White Male Privilege Is Why We Laugh At Lochte And Vilify Douglas

@maxdancona,

Did I count each tweet? No. Did I observe each event in real time? Yes. Do I stand by my observations? Yes. You are welcome to collect more data and refute my observations. You don't seem to be willing to do that. You want to say "you did not do a detailed analysis of the situation therefore your opinion has no merit". I disagree. This is an opinion board and my opinions based on my observations have been stated. I'm comfortable with the original article and the observations it made match those I made. You aren't refuting the observations based on data, you are asserting there is not enough data to make them. I'm not sure what position you want to argue. So far it seems to be "we can't talk about the proposed argument because we can't quantify the data. In fact we can't discuss any conjecture unless there is quantifiable data supporting the supposition." I think we can definitely talk about it. Do you want to argue that Lochte was in fact treated equally to Douglas in the realm of public opinion? Please make that argument. I think you can make an argument like Link did that it cuts both ways, that social media allowed hatred to be heaped upon Douglas and then support to also be sent her way. (I'd argue that that is worse than never being castigated in the first place.) Exactly what are you trying to argue? If you want to argue that these two accomplished athletes were not treated differently by the public, I disagree. If you are saying that they were but there is no evidence that it was because of race or gender, that would be an interesting discussion, but the entire discussion is going to be anecdotal and you are going to have to come to grips with that. If you want to say we can't in any way or form discuss this because it is not quantified, we simply disagree.

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@Foofie,

Foofie wrote:

What I have heard on tv regarding white privilege also relates to the white student that has parents that can pay for his/her college, so there is no debt to pay upon graduation. And, the student of color does not have such well heeled parents to the same degree.

I would strongly disagree with that definition. White privilege is an automatic assumption of innocent or benevolent intention granted members of the privileged class compared to those of other classes. A white ten year old boy takes his parent's car, goes joyriding, gets pulled by police - innocent prank done by precocious youngster, something to laugh at. A black ten year old boy takes his parent's car, goes joyriding, gets pulled by police - juvenile heading towards a life of crime, likely due to poor parenting. (I've seen side by side interviews on a morning show with this exact scenario.)

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@engineer,

Quote:

Did I count each tweet? No. Did I observe each event in real time? Yes. Do I stand by my observations?

I think we disagree on the meaning of the word "observation". I would call them "assumptions". You are saying what you believe based on your bias rather than making any objective attempt to find out the truth.

My arguments are pretty clear.

1) The initial post in its conflation of two completely different stories to support an ideological narrative (with apologies to Osso if she can find a better adjective) is bogus. Sure, this is my subjective opinion... but I stated it and I will stand by it.

2) Some of the claims made on this thread are demonstrably false (and ridiculous). Bobsal's claim that Black Fraternities are being portrayed as "gangster rapists" is a clear example of this.

3) Other claims on this thread are being portrayed and accepted as fact even though they are unsupported. I believe that this is due to cognitive bias.

I came to this thread to question an ideological narrative. In my opinion, Ideological narratives need to be questioned whether they are being pushed by the political right or the political left. Sure you are right that often ideological debates come down to anecdotes rather than data... but that is not a good thing.

The danger of ideology is that it creates truth without fact. This is why it is so important to point out ideological arguments that are unsupported by fact.
.

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@maxdancona,

Just argue each assertion, we know you enjoy arguing, instead of flaying the word ideological all around.
You also jump at opinions being political when they likely flow from people's personal experience and observations, so you are basically being insulting on the face of it.

This thread was not started by you, but you are taking it over.

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@ossobucotemp,

Osso,

Ideological bias is the point of this thread. The assertion being made in the title is a political assertion. I am responding as such.

Bobsal makes these threads with broad political assertions in a public forum. In my opinion, they should be be questioned.

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@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

Quote:
Did I count each tweet? No. Did I observe each event in real time? Yes. Do I stand by my observations?

I think we disagree on the meaning of the word "observation". I would call them "assumptions". You are saying what you believe based on your bias rather than making any objective attempt to find out the truth.

I disagree. I have followed and read up on the Douglas brouhaha and done the same on the Lochte story. I can add to that decades of following tennis where I have read thousands (tens of thousands?) of posts on athletes. Let's talk about four in particular, Federer, Nadal, Sharapova and Serena Williams. (I do not have these observations is a spreadsheet for you, sorry.) The debate between the Federer and Nadal camps is pretty spirited with the Federer fans claiming he is the best ever, most slams, etc. The Nadal camp points out that Nadal has a winning record over Federer and it isn't close (which is true). The debates between the two camps get pretty spirited with Nadal fans harshing on Federer's backhand or how he cried after losing one final to Nadal, etc. Federer's fans crack on some of Nadal's antics on the court include picking his butt, going through a long pre point ritual or looking to his coach in the stands for support. It's pretty much about the play though and these two tend to attract serious fans as commentators. Now look at Sharapova and Williams. Sharapova's detractors talk about her screams and grunts, her skinny body and how they would like to have sex with her. Williams's detractors take it to a whole new level. Williams (who is black) is compared to gorillas, called a man, her body is intensely analyzed (with both lust and disdain), she is accused of doping (Sharapova is currently serving a suspension on doping while Williams has never failed a test), she is accused of promoting a gang culture and is criticized for her Hollywood friends. Again, this is lot a isolated selection of posts, this represents thousands of posts over many years and it is often clear that these posters are not knowledgeable about tennis, they are clearly there just to criticize the players.

