if we can't generalize about races, there are no races
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can't find a reference to it online yet, so i'll say up front i'm not sure which coach said it, but there was a line from a press conference in the last few days about how black athletes can run faster than whites and this coach was saying he could use more black athletes, and apparently, people got offended, nevermind he was basically complimenting folks. it's an odd thing, we can't generalize about races but then, what's the point in noting races at all? nevermind, of course, that the usual races people bother to reference aren't even necessarily scientifically valid races, but something more like ethnicities or cultural breakdowns that just happen to coincide with certain shades of skin. and, for that matter, assuming blacks are good athletes, is that more an issue of "race" (muscular and skeletal structure, for example) or, as some say, is it a cultural thing, blacks only being able to make it in sports or music or gangs? and, how racist do i sound repeating that one?

the thing is, in order for anyone to get offended by a comment about his race, that person has to recognize the race in question in the first place, and then, in that recognition, do they not justify any and all generalizations about that race? obviously, there are generalizations that are inaccurate, but come on, these days we've got stastics out the wazoo that can tell us which races do what, and regardless of exceptions, we need to generalize to talk about groups. that's pretty much the only way to talk about groups. and, in the modern world, with global communications, the internet and whatnot, pulling us all toward a big conglomerate of a society, what other way is there to talk except about groups?

ah, why bother?