the question is. Should a HUMAN be punched in the face.

          The issue is, they think they aren’t human, so they don’t even stop to think. Kids should be taught that everyone is equal, not the specifics of racism, what does that accomplish? Just reinforces that they think they aren’t human?

      • four@lemmy.zip
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        17 days ago

        I’ll start by saying that I didn’t pay too much attention during history classes, but it probably just puts me closer to the average person on that topic.

        The way I remember history classes (I’m from Poland), is that they were heavily focused on our country (excluding sections where we talked about ancient history, obviously) and on how our country fought to keep existing. The wars it had with its neighbors, the fights over land, etc. And Poland didn’t really participate in colonialism, so it was just mentioned that other countries went to Africa and got slaves, but that’s mostly it. And we knew that slavery is bad. But there wasn’t too much effort on elaborating on this topic. Partially because that realization is still trickling in.

        I’m simplifying a lot, but I think that’s mostly what you’d carry out of those lessons. Maybe there was a week where we talked about the civil war in America, but that’s very little compared to the rest of the topics, so it doesn’t stay with you.

        If you consider the history of Poland, it kind of makes sense. There was a lot of struggle to not be eradicated, to preserve our culture, etc. And that’s reflected in what we learn in school.

        And I’m not defending the way it is now. I personally don’t like how “selfish” the point of view in those classes is. But I am sharing my experiences and thoughts, to add some context.

        • Tja@programming.dev
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          17 days ago

          Poland was too busy being enslaved by ottomans, tatars and russians to care about racism.

      • Miaou@jlai.lu
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        17 days ago

        European history is basically “and these people there killed each other because they didn’t like the pope” so it’s not exactly a surprise we are less sensitive to “this is racist” rhetoric, when every single possible reason has been used to justify slaughtering each other. If St. Barthelemy was not racist, why should the crusades be?

        American history is pretty much always them murdering non-whites, in comparison

        Note that I’m not defending the reasoning, or the problems it creates today, but I see way too many people online acting like Europeans were all BFFs before the empires came up

        • HuntressHimbo@lemmy.zip
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          17 days ago

          Do Europeans just not learn about the scramble for Africa and the Berlin Conference of 1885 or something? How do you have so many colonial powers and none of your history classes touch on the murdering of non-whites? This feels like some truly insane educational blinders

          EDIT: Corrected conference date

          • Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip
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            17 days ago

            Yeah, even in the US (who Europe makes fun of for not knowing history) we spent a ton of time on the triangle trade with Africa (which Europe was very much the creator of and active participant in).

            Like the “we didn’t have a lot of racism here” when they were the powers enslaving the native populations to sell to their other colonies…is an insane thing to say.

          • yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de
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            17 days ago

            I can only speak for Germany’s history education.

            Yes it did touch the scramble for Africa and Germany’s colonies. But colonialism is a comparitively minor part of that period (1890 - 1920) for Germany so it was the focus for a couple of lessons only. The genocide was covered - but again, only for like a single lesson or two.

            There’s just a bit too much history to cramp it down into 90 minutes per week and go over in detail, especially since teaching about the world wars is a priority.

            I mean, we literally crammed the period 1970ish to reunification within a single lesson at the very end of 12th grade because we ran out of time.

            • HuntressHimbo@lemmy.zip
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              17 days ago

              That’s a fair point. I don’t know that I would say colonialism was minor for Germany, but I suppose the advantage of American education is you have a lot fewer years of crimes against humanity to cover since its a younger country.

              • yetAnotherUser@discuss.tchncs.de
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                17 days ago

                Sorry, I didn’t mean minor in that sense.

                I meant more like in the sense of not exceeding a single chapter in a history book. It did happen and was significant – but overshadowed by WW1 happening shortly thereafter and ending German colonization right then and there (except for WW2 but that’s another topic).

          • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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            16 days ago

            The racist wars by European countries are diluted by any other wars. One decade they’re at war because the prices of wheat went down 10%, another because a pop had a vision, the third because someone’s princess is ugly and nobody want’s to marry her, then because someone found a sliver deposit in a desert.
            The history of Europe is a history of wars and war-related horrors.

          • Uruanna@lemmy.world
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            17 days ago

            1885 is way too recent. Anything past 1800 is Napoleon taking Europe, everyone’s local consequences, and then WW1. There’s a thousand and a half years of material to discuss before that even after Greece and Rome, this is only the very end and if you’re paying attention.

    • Microw@piefed.zip
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      17 days ago

      European history “doesn’t really have much racism in it”? Huh? You sure we’re talking about the same european history here? Maybe in some parts of Europe this isn’t taught, but I definitely learned in school about colonialism, the transatlantic slave trade, the Nazi’s racism against Slavs and Romas etc…

      • four@lemmy.zip
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        17 days ago

        We do, but they are simply not the focus. There’s still a very heavy patriotic rhetoric

        • real_squids@sopuli.xyz
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          17 days ago

          I’m barely european and it was a 50-50 split. We had a much heavier emphasis on the rest of the world towards the end of the school program/start of college program.

          Either way it shouldn’t be taught as part of just history class, law/ethics/literature (at least) come to mind.

      • Tuukka R@piefed.ee
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        17 days ago

        Of course, but did your world history classes talk about racism? I’d guess that was a theme in the classes about your own country’s history, whichever country you happen to be from, but not really in world history.

