Thursday, April 23, 2015

RACISM 101 please meet
ANTI-RACISM 101

A friend of a friend found this headline


"This Is What Happened When Maine Forced Welfare Recipients To Work For Their Benefits"
along with the required image of black and brown people standing on line, obviously poor.  But this time it was a picture of black and brown men...in MAINE.




File this post under
*AN IMAGE IS WORTH A THOUSAND WORDS*



Problem 1:
The image the U.S. Herald used to symbolize *lazy welfare recipients* in Maine is actually a photo from NY City.
Source:
http://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/people-wait-on-line-to-receive-donated-coats-at-the-kickoff-news-photo/56304568


Problem 2:
According to the census bureau black and brown population of Maine is less than 5% 
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/23000.html


Problem 3:
And here is a little Welfare Fraud Story from Maine. I can't remember if every single picture was of white people but most of them were.
http://www.wptz.com/news/dozens-arrested-in-yearlong-welfare-fraud-investigation/31174798


Problem 4?
I haven't bothered to find out what percentage of welfare recipients in freaking Maine are black or brown because I already know the image was chosen to create a certain impression. And anybody with a high school diploma worth the paper it was written on should know most welfare recipients are women and children -- not men as pictured.

Something you may not have bothered to think about? The white population's average poverty rate is 9% (in good years) And the black population's poverty rate is 28% (in good years) HOWEVER, black people are only 13% of the population while the white population is 77%*  according 2013 info on Census  This would tend to mean it's likely that are 2x as many white people as black nationwide. Now think about what 94% white Maine's welfare rolls look like. 


ANTI-RACISM TIP 1: Did you know that you can right click most images, save it, then go to go WWW.GOOGLE.COM or WWW.BING.COM to the search "IMAGES" section to search an actual image? All you have to do is find the word "image" on either search engine, then click on the camera icon and upload the picture you want to search for. You'll get results like the photo here. Dozens. Sometimes, if the photo is not TOO over-used all over the net,  you can find out where a photo was purchased. 



IMAGE USED TO DEPICT LAZY WELFARE RECIPIENTS IN MAINE
- AFTER SUBMITTED TO GOOGLE SEARCH



ANTI-RACISM TIP 2:  I used 95% of the above to place a comment on the article itself...which they'll have to approve in order for it to show up. But I also sent 95% of this message to two advertisers I saw within the online article --Goedeckers and Consumer Reports.

My final comments in the e-mails I sent were as follows:



The article you are advertising within should be called RACISM CREATION 101.  It's a teachable moment for sure.

I hope you choose your advertising spaces more carefully in the future
I hope you find these anti-racism tips useful, but not too often.

* I've heard much lower numbers for white population, but this is likely could be due to census corrections, white paranoia or purity desires. We'll use the 77% link to the census)

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