Is any comment that contains racial aspects automatically racist?

Question

It seems here on Y!A any question someone asks that contains any racial aspect whatsoever, there are people who call the questioner a racist. Even the most neutral question gets labeled that way. Has our society lost track of the true meaning of racism?

Answer 1

No, however a question like yours screams out for an example.  Otherwise you are speaking in broad generalities  that disregard the fact that some questions with racist elements are, in fact, racist.

Answer 2

If you demean a racial or cultural group of people based on a stereotype - then yes - it is racism.

If you attribute true racial features or metrics to opinionated stereotypical slurs - it is racism.

I don't know if you have been doing that or not.  

A lot of people feel their low opinions of a racial group are fact and should be allowed.  There are currently a lot of discussion of race going on in the politics section.  Many remain so I don't think the racism reporting has been all that strict.

There have been a lot of violations lately that people can't figure out the reason.  Go look at the forum.  Maybe that is what happened.

Answer 3

No, not at all.  It's reflective of how race and race relations are still more controversial as they should be in the US. For every one time "the race card" is effectively played there are at least a dozen times that the charge "you're playing the race card" is falsely made.

“This is no simple reform. It really is a revolution. s*x and race because they are easy and visible differences have been the primary ways of organizing human beings into superior and inferior groups and into the cheap labor in which this system still depends. We are talking about a society in which there will be no roles other than those chosen or those earned. We are really talking about humanism.”

-Gloria Steinem

Answer 4

Yes we have. Holding on to the concept of race itself is racist.

You can thank liberals for that one.

Answer 5

No. It helps to talk about racism by being able to describe it.

Playing the racism turns people into victims.

Answer 6

That depends on how politically incorrect the comment is.

Answer 7

No...it's not. It's only when people try to disparage others based on ethnicity or culture that I consider a comment racist.  Just as we discuss politics in terms of region, gender and age, there are also sometimes significant differences among voters of various ethnic backgrounds.

Answer 8

Our society has absolutely gone overboard on this PC thing- people throw the word racist around so much the word quite frankly should be losing it's bite.

Answer 9

I agree.  The current use of "racist" is as an expletive to slander someone who has a different racial view or a view that we pretend is a racial one so we can call them racist.  

Realizing this, I have vowed to never call people names for disagreeing with me.  I simply state why I disagree with their view without calling them names or even mentioning anything embarrassing from their past.  A political-social discussion should be about the issues.

To the person who thumbed down.  I was not going to call you racist because I thought it would be offensive.  If you desire to be called racist then post question with that request and I will happily join many who will do as you ask.  On the other hand, perhaps you're unhappy because you love to talk ugly to other people.  If so, say in your post why you want to call people racist.  Otherwise, it is very unclear why you thumb me down.

Answer 10

If the questions poses broad generalities about a large group, as if each individual were the same as every other, then yes it's racist.

Racism isn't always about making snide remarks, or simple name calling. It's the mistaken belief that you can know something about a person's character traits, based only on the color of their skin.