It's not a straw man at all (I think you mean argument from authority but it's not one of those either). I'm not saying that you can't have an opinion on this subject because you're not black. I'm saying that if you'd lived through the 50s and 60s as a black man, there's no way you'd be saying that things haven't changed.

Again, this isn't just anecdotal, it's backed by actual data. I know that racism still exists. I'm sure there are people whose attitudes haven't changed since the civil rights era. But you're claiming that you "have not seen any significant changes in the attitudes or actions of the majority of people in rural Washington or rural Georgia from those days."

I can't say that your experience is wrong obviously, but I can say that the conclusions you're drawing are innacurate.

And as an aside, no, most of the comments on this article are not racist. Again, you seem to have a tendency towards negative generalisations. I've read every single on of the comments here, something I'm confident you haven't done.

What I think needs to be clearly understood, is that the level of lunacy (articles about racist rocks), exaggeration, and divisiveness in today's racial discourse is damaging to progress. Yes, a lot of people are frustrated with the "nothing has changed since the 50s" style of rhetoric because everybody can see that it's not true. So instead of generating sympathy you generate suspicion and frustration.

I've written about racism numerous times here. I've come across a few racists. It's an opportunity to talk some sense into them and I often succeed. But the overwhelming majority of my comments are from people who care about these issues but are tired of the divisive way they're being talked about. The question needs to be; are we interested in venting or progress?

Articles that act as if the civil rights movement never happened are in fashion on Medium, but all they do is push people to greater extremes of "them and us". Go and see how many of the comments on *those* articles are racist. Then we'll have something to talk about.