[shadowgovt]

In computer security, we often talk about the lack of distinction between malice and ignorance---if the security system is bad, it doesn't matter if the attacker is intent on causing harm or merely innocently curious and hack-sawing away through your computer security for fun. The outcome is the same.

I think the same principle applies here. Malicious racism and passive racism have the same effect.

[darawk]

"Ism" is a suffix that implies a philosophy. An ism is a suite of beliefs. Anything that is unconscious is, by definition, not an ism. Racism refers to people with a philosophy of racial hierarchy, or ideas about race that evoke or imply such a philosophy.

For instance, Buddhism is a suite of beliefs about enlightenment and transcendence. We don't refer to people as "structural Buddhists" simply because they have equanimity.

[tpxl]

I'll bite, what the fuck is passive racism?

[shadowgovt]

The unconscious biases people walk around with in their heads. They're things people pick up without realizing it that lead to friction for minorities in society.

Studies have shown that people who don't think themselves to be actually racist still act in race-discriminatory ways. For example, people with non-ethic-names get more callbacks for their resume controlled for qualifications on the resume (https://www.nber.org/digest/sep03/employers-replies-racial-n...).

[tpxl]

So a bad way to say unconscious racism.