Looks like some US high schools still hold seperate proms for white and black students - article at Salon
In other news - the BNP (uk far right political party - slighter further right than US Republicans, but its hard to tell the difference these days) have won even more council seats in burnley, mostly due to a low turnout at the polls - still no BNP MPs though.. at the same time liberals have made council gains so the country as a whole is moving left to centre.
Does the U.S. have a liberal party or just 'right of centre' and 'really far right of centre' ?
Re:Simplificating
TeeJay on 2003-05-02T15:19:38
exactly - there is only right of centre in america - if you compare it to europe or japan.The UK never had deliberate policies of racial segregation - some pubs used to have 'no dogs, no irish, no blacks' but that was a long time ago and never an official or even popular policy.
Britain and europe never really had a culture of slavery - they benefitted greatly from slavery elswhere and through the slave trade but a lot less than the United States, where slavery was a major part of its economy and culture for a long time and a root of many of its racial problems today.
Puzzlingly the far-right nationalists are closer to socialist policies than the more moderate and popular parties in the UK like Tory and Labour (but possibly not lib-dem or green).
The UK has had problems not because of slavery but because of immigration and its empire-building, the latter causing the former.
Different kettles of fish but its pretty clear that the forces of the far right such as 'pro-lifers', creationists and racists have a much bigger grip on the US.
Re:Simplificating
Sifmole on 2003-05-02T18:32:09
This statement: Britain and europe never really had a culture of slavery - they benefitted greatly from slavery elswhere and through the slave trade but a lot less than the United States, where slavery was a major part of its economy and culture for a long time and a root of many of its racial problems today.Nearly make me spit soda out of my nose.
You are of course kidding right? You do of course remember that little period of world history often refered to as "The Age of Colonization". That period where England, France, and the Dutch formed colonies all over the world for the purpose of leeching as much as the could from the "natives". You do of course remember that the Dutch set up South Africa, right? The Spanish would have done the same, but some reason they prefered to eliminate entire cultures, Mayans, Incans, and Aztecs.
The slave trade was in full-swing long before the American Revolution, longer before there ever was a United States -- I wonder who that was? Even after the revolution the Dutch were the primary source for African slaves. Also, please remember a term "Indebtured Servitude"; they were perfectly willing to enslave anybody, not just Africans
Even well before all of that the Romans and Greeks used slavery as an institution. The form was different in very substantial ways but it was still forced labor without pay.
Britain and France in particular built their empires on the backs of slavery and experienced significant decline after they resolved to let it go.
The United States achieved it rise from the industrial revolution and well after the abolition of slavery. It wasn't until after the World War I that the United was anything more than the ruffians across the sea, and not until after World War II that the United States achieved "Super Power" status. All of this occured AFTER slavery had been abolished.
Instead the United States owes it prosperity to two things: Location and the disenfranchised.
Re:Simplificating
jordan on 2003-05-02T20:28:27
In fairness, he did say that Britain benefitted from slavery.
But, yeah, it is kind of odd to say that Europe never had a 'culture of slavery' when Spanish, Portuguese and English settlers introduced slavery into North America, enslaving the Indians and bringing in African slaves to work the large plantations they developed there.
Probably the primary reason there was so little slavery in Europe was the serfdom of European peasants. Why go to the trouble of buying and importing troublesome slaves when serfs can be made to work for free?
I wonder if we can trace any European attitudes of today to their serfdom at the hands of noblemen for many hundreds of years? Serfdom existed in Europe far longer than slavery existed in America.
Re:Simplificating
jordan on 2003-05-04T21:17:07
- I wonder if we can trace any European attitudes of today to their serfdom at the hands of noblemen for many hundreds of years? Serfdom existed in Europe far longer than slavery existed in America.
I'll answer my own question. Perhaps this can be explained by Europe's long history of a class-based society with little mobility.
Re:Simplificating
vsergu on 2003-05-15T18:48:30
After all, we have no screwdriver-wielding youths committing blatant crimes in the United States.You are obviously not Asian or Black
jaldhar on 2003-05-03T04:22:07
The UK never had deliberate policies of racial segregationsorry Teejay but I must call bullshit. I was born in Kent, grew up in a little village in Essex and spent the last 2 years of my UK soujourn (1971-1984) in eastern suburbs of London. I can tell you that even at that young age I was well aware of institutional racism. For instance I went to a comprehensive because (as my father later heard from a friend) the local grammar school already had "too many" asians. Ok there was no official policy but the effects were the same. That's why my father, a Guardian reading Bennite packed us off to an American theocracy where we're thriving quite nicely thankyou very much.
This is why whenever a European brings up the topic of American racial views I have to roll my eyes. There is every bit as much (or as little) racism in European countries but it is more likely to be swept under the rug than here.
Party Lines
chaoticset on 2003-05-09T05:47:03
Choose politics. Choose a party affiliation. Choose an office as your goal. Choose your trophy spouse. Choose a fucking big house. Choose power lunches, drunken boating trips, hookers and crooks...choose CSPAN and wondering who the fuck you are watching a Senate hearing. Choose sitting in Congress listening to an ancient man read from a phonebook. Choose photo-op-ing your way to the end, becoming an official United States Lobbyist Figurehead, nothing more than an embarrassment to the party, the selfish wastrels you hand-picked to replace yourself. Choose America's future. Choose politics...but why would I want to do a thing like that?Re:Simplificating
TorgoX on 2003-05-05T02:25:38
In France, even the ultra-far-right representatives avoid [statements with religious allusions] (in public at least), because this would be felt as a direct attack against the RepublicI've never been able to figure out what French people meant by "the Republic" -- what does it mean in general? And what does it mean in your sentence, such that statements with religious allusions could be seen as at attack on it?
Republic
rafael on 2003-05-05T08:29:31
Republic : an institution ruling a social contract and public instances, for the common good of all citizens, disregarding their race, opinions or religious beliefs. A government official is expected to take decisions based on the law of the Republic, which is universal, as it applies to all French citizens, and not based on some religious law, which is particular, and thus implicitely discriminative. In other words, when someone works the Republic, s?he's required to do so as if s?he were an atheist. Failing to do this, i.e. letting religious beliefs interfere with the Republic, is betraying the social contract by which the government is granted authority. Is it more clear ?Re:Republic
TorgoX on 2003-05-07T03:13:08
Wow. The only sense of "republic" I ever learned was something like "a form of state where the sovereignty rests with the people instead of with a king".
I think you have a stilted view of American politics. I think most Democrats don't say "God Bless America" very often in public. Some would sometimes, perhaps, when they are trying to get votes.
You are right that Americans are, as a whole, pretty far to the right of Europe, as a whole. I'd say that the more liberal Democrats are right about in the center of European politics, against the Iraq War, for Socialized Health Care, etc. The Greens are certainly far to the left of center, even for Europe.
You are right that the Republicans and Democrats are not far apart, really. George Bush was viewed at one time as being not conservative enough for the Republican party by many Republican stalwarts. George Bush is actually pretty middle-of-the-road for a Republican. He raised taxes when he was Governor of Texas, for example. People like to paint his record in Texas as far right, citing the number of Capital punishment executions, but the previous fairly liberal Democrat Governor, Ann Richards, had almost as many executions on her watch. That's just Texas. Now he often panders to the right because that's where a lot of the energized Republican base is found.
Re:BNP
TeeJay on 2003-05-16T10:06:00
thats not a good thought
