Michigander
Regular Member
budlight and Michigander
You both need to stop.
There is a young mans future here that we should be more concerned with.
Take your bickering to PM's please. Or better yet, call each other.
I wish in this thread, as I wished in the other threads, to resolve the matter as you described. PM's, calls, and even meeting up at a coffee shop are all fine with me, but apparently not okay with budlight. So I am going to say the following.
White suburban folks choose not to go to detroit frequently, and much of this has to do with hate and fear, largely due to the problems detroit has. It's a never ending vicious cycle, because the fear and hatred lead to less money coming in from whites with better jobs, which lead to crime. The fear and hatred cause a noticeable tension when blacks come from detroit into the burbs, largely discouraging the them from living or working in the burbs, or even going to see a movie or something. The elevated crime rates, well that causes people in detroit, and indeed other ghetto areas to try to look and act more tough and aggressive than they otherwise would. This attitude and appearance again leads into fear and hatred from whites, (quite reasonable, isn't it, not wanting anything to do with people who dress like thugs?) often directly translating into things like denying blacks jobs, and calling the cops for a suspicious person call.
Any attempt to talk about detroits crime problems which denies this is utterly absurd, and it seems that very few here wish to acknowledge it exists to begin with. This bothers me, and it should bother everyone else here too. As people who are arguing that we are for a safer, friendlier society, we are looking like idiots if we deny that it works this way.
What I said, that apparently pissed off budlight so much, was this
"Let me first say that I'm NOT calling you racist.
But I am saying that this attitude about black communities fuels racism, the same way that inner city attitudes about exuding fake aggression fuels racism. "
I was referring to the fact that society at large has this attitude, (and I certainly have had it at times myself, because again, fear and hatred of thug looking people is reasonable on some level, even if the people who look like thugs are otherwise good people) and it fuels the fire that is crime, poverty, and a generally bad attitude so many people have about detroit. I was not attempting to single out budlight in any way, shape or form. I wasn't meaning to accuse him of anything in any way. Rather, my intention was to make a comment "on that note" to attempt to make a more broad point, and one that I believe is crucial for open carriers to understand, especially in a thread that is about this very issue, even if people won't accept it. Not acknowledging these basic racial issues makes us look like idiots to those who understand them well. What makes us look even stupider is when we have absurd public arguments while the press is having a field day with our community, and this website is under heavy observation from all sorts of people. That was why I tried repeatedly to discuss the matter privately.
If budlight could be a more reasonable person in expressing his disdain for his take on what I said, I'd happily apologize to him over it. I can indeed see why it could be misconstrued, and I don't wish for people to think I'm insulting them in a circumstance where I'm not. But as it stands, I don't really feel apologizing is called for, on account of the repeat mud slinging and unwillingness to talk to me privately. I bring this up here, in this fashion, merely in hopes that it can stop.
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