Recent increase in racist sentiments on WP

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Is anyone else as disappointed in the increase of racist rhetoric on WP lately as I am?

I imagine it is a reflection of the political and social climate in America right now with the election and all the police violence against black people and other minorities lately, but it's still really disappointing to me to see it here, expressed by members of a community who are so often marginalised and abused themselves and yet don't seem to have learned any empathy from their own experiences of being bullied and excluded and misjudged because they are in a neurological minority.

We have an opportunity to learn here, to take the desire we have to be heard and understood by others outside our minority population of autistic people and apply it to listening and attempting to understand where others who are similarly excluded and oppressed are coming from, and to come together through that understanding. Instead many seem more interested in establishing themselves as superior to those of another race perhaps to attempt to capture a sense of worthiness they have lacked because of being bullied and excluded themselves.

It's like watching someone who was beaten as a child grow up to have children of their own and go on to beat their children, having learned nothing from their own abuse but how to perpetuate that abuse onto others. It's tragic and it is also vicariously embarrassing (being a member of this community, I don't want to be associated with the racism being expressed here that outsiders can come here and read.)

Has it increased? Feels to me like it's been here at least as long as I've been coming to these forums. Doesn't matter how marginalized aspies may be, many still seem almost eager to do it to others.

So much for this place being inclusive.

it's not only lately, very weird it's allowed to this point???
last weeks, sex-topics to cover it up and sexist is still on, too!! !
well i guess it shows what it shows

* This might be a bit crude, read this whole post before replying *

I am not racist, there are good and bad people of every color. I have known some really dumb so called people of color but I have actually known more caucasians that were dumb possibly because I am around more of them. On the flip side of that coin, I have known some very intelligent "colored" people and some very intelligent caucasians. There doesn't seem to be a correlation between intelligence and race therefore I can conclude that are races are equal. Also worth noting that I am by definition very white but my dad appears kind of a dark golden in skin color so if I was racist, I would have to hate myself.

Outside of intelligence, everyone has the same emotions and failures as everyone else. If a black person screws up, they should face the same consequences as a white, orange or green person. People should judge peoples actions and not color. Actually you shouldn't really judge action either but you should form an opinion about people based on actions and not color.

I think a better less crude way to express myself is I have known people of all races that have done stupid things, not to say that the individual is dumb or that they are dumb because of their race. Just bear in mind my neighbor is an idiot, I actually have two idiot neighbors, one white and one black. I suppose they aren't bad people in and of themselves but their choices are terrible and they are both on crack. Which really sucks, they probably wouldn't be stupid if they were not on crack. Crack is terrible drug, don't do it.

I am probably making this over complicated, but I am not racist and I don't think other people should be, nuff said.

They shouldn't be, but unfortunately many are.

I noticed a few explicit white supremacists making their rounds here in the last couple of months. I think two of them have been banned (both for anti-semitic statements, as I recall) and the third simply appears to have resumed lurking...

Then there are of course those who hold racist sentiments but hide these behind vague statements, innuendo, etc. As such statements usually do not violate any WP rules there isn't really much to do wrt. these types other than developing a good capacity for detecting BS...

I wouldn't really say that this amounts to an increase in racist sentiments on WP, though... I've seen worse in the past...

Personally, I'm more concerned about the often openly hostile attitudes towards transgender individuals on WP, as they are are a very vulnerable minority. It appears to have settled down somewhat recently, but IMO it was *really* bad about a year ago...

There's some, but I think a lot of it is more that aspie tendency to be blunt and put too much faith in statistics and authority figures making some posters opinions seem worse than they are.

Prejudiced statements against groups and personal attacks have always been here but I think has increased lately probably due to the American Presidential Election, Brexit, and the the split over the Neurodiversity movement. WP is still a lot better then most other online discussions. While some sections are moderated more loosely than others we all need to remember the basic rules of no personal attacks against other members and blanket statements about groups of people still applies.

People place to much personal value on ideas that can be contested and thus an attack on the idea is viewed as an attack on the person, which is where a lot of the accusations of discrimination come from, as well as exchanging the challenging of ideas with personal attacks.

That doesn't change the fact however there is some racism on the forums but it's largely moderated and dealt with. It also seems to be topical - when elections loom for example.

Another thing - intolerance towards religion isn't racist but is equally unacceptable.

I agree with you, OP.
If only there weren't so much intolerance, I'd spend much more time on WP. But hatred ruins everything. It scares me TBH. It scares me IRL as well. The quantity of openly racist people seems to be increasing so much lately, both online and offline. I expected WP to be a bit more tolerant than average when I discovered the place, but I was wrong on that.