The row centres around the exhibition ‘This is Colonialism’ and the museum’s decision to restrict white people from entering a small section of the display
Police officers are gathered in front of the Zeche Zollern museum in Dortmund, the focus of what social networks are describing as a racism scandal.
The row centres around the exhibition ‘This is Colonialism’ and the museum’s decision to restrict white people from entering a small section of the display. For several months now, Saturdays at the museum have been reserved for black people and people of colour to explore a colonialism exhibition
The museum claims the objective is not to be discriminatory, but to reserve a safe space for reflection for non-whites.
No, as that would be completely ignorant of the contextual reality of the situation.
‘Context’ is not a ‘get-out-of-jail-free’ card. Malcolm X’s pre-Mecca racism, for example. was far, far less heinous than the racism of the America he lived in due to context - but that does not mean it wasn’t bad. Likewise, othering a race with benevolent intent is still, at its core, othering a race of human beings.
And in any case, the point is meant to refute the idea that “you can pick literally any other time”. That you can pick another time does not mean that the circumstances which force you to do so are right. Even if you still think it is correct to continue this practice, that “It’s only 4 hours” is not a valid argument regarding whether the principle of the thing is moral or not.
Do you also consider affirmative action racism? Is women’s sports blocking male competitors misandry?
There’s a world where this could be racist, but it’s not the one we live in yet.
No
Misandry is a strong word for it, but I would say it’s not ideal. Of course, there’s also the broader issue of the most physical sports being, by their nature, a discriminatory (in the most literal, not moral, sense of the word) endeavor, from weight to height to genetics, and since I’m not a big sports person to begin with, I try not to have strong opinions on the subject.
I do have strong opinions on non-physical sports with separate women’s divisions, and especially those which bar women from participating in non-women’s divisions.
So how about something like chess or e-sports, which have little physical demands if at all? (It’s my understanding that both have open leagues and women’s leagues – no women exclusionary leagues.) Do you think it’s (problematically) discriminatory to have women’s only leagues? If so, why?
Ahh, see, that to me seems exactly what is being intended here: to help make a space more accessible for an otherwise under-represented group. That’s why it doesn’t strike me as being particularly segregationist, even though I’d agree that in a vacuum it’s problematic.