Constructive dialogue about race and inclusivity and forum moderation

Off-Topic
#7

A few things I’ll address as a moderator. First, I do support the sentiment that:

I don’t think there was any ill intent with the phrase in question but I understand Tommo’s concern, and I think it’s always worth considering how things can be interpreted in multiple ways.

I don’t find this to be true, and you’re one of the only people I’ve seen make this complaint. We have some fairly simple rules and very rarely run into problems; we’ve only escalated to e.g. suspend / ban folks a small handful of times.

But to be clear, this has never been a place where anyone can say literally anything with no repercussions. If that’s not to your liking, well…you don’t have to be here.

To the question of “is this forum inclusive?”—

No statistics on this actually; we don’t collect this sort of specific data when people sign up. In general it does seem pretty clear the userbase here is mostly male, and probably older and whiter than average.

However I think inclusivity and diversity are two different (though related) things. Whether or not the forum is not super diverse, we can try to make it as inclusive as possible, i.e. open to everyone and not signaling (intentionally or not) that certain types of people are more or less welcome here.

Not sure if this is a thing we’ll ever be able to measure but we can do our best. Very open to suggestions for anything we can do to improve here.

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#8

I was a kid long enough ago that I grew up with a shitload of bad habits. My grandfather, who I lived with, was basically Archie Bunker. He couldn’t talk about anybody without tacking on some irrelevant epithet about their ethnic background like “black guy”, “Chinese guy”, or whatever. It’s taken me a long time to break these habits. The Long Island is strong in me.

I delete some variation of the “asian girl” comment on our the Li-Sa-X videos on YouTube a couple times a week. I’d rather not have those comments around here because they are irrelevant at best, add nothing, and reduce the quality of our conversations.

If you want to specifically discuss different approaches to arts education around the world, that’s totally cool. I recommend the Ellen Winner interview, where we discuss the approach to arts education in China:

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#9

There are plenty of words that can have more than one meaning and then there’s another term, which escapes me right now, that has to do with an idea that some words have two different types of meanings and I feel like the word for this is right in the tip of my tongue but I can’t quite remember it. Hopefully it will come to me soon…

Anyway. the way I interpret it, your using the word inclusivity, at last some of the time, as something that’s a means to an end. That need being that we have a nice, varied, group of people here with men. women, boys, girls, whites, blacks, hispanics, orientals, arabs, jewish people, etc.

It’s been a long time since I joined and I honestly didn’t remember if you asked (for statistical reasons only) sex, ethnicity, and possibly religion (interestingly enough, jewish can refer to ethnicity or religious affiliation).

So, I was wondering, if there was somebody who might be able to tells us how well your way of going about being inclusive has resulted in diversity among the total populace of the forum.

Would people find it uncomfortable to be asked about their ethnic backgrounds when they join? I can’t say. I can only speak for myself in that if it were stated you were collecting this information so you could make sure you were marketing equally effectively towards men and women, whites and blacks, etc.

I wouldn’t have minded if you’d asked me those types pf questions when I joined. It’s funny how people tend to form mental images about people they only know through internet forums including age color, and maybe even general appearance. For the record, I’m 50 years old, I was born in The United States but am of Colombian origin, and I am Christian. Now your mental picture of me may be of brown skin, as many hispanic people are, but that’s true for some countries more than others. Colombia certainly has many native people who are brown skinned, but remember, Colombia was colonized by Spain - that’s why they speak Spanish! Well Spain is in Europe, just like Italy or France. So there are also white people in Colombia. I’m white. But that’s just skin tone. I am latino! OK, I’m not gonna bore you anymore with my fascinating background. Also I wanted to make a point - that to me anyway, volunteering that kind of info is no big deal. Why should it be? I’m proud of my background.

