still failing to even admit an issue with African youth gangs should be acknowledged.
What is this thing with the fear of being called “racist” becoming such a powerful behavioral influence and inhibitor of common sense? It’s just a god-damn word, and one generally thrown out with insincere motives, suspect intent and by hypocritical utterers of it who fear (even more than you might do) being called racists, themselves, which they generally are if that word even stands as a go-to insult of opportunity in their lexicon of effortless epithets to hurl at others.
But public officials, employers, authors, celebrities, all seem to have decided that the personal consequences which may come to them resulting from being called this thing, apparently outweigh all the no-go zones and the crime waves and the bullying and the riots and the mayhem that result instead from everyone pale-skinned agreeing to be cowed into submission by anyone who isn’t (or is ashamed that they are, a thoroughly intolerable archetype but one hardly worth taking seriously) over the potential unleashing of a stupid word.
Try this: grab a trusted friend (so you feel safe during the experiment), explain the exercise to them, say to them unapologetically something like “the Sudanese community, which has been immigrating since 2001 and make up only 0.11 percent of Victoria’s population, are responsible for over 7 percent of home invasions, 5 percent of car thefts and just under 14 percent of aggravated robberies….” and then invite them to just pour it on, shouting “RACIST-RACIST-RACIST!!” at you again and again, right in your face (remember, for now this is just an exercise and they might not really, you know, mean it, which I gather makes it a lot worse but still….)
I bet, I just bet, that you’ll get over it. In time and with practice you may even come to have the moral courage to answer this meaningless charge with its appropriate response of “how dare you??”, but that may take more therapy…
Highly recommended as a corrective self-induced procedure for (as a start) anyone who has a job to do with responsibilities to the public and can hardly afford to predicate the doing of it on how a word might feel to them.
