Job Discussion Forums

[Ger]

Racism ad nauseum in this thread.

How is it that the USA found itself making the social policies it has on this question. Does the policy not stem from their policy on slavery?

[Kitegirl]

This thread has been super-interesting. I didn't post it with an opinion at all, my comment was just meant whimsically.
Interesting to see how people react - I think we're all mature (and jaded) enough to face the reality here.

[nolefan]

In all our Political Correctness, we often tend to forget the harsh truth or reality!!

[extoere]

Kitegirl: How Unfair of you to attempt to hold me to the facts at hand! How Cruel and Unjust! Where are my rights! Where, pray, is the fairness! The fact that you did NOT venture an opinion should not be allowed to stand in the way of a good brawl on this matter!

You're a good sport, Kitegirl. Your tone is refreshing. As Galileo so famously said: "I abjure."

Ger: You've used the word "racism" twice in your posts. Now that you've established your credentials in the Great White Liberals Yearbook and been duly annointed, let me ask you this: Do you truly believe that those opposing the mandates of "group rights" and agendas are racists? Re: your question about how the US came up with (presumably) these solutions, a cursory examination of our history will indicate the necessity for a good legal framework for protecting minority rights. But the solutions advanced by various interests groups have been sometimes draconian; at best, ineffective. As an example, the University of California, until very recently, had an OFFICIAL POLICY of holding Asian applicants to a rigid minimum, while actively recruiting blacks and Latinos who did not meet entrance requirements. One of my own former students, a young Chinese woman (now a Ph.D) was denied entrance to Berkeley because she didn't fit their elitist notions of "minority goals." But more to the point of your question, perhaps the true roots of so many of our programs, such as Affirmative Action, can be found in the words of President Johnson, who, after one particular signing ceremony, said: "We'll have the N-ggers voting for us for 200 years!"

Wolf: 'Backlash,' did you say? You Ain't Seen Nuthin' Yet!

Cheers!

[Redfivestandingby]

Wow!!! Fascinating. Here's my response. I think some of you are backing the writer of the ad based on some misconception of being free 'pc'.

Extoere: you're talking about just one case but it seems that you're generalizing its outcome and the scope of its effect. That's how we get racist beliefs. Regardless, that discussion has nothing to do with teaching in China since many people are here without any qualifications or expertise. They are hired simply because they are white and foreign. Very few schools here actually care about your education and experience.

Hey, I've been here long enough to see too many drunken white folks AT WORK. This is preferable? Should I generalize based on this? I suppose if that's what Chinese want then let them be happy with their choice.

There are many schools here that routinely turn down perfectly acceptable non-white individuals for white ones who have less to offer. Anyone working with hiring of foreignors will testify to this.

Why should we support what the ad writer wrote? We are here to educate. Not only English, folks. Yes, Chinese are fairly racist. This does not mean we have to support it.

Are you gonna tell me that it's perfectly acceptable to have someone from France or Russia teach English even though they are not native English speakers but solely because they are white? I'm not saying that they can't but it surely wouldn't be native.

This country wants to be open to the world. The world is made of all different colours. We should represent that.

[extoere]

Redfivestandingby: You offer a rather evangelical ethic to the world's oldest civilization. I agree with much of what you say. But it IS, after all, THEIR country. I question our prerogative of imposing our standards on China. I disagree with them. I believe ALL races should be included as teachers here. But it's THEIR choice. If they don't like ME, I will use that most coveted of possessions, my U.S. passport, and seek greener pastures.

As far as me "generalizing," using only one example, please consider that this has been the subject of a great deal of scrutiny for more than ten years now. Much to the embarrassment of our entire UC system, but Berkeley, the flagship institution, in particular. I just happen to have had one particularly bright young woman who worked hard and was denied admission SOLELY because she was Chinese! It's happened, quite literally, thousands of times! You can easily access the information regarding this matter in the Los Angeles Times archives or any number of other sources. But it's been a very real problem here, this matter of "chosen" minorities --- blacks, Latinos and "Native Americans," (as little as 1/16th blood quantum of any Indian nation) who are given preference over Asians. And this whole idea of "representation" by ethnicity or race is a rather ameliorative substitute for the word "quota," as advanced by self-interested professionals (read that the "Academic Elite Seeking Career Advancement") and specifically identifiable personalities on the Far Left of the political spectrum. (Nostalgic, no doubt, for the 1960s!)

Redfivestandingby, many of us enjoy the obvious sincerity of your posts. I'm reminded that those of us from outside China, no matter our origins, have a great deal to be thankful for. But while I'm in China, I will respect their wishes.

Cheers!
Ever-Sensitive Extoere

[Ger]

extoere, I am not in any "Great White Liberal Yearbook" and ease off on the labelling.

I don't wish to share my "belief" on that question with you right now, but I hear what you're saying about USA "racist" policy of allowing minorities access to your flagship and thereby denying majority peoples admission. I hear what you're saying about USA institutions denying a Chinese access to this or that too. I hear what you're saying about questioning "our" right of imposing "our" (perhaps you mean the "USA" here) values on the Chinese in their own country when it comes to the question of race, but I don't think a lack of "right" has stopped "us" before!

