[bokonist]

If his peer group is in fact white, then it's not racist, just a statement of reality. And as for competition, most people only care about competing within their own peer/status group. And yes, it is bad for the economy if whites are significantly under invested in engineering. It's bad for the economy if anyone or any group is under invested in engineering. Anything "assumed" or implied by his post, is added by you, not by the original poster.

Let's save the racist card/downvotes for when someone actually makes personally disparaging remarks about someone of another race, not when someone just makes earnest and frank observations about society.

[barrkel]

See now, you just equated peer group with status group. If you believe that "white" can be a peer group, then that seems to imply that you also believe that "white" can be a status group, which is a far more troubling scenario.

Racism is not about making disparaging remarks about someone of another race. It's about prejudging, i.e. assuming that certain things are true, just because of that person's race.

[bokonist]

I'm saying that one's peer group is almost alway's one's status group. People don't personally compare themselves/compare self-worth versus a random sample of the population. We compare ourselves to friends, neighbors, classmates, and co-workers.

[barrkel]

By TheElder's own admission, some of his co-workers are not white. Why would he then choose to describe his status group as "whites"?

The more I read in this thread, the more I start to believe racism is deeply embedded in the American psyche.