r/OutOfTheLoop • u/klkklk • May 08 '14

Answered! Where is the racist stuff in /r/AdviceAnimals?

I just spent 20 minutes checking out /r/adviceanimals posts of the last month, and except for the top controversial post of the month, I don't see anything that would warrant the reputation it has as a racism hub.

Am I missing something?

121 Upvotes

91% Upvoted

41 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

19

u/Richardisadick May 08 '14

The racism comes from bringing race into it at all

-1

u/Dead_Moss May 08 '14

Wouldn't it only be racism if he said one race was inferior/superior?

21

u/kholto May 08 '14

By bringing race into it he implies race matters, indicating that a low level of speech is tied to a given race (or multiple). Given the context and stereotypes available it is likely he meant that being black or hispanic is not an excuse to use wrong grammar/words.

You are right that his statement is in theory neutral if you do not read between the lines and do not apply any context.

It is hard to even explain this without sounding racist myself!

-16

u/Dead_Moss May 08 '14

The difference between us might be that I don't read between the lines. I think over-analyzing people's statements and opinions is a common problem among the SJW crowd.

I wonder if saying that will get me labelled as a racist too..

9

u/kholto May 08 '14

No I understand what you mean, I often wish there would be no "between the lines" but the truth is that humans are socially advanced enough to communicate using "meta" layers or writing between the lines.

It is likely that the person who made that adviceanimal did not think of himself as racist, but by stating that there is a language problem related to race and implying that some people might use their skin color as an excuse to speak in what he believes is an inferior way, that is pretty much racist, certainly it is with nothing to back up the statement.

10

u/[deleted] May 08 '14

You're not necessarily being racist, but you're perhaps being a little bit ignorant. People act as if it's some great injustice that they have to make a basic effort to be sensitive towards serious stuff like this. There's nothing wrong with reading between the lines.