        You needed to be taught the basics of the two world wars, the concept of dark ages and renaissance, something about Roman empire probably, etc. And people from countries whose history doesn’t include noteworthy amounts of racism have to learn about the same amount about their country as you had to learn about yours, and have about the same amount of teaching time left for teaching the same things about world history that were taught to you.

        • real_squids@sopuli.xyz
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          17 days ago

          Of course, but did your world history classes talk about racism?

          Kinda, when the slave trade and the US civil war was covered. I don’t remember how in-depth it was at the time. Was briefly covered in law classes too iirc.

          I’d guess that was a theme in the classes about your own country’s history

          We had white (by modern standards) slaves and white slaveowners. Nationality/ethnicity is more important, and the reason for most of the killings and hate and bigotry in the region.

          In a sense it was a blessing, gave us a better class consciousness, and made me realize sooner how dumb the concept of a race is. Unless self-applied it’s pointless at best, and at worst very harmful.

        • Tuukka R@piefed.ee
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          16 days ago

          Oho, I would not have expected this comment to get downvoted. Anyone able to explain why? It’s now received one upvote and two downvotes. What is wrong about the comment? When I’m as surprised about something as now, it’s often a good chance to learn something!

  • Tja@programming.dev
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    17 days ago

    Europeans who are racist (especially from the east, or countries which didn’t have colonies) are racist in the sense of staring at black people and trying to touch their hair.

    Americans who are racist are racist in the sense they want to disenfranchise black votes, gerrymandered the hell of their districts and maybe enslave them in a federal prison for a minor drug offense. Because lynching is frowned upon these days.

    Both exist, but they are not the same.

    • Soup@lemmy.world
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      17 days ago

      Europeans will also be like British people treating Polish people like shit, or various flavours of white people from adjacent communities deciding the other white person needs to be struck from the earth.

      Europeans can absolutely be violently racist. I mean, who do you think sold all those slaves to the US?

      • shneancy@lemmy.world
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        17 days ago

        yeah exactly, we don’t need someone to have a different skin colour to be racist, that’s a simple man’s racism. us europeans only do the finest of racisms - normal people with normal white skin (my village) vs the weird people with a similar skin but their accents are kinda weird and scary (all the other villages, and especially that one village over there)

        (huge /j in case that wasn’t obvious)

        • Soup@lemmy.world
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          17 days ago

          Define “race” and then tell me that an anglo person is the same as an eastern European person.

          • REDACTED@infosec.pub
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            16 days ago

            Do you not understand the difference between a race and ethnicity or nationality?

            • Soup@lemmy.world
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              16 days ago

              The first sentence of wikipedia: “Race is a categorization of humans based on shared physical or social qualities into groups generally viewed as distinct within a given society.”

              Also you not understanding that there are physical differences, if more subtle, between Eastern Europeans and those descended from Celts and the like is a you problem.

              • REDACTED@infosec.pub
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                16 days ago

                Why did you quote Wikipedia for a word definition? I don’t care what some randoms write in Wikipedia, we have established definitions agreed upon by experts and governments. Please refer to a better source like Oxford dictionary and learn the actual meaning of racism

                Also, I’m from East, a Slav, who constantly travels to Scandinavia (Nordic countries)

            • Soup@lemmy.world
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              16 days ago

              I said Polish because they are the group of easter Europeans that are most readily gone after in Britain. British is also not a race, by the way.

              Ya stupid.

    • Fredthefishlord@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      17 days ago

      You’re very blatantly underestimating the extent of European racism just because it shows itself less towards black people specifically.

      • Tja@programming.dev
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        16 days ago

        It shows itself versus everyone specifically. There is no group of people persecuted based on their race by politicians, law enforcement, media and half the population like back people are in the US. Or brown Muslims in the US. Or transgender people in the US. Maybe in Poland, this last one, but i don’t think so.

        • Owl@mander.xyz
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          16 days ago

          In Europe roma people are discriminated against in a worse way

          • Tja@programming.dev
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            16 days ago

            Any specific examples of laws or initiatives or just the hurt durr Roma poor that was inherited from reddit?

            • Owl@mander.xyz
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              16 days ago

              There are no laws, but for example in Hungary romas are segregated in countryside schools

              • Tja@programming.dev
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                15 days ago

                Well, that’s kind of my point. If the worst thing is what some villages in the most hostile country are doing, shows that there is no systemic/institutional racism to the extent of the US.

  • ExLisper@lemmy.curiana.net
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    17 days ago

    Being from Europe doesn’t mean you can’t be stupid. It’s just harder because it’s encouraged not to.

  • MissJinx@lemmy.world
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    16 days ago

    Tbf some people in Africa don’t know what racism is either. In some places white people are not that regular and some kids in the country side never even saw a white person, much less ever faced or understand the concept of racism. If you are somewhat isolated in a comunity you won’t get it until you start watching more problematic Tv or movies. Maybe that’s what this polish person said

    I live in a big country, in a big city, and I don’t get why racism is even a thing, imagine being isolated!?

    • BonesOfTheMoon@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      When I was a kid we had so few POC in our schools; it was simply because there weren’t many here yet. I had one black person in my grade school and three in my high school. It was just our population then, the area was mostly European immigrants back then. It has changed immensely now, and the racism against immigrants here is pretty vile.

  • citizen4509@lemmy.world
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    17 days ago

    Nice, this post is a circlejerk of Americans being racist to Europeans without even having met one in their lives probably.

    • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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      16 days ago

      “My uncle from Boston is Irish because he’s ginger and he likes whiskey. This basically makes me better specialist in the customs of country of Europe than any of people who live there”