Quote:No, it really isn't, your declaration not withstanding.

 

It's a charge made every day in the public arena (politics and sports, which are two that I pay attention to), with no evidence whatsover to support it.  It only means that the one making the charge hates your position and you're a big old meanie for holding to it.  It claims the clairvoyance to see into another person's heart and intentions, an ability that clearly doesn't exist.  Do I feel confident that a few unrepentant racists exist, even on this message board?  Yes.  Do I have any way to discern who they are because they like or dislike a certain player based solely on that players skin color? No.

 

So, yes.  It is an inherently flawed argument to that based on Player A being black and Poster B not thinking Player A is a future HOFer that Poster B is a racist.

 

No evidence whatsoever?

 

This is a society that restricted by race, within my BROTHER's lifetime, voting, marriage, entrances to establishments, seating on buses, public accommodations school availability, where you could live, water fountain access, and countless other things you take for granted.

 

Many of those who supported those restrictions are still around.  What's more, they had children, and they instilled those same values into their children who then act in accordance with those values, whether stating an opinion on a message board or something more deleterious.

 

But lest you think racism is a product of a bygone era no longer relevant to today, I urge you to consider electricity, your status as an American citizen, if you at all benefit from the automobile, if you are a Christian, Muslim, or Atheist, or are worried about how wars over religion will impact our future.

 

If you read your favorite book or magazine or newspaper under a lamp, your behavior is or has been shaped by technology-the light bulb- invented in 1879.  If you are a patriotic American, you love a country that gained its independence in 1776, you assert your rights under a document signed in 1787, sing a national anthem penned in 1814, and studied a Civil War that ended in the 1860s  If you call yourself a Christian, you worship a Savior born 2014 years ago.  If you are a Muslim or are concerned about what you perceive to be the harm Islam causes, you either worship or revile Muhammad, who was born in 570.  If you drive a car, you benefited from a technology-the wheel-invented anywhere from 5000-3000 B.C. 

 

So if your behavior today has been or can be influenced by events that happened anywhere from 135 years- 5000 years ago, how in the world can you argue that the things that caused the 1964 Civil Rights act have no bearing today?

 

Race based bigotry-conscious and subsconscious is more pervasive than you think, your reflexive dismissals notwithstanding.

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