Excel

That scholarship has existed for years, it's called the GI bill. baaazing. and I'm banned.

I can only talk about what I have seen in various places, especially in the South, that I have lived. They are my own experiences and my own interpretation of them so I don't want to hear a bunch of s$*t...but what I'm talking about are the super-restrictive dress codes at bars, the members-only clubs and billiards lounges, the massive networks of private schools founded post-brown v. board, the public transportation systems that end just outside of white neighborhoods, white neighborhoods that are kept white with gates and housing authorities and even some things I've seen with police. I'm not some bleeding heart liberal but the de facto segregation and discrimination that exists in this country, at least in the South, is very real.

What is "white" anyway? Are the Irish and Spaniards white? Jews? Italians? They weren't 100-150 years ago.

meh, it's really not something worth getting worked up about. Many of the things you mentioned were started at a time when Blacks couldn't participate in the "white" versions of things either because of de jure discrimination like Jim Crow or de facto discrimination. Let's look at what you mentioned: CBC: 1971 Ebony: 1945 United Negro College Fund: 1944 BET: 1980 The best example of this is with HBCU's. Is the idea of a university for students of only one ethnic group racist? Maybe. But HBCUs still exist and it's understandable given their history...but if you look at the state of HBCU's today they're dying off as many of the good black students that used to choose to attend them are going to larger integrated schools. I think that will eventually happen with most of the things you listed. Is it a double standard? I don't know. A lot of dating sites, a lot of everything really, are effectively white-only or dominated by whites. Some places make it clear that whites are the only accepted group in almost every way short of putting up a Jim-Crow era sign. In a country with residual de facto discrimination/segregation I think it's worthwhile to have spaces for minorities to do their own thing but it doesn't matter what I think. These are private enterprises and they can do what they like. The only race issue that annoys me are race preferences in government jobs/universities.

Unrelated but I saw an ad for JDate on reddit the other day and this thread made me think of it:

Or better yet, taking a few religion courses about Christianity taught by native Indian Hindus.

Is it? I know some protestant denominations keep the Saints but certainly not like Catholics do and there's no praying to them.

Economic opportunity obvs. Of course I keed. But you have given me something to investigate. I;ve got some pretty good whens and where froms but I have never delved into the whys. The why's are difficult because they get lost. I would figure that would be a pretty important thing to remember and pass down but I guess it doesn't happen, at least it didn't in my family and I'm speculating on much of it if it's before 1900.

Economic opportunity obvs.

At the Statue of Liberty there is a plaque with a poem, The New Colossus, engraved upon it. You may be familiar with one of it's more popular bits: "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" This quote seems to embody what many of us think about those immigrants, that they were really the tired, poor and huddled masses, the wretched refuse the old world. That they came here to escape religious or ethnic persecution, hard economic times or war. But how much of this is true? Why did your family actually come here? What was their version of the "American Dream"? My Grandfather was more than 100 years old when he passed a few months ago and his death and the things that came out of it shook me up pretty bad. I dealt with that but also the idea of losing the oldest member of my family and an important link to the past. It got me digging in to my family's history and pondering that question - why did they come here? What drove them to emigrate? Here's what I found on mine and the reasons I think they left, much of it I can only speculate on based on where they came from, bits about them and events at the time: Mother's side (Swedish/English/Scottish) Great Grandfather 1 (GGF1) - Baptist family from Stockholm. The state church was Lutheran so that may have played a part. Sweden was also overcrowded and a lot of people left for better opportunties here. His parents emigrated to Wisconsin in the 1870's. I'm guessing that it was for Religious Freedom/Economic Opportunity. Great Grandmother 1 (GGM1) - Lutheran family from Stockholm. No idea exactly why they left but they also settled in Wisconsin around the same time, probably got swept up in the wave of Swedes that left so I'll say Economic Opportunity. GGF2 - Scottish family that emigrated to Nova Scotia but I have no idea when or why. He went to college in Toronto and became a doctor. Moved to New York and then Wisconsin in the 1920's. Economic Opportunity. GGM2 - English family that emigrated to Toronto and I have no idea when or why. Met my great grandfather and moved with him to the states in the 1920's. Economic Opportunity. Father's side (German) GGF1 - German family from Wissembourg in what is now France. Emigrated around 1795 and settled in New York and then Indiana where the family started a large furniture making company. Wissembourg was a battleground during the wars of the French Revolution and so either that or the prospect of making money probably drove the move. War/Economic Opportunity. GGM1 - Also from Alsace Lorraine and probably ethnic German judging from the maiden name. Married in Europe and emmigrated at the same time. War/Economic Opportunity. GGF2 - German family from Silesia, emigrated in 1920 to Ohio with his wife and my Grandmother probably due to the shakeup from the Silesian Uprisings after World War One. Started a factory in Ohio and lost it during World War Two. War/Economic Opportunity. GGM2 - Came with my great grandfather. War/Economic Opportunity. I just found it interesting because of eight of those families I think only one really falls into the "huddled masses" or "refuse" category. Everybody else was pretty average and just decided to make the jump...in fact they may have been slightly better off than their countrymen if they were able to afford to move and do what some of them did in the states. Is that true for you? Did your ancestors really get the boot?

