Racial Tension in the U.S.

Randolphkeys said:

So sorry, I'm with Jigo, there's way too much victim mentality with blue collar areas.

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Too much of a victim mentality isn't good for any group. Having college degrees focused on emphasizing that victimisation, and a cultural movement demanding recognition of victim status for certain groups, probably isn't a good idea either.

The Human Q-Tip said:

Too much of a victim mentality isn't good for any group. Having college degrees focused on emphasizing that victimisation, and a cultural movement demanding recognition of victim status for certain groups, probably isn't a good idea either.

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And yet studies coming out of Stanford show that individual classes in gender and ethnic studies have a correlation to higher scores in more critical high school subjects for racial minorities, including high school math and hard science. Colleges are absolutely willing to put majors out there that are self-serving and always have... Did your college have a television or radio station on campus? Theater? Of course, and they trained future waitresses exceptionally well. But these soft sciences in specific fields have proven to bridge academics to people who weren't connecting to the classroom, so they play a role in society.

The Oi said:

All of this is 100% dead on.

I am curious as to why you went with psychiatry though. Passion? Or do you think there will be an uptick for a need there for whatever reason?

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Both. I want to help people and the field is very underserved. Many of my brothers in arms came back broken. Most of their wounds healed but their hearts are still in turmoil.

There is a mental health epidemic in this country with huge increases in occurrences of many abnormal disorders without a corresponding rise in the number of people going for the Psy.Ws or getting into psychiatry programs.

@Hydroponic3385 can't service everyone... as much as he'd like to.

Connecting back to the BLM topic though:

It seems like the government's attitude toward struggling rural (and largely white) communities is "oh no, 'real America' is dying, we need to do something to help these poor blue-collar Americans break out of the cycle of poverty."

Meanwhile the government's attitude toward struggling inner city (and largely black) communities is "this is a hotbed for drugs and crime, we need to have a strong police presence and crack down on all illegal activity."

The problems, poverty leading to drug abuse and crime, are the same. Why do the solutions have to be different? Making inner city communities great should be just as much of a priority as making rural communities great, i.e., black lives matter.

Nathan S said:

Connecting back to the BLM topic though:

It seems like the government's attitude toward struggling rural (and largely white) communities is "oh no, 'real America' is dying, we need to do something to help these poor blue-collar Americans break out of the cycle of poverty."

Meanwhile the government's attitude toward struggling inner city (and largely black) communities is "this is a hotbed for drugs and crime, we need to have a strong police presence and crack down on all illegal activity."

The problems, poverty leading to drug abuse and crime, are the same. Why do the solutions have to be different? Making inner city communities great should be just as much of a priority as making rural communities great, i.e., black lives matter.

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Witness the legislation of exceptionally punitive laws dealing with crack in the 80s. Cocaine, not so much.

The Oi said:

Why do you have so much contempt for the rich before you know anything about them?

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That was a joke.

I can say that I believe in a highly progressive tax system that asks more of our wealthiest Americans. I also believe that the growing income inequality in this country is a massive issue that holds many Americans back while immigrants get scapegoated. I can't say I'm thrilled with what is essentially the ruling class in this country given the condition our middle class is in, or the fact that we are no closer to ending poverty.

I don't hate rich people without meeting them... usually. I get easily judgmental with people that aren't aware of how privileged they might be, but I don't actually have contempt for people just based on money. Shit like the affluenza defense drives me up the fucking wall though.

The Oi said:

I agree with you that Trump was full of shit when he claimed to be able to bring coal jobs back to such areas because like every President has done on the campaign trail he was making promises he couldn't keep, and knew it and didn't care. I didn't bother expressing that opinion to people here because I knew it wouldn't change their vote and that's not my place in the world as I see it...to change votes that is.

That said, anecdotally...the town I live in is very, very poor. The concern here has nothing to do with Muslims or LGBT. They're not even on the radar. The concerns are:

1) How the FUCK are they going to create and get jobs in this depressed area nobody wants to move to?

2) How are they going to stop heroin overdoses?

So you can imagine how the rights of Muslims and LGBT people aren't even on the radar here. Muslim terrorists aren't going to be invading this place any time soon because there's nobody here to kill!

Most of these people either don't know any LGBT people or if they do I have heard over and over that they don't gaf one way or the other if they marry or don't, so long as there are jobs here.

I'd imagine this place is quite similar to the many, many other rust belt towns he won...

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I'm from the Rust Belt (doy). And while it's not as bad as coal country, it is depressing. I love home to death and I just want Ohio to thrive. It's not an easy problem to fix, and I don't have a ton of solutions on me. And it really pains me to think anyone had faith in that lunatic to magically makes things better.

And I know the minorities in places like West Virginia are even moreso minorities, but I stand by the fact that anyone who voted for Trump had to overlook his bigotry, against blacks, Mexican, Muslims, etc. If their attitude is "I don't know any, so fuck 'em I need a coal job," that doesn't purely absolve them IMO, even though I understand the motivation and desperation for an answer. And, to be clear, let's not pretend there isn't a large portion of these same populations that are TOTALLY on board with building the wall and banning Muslims even when it does ZERO to help their shitty situations.

Many of these are deep red states/areas regardless of what Trump has done. It's gotten worse I'd say in part because the Dems are so shitty and they've done very little to protect unions while Republican governors fuck them in the ass. So even when deregulation or whatever does bring in new jobs, they usually come at a cost to the workers anyway.

Nathan S said:

Connecting back to the BLM topic though:

It seems like the government's attitude toward struggling rural (and largely white) communities is "oh no, 'real America' is dying, we need to do something to help these poor blue-collar Americans break out of the cycle of poverty."

