“As obnoxious as that post is, I’d rather we counter such bigotry with a response that shows bigotry for what it is. Simply deleting a bigot’s post only reinforces their ideas that they are right. I agree that the post is hateful and uncalled for, but I don’t believe in censorship. I believe in exposing bigotry for being bigotry.”

Wait a second, sir, who in the world says what Tact posted was bigotry? He said stereotypes don’t make themselves up and that can be true in a lot of ways. It’s a matter of interpretation. If his point is that African Americans are all lazy jackasses, well then yeah, he’s a bigot and an assclown to boot. But perhaps it was merely a comment on a systemic cultural problem that many African American communties have had for a long time, which is the instillation of a hardy work ethic and also the instillation that you can “rise above”. That seemse to have gone by the wayside in today’s poorer African American communities, being replaced by things like “the white man doesn’t like me”, “the ghetto is cool”, and “anything for this fast money, yo”. To pretend that doesn’t exist perpetuates the problem. Even the Prez has remarked in many of his speeches that the African American community has a serious problem within their ranks, mostly with the issue of fathers being responsible for their children.

“As for tack’s original comment: just what “stereotype” are you talking about? The stereotype of MLK Jr. is that he was a brilliant man, a charismatic leader who, in the face of amazing danger helped lead and inspire an entire generation. What’s wrong with that?”

Don’t play dumb just to counter phantom racism. Stereotypes are about groups, not one brilliant man (and he was ridiculously brilliant). You do a fine job of not impeding on free speech, but blanket mischaracterizations of what was said does NOT asist in the argument.

“Having spent plenty of time discussing these issues, I can tell you that people on all sides of this issue seem to be pretty evenly distributed in terms of creed, color, religion, ethnicity gender or race”

Agreed, that’s one of the reasons I like this site, and internet threads in general, because it can take things like racism, sexism, etc. out of the equation and focus on the issue. But pretending that varied systemic problems and issues don’t exist within just about every race, creed, color, religion, and gender doesn’t help.

I’ll be clear: racism is wrong, thinking that certain people don’t have equal capacity because of their race is just scientifically stupid. But pretending like there aren’t problems unique to race, religion, etc. is equally dumb. One stereotype is that African Americans today have an entitlement issue: slave reparations, affirmative action, welfare, etc. etc. There is a reason that overblown stereotype exists.