Should we have Black History Month?

elprincipe

elprincipe

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I say no for two reasons.

1. It is singling out a specific group as more important than others. We don't have White History Month or Asian History Month or Hispanic History Month or Arab History Month or any other group history month, so why have one for blacks?

2. It allows schools to get away with teaching about black historical figures one month out of the year, and often out of context. I don't know about you, but I'd say history classes shouldn't single out people like Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver and Martin Luther King Jr., to name a few, as somehow different than other historical figures just because the were black. They should include them in the relevant time period being studied and thus all year round when appropriate.
 
The idea of having a month dedicated to a specific race is laden with problems. I've always felt that it was unnecessary. It's like we're saying "hey, black people have done things too, here's who they are".
 
[quote name='elprincipe']I say no for two reasons.

1. It is singling out a specific group as more important than others. We don't have White History Month or Asian History Month or Hispanic History Month or Arab History Month or any other group history month, so why have one for blacks?[/quote]
There are those who argue that the other eleven months are "white history month." Given that history texts tend to emphasize the work of wealthy white landowning protestant males, the idea of hegemony is at work here. Likewise, it's at work in regards to gender as well; name me some important historical women that your textbooks named. I'd say it's the same concept.

As compared with other groups, then it's more of a saturation effect, I'd argue. While the history of Arabs would be a great idea (in order to stave off the next great racism), the truth is that blacks have been an everpresent part of the growth of this nation from the beginning, and were a significant part of the politics of the 19th and 20th centuries. The same can't truly be said of Arabs and Asians (though Japanese internment is something that should be taught in history as well).

2. It allows schools to get away with teaching about black historical figures one month out of the year, and often out of context. I don't know about you, but I'd say history classes shouldn't single out people like Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver and Martin Luther King Jr., to name a few, as somehow different than other historical figures just because the were black. They should include them in the relevant time period being studied and thus all year round when appropriate.
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I'm not certain that you can take away their blackness and still make an important point about their historical contributions. MLK in particular (though it's bothersome that people know about a handful of people in the civil rights movement, but not everyone learns the organizations that spurned them - SNCC, SCLC, NAACP, etc.) I agree that focusing on individuals is a shame - King didn't fight for civil rights by himself, certainly.

I personally think WEB DuBois is given the short shrift here, as his concept of "double conciousness" is a crucial one that, although a century old, persists today (IMO), and isn't something that the average white person considers.

The overall argument you have is like the boring question "why can there be a BET on my TV, yet no WET?" Well, white representation on television is omnipresent, save for a few shows on WB, and maybe Oprah. If you want to argue that the content of those few black shows, and perhaps BET in general, is complete shit, then I won't argue that. I'll buy you a beer in soldarity instead.
 
I think we are at the point where we no longer need black history month. We have a long way to go in fighting racism, but it is at the point where we should introduce multicultural history into classes when relevant (ie. asian and black contributions in an american history class).

I think there was a time when black history month was necessary, but it is now simply a division where people can ignore black history because "they have their month anyway".

I thought there was an asian history month though? I'm pretty sure my old high school had one, maybe it wasn't national? They have made significant contributions, especially out west. Though, at the same time, I'm not sure if there are any key figures or if it's mostly collective history until the 40's or so.

Though I would support an arab or middle eastern history month, but I don't think the rest is necessary.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']I say no for two reasons.

1. It is singling out a specific group as more important than others. We don't have White History Month or Asian History Month or Hispanic History Month or Arab History Month or any other group history month, so why have one for blacks?[/quote]
There is a month for Asians. http://www.infoplease.com/spot/asianintro1.html
 
No. It's stupid to have a month devoted to one specific race. Why not work toward equality by not making allowances for certain races? I'm not saying it's bad to have black history -- it's just that we shouldn't keep reminding people of race issues by having months like this.
 
[quote name='62t']black history shouldn't just be a 1 month per year thing, it should be year around.[/QUOTE]

I have to agree. Seperate but equal is not really equal and we would all be better of with a little more integration instead of separation. There are plenty of integral achievements by blacks that are worthy of history and should be taught within the context of the timeline.

However, I don't think we get to decide whether or not blacks, in general, should have a black history month onto themselves. That's for respective cultural groups to decide. I have a problem with the pollitically correct social engineering crowd who thinks we need to have all these lovely catagories in our history lessons mandated by the government to force empathy on our children.

There is a huge difference if you teach kids blacks are an inseparable part of history compared to teaching them a separate group of special history. The latter only serves to enhance or racial differences and foster prejudice based on skin color.
 
