@ Bonmot & Co

Far be it for me to talk on behalf of Individual, but I have in my travels detected a very exotic, but far from rare species who style themselves as "anti-racists".

Not sure whether they're from the same phylum as the ones Indy is alluding to ...

The ones I've studied are usually found at the forefront of town hall meetings decrying the evils of racism. And campaigning very loud & long that anything--anything, with even a smidgen of special race-based privilege should be scrapped out, shredded & stomped on.

But, blow me down, as soon they gain acceptance for their ideas -- & a little bit of power-- they go about introducing of a whole series new provisions, giving special rights to special groups, for special reasons--and calling anyone who questions it "RACIST"

binmot,
you're simply wasting time. Go out & live among people whom you help to support & cop resentment for it it. Nothing to technical about that & the nosing around by some academics does nothing. Racism is natural & can't be eliminated. Unless of course you favour genocide. What can be eliminated are the voices of those who are hellbent on dragging it constantly to the surface instead of leaving it alone. By constantly drawing attention to it you merely exacerbating an unfortunate natural attitude that can't be eliminated by legislation. Accept that racism has alway & always will be there & leave it at that. Just remember a cut will not heal if you keep tearing the scab.

Yeah, I've seen/met them too SPQR.

As I've often said, there are extremists on all sides. Sadly, they seem to gravitate to media shock-jock sites - and OLO of course :)

individual

You may not agree with Dunn (albeit he's an 'academic' walking the walk):

>> A careful balance must be sought between acknowledging racism and avoiding the perception that racism is normal and natural.

There are dangers in spreading the opprobrium of racism too widely - it should be characterised as a deviance and threat to public order, not as normative. <<

I agree.

Bonmot,

<< there are extremists on all sides. Sadly, they seem to gravitate to media shock-jock sites - and OLO of course :) >>

Thanks for the tip, I'll do a bit of David Attenboroughing around those sites.

The most idyllic environments for anti-racists I've found have been the ABC & SBS sites. And in those habits far from being an extreme fringe, they are very much mainstream...only stream, even. They seem gravitate to those sites like ruddy flying foxes to a favorite roosting tree.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1V1e20gdtd0&feature=related

Which makes me a bid dubious about your claim that shock-jocks are a good site to find "anti-racists"!

Since I seem to recall one of the most notorious shock jocks was recently shat on by the anti-racist flock --and I don't think we could put it down to him being a casualty of friendly fire.

Bonmot.
The accusation of Racism is always based on opinions not facts.

I personally know one Afro Carribbean/British HR manager who will simply bin any application or CV from an Indian or Asian, he won't hire them under any circumstances.In his particular field, which is highly technical and involves multi million dollar projects with a multi disciplinary team there is no room whatsoever for incompetence or lack of comprehension of English because the company loses money as a result, the idea of a company is to make money.
Today I went to do some follow up work on a project I started before christmas, the client was at the stage where he was getting quotes for floor sanding, he'd had six guys turn up, four of whom were Chinese, none of them could comprehend his requests, nor could they explain what services they offered or what process was involved to gain the particular stain and finish he needed.
How is it reasonable to ask people to lose money or accept sub standard or incorrectly finished work for the sake of feeding economic migrants?
Before you go off on a "Nation Of immigrants" tangent this is not the same as language difficulties between, say Greek and Italian workers and native English speaking clients, anyone will tell you that, if anything European tradesmen are often more skilled and more in step with the latest techniques from the continent than local White workers since all advanced processes are developed there and we still tend to lag behind.