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Debate Info

22
23
Yes No
Debate Score:45
Arguments:47
Total Votes:45
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 Yes (19)
 
 No (20)

Debate Creator

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Shouls Racism be Considered a Mental Illness?

Yes

Side Score: 22
VS.

No

Side Score: 23
2 points

There is a difference between extreme racism and ordinary prejudice. Yes. Extreme racism is a trait of psychopathic dx and should be included as a diagnostic code. These extreme racists represent a danger to themselves and others.

Side: Yes
Nomoturtle(857) Disputed
2 points

so racism is ok as long as what you do is not as extreme as what everyone else does?

watch out for peer pressure guys, it can turn you into psychopaths

Side: No
geekgroupie(31) Disputed
1 point

I don't think toddlers are under peer pressure when they react with a type of familiar bias to those similar. Racism is not learned.

Side: Yes
1 point

Can you identify the difference between 'extreme racism' and 'ordinary prejudice?' Yeah said there was a difference and said how to deal with one of the options, but you didn't say what it was.

Side: No
skyfish(276) Disputed
2 points

prejudice is having thoughts about someone based on their race

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racism is ACTING on those thoughts

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.

.

we ALL have prejudice... but only some of us are racists.

Side: Yes
Blxchs(23) Clarified
1 point

"Ordinary Prejudice"

- Might you clarify to what it is that you mean by this phrase....

Quite frankly there shouldn't be any sense of familiarities or ordinances with prejudices. Why, might you ask? You're leaving a big gap open for people to believe that their preconceived thoughts about any race, culture, or ethnic category is okay simply because it's "common" to think this way, but that isn't correct nor is it okay, especially if these thoughts are false. A racists person is simply a racist there is no such thing as an "extreme racist" or "slight racist"; racism, literally speaking here has zero grey(gray) areas.

Side: Yes
1 point

racism is based entirely on a distinction without a difference... there is only ONE human race.

only crazy ppl make up "distinctions" out of thin air so they can behave in anti social ways.

i hear they have come up with a new form of lobotomy... perhaps there is hope after all.

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: No
2 points

No. People aren't born racists. They form opinions by observation and through experience. It is also a form of self preservation as certain races are more violent than others. For instance, before the P.C, brigade had the publications stopped, London's Metropolitan Police issued statistics showing that whilst blacks represented 10% of the City's population they were responsible for 90% of all violent crime, including gun and knife attacks. Blacks have a congenital aversion to the disciplines of a formal education which results in them finding difficulty in securing 'gainful employment' as adults, and then blame the ''big bad white man'' for their plight. This, 'oh us poor repressed blacks'' syndrome results in an irrational sense of persecution offering them the perfect excuse for murderous crime, maiming and rioting at the drop of a hat. So, instead of racism being a form of mental disorder, it is a clear illustration of the well balanced mind of a prudent human being with their self survival instincts well honed.

Side: No
Nomoturtle(857) Disputed
2 points

certain races are more violent than others -blah blah, blacks, blah

that a good point except that it's based on assuming the quote above, which i cannot agree with.

you briefly hinted at poverty being the cause for black aggression, which i agree with, but i feel you underestimate the predicament horrendously and accept it only when in favour of your race. whenever whites find themselves in a position such as some blacks and others are in now they rebel and slaughter, only in history the whites in these scenarios are seen as righteous and just. with the blacks you just look at it as primitive and unruly. you also seem to be forgetting that your whole 'irrational sense of persecution' applies to poor whites as well as any other race.

in addition to this, there are no world wars worth mentioning amongst blacks whilst whites have caused 2.

Side: Yes
2 points

you briefly hinted at poverty being the cause for black aggression, which i agree with, but i feel you underestimate the predicament horrendously and accept it only when in favour of your race

Yes, but black poverty doesn't automatically indicate white oppression. I heard an NPR piece on Hispanics worldwide being behind in education because both past and present Hispanic culture hasn't had a big emphasis on reading and writing in the household. Maybe true, but it goes to show that just because a group of people is behind doesn't mean it has to be because some other group is holding them back, nor does a group require special privilege to do well. Blacks bore the brunt of slavery in the US, but there were just one group in a long line of oppressed minorities, many of whom are now excelling in the United States. Japanese Americans were subject to internment and discrimination in only the last century, but that hasn't stopped them from jumping to the top of several academic and professional fields in this country. As a white male living in the US I've always resented the notion that anything I achieve isn't the result of my hard work or dedication but of a special, unearned advantage inherit to my skin color, and conversely that any lack of achievement or bad behavior from minorities is a direct result of the terrible, ongoing racial oppression all whites are apparently responsible for.

whenever whites find themselves in a position such as some blacks and others are in now they rebel and slaughter, only in history the whites in these scenarios are seen as righteous and just.

