As to #1, I'm sorry if I wasn't clear, but the frustrations I was expressing with the "system" weren't directed towards the system itself (though I do, in fact, have many, many, many frustrations) but instead to the way we have been talking about the system. I just don't find it very productive to talk about the system and the problems it causes in the abstract, as this monolithic entity. I don't see us getting anywhere when we criticize the "system" when it's really specific institutions within that system that are to blame.

I also think this conversation veered wildly from Kipp's original premise: That when we talk about White Supremacy, we're not giving enough credence to the role that class - and not just race - plays in that system. The discussion of whether or not Kipp had a right to feel alienated became the focus, but I think this RaceVClass dynamic (the topic of this thread) is a very worthwhile conversation to be having. Like you said, William David, we have a society where we still very much feel the effects of the vestiges of slavery, Jim Crow and segregation. While the position that blacks (and other minorities) hold in society can certainly be attributed to race, I'm not so sure that there's such a 1-to-1 causal connection from race to explain why there's such inertia at the present moment. Achieving equality involves selflessness. Giving more power to the lower classes involves taking away power from the upper classes. Ensuring fair opportunity involves sacrifice from the top. In my mind, it's these factors that more adequately explain our unwillingness to change. I am certainly not going to deny that race plays a huge factor in all of this, especially within an institution such as our system of mass incarceration. There is definitely a certain aspect of the "other" that makes achieving equality that much more difficult when the lower classes are predominantly made up of people of another skin color or ethnicity. But at the end of the day, the reason society is not going to change is because that would involve loss from those holding the keys to change. And that holds true no matter what color your skin is.

-- JaredMiller - 19 Apr 2012