Click on a poster's name, their page should load. Look to the right, do you see a green box with a number? That's a user's "reputation score" or count of their +1's. Look just below that you should see a box that says "User Tools", in that box you'll see a little icon with a pencil and a tag, next to the icon it should read "Display name history". Click that. A pop-up should appear showing a user's old names and current name with the change date. For you it says: NUandOU Hooked on Huskers Nov 13 2012 04:00 PM

Lots and lots and lots of people regardless of faith are being killed. I hope I will be the kind of person that always errs on the side of getting too worked up about stuff like that than on the side of diminishing it for a good laugh or something. People have always died and a fair amount of them get killed by other people. It's always been this way and no amount of emotion or compassion will prevent it in the future. You will die, I will die and eventually (fairly quickly) no one will remember and the world will keep spinning. You're trying to make sense of these things and apply broad labels to them like "persecution" or painting me and others with very very broad strokes, that's fine because it helps you function. A world in which bad things happen for reasons that don't make sense is just too painful for you to handle. It has to be persecution or part of some huge plan or conspiracy. That must be very difficult.

I never laughed off people's deaths, I laughed off the idea that they were part of some gigantic worldwide campaign of persecution of Christianity there's a difference. Do you laugh about 9/11 or the Kennedy assasination? No, most people don't but many people laugh at their related consipracy theorists.

Based on biased and anecdotal evidence. Not that Christians wouldn't say the same thing, but the ISHR is a self-described "secular" group that estimates 80% of religious discrimination is targetted towards Christians. I'm trying to track down the report, but even if their numbers are over-exaggerated, 80% towards one group? Idk man. Regardless, still not the point. ...and it's based in Frankfurt and publishes its reports in German and English. I can almost guarantee you that there's some "Center for Islamic Learning" in Jeddah or Riyadh that disagrees. I may be being biased though because I naturally assume that a LL thread is going to involve blowing something hugely out of proportion.

Let's imagine we asked an observant Muslim which popular religion is the most persecuted these days, what would he say? I'd bet he'd say Islam: - American military presence on the Arabian Peninsula - Four Western (Christian) invasions of Muslim countries in the last two decades including three occupations one of which is ongoing - Israeli occupation of Gaza and the Westbank/treatment of Palestinians - Drone Strikes throughout Pakistan/Yemen - Indian occupation/aims on Jammu and Kashmir - Chinese campaigns against Xinjiang sepratism - Russian campaigns against Chechnya - Genocide of Muslims in the Balkans - Western support for secular or moderate governments in the ME - Anti-Muslim incidents in America and Europe - Quran burnings, Muhammad Cartoons, Bans on head coverings - Anti-Muslim violence in Nigeria, Burma and other places Not trying to make this a persecution olympics but I think it's a point worth making - that Chrisitanity is not, without debate, the most persecuted religion in the world. I mean, can we dismiss many of things on that list as not actually being rooted in religion? Sure, just like we can with the Christian persecution list and while I do not feel that Muslims are being "persecuted" I find their list far more convincing than LL's. I guess I'm trying to say it's all about perspective and understanding. We can dismiss their list because we think there are more compelling political or economic issues behind each item but when we get to the Christian list oh no every single one is clearly about religion. They hate us because apple pie, grandma, baseball and jesus.