Meanwhile the government's attitude toward struggling inner city (and largely black) communities is "this is a hotbed for drugs and crime, we need to have a strong police presence and crack down on all illegal activity."

The problems, poverty leading to drug abuse and crime, are the same. Why do the solutions have to be different? Making inner city communities great should be just as much of a priority as making rural communities great, i.e., black lives matter.

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Beat me to getting back to it...

We Make our own Meth, Grow our own pot too
Ain't too many things those ole boys cant do
cuz a country boy can survive.,,
country folk can survive

My cat dies and no one cares.

-Akronite- said:

That was a joke.

I can say that I believe in a highly progressive tax system that asks more of our wealthiest Americans. I also believe that the growing income inequality in this country is a massive issue that holds many Americans back while immigrants get scapegoated. I can't say I'm thrilled with what is essentially the ruling class in this country given the condition our middle class is in, or the fact that we are no closer to ending poverty.

I don't hate rich people without meeting them... usually. I get easily judgmental with people that aren't aware of how privileged they might be, but I don't actually have contempt for people just based on money. Shit like the affluenza defense drives me up the fucking wall though.

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Would you mind expanding with specifics on your, "progressive tax system on the wealthiest Americans"?

What is the cause of this "massive income inequality" and how and why is it "holding Americans back"?

Who are the "ruling class" in this Country and how would you [end] poverty?

Seems to be several talking points in your statement and I am curious about the specifics (policies?) you would propose.

Randolphkeys said:

When I was a social worker in downtown Pittsburgh, PA I made $25,000 a year. I planned on going back to school to be a public school teacher in Pittsburgh, but oh wait the City declared bankruptcy. I then took out a monster student loan, no parent help financially at all, and got into the University of San Francisco for a Master's in Education. They had a good local economy, teacher shortage, and I had a good work ethic. It turned out great.

So sorry, I'm with Jigo, there's way too much victim mentality with blue collar areas. Take a few risks, trust your work ethic if you really do have one.

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FWIW I'm not talking about Pittsburgh. Not sure what you know about Pitt, but it is not what it was even 10-15 years ago. It is kicking ass.

The Oi said:

FWIW I'm not talking about Pittsburgh. Not sure what you know about Pitt, but it is not what it was even 10-15 years ago. It is kicking ass.

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Oh, I'm aware Bill Peduto leaned on tech and the product of it's universities to enter the 21st century. I voted for him to be the district rep for where I lived at the time. He had a 21st century economic view that is decidedly tax and spend but in the right places. If I had stayed I would have bought a house in a neighborhood that would have tripled it's value by now. At the same time, entry level jobs were scarce when the local recession hit an all-time high. Public school funding was a joke at the time. I do see your point that they pulled out of the tailspin.

WellYouNeednt said:

Would you mind expanding with specifics on your, "progressive tax system on the wealthiest Americans"?

What is the cause of this "massive income inequality" and how and why is it "holding Americans back"?

Who are the "ruling class" in this Country and how would you [end] poverty?

Seems to be several talking points in your statement and I am curious about the specifics (policies?) you would propose.

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Oh wow. Well you've asking for a lot here I hope you realize. I'm stating a general political philosophy based on my experiences and knowledge. It's the issues I vote toward rather than some platform I myself have, but I'll breakdown my thoughts-

Progressive taxes: I don't have figures to give you on this. I just feel that the top earners have the ability to put more back into the system via taxes. We used to have higher tax rates on the wealthy in this country and we are far from the highest taxed nation on the planet. Meanwhile we have massive debt (wars are to blame but we won't reduce military spending), there are still millions with insufficient healthcare, and education is bankrupting our youth.

Income inequality: This is complicated and I have a limited understanding. But with the economy suffering over the last couple decades essentially, we have seen a middle class in decline. Americans that are working are not getting compensated at a rate that even matches inflation. Meanwhile, the top percentages of earners are making more money than ever. We are seeing a wealth distribution that is severely out of skew. This is what I mean by income inequality and held back Americans. The common worker has been struggling in this country for a while, but CEOs have been having it better than ever during this same period (to my understanding).

Here's a video that illustrates (with an agenda) how reality is worse than our perception of wealth distribution which is worse than our ideal, generally:

Ruling class: The richest 1% or so of Americans and corporations with pockets deep enough to have major influence in Washington and our daily lives via lobbying, campaign donations, advertising, etc. The issue has become worse with the Citizens United decision, as we basically have the Koch Brothers funneling ass-loads into local elections. Money doesn't always win, but goddamn does it help tip the scale. I'd like us to move to a system that removes as much money as possible from the election process, as well are shortening the primary/election season significantly because it contributes to the polarization of the country.

Ending poverty: Interestingly, I just saw a Ted Talk that shifted my thinking about charities and the way they may be held back because we don't give them enough capitalist leeway. Things like cancer research and fighting homelessness suffer as a result. IDK if there is a private sector solution in the near future regardless.

I think overall we should have more money going to social programs, move toward providing free (govt funded) higher education, establish universal healthcare, and help shift people toward training in skilled labor (where we need workers) as well as getting people jobs in sustainable energy and technology rather than hoping manufacturing/coal will return. Jobs kill poverty, especially good ones with proper pay/benefits. I'm 100% certain people disagree with me about how to create jobs and lift people out of poverty, but this is the general route I'd like to see us move toward.

Whittaker said:

What do you think the new name of Columbus Ohio will be?

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Snowflakeville



Demonstrators rally at City Hall to bring down Christopher Columbus statue
http://www.dispatch.com/news/201708...all-to-bring-down-christopher-columbus-statue