#10

If mentioning a guitarist’s ethnicity and heritage is “irrelevant at best” and “adds nothing” in your opinion, how do you explain this:

" Cracking the Code Episode 2: “Rise of the Viking” — Yngwie Malmsteen"

" Chapter 2 - How Swede It Is"

#11

I have to agree with @Acecrusher here. If calling an 8 year old Asian girl an 8 year old Asian girl is offensive, I really have to wonder where this world is headed.
Should I be offended if somebody called me a middle aged white guy? It’s what I am. Since when is that offensive?
I can’t speak to what happens in other countries, but here in the US we are turning into a nation of crybabies. Some colleges are actually installing “crying rooms” so if a student feels emotionally overwhelmed they can go to this room and have a good cry or something. Isn’t college the place where people are supposed to step over the threshold into adulthood and leave childhood behind?
What are we teaching the youth of today? That being a crybaby will get you whatever you want because people are terrified of being called out on social media and be accused of something they aren’t?

I don’t see anything wrong with the above comment on Lisa-X.
The fact that there aren’t any women here is due to the fact that the vast majority of guitar players are male and not because the members here are offensive.
I am a member of several guitar forums and they typically don’t have many female members either. I’m sure if you went to a knitting forum you would find a female majority there too, and I’m sure they don’t wonder why that is.

#12

I can’t tell if this is a serious question or if you’re just trying to “catch” me on a contradiction. It feels like you’re just trying to zing me. If you honestly and truly don’t know why I might think that discussions of Yngwie are different from the various “asians” comments I delete from Li-Sa-X videos on our YouTube channel, I guess I could try to ham-handedly spell that out. But again, my impression is that you do know why I might think this, and that the nature of the beast these days is just to fire back.

Look, we live in contentious times. I get that. I count our blessings that discussions of guitar technique really don’t lend themselves to political / cultural arguments. This is not what gets me all fired up to strap on my flame suit and hit the keyboard. On the super rare occasion that a particular thing bothers me and I don’t want it here, I would hope I and @Brendan have demonstrated through our thousands of posts that there is a balance to these requests, and which direction this balance swings in.

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#13

In olden days i used to roam a strange and secretive guitarforum in the depths of the interwebs, where the very ability of shredding (or doing anything properly) was traced back to having a certain socio-political attitude.

So yes, nothing is save anymore :no_mouth:

I am a political person and not afraid of discourse, but i enjoy places like this community here a lot! Reminds me that we all have so much in common, like eyes and the primordial urge to shred faster on guitar :heart:

#14

wish i had a nickel for every time in the last, oh, 10-11 years, that I turned on the TV and heard how evil “white people” are.

I personally, as a Christian, conservative, white, southern male, have been blamed for all of the worlds evils pretty consistently for quite a number of years now. Im talking about on mainstream TV, movie culture, music culture, the whole bit.

No one blinks or bats an eyelash when someone is called “that white dude”, or “you know, that white girl”

“she dance good for a white girl” etc. Or in my case the ever popular “you alright for a white dude”

Seriously, let a white cop shoot a minority and its world wide news for months…meanwhile a few hundred white folks get killed by minorities and it’s a yawner.

good ol inclusive pop culture. No tears shed huh?

now here, in a community thats, what, 98% white males…we gonna be scolded by other white males for mentioning someone’s continent of origin? I imagine most Asians are proud to be Asians just as am am proud to be American and also proud to be of European descent.

I could see someone raising a fuss if an actual racial slur occurred, but I mean, this is already like the mildest, most self regulating forum online.

Instead of all the assuming this or that could be offensive, why not ask @Peter_C if he was offended by any comments in this thread.

Seriously, PC nannying is like the most toxic of all possibilities.

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#15

mainstream TV, pumped out worldwide. No outcry.

“We have to stop demonizing people and realize that the biggest terror threat in this country is white men, most of them radicalized to the right, and we have to start doing something about them.”

Not only denigrating a whole group of people, but essentially calling for violence …“doing something about them” etc.

Was he fired? Was he censured at all? Nah. This is the world we live in. Blatant racism aimed at one group nonstop with billion dollar budgets…keep that in mind when you pull out the microscope to nitpick

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#16

Of course I wouldn’t be alright also with these sentences!

Just to clarify, I may have written the above post too fast and it came out like I was “scolding” but that was not the intention.

I just imagined some people might be put off from interacting with us if they read these kinds of sentences, even if there was no bad intent at all. And I don’t think there was, to be clear!

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#17

truer words never spoken

#18

Never said I couldn’t be wrong, but why not avoid the risk altogether? Anyway I should probably back away from this discussion, and apologies to the OP for derailing the topic. @Brendan would it be possible to split away this chapter into a new topic?
Thanks!