As Redfivestandingby said, you are rather "generalizing", I think you are generalizing on the extent of so-called Chinese racist policy, maybe there isn't one, I think the subject of this thread originated from one online advertisement that is racist in tone and nature, which generated subsequent racist post that are similar in nature.

I hope you don't ever have to go elsewhere with your American passport, if that's what you've got, because of racism, but imagine for a moment if there were no where else to go, where ever you went with your USA passport and your ethnicity you were ostracised because of those facts and none other.

[Redfivestandingby]

I've got to say that I'm very happy with the general tone of these postings. Very civil for a controversial topic.

Yes, I agree the affirmative action rulings regarding the education system in California have been disastrous. But even if this happens in California, NY, or any major area, the benefits to minorities(as far as I'm concerned) outweighs the negative ones in the rest of the country. Of course if you are that person(like the Chinese person that Extoere mentioned) who got bumped out then you wouldn't be too happy. I understand.

It's not a perfect system by no means. But it's one that is attempting to balance inadequacies in education from our American past.

Now to China. I don't want to impose my values on anyone. But since China has been so closed for such a long time they are hungry to learn how, what, and why we do what we do. How do we think and why. The only way to get this across is by having 'others' here. Simply put, they are ignorant.

I'll tell you my experience. I'm not white so I do take this subject personally. I've been told many times that I have been denied a job in China because "you are black". I'm not black but that's all they see. After a couple of months here my first year, one of my students came up to me and said that when she first met me she was sure that she wouldn't like me simply because of the colour of my skin. Now, she liked me and enjoyed the classes.

This type of 'confession' has happened many times in my four years here. I'm glad that these students made that breakthrough, got over my appearance, and learned. Some started to say that I was very good-looking. But that's another problem!

If China continues in their discriminatory hiring procedures they will never be able to get a chance to 'breakthrough' and get to know people.

I agree with extoere, as I said in my first post, it's their choice in the end.

Another reason I'm concerned about this topic is the Chinese notion that discrimination is a foreign concept. I've heard it too many times, "We Chinese are not racist". Only we Westerners are capable of this. A lot of this attitude is shear ignorance and a lot is just face.

[extoere]

Ger: "Labeling," did I hear? "..ease off on the labelling?" was it? The reader was accosted not once, but TWICE, by your own use of the term "racism." Labeling, indeed!

One might easily be reminded of the late Thurgood Marshall, whose tenure on the U.S. Supreme Court was distinguished ONLY by the color of his skin --- he was the first black appointment to the high court (by Johnson) and left the court without authoring a single significant opinion - - -- who had the predictable habit of labeling as "racist" any argument against wholesale bussing of school children in order to address "imbalance." At one point, Justice Scalia, noticeably irritated by Marshall's kneejerk reactions at every given opportunity, exploded in open court: "This line of reasoning is growing extremely thin!"

Just as the postings on this particular thread have become.

In closing my admittedly modest contributions on this particular subject, let me note that the ethnic and racial origins of my own IMMEDIATE family are the following: Ireland, Scotland, France, Germany, the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma, the Island of Iloilo in the Philippines, the Hawaiian Homelands of Keaukaha on the Big Island of Hawaii, Guangdong Province, PRC, and Hiroshima, Japan. Given this, I am most acutely aware that the problem of "racism" ---- or "tribalism," if you prefer --- is quite multi-dimensional and not confined to the black experience. Nor are the solutions (if, indeed, "solutions" exist!) so easily amenable to the facile suggestions by those whose perceptions are cultured in the cocoon of a lifelong classroom environment, student-to-teacher, and, of course, that warm, salubrious mind-bath that is our current educational process.

As John Updike so felicitously penned in his poem, Sand Dollar:
" .. and know, my sudden young archaeologist
that other modes of being do exist."

Cheers,
Ever the warm-blooded, hot sperm-spurting, Upanishadic Extoere

[gingermeggs]

[been_there]

Well, I got a response from the guy who posted that first ad on Lonely Planet:

[Teacher Lindsay]

I have been in China for only 2 months.

Thus far I have met ESL teachers from, inter alia, Bulgaria, Kenya, Nigeria and Cameroon.

Their enunciation was poor and their inflections were often incorrect.

I was astounded that they have secured employment as ESL teachers.

I'm inclined towards the view that "xiaoaogz" is referring to persons from African countries and is ignorant to the fact that there are native English speaking colored people.

I most definitely think that skin-color should not be a criterion for securing employment as an ESL teacher in China, but being born and raised in USA, Canada, Britain, Australia or New Zealand should be.

Cheers.

[Kitegirl]

Slightly off-topic here - but I'm not in Indonesia for this reason.

[extoere]

Kitegirl: In your particular case, my suspicion is that they're missing out on a lot! Their loss is Guangzhou's gain! And hey, at least Guangzhou has lots of that true gourmet's favorite --- MacDonald's! (for whenever you wanna get some reasonably decent OJ!)

[jg]