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Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

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Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#111

Post by walkedaway »

ceilingcorner wrote: post #76
rayiner wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Racial inequality is not an "artificially inflated issue." Studies show that, despite reduction in de jure racism over the past 70 years, Black-white income gaps are large (with Black incomes being 19 percentile points below white incomes in the income distribution), and also persistent. Meanwhile, the incomes of other groups (Latinos, Asians) have or are in the process of converging with those of whites. So there is…

The fact that inequality exists in no way indicates that there is a society-wide conspiracy of white supremacy. That other minorities have rising incomes should make it obvious that the issue is very complex.

Indeed, a simple reading of almost anything by Thomas Sowell, especially Discrimination and Disparities, would go a long way to educate everyone that discrimination is not a meaningful factor in why we have disparities between groups.

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#112

Post by walkedaway »

mc32 wrote: post #45
insickness wrote: post #38

From the third slide: > To be less white is to: > > - be less oppressive > - be less arrogant > - be less certain > - be less defensive > - be less ignorant > - be more humble > - listen > - believe > - break with apathy > - break with white solidarity Basically associating everything negative with being white. If this is not racism, I don't know what is.

Wow! That’s incredible. How does something like this pass muster? Hey let’s find every negative stereotype about a class of people and let’s tell them to be less of that stereotype! Nice.

This is basically Silicon Valley mentality broadening its influence. I would guess - just a guess - that a corporation like Coca-cola sees this kind of stuff heralded in Silicon Valley and things "hey we can be hip too!"

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#113

Post by sangnoir »

sergefaguet wrote: post #20

As an international entrepreneur, I am delighted that large US companies spend their time and attention on inconsequential and toxic identity politics. More opportunities for us to exploit their weakness, create real value and shape the future And it goes without saying that the future we create and control will have no place for this drivel

The US has a long history with "toxic identity politics" - much of it very consequential. I dare say, there wasn't a time when America didn't care for "identity politics" - if there was, please let me know when.

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#114

Post by seneca »

Nacdor wrote: post #77
seneca wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The topic is clearly about personality traits not medical conditions. Contextualizing it would make sense if you had not said "literally no context". This is my point, black and white language like this repels nuance.

You're changing the subject. This topic is about personality traits, not medical conditions. This statement is still true: "There's literally no context where attributing qualities to people based on their skin color is OK." You wanted to be pedantic, so you ignored the context in which that statement was made. If you hadn't ignored the context, you would've known the statement was about personality traits and not me…

The person I am replying to used the phrase "literally no context" and you're saying I am ignoring the context in order to make an argument. My entire point is that the OP is throwing away context, and in so doing falsifying their own argument. The lack of context is the whole point of contention. You're attributing to me the very thing I'm disagreeing with.

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#115

Post by alea_iacta_est »

inglor_cz wrote: post #106
alea_iacta_est wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you, thanks for the source.

Glad to provide it. I am not sure why you are getting downvoted. Asking for a source is GOOD and Hacker News public should understand that.

I guess some people read my question as if I doubted while I just wanted the source which I didn't have.

C'est la vie :)

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#116

Post by thoughtstheseus »

germinalphrase wrote: post #75
rayiner wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "White" isn't a racial group. I understand the academic underpinnings of that idea, but that's not how normal people understand the term "white." The Bureau of the Census, for example, certainly appears the believe that "white" reflects a racial category: https://www.census.gov/topics/population/race/about.html .

I was trained as a census taker back in the day. We were instructed that “race and ethnicity” was explicitly ‘self identified/defined’ not based on any physical, cultural, or geographical origin. If a respondent wanted to write “Minnesotan” or “dog” in that box we were to accept it at face value.

This should be a grass roots movement. Stop filling out your “correct race and ethnicity”. If it doesn’t matter then it doesn’t matter right?

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#117

Post by lazyeye »

nobodyCloak wrote: post #50

Honestly seeing the comments on here makes me feel a little better about life. Even if there are people out there who want to judge me literally by the color of my skin and not the content of my character, I’m happy there are still a lot of people here who don’t want to go back to the 1950s way of looking at race (or heaven forbid to the racially-focused social Darwinism that caused so much suffering in the early and…

Im also genuinely surprised to read the comments here. I typically expect US silicon valley types to be woke to the point of mental retardation.

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#118

Post by newmnhn »

dragonwriter wrote: post #83
newmnhn wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"White" isn't a racial group. "White" as an idea to describe a group of (roughly) light skinned European people, came about in order to justify enslaving and subjugating other groups. Various groups worked their way into being considered white over time, in part by contributing to the subjugation of others. And various groups once considered white, later were not considered so. "White" as what you call a "social grou…

> "White" isn't a racial group. Yes it is. > "White" as an idea to describe a group of (roughly) light skinned European people, came about in order to justify enslaving and subjugating other groups. That's where the entire idea of distinct human “races" came about, and “white” was a pretty constant part of such taxonomies. > Before, say, about 400 years ago, whiteness was not an idea used to identify a "race" of peop…

I think this is a better way to put all of that than what I said, thanks.

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#119

Post by dang »

All: if you're going to comment on a divisive topic like this one, please make sure you're up on the latest HN guidelines and are using the site in the intended spirit. The intended spirit is curious conversation. That means finding things of interest in what others have to say and/or the story, and responding from that interest.

If you're feeling angry at things you've heard before and reacting with things that have been said before, that is not curious conversation. That is ideological battle, in which people use hardened pre-existing points to bash each other's positions. We don't want that here—but please understand why: it's simply a question of preserving this site for its mandate.

Battle mode a.k.a. flamewar takes over threads completely if allowed to, and destroys the curious conversation that HN is supposed to exist for. Since we're trying to be a particular kind of website, we need a community which understands what the site is for and avoids using it for what it's not for.

Some accounts are not only using this particular thread for ideological battle, but are using HN primarily for ideological battle overall. That's the line at which we start banning accounts. If you're not familiar with how and why we draw the line at that standard, there's lots of past explanation at https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme....

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Coca-Cola says 'Be Less White' learning plan was about workplace inclusion

#120

Post by sangnoir »

alea_iacta_est wrote: post #84
rayiner wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nigerian Americans are the most highly-educated demographic in the U.S., due at least in part to the filtering effect of immigration.

So what, you're admitting it's not a race issue but an education issue?

That depends - are you willing to admit that the education issue is a race issue? Race, income and school quality are highly correlated in the US: poor neighborhood = poor education. The fact that immigrants (who were not poor in the old country - immigration is expensive) bypass low-quality education doesn't mean it's not a race issue, it just means they are not useful as a control group.

Ruby Bridges, the first black person to integrate in the south is only 66 years old.

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