Re: "The blacks" -- It's Debateable

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Subject: Re: "The blacks"

Author:
Raisinmom

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Date Posted: 12:41:03 09/26/02 Thu
In reply to: Astrid 's message, "Re: "The blacks"" on 11:34:41 09/26/02 Thu

>"When you say "the aboriginals," you can only be
>referring to a particular group of people."
>
>No, it could mean Australians, South Americans, or
>North American first nations.

I understand that -- I should have said, you can only be referring to a group of people.

>But that aside, I think what you are objecting to is
>gross generalisations. When we're talking about "the
>blacks who fought for civil rights" we aren't
>generalising, so that's ok. When we're talking about
>"blacks in America" it's ok. "The whites in South
>Africa have lost a great deal of political authority"
>is ok. Right?

Well, as I said above, that's part of it, but not the whole story. Generalizations are problematic for reasons separate than the objections to "the blacks" as a term. I can only refer you to my previous post...the problem is that terms like "the blacks" and "the whites" do not necessarily refer to people (at ANY level of generalization). That's what I don't like.

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