Re: USAGE: "racism"

On 13 Jan 00, at 18:51, Ed Heil wrote:

> Tom Wier wrote:
>
> > John Cowan wrote:
> >
> > > Because "racism" is not synonymous with "discrimination" or "race
> hatred";
> > > it refers specifically to a pattern of *institutionalized* denigration
> > > and degredation of dark-skinned people.
> >
> > Eh... I would ammend that only to say that it is the institutionalized
> > denigration of other people on the basis of skin color.  There can
> > be black racists, too. (Given the history of African peoples, however,
> > my suspicion is that there are fewer of them.)
(I have to say "Huh?!?!" right here, but that's not the point I'm
making right now, so I'll leave it at that)

> You both seem to be taking a very prescriptivist stance towards this
> word...  Surely you're better linguists than that! :)
>
> I think that most people would say that "racism" is thinking of
> someone badly because of their race, and/or treating them badly
> because of that.
Thank you, Ed.  I could not have put it better.

In England recently, there's been a fairly big fuss in the news
about various forms of "institutionalised" racism, mainly in the
police and armed forces.  It is clear that the prejudices of an
individual (or group of individuals) are very different in nature and
outcome to the prejudices of an organisation.