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graemep • today at 4:17 PM • 1 reply • view on HN

Her other book, Caste, was what made me understand American racism, and how it differed from racism in societies I knew. I strongly recommend it.

i have a blog post about this: https://pietersz.co.uk/2023/08/racism-culture-different/


Replies

klaff • today at 6:42 PM

Thanks for the link. I'm a white American who has been lucky enough to visit Sri Lanka! I don't agree with your conclusion that American racism is inescapable, or uniquely so. I believe we can make progress on bigotries - in particular, despite the current and despicable wave against people who are transgender, non-binary, or otherwise queer, I believe we have made significant progress in reducing homophobia over the last 5 decades (the ones I can remember!). On the negative side, I did reach the conclusion (due to what I've seen during the Trump era) that much of what I thought was progress on racism was simply racists learning to code-switch. That part's depressing.

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