Black men only: UConn's proposed 'learning community' sparks controversy

[frizzled]

82. I'm probably a lot further left than you

Jim Crow was a caste system set up to harm black people and thoroughly abhorrent.

I don't rule out voluntary segregation under all possible circumstances. If there's a desire for it and it does not harm or disadvantage one group over another.

Our democratic politics are based on an assumption we all have the same interests, but we now know this is false. Some groups of people simply don't get along. Segregation is probably the best solution. It's conservative to oppose segregation under all circumstances.

The important thing is that neither the government nor civil society can 'unmake racism'. There is no tolerance pill, which can cure an individual’s negative and hostile attitudes to specific groups. Anders Breivik and Dylann Roof are here to stay. So is hostility to specific minorities, and aggressive expression of that hostility. So are the fanboys: some people will continue to admire Breivik and Roof, and to see their actions as justified.

We can not make people be nice to each other. Despite all its surveillance powers, the United States government can't stop them killing each other either. Nor can European governments, even though the killing may be less frequent, and take a different form.

People hate other people. People want to kill other people. They say so openly. Social media made it possible for each individual to broadcast their attitudes to the world, and the result was a flood of hate and death threats.

What the state can do, is keep them apart. Paradoxically, the fact that individuals hate groups more than other single individuals, makes it easier to separate them. If a white person hates blacks, the state can keep that person away from blacks. If a Christian hates gays, the state can keep that person away from gays. If a feminist hates men, the state can keep her away from men. And it works both ways: if a gay man hates homophobes, the state can keep that person away from homophobes.

I see in America an inability to confront the issue of hatred and hostility. I see platitude after platitude, but a general unwillingness to analyse society and politics. I see millions of reactions, but apparently none of them innovative. Everyone says roughly what you would expect them to say, and they will say it again, after the next racially motivated mass shooting.

Segregation is probably the answer to racism.

This is a Peace Wall in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It segregates Catholics from Protestants. Together with guaranteed Catholic and Protestant governments, it means both groups have their interests represented and they are kept from harming one another.