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#19

JonJon, and others in this thread- what a can of worms!

Let me preface all this by saying we’re from all different walks of life with only one thing in common and that is too precious to lose. That thing isn’t even guitar- it is THE guitar. So we need to cherish that.

I think we can even have a discussion on this provided we don’t shoehorn each other and/or assume the worst of intentions behind every single word. That courtesy I believe can be granted to others at least in the scope of this forum.

JonJon, you asked me in your message to be as frank as possible so I will oblige. I don’t for one second you are offensive or racist, but I can’t just brush off some of the insensitivity (which I believe stems from a lack of experience “on the other side” rather than a blatant form of discrimination) in bits throughout this thread- though not from you in particular.

Now, when people speak out against this “insensitivity,” whether it’s really that or just poor semantics- it should not be understood as the “PC Police” policing speech. When legitimate claims get reduced to memes, it tends to make matters difficult.

I have a few reservations about you overly identifying yourself with these labels; thus I need to question why you even feel attacked about minority claims that you’re responsible for this and that. You are surely not the cause for the world’s troubles so there’s no need for you to project that somehow this issue is about you- I say this in the most sincere and respectful way :slight_smile:

One’s obligation should be first to themselves and their integrity, then to others, and then far down the list what niche they belong to, and then inform those (who make blanket statements) to use better or more precise semantics.

Which is why I find this bit:

"No one blinks or bats an eyelash when someone is called “that white dude”, or “you know, that white girl”

“she dance good for a white girl” etc. Or in my case the ever popular “you alright for a white dude”

Seriously, let a white cop shoot a minority and its world wide news for months…meanwhile a few hundred white folks get killed by minorities and it’s a yawner."

A little bit out of place because it feels like a mixture of projection, uncorroborated victimization, and a bit of straw-manning if you will.

You yourself say,

“I personally, as a Christian, conservative, white, southern male, have been blamed for all of the worlds evils…”

First, has it ever occurred to you that most if not all of those labels were at one point in history or another, for long periods, the ruling and/or privileged majority, and hence the disrespect they could be shown is not really equal to the disrespect shown to a minority group- because history provides the context for it to be so. That’s what being a majority power implies- that de facto by status you are sort of “immune” to hurt, because well- you have never been, to the same extent that other minority groups have been.

For example, “he’s cool for a gay dude” is not on equivalent standing to “he’s boring for a straight guy.”

But this does not mean I condone disrespect to those groups either- hardly in fact. It’s just that I do that while being very well aware of the immense historical context that I just cannot deny.

It is irrelevant, but just to highlight the spirit of what I mean, I personally am atheist, libertarian, of asian descent, and American upbringing- YET we are still holding conversation and enjoying each other’s company.

And in that context and framework I think there’s very little to get riled up over.

And for what it’s worth, I did not find “the 8 year old japanese girl can do it too” comment offensive (because I believe the context determines intent- and I didn’t find any)-

But then again, I am not Japanese, nor female, nor 8 years old :stuck_out_tongue:

But aside from the facetious remarks, I do see the larger point you made in that paragraph about how technique has come a really long way as to be really accessible to the younger generation these days. Adapt and evolve, rinse and repeat as they say.

I hope my perspective has been helpful and above all, respectful :slight_smile:

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#20

oh snap, I thought u were going to say u were vegan…that might have been an issue.

Yeah, i’ve never been black or “Asian” but neither have blacks or Asians ever been white. As a human I dont feel particularly “immune” to the kind of blatantly anti-white, anti-male rhetoric that is in vogue today. So without you walking a mile in my shoes, I doubt you COULD understand my comments that you quoted. The type of stuff ive had to endure is stuff like, lets say myself and 2 other white people are in conversation at work, a black person rides by and says “yall having a meeting”? You’d have to be a white person from the south to get the insult. If the comment were made the other way around id be looking for a job

The “racism” or stereotyping that ive seen aimed at Asians is generally positive lol. People joke about how smart ya’ll are or how you are all doctors etc. Yeah, id say you and I would have different perceptions on racial issues lol. You haven’t had to live with the bullseye on you.

