No, seriously, quite literally you’re wrong. I even cited a bad action (the very one the commercial is criticizing) in the post you’re replying to. There are others. You don’t see them. It’s weird that you don’t.
What? A black man repeats “boys will be boys” after a white guy says it and there’s also a short clip of a black guy making peace between two black guys who may or may not be fighting. I guess you could technically call those bad actions but that’s about 2 seconds of a long commercial.
I’ll have you know that I learnt from a comment on Facebook by a very respectable gentleman that I have never met that the ad was directed by a woman, and therefore it represents a feminist assault on men. /s
No, your examples were
- Black men discussing something on the street. We never see a fight.
- A black men doing nothing at a barbecue. This is not an action. This is the lack of an action.
The negative actions shown in this ad are:
- White kid being chased by other white kids.
- Bullying but only via text. We do not see the perpetrator.
- White guy harassing in a sitcom.
- A video where I cannot tell the race of the first individual but everyone else is white.
- White kids watching that video and/or sitcom.
- Group of white people laughing at the sitcom.
- White man at the head of the boardroom.
- White kids fighting. Again, the closest action here is a black man saying “boys will be boys” but this is the lack of a response to a situation. The situation is caused by the white kids fighting. Two white men say it first and then quite literally 15 white men say it afterwards but these are not actions, they are reactions.
- White kid at pool party harassing women.
- White guy on street harassing women.
Please point to the time where there is a bad action by someone who is not white. I watched this carefully because I was wondering how they would work a minority into the negative actions. I was surprised it did not happen because I expected an Asian or Indian to be the bad actor. I am used to seeing myself as the bad guy in modern film and television when they need a person of color to be the baddie.
Also peteb I never said, “white men doing bad things, black men doing good things”. The first part of the statement is true, the latter is not. The only statement I made regarding the resolution (the good actions) are “mixed in race”. Please be careful with your paraphrasing.
Equality is an admirable goal, but to achieve it, it is not simply enough to treat everyone identically, because doing so cannot account for the vastly different starting positions we all have in life. This applies across race, gender, financial status, and more.
Some people are intrinsically worse off, and giving them the same treatment as someone far better off isn’t going to produce equal results, it’s going to maintain the unequal status quo.
This old saw of an image is a very simplistic take on the matter, but it conveys a useful message.
The core of your post suggests that we will not see eye to eye on this issue, so, forgive me, but I probably won’t keep myself up tonight typing the fullness of my thoughts that arise in response to it, but suffice it to say that I think that you’re dead wrong for the vast majority of it. One minority to another :)
I might take a stab at it tomorrow, but past experience suggests to me the gulf between our worldviews in this situations is very, very difficult to overcome, though I’ve seen wiser and better people than me manage it. Just not certain I’m entirely up for that particular philosophical delve over, well, a shaving ad.
Even a very important and awesome one.
edit, briefly:
This is to the side of the massive difference in worldview I cite above vis a vis equality, but I will note that a core part of my response to this ad is a deeply held belief that inaction can be every bit as bad as action, in the end. Allowing terrible things to happen that you are empowered to stop, especially when the cost to do so is relatively minor or even nonexistent, is something I find very distasteful. I recognize we all do it to some extent. The $95 I spent on internet this month to type you this message could have fed a family in Africa for the same span of time.
But as you yourself cited, in your quitting a job that had a serious issue with sexual harassment, letting injustice stand seems to be against both our worldviews, whatever specifics we might disagree on.
When one of our buddies, or colleagues, or even just a stranger on the street is engaging in shitty behavior right before us, staying quiet and letting it continue the cycles of violence, abuse, and oppression that have defined so much of human history, summed up in the microcosm of a friend badgering a girl at the bar for her number, we are, in some small way, responsible for that act, insofar as we did nothing to stop it.
Yeah, that “bigotry defined” thing is where you’re on very thin ice, G.
Holy shit, this thread.
Indeed, thinking of this on a micro scale might be the key to really seeing the beauty of the ad.
It’s not up to any one of us, via collective universal guilt or otherwise, to “fix” men.
But each of us can contribute to making the world a better place by acting as a check on the negativity we witness in our own lives, and as a group, connected by nothing more than a shared commitment to a better tomorrow, we can achieve just that.
This isn’t a condemnation of Men At Large. It’s a call to action for each of us to be the change we want to see in the world.
Interesting message but one I think is very naive. There is no sameness or fairness in life and there never will be. There will always be people born to money or privilege and those who are not. Life and nature are not ever going to provide balance either. Just like money and power, there will always be people who are born with different advantages or disadvantages. Attempting to level the playing field will never be successful. Furthermore, we do know that by attempting to balance the scales we will cause inequity on an individual basis.
So I believe in the ADA as it does not provide any advantage to a disabled person but removes the disadvantages to them without disadvantaging anyone else. But I do not believe in race or gender based college admissions because there is an individual out there who has earned the right for that position who will not get it because of their race or gender. We do not know if that individual received any benefit from being that race or gender but we do know they are being punished for it. I call that bigotry. You call it fairness. You probably look at my position and thinks that it leads to bigotry. I look at yours and believe that is the path to bigotry.
I look at South Africa as an example of what happens when man tries to dictate fairness and collective punishment. It was bigoted then and it is bigoted now. The only difference is who wields the power. It is human nature that collective punishment and guilt can never work because it will always be abused. Power corrupts, of that I am sure we can agree. To me, the only thing that an individual can do is treat everyone equally and expect the same. That way may take more time but it does lead to ultimate equity and fairness.
People who respond to calls for more fairness by pointing out that life isn’t fair are part of the problem. Don’t be part of the problem.
What’s your experience of South Africa?
Life is not fair. It is not a problem. It is a fact. Both nature and man are inequitable. The difference is that nature knows how to deal with it. Man does a really bad job of it because power corrupts, no matter who holds it.
Yeah, I’ve said more than I intended, and am further convinced we cannot possibly see eye to eye on this. I do wish I’d read a little less of how you felt about this, though :(
Shit, no kidding. Geezus.
Yeah, this is the message that I originally got from the ad.
Life has unfairness, just as life has polio. It’s just a fact. We should attempt to do nothing about either. Now, do you see the problem?
Jesus Christ. We have a mob boss president, and there is agitation about this?
This times 1 million.
The irony being that the people complaining along those lines also probably talk about how men and women are different biologically and that anyone saying otherwise is dumb.
“Men and women are fundamentally different, saying they aren’t is stupid. Also saying men cause bullying and sexual harassment is sexist, why aren’t they targeting women with this criticism?”
Wut?