When I was in high school, the only time we studied about anyone who was not white was during black history month. We barely skimmed over the Chinese railroad workers, the Japanese internment camps, the Korean War, Kosovo, etc. Even when we were learning about slavery and the Civil War, most of the information we read were about the plantation owners, the white government, and white people's reactions to slavery. I think it might have just been my school and hopefully things have changed but since most history is written from the white man's perspective, there are a lot of other points of view that aren't addressed.

Then again, maybe we should try to address these issues year round instead of singling out specific groups during certain months.
 
I love when McDonalds introduced Asian Month (Asian Appreciation month or something just as tasty) while CONCURRENTLY launching a new campaign - not kidding here - Black365...:roll:

Because every day is a good day to be black. Thanks Mc Donalds!

I wish I would have saved some images from this campaign (about six mo's back).This is right after the time of Dave Chapelles "Wac Arnolds" / MacDo parody.

So back to the Asians, oh hell this campaign was so fuck 'ed and insulting to humans as a whole, they should have called it Oriental Month. I
I think this illustrates quite well the absurdity of this kind of, largely, insincere placation and pandering. When I hear Black History month it makes me think it's weird that it should happen for a month, and then it's like STFU??
 
This country needs Black history month/MLK Birthday/MLK randomly named Crap to keep the ignorant people thinking that racism is gone from this country.

the funny thing people either interpret the month as being PC or an annoyance. They don't look into the underlying reason for it. Racism is an important part of American culture and is what sustains a majority of our prosperity. Racism does not exist for racism's sake but because people benifit from it. Just because it's less overt nowadays does not mean it doesn't exist.

It all boils down to 1 thing kids. Power

All seirousness asides what about the Chinese, We built the damn railroads and you punks don't even use em anymore ;)
 
The white man gave the black man the feeling like he was getting something. While the black man celebrates black history month thinking he's making process in america, the white man is sitting back and counting his money. Black history month is just another way of the white man keeping the black man down.
 
[quote name='Zoglog']This country needs Black history month/MLK Birthday/MLK randomly named Crap to keep the ignorant people thinking that racism is gone from this country.[/quote]
Make people think it's gone despite it not really being gone in actuality?
 
[quote name='mykevermin']There are those who argue that the other eleven months are "white history month." Given that history texts tend to emphasize the work of wealthy white landowning protestant males, the idea of hegemony is at work here. Likewise, it's at work in regards to gender as well; name me some important historical women that your textbooks named. I'd say it's the same concept.[/quote]

Exactly why "black history" needs to be the same as "white history," because both are history, and in fact both are part of American history, which is what kids are supposed to be learning in school. As I said, I think the designation really gives people the easy way out in terms of only studying black historical figures in February. Although given the (in this case unfortunate) nature of our history as a country a disproporationate amount of important historical figures are white Protestant land-owning males, I guess.

[quote name='mykevermin']I'm not certain that you can take away their blackness and still make an important point about their historical contributions. MLK in particular (though it's bothersome that people know about a handful of people in the civil rights movement, but not everyone learns the organizations that spurned them - SNCC, SCLC, NAACP, etc.) I agree that focusing on individuals is a shame - King didn't fight for civil rights by himself, certainly.[/quote]

Oh, I think you're misunderstanding me here. Obviously teaching about the civil rights movement without teaching about racism and race is not going to be too useful. I meant more that there was no need to see them as "special cases" that only are emphasized at one time of the year due to them somehow not being important enough for normal studies.

[quote name='mykevermin']The overall argument you have is like the boring question "why can there be a BET on my TV, yet no WET?" Well, white representation on television is omnipresent, save for a few shows on WB, and maybe Oprah.[/QUOTE]

Good point here, although I'd rather people not define themselves (and attempt to define everyone else) due to their skin color or ethnicity, but rather as they themselves as individuals with individual characteristics not dictated by the fact that they share their skin color with someone else or don't share it.
 
What about Irish History Month. Think about it, a whole month devoted to Guinness. Now that's a solumn time that my ancestors could really get behind... err if they could pick themselves up off the floor that is.
 
[quote name='SpeedyG']What about Irish History Month. Think about it, a whole month devoted to Guinness. Now that's a solumn time that my ancestors could really get behind... err if they could pick themselves up off the floor that is.[/quote]
I do believe Irish drunkenness is a recent stereotype.
 
[quote name='bmulligan']Huh ?[/QUOTE]

You've seen these, eh?

Image7.gif


Totally recent phenomenon.