Ok no. I'm not saying it's ok to "persecute" Chrisitans but I just find this whole idea laughable. The few isolated incidents Landlord is citing are just that, isolated incidents and they're being blown way out of proportion. There is no world wide persecution and Christians have no idea what that's really like but broadly speaking they're pretty good at doing it to other people. I don't view it as religious based persecution because of the context of each incident: North Korea: Political issue more than it is religious. Nigeria: Most valid case there is but Boko Haram is terrorizing plenty of Muslims as well...basically anyone who isn't them and the nation has seen anti-Muslim violence as well. Iraq/Syria: Waaaay too complicated to paint this as a religious persecution issue. If anything I'd say that most of violence there is rooted in ethnic conflicts. Some groups are applying a thin religious veneer to it but just like in Nigeria they're "persecuting" plenty of Muslims as well. Oh come on. It's laughable to list these countries and say it's not a religion issue. Of course it's about religion. It's not like the dictators, regimes and mobs in North Korea, Nigeria and Iraq/Syria are persecuting Christians because they hate the sound of Methodist hymns. PS: So Bucky is in *favor* persecuting Christians? WHAT?? (/jk lol) I don't know what to say. You don't know what to say because you've never been over there and seen these things first-hand. You've only sat here in America and you've never been to the Middle East, or to Afghanistan, or anywhere else where these troubles may be happening. So how could you possibly know what's going on? Oh..... Wait...... lol I don't want to play that card, it's lame when people pull it out. Let's slide it back into the deck.

Ok no. I'm not saying it's ok to "persecute" Chrisitans but I just find this whole idea laughable. The few isolated incidents Landlord is citing are just that, isolated incidents and they're being blown way out of proportion. There is no world wide persecution and Christians have no idea what that's really like but broadly speaking they're pretty good at doing it to other people. I don't view it as religious based persecution because of the context of each incident: North Korea: Political issue more than it is religious. Nigeria: Most valid case there is but Boko Haram is terrorizing plenty of Muslims as well...basically anyone who isn't them and the nation has seen anti-Muslim violence as well. Iraq/Syria: Waaaay too complicated to paint this as a religious persecution issue. If anything I'd say that most of violence there is rooted in ethnic conflicts. Some groups are applying a thin religious veneer to it but just like in Nigeria they're "persecuting" plenty of Muslims as well. Oh come on. It's laughable to list these countries and say it's not a religion issue. Of course it's about religion. It's not like the dictators, regimes and mobs in North Korea, Nigeria and Iraq/Syria are persecuting Christians because they hate the sound of Methodist hymns. PS: So Bucky is in *favor* persecuting Christians? WHAT?? (/jk lol) I don't know what to say.

Ok thanks. I'm going to have to respectfully say that I still don't buy the persecution idea. 2,123 killings in 2013 of which half were in Syria which I have already said I see as being as much ethnic as it is religious. There are ~2.1 billion Christians in the world so that's about 1,000 out of more than two billion and you call it widespread persecution? Nah. Do people who identify as Christian have it rough in some areas of the world? Sure but its often due to many other factors that are only tangentially related to their religion. To call it persecution and start some big sob campaing is ridiculous especially given Christianity's history of actually persecuting people.

Did you actually read the links or nah? Isolated incidents is hardly how I would describe what is being reported. It's not really a matter of do you care or do you not care, but a matter of degrees. ZRod's answer seems pretty spot on to me, but also just confirms that we're all inconsistent, hypocritical and biased when it comes to what we really want to fight for. Ugh no I didn't read all of them just like I didn't watch the two hours of youtube video some guy posted the other day. TL/DR them for me.

Ok no. I'm not saying it's ok to "persecute" Chrisitans but I just find this whole idea laughable. The few isolated incidents Landlord is citing are just that, isolated incidents and they're being blown way out of proportion. There is no world wide persecution and Christians have no idea what that's really like but broadly speaking they're pretty good at doing it to other people. I don't view it as religious based persecution because of the context of each incident: North Korea: Political issue more than it is religious. Nigeria: Most valid case there is but Boko Haram is terrorizing plenty of Muslims as well...basically anyone who isn't them and the nation has seen anti-Muslim violence as well. Iraq/Syria: Waaaay too complicated to paint this as a religious persecution issue. If anything I'd say that most of violence there is rooted in ethnic conflicts. Some groups are applying a thin religious veneer to it but just like in Nigeria they're "persecuting" plenty of Muslims as well.