As a forklift driver in a warehouse, I dont feel particularly like part of any “ruling class”. It’s odd. So for the last several months at work, my partner has been a Filipino woman. She talks a lot and some people find her annoying. Ive sort of gotten used to it. She is married to a black guy. Well, our shifts are changing so she and I wont be working together anymore. She is worried who she will get as a partner and she wishes I was coming to her shift so we could be partners 4 days per week.

Im the minority at my workplace lol. (by far). Im trying to think back to the partners ive had at work (we get paired up to work in certain door ranges etc). I think ive had 1 Filipino girl, 3 black girls, 3 black guys, 1 white guy. So there’s your ratio.

So my partner is Filipino and my supervisor is black and I gave a ride home to a black guy this very day. Yet on an almost all white forum, I get flagged for mentioning someone’s race. I guess you’d have to be me to understand how foolish it all seems.

BTW I dated a black girl for almost 5 years. Loved her, put a ring on her finger, had her here living with me, took her to be with my family for holidays yada yada. Its all there in my facebook history (no secrets online of course)

So it seems it would be a bit hard to hang the “racist” or “white supremacist” tag on me…yet here we are in this thread with some simple comment being taken to task lol.

Even in your comments Peter, there is a certain bias. Disrespect shown to me isnt like disrespect shown to others? Because of things that happened hundreds of years before I was born? So when I was born, I was guilty? If I feel victimized its “uncorroborated”. Too bad we cant all change places on occasion.

Damned if I do or dont.

At over 50 years old with over 30 years of guitar struggles, ex military, one who has lived in a foreign country for several years (Greece), one who has dated interracially, one who has competed in probably 10 different activities, one who has (attempted to) run his own businesses, it would almost seem like i’d be seen as someone who’s opinions and perspectives would be welcomed…but lately it seems id just be better off to be silent

Peace, JJ

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#21

Thanks for the comments @Peter_C, appreciate the thoughtfulness and arguments respectfully made.

@tommo yes I will split this into a new topic, agree we’re indeed getting way off track from the OP.

@JonJon Troy above touched on the broader context of YouTube comments we get often on the Li-sa-X video that play into stereotypes. We do see lots of comments to the effect of “haha there’s always an Asian who can do it better” or similar ‘jokes’ that seem to come at the expense of reducing someone to their race. Again, not assuming ill intent with your initial comments, just some background on why we’d rather not even bring race into the picture if it’s not relevant, and why we may seem touchy on this.

I’ll add some comments from my own perspective…recognizing the can of worms has already been opened and hoping we can continue to learn from each other.

We (Americans) live in a culture with deep roots in both patriarchy and white supremacy. That’s historical fact and it extends to our present-day reality. Not particularly comfortable to confront that, but I think it’s important to do so. This does not mean you or I or any given individual white guy is evil. It doesn’t even mean men in general, or white people in general, are to blame for everything.

It does however mean being honest about the ugly parts of our society, e.g. a history of privileging white lives over black and brown ones, denying women rights, and so on, so that we can collectively work to improve things. As a white guy myself I don’t find it ‘anti-white’ or ‘anti-male’ to acknowledge that structures with white men at the top have been at the root of a lot of bad shit, historically speaking.

There’s a lot to learn about this kind of systemic injustice / power imbalance that we (white guys) aren’t necessarily aware of, whether because we didn’t learn about it in school, or it’s not a part of our lived experience, or both. From redlining to police brutality to the prison industrial complex.

Personally I am privileged in a lot of different ways. This includes white privilege, which all white people benefit from to a degree, plus various other things like being straight, able-bodied, etc. I recognize it’s also true that everyone’s experience is unique and that talking only in broadest demographic terms leaves out a lot of nuance.

There’s similar nuance with e.g. stereotypes about Asians; for example that of the ‘model minority’, where even seemingly positive stereotypes have sometimes been used harmfully, like in the context of comparing racial achievement gaps in this country. Anyway I think it’s important that we do our best to learn both from history and each other’s personal experiences…that can be hard to do on the internet but I’m glad we’re trying. I think there’s value in talking about this stuff and appreciate that we’re able to have the conversation.

