As you've all no doubt heard Obama has been addressing the racial question here in the good ole US of A. due to his ex pastor saying that America is and was a racist country.
Now I understand one doesn't want to rock the boat when you're campaigning, but for heavens sake, isn't America a racist country?
I've certainly found it to be so.
I've seen good ole boys take advantage of a loophole in the law in Florida and walk into bars ordering everyone who wasn't white as to where the door was!
I've seen appalling housing complexes(ghettos) in California, mainly populated by black Americans.
I watched Katrina.
I think America should wake up, you have to remember all those pure bred Brits on the Mayflower were our religious fanatics we sent here.
They have no upper ground in this argument.
What do you think?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7302938.stm
From what I have heard and read, Obama didn't deny that there is racism, just espoused a desire fro America to move forward together and put it in the past, seems reasonable enough to me.
I agree we should all move forward, but I think recognition of the problem would help. You can't move away from a point you don't recognise or acknowledge.
obama never was a poor black kid came from a racially mixed middle class family ans went to all the best schools .
to say that he didnt EVER/NEVER *hear *or was in the congregation when the rev white gave one of his vitriolic and hatefull sermans is rather disingenuous , he and the rev have been close friends for 30 years .
the man (obama )had a lot of charm and be very engaging, but his retoric is of a dreaming idealist nature promising everyone what they want to hear .
LESSON LEARNT
A POLITICIAN SHOULD NEVER SAY NEVER .
SO JohnA do you see the possibility of a black president?
and do you have the butt to hold up the low slung trousers which will become de rigour?
I have lived in one of the fly-over States and the US is horrifically racist, to anyone who isn't a WASP, it unnverved me and I am as white as the rest of them.
I play basketball everyday in Chinatown San Francisco with people from so many different nations I cannot remember where they all come from.
Somehow we all get along very well, we are all great friends and would all do anything to help each other, how hard is it. This is one of the main reasons that I love working in good old S.F.
Also right this second I have a birds eye view of Iraq war protesters doing there thing on Market Street directly below me, the drummer is really good !!
Well anne to answer your question i dont think we should think of the next president as white or black that is one of the thinks that is seperating americans at the moment .
i would like to see one who is qualified and has the support of MOST of the country .
thats the question do we get one who will best the serve country as a whole ...or do we get one that the press has nominated ???
I have lived in one of the fly-over States and the US is horrifically racist, to anyone who isn't a WASP, it unnverved me and I am as white as the rest of them.
I play basketball everyday in Chinatown San Francisco with people from so many different nations I cannot remember where they all come from.
Somehow we all get along very well, we are all great friends and would all do anything to help each other, how hard is it. This is one of the main reasons that I love working in good old S.F.
Also right this second I have a birds eye view of Iraq war protesters doing there thing on Market Street directly below me, the drummer is really good !!
there is no reason why folks from differant cultures should get along together ,and sports is one of the mediums that works in this way ...
you will have noticed thou that in times of a national disaster / major accident , flood , hurricane etc most folks put differances aside and work with each other for the common good ... the goodness in poeple is eroded each day by constant battering and false information feed to us by folks with a personal agenda .
leave folks alone (including the govt ) and we will learn to get on
we are influenced and seperated by hate mongers ( on both sides ) who refuse to let and let live and the press who are bias one way or the other ..
I have lived in one of the fly-over States and the US is horrifically racist,
!!
That was my experience as well. I never seen such racist county.
It is racist. and sexist. And one day I hope we get over both problems.
When I lived in the greater St Louis area people were horribly racist against blacks. In Colorado it is the Latino population that is the target of racism. However, like all sweeping generalizations, not every white is a racist and obviously the problem is smaller now than a generation ago.
I am going to disagree. I do not think the USA is a racist country.
Now, that is not to say that there are not racists in the US, just as there are in the UK, France, Germany and every other country in the world. America also has a bigotry issue (just like every country with multiple religions. Is that to say that America is a bigoted country. NO!..to tar the whole nation with the same brush is simply wrong. America is no different from any other rich nation.
I lived in Mississippi, where they still have restaurants where people of colour sit on one side of the restaurant and the whites on the other, where there are churches where some blacks would never dream of going....it is shocking just how ingrained it is in them.
Saying that, there was just as many people of color who were racist towards the whites. Treating them like crap on their shoes, because America owed them for what happened in the past. Those who felt that they did not have to work hard to get anything because America owes them.
I lived in SoCal, where there are many Ghettos, just as there are in London, Glasgow, Amsterdam, Paris and Munich...and as in all those countries, the majority of the people in them are the people of color. The point is that typically immigrants are poor, they come to a country in poverty and as with all modern societies it is, with a few exceptions, impossible to get out of it when you are in it. The ghettos are filled with the poorest in that society and is irrespective of their race.
Those in poverty you get the worst education, especially in the US where that funding is comes from the local government..who has more money, the City of Hawthorn or the City of Beverly Hills? Therefore, the teachers will get paid less, the school will have less equipment, less after school classes, less councillors, etc. As a result the top teachers will be at the better paying roles, where they have the resources to do their jobs. It is a catch 22 situation and then those that do graduate have to be able to pay their own way through college and not many of them are in a position to do that.
It is not a question of race...it is a question of poverty and social responsibility.
[quote="annie @ Wed 19 Mar, 2008"]SO JohnA do you see the possibility of a black president?
/quote]
i do see the possibility of a mullato being the next president .