DontRunMeOver

You made it clear?? You really think you made it clear by saying "we are talking about institutionalised racism" when you were the only person who was talking about it?? I mean, seriously?? Who was the 'we'? You?? If you were the only one then I'm not sure your statement could be clear because it would also be wrong. Or were you using the royal 'we'?

Everybody else was talking about racism in the interpersonal level. They talked about it for pages and pages on this thread. It was appropriate for them to use the blanket term 'racism' because whichever form of racism they were talking about would fall into that category.

It was not appropriate (in a communication sense) for you to try take the broader term 'racism' and claim it only meant 'institutionalised racism', when other people wanted to talk about other forms as well.

You should have written institutionalised racism each and every time you meant institutionalised racism and I recommend you do so from now on. Its one specific term which describes a specific thing. If you're too lazy to be specific then you can't complain when other people misinterpret your overly vague statements.

When you say "we're talking about institutionalised racism", I can see that you were trying to pull everybody along to understand your definitions, so that they can understand the point you're trying to make... but why should they start accepting your own personal definitions, just to make it easier for you to say what you want? They don't have to and if you expect they will then you're setting yourself up for a fall.

Use the already accepted terms, which everyone will understand and then you can communicate what you want to say and actually get into a meaty discussion, not one where you spend the whole time trying to justify the misuse of a couple of words.

Governmental power? Oh, the word governmental must have been in the smallprint in that section. Or maybe it was written there with invisible ink?

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