Cosmo Kramer makes an ass out of himself. (American, career)

DontRunMeOver · 11-24-2006, 03:57 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by RHYMEFESTkillah

It's not reserved for whites on a worldwide scale, and I would wholeheartedly disagree with that statement if it came from anyone. But racism, if I was going to use the definition that I feel best represents it, can only be exerted by the majority/people in power, and in the case of the United States, that is whites.

Other forms of racial prejudice certainly exists, but they are just that, racial prejudice, but not institutionalized racism since the racism would have no means of institution if there was no power behind it. Phew.

I know this is quite a way back in the thread, but this post in particular gave me the feeling that you've been talking about 'instiutionalised racism' and 'racism' as exactly the same thing.

Institutionalised racism is one type of racism.
All institutionalised racism is racism.
NOT all racism is institutionalised racism.

If you replaced the word 'racism' with the phrase 'instutionalised racism' in a lot of your posts, then I'd tend to agree with what you've said. As it stands, I think you're using quite a broad term within an extremely limited scope and essentially you're claiming a word means something different to what it actually means (i.e. you are wrong!)

Also, as far as institutionalised racism goes, I think its more pertinent to talk about discrimination from those with power against those without, but not necessarily by the majority against the minority. For example, during colonisation by European nations in India and Africa, the native people were the majority by far but the systems set up by the powerful colonial minority discriminated against them. That = a form of institutionalised racism.