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#22

Apologies for the misunderstanding :slight_smile: I was clear that discrimination is wrong on all accounts- but history, even recently didn’t really see eye to eye with us on that :slight_smile:

But it’s a little unfair to paraphrase my argument like that because the comparison is for inter-groups, not an individual vs. a certain subset of people. This distinction is important because you are right on principle that discrimination (disrespect) is discrimination no matter the time and place, with a big if and emphasis on “time and place.”

And most of human history has raised a big question on time and place. To put it in other words, the day we equate “white trash cracker” to “there once was a big black guy named N***** Jim” is the day I truly can say humanity has moved on, but that’s not objectively true even today. Both discrimination on some absolute scale but the historical weight behind the words is beyond comparison- that’s where this relative aspect comes from.

Yeah, i’ve never been black or “Asian” but neither have blacks or Asians ever been white.

And hence the relativity above prevents anyone with a knowledge of the ugly sides of history can never normalize. I cannot blame you thinking in such and such based on your anecdotes, but anecdotes in far greater scope and numbers and scale have occurred in history that for example, in america alone, black people would have gladly traded places for a good 100 years or more, a good 1000 years or more outside america, with extremely few white men willing to trade spots in that same exact time frame. That’s why the comparison matters. Your experience and views are completely valid and justified but likewise you cannot complain that a great majority thinks this way because these “anecdotes” were actually very representative of the status quo. The comparison breaks down because an anecdote does not revise, erase, nor contradict history, regardless of whose anecdote it is.

The “racism” or stereotyping that ive seen aimed at Asians is generally positive lol. People joke about how smart ya’ll are or how you are all doctors etc.

And this is only positive because one has chosen it to interpret it that way- in no way is this stereotyping warranted because it is associated with doctors or other high-paying jobs or dexterity in some particular activity. It’s not even a generally accurate view of Asians in Asia or Asians in America. That’s the whole point; that a stereotype is not excused because of how positive it is. One step further and the label becomes a soul-less unoriginal note-for-note nerd. That’s the other side of the coin.

I hope you can at least understand where I am coming from.

Also I don’t think you were guilty as soon as you were born, but oddly enough the religion you say you are part of has a big say in that :slight_smile: Again, just a humorous and light-hearted comment :slight_smile:

So it seems it would be a bit hard to hang the “racist” or “white supremacist” tag on me…

You’d be absolutely right and I’d be the last to say that about you :slight_smile:

If I feel victimized its “uncorroborated”.

This is what I struggle to understand- a person open-minded such as yourself would burden yourself to fixing something you yourself had no fault in; I say it’s largely uncorroborated simply because it is by precedent not because “you felt it.” Again, it is the lack of general evidence (to the extent it applies to other select groups for example) which is the indicator, not that the fact that it was said by you :slight_smile:

At over 50 years old with over 30 years of guitar struggles, ex military, one who has lived in a foreign country for several years (Greece), one who has dated interracially, one who has competed in probably 10 different activities, one who has (attempted to) run his own businesses, it would almost seem like i’d be seen as someone who’s opinions and perspectives would be welcomed

And you are anything but :slight_smile: You have my total respect for the person you are. For how different we may be ideologically somehow I find a lot in common in your life experiences- I find for myself it’s very easy to fall into a trap that I am somehow free from prejudice but the reality is that it’s still very much a WIP and everything I wrote in this thread is directed to you just as it applies to me.

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#23

Ok, I said I would back away but I keep feeling bad about how things turned out. In case that wasn’t clear enough from my behaviour on the forum I don’t enjoy conflict*

My post that opened the can of worms was probably poorly phrased (which interestingly is also my main problem when recording guitar). I did not want to label @acecrusher and @JonJon as “offensive”, if I ended up doing that I apologise, particularly if I made you feel frustrated and/or that you are not welcome in the forum.
That would achieve pretty much the opposite of what I was trying to do - i.e. say something useful about inclusivity with the aim of making the forum welcoming to everyone. Luckily I think @Peter_C has done a much better job at that.

To clarify once more, I don’t think any of the posts were malicious!