To summarize, yes, I have an opinion that fits this narrative that Douglas is a target because of her race and gender and Lockte is not. If I am biased, it is a bias based on years of observations, not an uneducated opinion.

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@maxdancona,

Knock yourself out.

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@engineer,

Engineer,

I agree completely with what you say about the racial abuse and sexual attacks faced by Serena Williams. They are based on her race, and many of the worst attacks are focused on her sex. The gorilla comments are atrocious. The rape comments are horrific. No White male tennis star will face these. You and I probably agree completely on the topic.

So yes, we have a narrative that fits the facts of what is happening to Serena Williams. The claim that Serena Williams is facing racism can questioned, and the evidence will back it pretty clearly. There is no need to even have this argument.

The problem is that this narrative becomes a "religious" dogma of sorts that is applied to all other cases even when the facts don't support it. Real life doesn't favor a simplistic narrative that can be applied to every situation.

In 2008 when the Hillary Clinton Campaign ran into the phenomenon that was Barack Obama, the narrative broke down. The narrative should have broken down, it didn't fit the facts. And yet, you had a lot of people who used this narrative (which is true in some cases) to end up being irrational.

The point about ideological bias is not that the narrative is never right. The problem is that it is assumed to be right even in circumstances where the facts don't back it up. I am not even arguing in this case that Gabby Douglas, is not being attacked online due to racism or sexism. I am saying that the narrative in the title is ridiculous.

There are countless examples. Do you remember the Central Park Five case for example? These kids were jailed based on an ideological bias. Years later it turned out to be tragically wrong.

It is not a good thing for people to believe something to be true, in spite of being unsupported by fact, simply because it fits into an ideological narrative that might be true in other cases.

Even if you have an ideological narrative that sometimes is supported by facts, facts still matter in the cases that it isn't.

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@maxdancona,

It's useless trying to fight ignorant bigotry. Many need to feel superior in some way, and they do it by belittling others.

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Some information here -

The title of the thread was not Bobsal's but the Huffington Post article he was quoting to start a thread about.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/ryan-lochte-gabby-douglas-and-white-male-privilege-in-action_us_57b5e76de4b034dc73262f93

Get a grip.
Bobsal is an information giver.

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@ossobucotemp,

Am I upsetting you again Osso?

Are you saying that because this opinion piece is from Huffington Post it can't be ideologically biased? (The idea makes me chuckle). I don't see Bobsal as an "information giver". His or her claim about Black Fraternities is still unsubstantiated. Bobsal clearly has a ideological theme to the topics she posts here.

You seem to be really emotionally invested in this. You are free (as any of us are) to disengage from this discussion if it is bothering you.

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@maxdancona,

Ok, let's talk about this case.

Gabby Douglas did not put her hand over her heart for the national anthem. She dressed as you would expect a world class female gymnast to dress, she supported her team mates. She received a firestorm of criticism on social media which was picked up nationally. Given that is was covered by just about every national media outlet, I don't consider this just an opinion or observation.

Ryan Lockte apparently urinated on the floor of a store, damaged the property, fought with the security guard, made up a story about how he was robbed and fled the country. Social media said, well that was terrible. You can argue whether social media said that was really terrible or just slightly terrible. I suppose that is in the opinion category.

The article argues that Lockte did not receive nearly the rebuke for criminal activity and basically embarrassing the country that Douglas got for basically doing nothing. I agree with that and I don't find it all that controversial. Based on the Douglas standard, Lockte should be receiving death threats. Do you disagree with that?

The article further implies that Douglas is held to a different standard, likely due to race and gender. That's debatable. Do you disagree with that? It's a debate, so saying "not enough data to tell" is a fair position, but I'd say whatever position you take, including that one, reflects an inherent bias based on life experiences. That doesn't mean the opinion has no merit.

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@engineer,

First of all, let me start with the claim you are making that it is easy to dispute with facts. The Lochte case is on the front page of CNN. The Gabby Douglas case is no where to be seen. I believe your claim that Gabby Douglas was covered by "just about every national media outlet" is factually incorrect, especially compared to the coverage that Lochte was given. You have yet to provide any support for your claim that Gabby has gotten "much more" attacks on social media than Lochte.

The Lochte case was given much greater coverage and got much more negative press.

That being said, they are completely different stories.

