United Statesian

These are my notes from "Caste" by Isabel Wilkerson. Note: This is not a review of the book or a complete set of the ideas presented. It is simply a list of points, listed in order of presentation in the book, that I found interesting. I have added some personal comments from personal experiences. This picture has nothing to do with the book. It is just a picture of me reflecting. 😏🤔 1. Do not focus on individuals and racism. Focus on the Caste system that causes inequality. I think that this is the single most useful idea in the book. My takeaway is that it is often useless to blame/attack individuals for their racism. It is more productive to point out problems from the Caste system and working to fix the system. 2. Nazi Germany used the US system, laws, and history (Indian genocide, Jim Crow laws of percentages, slavery, etc) to set up a less extreme system for Jews. The fact that the USA had the best legal model for Nazis to set up a system to discriminate against (and

Builing Bridges, not walls... Claude Monet, National Art Gallery, Washington DC, December 2008, Photo copyright @unitedstatesian Basic truth/facts which are accepted by the majority of the population seem to be rare. The path to reaching the common ground is more indirect than might be expected  The direct route would be for journalists on both sides to form a kind of consensus commission. A multi-partisan group could work together to publish a "wiki" of agreed facts from the previous week's events. They could complement these posts with lists of contested facts on parts they do not agree on and links to their supporting evidence.  In my opinion, the road to true change would also require the creation of one or two new parties, but I will leave that for a future post :-)  However, these dry, unemotional facts would only solve a small part of the problem and I argue that it starts with two key concepts becoming part of colloquial language.... The solution lies in making  M