Ahh no. The kind of aggression we're talking about is burglary, mugging, assault, gang association, etc., all of it driven by poverty. Shotgun-totting white-trash hicks with prison tattoos selling crank on the street corner are remembered every bit as distastefully as their black counterparts. I agree that history as we know it is a biased account, but that fact isn't relevant here.

in addition to this, there are no world wars worth mentioning amongst blacks whilst whites have caused 2

That's borne of a lack of capability, not a lack of malicious intent. There have been plenty of insane, homicidal warlords in Africa who would have gladly sparked global conflict if only they had the strength to do so. In fact there's probably even more aspiring tyrants in Africa than anywhere else, given the horrific level of violence that has characterized the continent for most of recorded history (that would be before imperialism, colonization, slavery, the Cold War, and all the other world problems that are evidently the inherited sins of young white people like myself who, of course, had jack shit to do with all of that).

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes

No, since it is a learned behavior. Even if it is simply because you didn't grow up around people of a certain race and you feel uncomfortable around them because they are unfamiliar to you, it's still a learned behavior.

Now that I say that, I'm actually not sure if that means that it is or isn't a mental illness.

Side: No
geekgroupie(31) Disputed
1 point

If you think racism is a learned behavior, think again. http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2015/06/i-wasnt-born-scientist-and-you-werent.html

Side: Yes
1 point

I was trying to address that in my original comment. Yes, we do have a tendency to mistrust those who are different from us, but that is learned from being around those who look like you as a child, not based on what you look like. If a white kid is adopted by a black family and grows up exclusively around black people, they may have a tendency to mistrust whites and not blacks.

Side: No
skyfish(276) Disputed
1 point

having a bias toward those who look like you (family resemblance) is NOT racism...

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not even close.

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racism is hate, and it is DEFINITELY learned.

Side: No
1 point

not that i disagree, but if you consider learned behaviours not to be mental illnesses then what about learned behaviours that mimic mental disabilities?

Side: No
pirateelfdog(2655) Clarified
1 point

Yeah, I'm not sure actually. I lost confidence in my answer by the end.

I guess if it was a learned behavior that mimics mental illness the behavior itself wouldn't be the same thing. Just like a symptom and a cause of the symptom aren't the same.

Side: Yes
skyfish(276) Clarified
1 point

you can certainly "learn" to be crazy.

i bet i could teach you.

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes

No, I don't think so. I believe everyone is equal and people who are insecure about themselves try to bring down other with their racists statements to bring themselves up.

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Based on the DSM-5 definition, no.

"Socially deviant behavior (e.g., political, religious, or sexual) and conflicts that are primarily between the individual and society are not mental disorders unless the deviance or conflict results from a dysfunction in the individual, as described above."

Mental disorders can exhibit as racism though...

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Being able to live in denial in that Utopian kingdom of ''Cloud Cuckoo Land'' must be wonderful. Even a shortsighted dimwit on a galloping horse could see from a mile off that the ethnic minorities originating from other races all manage, in the main, to prosper and be an asset to their adopted countries. The Jews, the Chinese, white Europeans and many other ethnic classifications have all merged into American society and, through their work ethic, ingenuity and self reliance been able to make a good life for themselves and at the same time contribute towards making the United States the greatest country on earth. Not so the whinging black man with an enormous chip on his shoulder. It's not by chance that inventions and discoveries such as the computer you're all using, the language which you're using to communicate, electricity, the light bulb, radio, television, the telephone, the automobile, aircraft, submarines, ocean going liners, splitting of the atom, the petro-chemical industry, ( fuel and plastics) almost all modern building techniques and material, high yield farming methods, mass production (Britain's Industrial Revolution and Henry Ford ) life saving and pain relieving drugs and surgical operating procedures, etc, etc, were all the product of brain power from non blacks, mainly whites. For instance, whilst the Jews keep the past horrors of the Holocaust under control, they roll up their sleeves and get on with the harshness of everyday working life, the blacks, in stark contrast and generally speaking, engage in a wide range of criminal activities, loafing around and feeling sorry for themselves. They have convinced themselves that they are a special case for state handouts and privileges which everyone else has to earn. It's up to the blacks to mesh in with the societies of the countries which they have adopted as their home and not for their hosts to bow to their constant whinging nor accept their violent criminality. It's the black's ''attitude of mind'' which is going to have to change if there ever is to be harmony between blacks and whites throughout the world. Whites have bent over backwards to facilitate the 'different''! ways of the black man, it's now time for them to put their own house in kilter with the rest of the world.

Side: No
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes
1 point

Indeed

Side: Yes