Michigan school for gifted children gave students a Duke University biology handout with photos of monkeys, chimps, and Obama

boing
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And I would suggest that you look at some more recent examples of how racism has been and still is perpetuated. You don’t need to go back 700 years to find examples of why the primate imagery is problematic.

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Yeah, the embarassment is that a centuries-old racist trope (simianization) can get printed by an academic institution and defended here in the information age. But don’t feel bad, for some of us it’s just Thursday.

edit: at least Duke took it down, I guess

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Birmingham, MI? No, I wouldn’t give them the benefit of the doubt regarding that worksheet. There’s enough signalling behavior there to give the impression of tolerance and acceptance in that very, very white community, but that just means it’s not replete with overt racism. I’m aware of older students who transfer to schools up to 20 minutes away to escape from crap like this and worse.

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There is a long history of Black people being compared to apes, specifically. It’s a racist trope, full stop. There is not question about that. The person who created that might not have INTENDED for it to be racist, but it absolutely is.

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I may not have read as closely as you have. I saw no one denigrating primates, I saw concern over comparing a Black man to apes and monkeys, which is a disgustingly common racist trope. Perhaps you could point me to such a “primates are bad” post?

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You are new here, I will let that slide. I would suggest you read more and comment less for a bit, though.

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I won’t.

No one said nor even implied that; stop being disingenuous. It reeks of piss-poor fail trolling.

In fact, just:

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They might have tried this image of a primate – at least it’s not a living person (and no evidence that it’s a reasonable likeness of any individual in the past)
image

But somehow, many people might have been more upset at this choice.

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I agree. I expected conservatives to start saying “see, racism’s over, stop talking about it. And while we’re at it, get rid of affirmative action, etc. because they aren’t needed anymore”. All while simultaneously ramping-up racist speech and action.

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