Are you claiming that if Gabby Douglas had urinated on the floor of a store, damaged the property, fought with the security guard, made up a story about how she was robbed and fled the country that she would have been treated any worse than Lochte?

Would she be getting death threats in this case? I don't know, the only fact that I have (according to Pew Research -- http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/10/22/online-harassment/) is that male public figures get more death threats on social media than females in general. I don't have anything else to go on, but I don't agree with your assumption.

I don't think I have asserted anything as fact in this discussion that I can't actually support with fact. If I have, please point it out and I will retract it.

The point is that ideological bias can take the place of fact. There is nothing wrong with having an opinion, as long as you don't assert it as fact... and as long as you are willing to change your opinion once you are confronted with the facts that contradict it. The truth is that no one know if things would have been covered differently had the genders been changed. These stories are so different (one is a crime, the other is a misstep due to disappointment).

Ideology is often resistant to facts.

1 Reply

@maxdancona,

maxdancona wrote:

First of all, let me start with the claim you are making that it is easy to dispute with facts. The Lochte case is on the front page of CNN. The Gabby Douglas case is no where to be seen. I believe your claim that Gabby Douglas was covered by "just about every national media outlet" is factually incorrect, especially compared to the coverage that Lochte was given. You have yet to provide any support for your claim that Gabby has gotten "much more" attacks on social media than Lochte.

https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=gabby%20douglas%20national%20anthem

maxdancona wrote:

The Lochte case was given much greater coverage and got much more negative press.

Absolutely! The press was all over Lockte. The point is that the public (as represented by social media) was not. They were all over Douglas. If you read through those stories I linked to, you will see that Phelps laughed during the national anthem and no one said much.

maxdancona wrote:

That being said, they are completely different stories.

Are you claiming that if Gabby Douglas had urinated on the floor of a store, damaged the property, fought with the security guard, made up a story about how she was robbed and fled the country that she would have been treated any worse than Lochte?

I haven't made that argument, but I would be happy to make it. The argument the article made and which I agree with is that Douglas was treated much worse by the Internet for doing much less.

maxdancona wrote:

The point is that ideological bias can take the place of fact. There is nothing wrong with having an opinion, as long as you don't assert it as fact... and as long as you are willing to change your opinion once you are confronted with the facts that contradict it.

So as long as I say "in my opinion" before every post, I'm good? My posts are clearly my opinion. If you don't feel they are worthy of debate, you don't have to debate them.

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@Linkat,

Quote:

I find that weird - I have actually heard more the opposite

Do you dispute the point that white people get different, generally more favorable treatment in the press than black people?

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@snood,

And what did they call any black who got hired over any white candidates?

A "quota" hire. An "affirmative action" hire.

And if that black made any mistake at all, well it was tarred all over every black person in the US. Blacks may have gotten jobs over it but they hardly ever got the right to make mistakes or be an 'average' worker like white workers do.

Right up to now I always knew that my black co-workers' work was scrutinized harder than my own, even if we had black supervisers.

I know what a lot of white workers feel about this stuff. I used to feel it, too. I felt that racism never benefited me, that because I didn't think I was racist I didn't like being reminded of white racism. But the fact is while I would never actively discriminate, I was benefiting from institutional racism. I was counting on it for employment particularly. I was counting on it viz a viz my work performance against the work performance of black colleagues. I had the freedom to make mistakes, black employees were either careless, untrainable or letting down the entire black population. They were only "affirmative action" hires.

It took too long for me to get it. And I do regret how long it took.

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@ossobucotemp,

I appreciate that very much osso.

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@engineer,

engineer wrote:

Ryan Lockte apparently urinated on the floor of a store, damaged the property, fought with the security guard, made up a story about how he was robbed and fled the country.

Hold on here. I agree that the swimmers kicked in the bathroom door and/or peed in public (if I desperately had to pee and there was no bathroom available, I would likely pee in public too).

However they certainly did not fabricate anything. Did this security officer communicate to them in clear English that he was a security officer and responding to their behavior? Or did he babble in a foreign language, point a gun at them, and take their money?

If someone babbled gibberish at me, pointed a gun at my head and cocked the hammer, and took my money, I'd report it as an armed robbery too.

He didn't flee the country. He simply went home on his intended schedule.

I think the people who are bullying Gabby Douglass are scum, and I'd pee all over their living room floors even if a bathroom were available.

1 Reply

@oralloy,

Quote:

Hold on here. I agree that the swimmers kicked in the bathroom door and/or peed in public (if I desperately had to pee and there was no bathroom available, I would likely pee in public too).

Too bad they didn't go into the office where the off duty cop security guards were and ask for the freaking key to the locked door, just like reasonable folks in the USA do by the millions every single day.

When you next pee in public, I hope you get arrested.

1 Reply

@bobsal u1553115,

bobsal u1553115 wrote:

When you next pee in public, I hope you get arrested.

That's not very nice of you.

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White Male Privilege Is Why We Laugh At Lochte And Vilify Douglas

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