5 Likes
But here goes…
6 Likes
as a white guy myself who just entered his 60s allow me to point out that the “white guy” part of your statement makes the “being in one’s 60s” part of the statement much more likely.
11 Likes
Nothing “secret” about this. He was in a high security area that obviously would be recorded. He was just too stupid to mind his manners at work.
6 Likes
The more I think about this story, the stranger it seems that his should even be an elected position. Wouldn’t it be better to have a clear set of qualifications for the job, then also a clear and enforced set of workplace policies?
5 Likes
My theory is that America has the same sort of pathological societal faith in elections as it does in capitalism. This sort of pure, naive, childlike faith that the system will just sort of arrange it so that the best and most appropriate thing happens, and anything which stands in the way of that, be it truth in political advertising laws or consumer safety protections, gets in the way of the best possible outcome.
Not everyone, of course. It seems to be less common as you go further left, and more pathological as you get further to the right.
And of course it’s bullshit. Yet the idea that some jobs should be assigned on skill and experience and professionalism rather than on a popularity contest is treated with the same contempt as that some services and industries are too important and fundamental to life for private profit motives to be allowed to dictate their provision, and are correctly and properly nationalised.
And of course it’s abused, typically by it’s shoutiest proponents. The people who are loudest about the Free Market are the same who are the loudest about Free Elections of all the positions, but in both cases, their definition of “Free” is evidently “only after we have rigged the game so that those people don’t get to participate, you know who I’m talking about”.
5 Likes
His raging bigotry isn’t a problem because it’s rude. It’s a problem because he’s in a position of tremendous power over countless people of color and his conduct could literally have life-or-death consequences for those under his charge.
12 Likes
One thing that is worth noting is that a lot of these bizarre elected positions are county offices. States have their own government and towns/cities have their own government and then you have counties in between. Larger counties will often have a board or council or something like that, but even then, they often do not have any centralized government infrastructure like states or even fairly small towns have.
Counties will usually have a sheriff and a coroner and a bunch of offices that are just related to recordkeeping (like the registrar for marriage licenses, etc.), and a lot of these positions are, by longstanding tradition, elected, though it varies from state to state (and sometimes county to county). In some states, even the coroner is elected. In some states, the sheriff is the coroner. Of course, the lowest level court system is also county-based, and judges are usually elected as well.
To summarize, I think that a lot of these extraneous positions are relics of the past, of a time when county governments did a lot more in terms of the day-to-day management of a place because people could not easily travel to the state capital and city governments (much less cities themselves) had not yet developed to the extent that they have now. As counties did not then and still often do not now have the infrastructure to vet people for these positions, they were and still are just left up to the people by popular vote.
During times of personal stress, I tend to eat too much chocolate and not get enough done at work. Going off on racist sexist tirades just doesn’t seem to come up, for some reason.
5 Likes
The operative word is “could”. You can only prosecute people for their actions, not their opinions. If he leverages his beliefs into official decisions, get him. The second he misallocates resources based upon race instead of evidence, kick his ass. But until then, it doesn’t matter what he thinks - it matters how he behaves. If you throw people in jail based upon what they think, they’ll happily do the same to you.
If you are naïve enough to believe that a raging bigot can be fit to serve in a position like this then heaven help you. Do you honestly think it’s possible for a person who says stuff like this in official meetings to NOT create a toxic work environment? Jesus.
First, he should be immediately removed from this position based on his words and actions, not for whatever hateful shit is going on inside his skull.
Second, we’re trying to get him OUT of the jails (at least until such time he is convicted of a crime and returns as a resident).
Third, I would never say anything like what he said so the “there but for the grace of God go I…” line only applies if you’re a hateful bigot.
8 Likes
People who are racist can certainly lose their job for such comments, and they absolutely should. You can’t expect someone in such a position who holds such beliefs to carry out their job fairly. It will lead to deaths, most likely.
8 Likes
Good news, then! Jails and prisons are structurally and systemically racist. A 5-minute search will find higher fatality and injury rates at his jail for BIPOC inmates. How can I be certain? Because there are higher fatality and injury rates for BIPOC at every jail and prison in America.
This guy’s mistake wasn’t being rude; it was advertising that he likes it that way.
8 Likes
I never understood the idea that we somehow owe self-proclaimed racists the benefit of the doubt on this point. This bigot clearly isn’t capable of maintaining a wall between his personal beliefs and professional responsibilities because he made these comments in the context of a work-related phone call with other co-workers and law enforcement professionals.
9 Likes
We do not. I’m sick of people saying that we do.
And I think it matters to point out that the concept of racism is a violent ideology that will inevitably lead to violence. That’s the whole point of the ideology, to violently keep one set of people in power, at the expense of others. That’s it. You can’t be peacefully racist, or peacefully anti-semitic. It’s not how that works. It will eventually result in some violence, because people will never accept being second class citizens in their own country. That’s what people get wrong about Franz Fanon’s work - the violence he discusses in Wretched of the Earth is from the oppressed class (in the form of resistance to imperialism) is a reaction TO violent oppression. The violence, though carried out by the oppressed class is the result of the violence visited upon them.
You can’t have a peaceful racist system. It’s impossible. It will always end up in violence, most often visited upon the oppressed. The violence of rebellion is a direct response to that.
9 Likes
Yet somehow, Black and Brown people never seem to merit that same ‘benefit of the doubt,’ no matter what the circumstances are.
White Supremacy has entered the chat…
8 Likes
4 Likes
Can you show me where anyone in this thread suggested prosecuting him or throwing him in jail, because I’m not finding it.
All I’m seeing in terms of suggested consequences is a bunch of comments about how, with those attitudes, he is no way suited to fulfill his work duties fairly and humanely, and so should be removed. Which is the correct answer.
6 Likes