I must admit that while I'm Irish and a good drinker, I saw t-shirts for sale in some dept. store the other day with Leprechauns and Shilleleighs and pots o' gold and all that shit, with not-very-witty sayings about how trashed one either is, or plans to become. I'm not very amused by them, but I reckon that's neither here nor there.
 
Scuse me. Not a recent stereotype, but most certainly unfounded when it started to be perpetuated. It was usually by newspapers in England when keeping the Irish down. Police seemed to overlook English drunkards and zoom in on the Irish. American caricatures especially began to appear when the Irish migrated en masse (The irish, despite being white, were treated almost as bad as blacks). Their drunkenness was no more or less spectacular than any other European culture. It's only recently that the Irish appear to be drinking like their stereotypes say they do. That is to say, it appears alcoholism took an extremely sharp rise over the past couple of decades.
 
I think we need to do one of two things.

1. Have a month, week, day, or hour for every type of person.
2. Not have a Black History, no columbus day etc.

Having a month, day or anything to celebrate ones race only furthers us as a human race. Its a a month, day, hour etc to say hey were still different then you.
 
When the Irish came to this country. They were treated horrible for some reason. Police patty wagons were named for for all the Irish they carried, No Joke.
However till this day the Irish are just like New Jersey no one cares for them and are some what disgusted by them. ;)
 
[quote name='kakomu']Scuse me. Not a recent stereotype, but most certainly unfounded when it started to be perpetuated. It was usually by newspapers in England when keeping the Irish down. Police seemed to overlook English drunkards and zoom in on the Irish. American caricatures especially began to appear when the Irish migrated en masse (The irish, despite being white, were treated almost as bad as blacks). Their drunkenness was no more or less spectacular than any other European culture. It's only recently that the Irish appear to be drinking like their stereotypes say they do. That is to say, it appears alcoholism took an extremely sharp rise over the past couple of decades.[/QUOTE]

Wasn't the old saying, "The Civil War turned the Irish white"?
 
I say that we desegregate history. This separate but equal crap never works. :)

And I really think gay and lesbian month should go too. Much like "Pride Parades," why limit yourself to a short period of time to study people that you identify with, celebrate your cultural/subcultural uniqueness, and feel proud about who you are?

Black history month seems like the same thing to me. Everyone cares for a month and then it disappears for the rest of the year. If your heritage is important, celebrate it all year long. And if it's worth focusing on for whole month, then it's probably something that could stand to be integrated into the mainstream.
 
[quote name='sheepboy_1923']I say that we desegregate history. This separate but equal crap never works. :)[/quote]

I would tend to agree. The idea is fine but it really doesn't amount to much. I was never big about the month because is is so generic. Plus, this country is more than just black or white. There are many ethnicities in this country.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']I say no for two reasons.

1. It is singling out a specific group as more important than others. We don't have White History Month or Asian History Month or Hispanic History Month or Arab History Month or any other group history month, so why have one for blacks?

2. It allows schools to get away with teaching about black historical figures one month out of the year, and often out of context. I don't know about you, but I'd say history classes shouldn't single out people like Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver and Martin Luther King Jr., to name a few, as somehow different than other historical figures just because the were black. They should include them in the relevant time period being studied and thus all year round when appropriate.[/QUOTE]

Interesting points.

Also might have been interesting to setup the poll with answers:

Yes, and I'm black
No, and I'm black
Yes, and I'm not black
No, and I'm not black
 
[quote name='munch']Wasn't the old saying, "The Civil War turned the Irish white"?[/quote]

Race once meant more than the color of skin (ie. Irish people were thought of as a different race), though other races were still viewed negatively. Even according to some early evolutionary scientists (though many disagreed), they were considered less evolved than anglo-saxons.
 
[quote name='elprincipe']I say no for two reasons.

1. It is singling out a specific group as more important than others. We don't have White History Month or Asian History Month or Hispanic History Month or Arab History Month or any other group history month, so why have one for blacks?

2. It allows schools to get away with teaching about black historical figures one month out of the year, and often out of context. I don't know about you, but I'd say history classes shouldn't single out people like Booker T. Washington, George Washington Carver and Martin Luther King Jr., to name a few, as somehow different than other historical figures just because the were black. They should include them in the relevant time period being studied and thus all year round when appropriate.[/quote]

The reason they don't have other race month is because Blacks have suffered for 400yrs. The whites never suffered, the Asians and Hispanics never went through slavory. They were treated almost as whites when they first came over to America.
 