I hope it can be useful to share a bit of my background: I teach maths/physics at a UK university and have done quite a lot of training on inclusivity/diversity. These courses made me more sensitive to issues I never thought existed. For example, Physics is still widely perceived as a “mostly male thing”. If I start a lecture with something as innocent as “Hi guys”, I may make some women in the audience feel excluded / feel like my lecture is not aimed also at them and effectively I am giving a little reinforcement to the stereotype.
Even more subtle, if I start with the seemingly more inclusive “Hello Ladies and Gentlemen”, I may be excluding those members of the audience who don’t want to be identified as male or female.

If I start with “Hi everyone”, problem solved at no cost at all for me, everyone feels part of the lecture and they are a little more likely to pay attention/ do well on the course :slight_smile:
I know all these seem like tiny tiny details, but they accumulate over time.

At the same time, I don’t think my colleagues who start a lecture with “Hey guys” are offensive or bigots or whatever, they are simply not informed of the issue (In fact this is probably stuff I would have said before doing the above training).

So, this is where I was coming from, but clearly I haven’t yet learned to articulate these ideas well.

*This is perhaps why my judo and karate “careers” never took off. Maybe also because I was awful at them :smiley:

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#24

No, need to apologize Tommo, I believe your intent was good. It lead to conflict when there was no issue but I know that was unintended. Intent is what matters most to me. If see someone trying to do something good, and it works in a way that as unintended, I can’t be angry and you certainly don’t make me feel unwelcome in the forum.

What was frustrating was seeing an issue ensue when there was no issue to begin with. As Jon Jon succinctly put it:

I don’t think I even interpreted your post, Tommo, the way it was intended. The way I interpreted was, don’t say “Asian girls can play Eruption” because you thought then the forum would be inundated with angry posts from girls from other continents: We’d get European girls asking why we didn’t say they could play Eruption too and ask us if we thought they weren’t as good players as Asian players. Then North American girls writing in asking: “What about us” The Australian girls, and so on. That’s what I thought you wanted us to avoid happening.

I thought it was so unlikely to happen as to be a non-issue.

Then an even more bizarre thing happened. Troy posted to the effect that we shouldn’t mention the origin or ancestry of a guitar player. He said:

So, it’s best to not mention where someone is from or their heritage because it’s “irrelevant at best” and “adds nothing”? This coming from a guy who goes out of his way to do just that with Yngwie Malmsteen such as on:

" Cracking the Code Episode 2: “Rise of the Viking” — Yngwie Malmsteen"

" Chapter 2 - How Swede It Is"

Well what is the message here? That there is one protocol for how we treat men and another for how we treat women? Or is it something else? I don’t know. So, I asked Troy directly for an explanation and he refused to explain what looks like a double standard to me. It’s bizarre! What’s the secrecy about? Isn’t inclusivity about treating everyone the same and not having one set of rules for one group of people and another set of rules for another group?

#25

Thanks @tommo, appreciate you prompting this dialogue on inclusivity, even if it got off to a bit of a rocky start, I do think this stuff is worth talking about :slight_smile:. Good points here and I think the “you guys” example is a helpful one.

I remember reading about this issue with ‘guys’ and inclusive language a while back in a book by Douglas Hofstadter and realizing it was something I hadn’t even consciously considered. But once you think about it, it’s a pretty simple change, and indeed while it may take some getting used to, it’s by no means burdensome.

@Acecrusher not sure exactly how to respond because this doesn’t really feel like a good faith question; you seem to be misconstruing / oversimplifying for the sake of argument… Troy mentioned the context right there in the quote you posted, and I expanded a bit in my above post as well:

But assuming your question here is genuine, to clarify further—

These comments we see on YouTube frequently play into a dismissive “of course Asians can do anything” stereotype, a common trope which as @Peter_C explained is not acceptable just by dint of a nominally positive framing. What’s more on YouTube, as you might expect, these comments are often not thoughtful or ‘positive’ at all. That’s the context of Troy’s above post.

I hope this all makes it pretty clear why these sorts of comments are a world apart from, say, a pun identifying Yngwie Malmsteen as being from Sweden.

I feel like we’ve pretty much exhausted the conversation here, I’m going to close this topic for now. Thanks all for the discussion and feel free to reach out if you feel like we have more we need to talk about on this.

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#26