[quote name='ChubbyChase']The reason they don't have other race month is because Blacks have suffered for 400yrs. The whites never suffered, the Asians and Hispanics never went through slavory. They were treated almost as whites when they first came over to America.[/quote]

umm.... some hispanics have slave ancestors, as natives were often enslaved. And no one, except western europeans, were treated anywhere near what europeans where when they came here.
 
[quote name='ChubbyChase']The reason they don't have other race month is because Blacks have suffered for 400yrs. The whites never suffered, the Asians and Hispanics never went through slavory. They were treated almost as whites when they first came over to America.[/quote]

?

What about Japanese internment camps in the 40's and illegal labor from aross the border? Also, there are more poor white people in this country than black. It may be a different type of suffering but it is suffering nontheless. Jewish people often changed their names so that they wouldn't get unwanted attention for their heritage. Do I even need to talk about Native Americans who suffered as much if not more than any ethnic group in this country?
 
[quote name='ChubbyChase']The reason they don't have other race month is because Blacks have suffered for 400yrs. The whites never suffered, the Asians and Hispanics never went through slavory. They were treated almost as whites when they first came over to America.[/QUOTE]

You're wrong about many other groups besides blacks not being oppressed. Chinese immigrants were treated virtually as slaves when they came over to help build things like the transcontinental railroad. Japanese immigrants were sent to camps during World War II for fear of them helping Japan. As others have pointed out on this thread, there has been discrimination even against other white groups, like the Irish.

Have blacks suffered in this country? No doubt about it. Are they yet still subject to remnants of racism from time to time? No doubt about it. Since we don't have thought police, it's difficult to eliminate that scourge from our society, although I would argue that we've done a very good job in reducing it to a fringe element by making it societally unacceptable.

But the main point here is that if we want to treat people equally with regards to race, we shouldn't be singling out this or that group, focusing on someone's skin color or heritage as the defining factor of them as an individual. If we want race not to matter, and I think all reasonable people want it not to matter, we should stop concentrating on it so much by attempting to define people based on it and basically saying to people that someone is different because their skin is black or white or whatever.
 
[quote name='Metal Boss']

"Race differences show up by 3 years of age, even after matching on maternal education and other variables," [/quote]

What variables? Nutrition, parenting styles, what? Did they factor in womb conditions? Nutrition, maternal stress, diseases, tobacco use, alcohol consumption (about 20 percent of fetuses are exposed to this alone), and other teratogens? Due mainly to economic differences, all these dangers are more common in racial minorities.

The Worldwide Pattern of IQ Scores. East Asians average higher on IQ tests than Whites, both in the U. S. and in Asia, even though IQ tests were developed for use in the Euro-American culture. Around the world, the average IQ for East Asians centers around 106; for Whites, about 100; and for Blacks about 85 in the U.S. and 70 in sub-Saharan Africa.
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If it's genetic, then the black population in the u.s. would not exceed the sub-saharan population of africa by that amount. It is also odd they it is essentially being argued the differences aren't culturally based at all essentially, since the actual IQ averages come out to the differences they say are largely biological. And asian countries, such as nepal and india average in the 80's or below.

Also, essentially all previous studies have backed cultural differences due to race, such as this large one done by northwestern and columbia:

Adjustments for socioeconomic conditions almost completely eliminate differences in IQ scores between black and white children, according to the study's co-investigators. They include Jeanne Brooks-Gunn and Pamela Klebanov of Columbia's Teachers College, and Greg Duncan of the Center for Urban Affairs and Policy Research at Northwestern University.
As in many other studies, the black children in the study had IQ scores a full 15 points lower than their white counterparts. Poverty alone, the researchers found, accounted for 52 percent of that difference, cutting it to 7 points. Controlling for the children's home environment reduced the difference by another 28 percent, to a statistically insignificant 3 points -- in essence, eliminating the gap altogether.
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http://www.monitor.net/monitor/5-5-96/povertyiq.html

Study followed children to age 17 and found race differences were even greater than at age 7: White children, 106; Mixed-Race children, 99; and Black children, 89.
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Increasing differences in age as development continures back up cultural differences, and then go back to all the cultural variables I listed earlier than can make biological differences.

His later books Bias in Mental Tests (1980) and The g Factor (1998), as well as Rushton's (1995) Race, Evolution, and Behavior, show that tests are not biased against English speaking minorities and that Black-White-East Asian differences in brain size and IQ belong in an evolutionary framework.
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This is not the mainstream view in psychology, and to say his books in the 90's and 80's proved this to the psychological community (which it seems to suggest) is wrong.
 
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