Q vs. A, Ped-x-ing Racist?, Round One

Q: Are pedestrian crossing signals racist? 

My first encounter, like fall down, full body blow of ped-x-ing possible racism took place with a dear friend, as we approached a cross walk with our partners who are both a mixed variety of ethnicity and capacity to literally look like - in color and form - the way that bleached white figure told us to cross the street. I felt like the signal was telling me only specific people could cross the street.  I think I think too much?

A: Pedestrian crossing signals are racist because everything created by a human is inherently racist. 
Racism involves the differential treatment of one person/tribe/people/nation by another person/tribe/people/nation with different shared habits or characteristics.

Because every race cannot logistically be involved in the creation of a pedestrian crossing signal, the creation of a crossing signal symbol inherently will exclude the characteristics of the race(s) left out of the decision process. This is not to say that racism can be avoided by including all of the races in a discussion. No matter who is making the decision, conscious rejection of other races and subconscious preference for ones own race will shade the end result pedestrian crossing towards some race(s) and against others.

Ask yourself if it would be possible to create a completely race neutral pedestrian crossing. Maybe a color changing LED could be implemented that would scroll through the full rainbow of colors. The shape and gender of the symbolic every-pedestrian also would need to be adjusted to achieve what amounts to a race-less figure. Even assuming this is possible- consider the can of worms that is opened with respect to others who justifiably feel unrepresented by "pedestrian 2.0". Is our selection of an upright seemingly able bodied stick figure prejudicial to those in wheel chairs, the obese and amputees? 

My solution- Privatize pedestrian crossings and allow the highest bidder to replace inherently racist and outdated symbols with popular and current symbols of their brand(s). Spongebob could appear at a school intersection in brilliant digital color and alert children of when to cross. Michael Vick could appear at an intersection near Central Park and implore passers by to "stop walking across the intersection- and animal cruelty." In light of municipal budget shortfalls and the relative lack of advertising available when walking, this may be the right time to take decisive action.

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Also, please participate at the end of each post, voting on which unanswered questions you would like answered for the following week. Submit your votes through the comments section of the post. 

What and why and who: Q vs. A.

Welcome to the illustrious kingdom of Q vs. A, quizzical curiosity and endless searching for new answers. The minds inside this kingdom accept that for many questions, several answers would be acceptable. And that for every answer, usually a new question emerges.

Q: What is the point of this blog? 

A:  The purpose of this blog serves as a home base for Qforquizzical versus Aforanswers (or Q vs. A). These two bantering lunatics, when not howling at the moon for resolution and peace, well - they can be found debating inane though life sustaining topics. Through a series of proposed questions, then answers and perhaps more questionable answers - this blog invites friends, family, and foes to weigh in on the commentary.

Periodically, Q vs. A, will send twitter messages inviting discourse around important topics such as: "Why does denim go with anything?" or "What one holiday (real or imaginary) could summarize the diverse energy of the Mid-Western portion of the United States?"

Q: Why exist at all? And why create more blogs in a blog-saturated society?

A: Is there really a simple answer here, for Q vs. A? Of course not. But if we must: why exist?

Well, Q vs. A intends to be a respectful space to be curious, at times irreverent risk takers, hoping to learn as much about self, other, difference and productive disagreement while blabbering about specific topics. We hope friends, family, and foe will be inspired to engage with us along our journey. Regarding the second question, too many pointless blogs exist but the creators of this blog think they are so important, thus their blog is equally important.

Q: Who are these important bloggers?

A: For short, Q and A represent two individuals who ran on the same cross country team in high school, one among the slowest runners and the other among the elite, speediest. Through the miraculously rejuvenating Democratic Process of the Democratic Primaries  - ideas were juggled, debates were had. One was a staunch Hillary Clinton supporter since her first word at age 18 months happened to be "mom," and the other - a wise supporter of Barack Obama since his tenth grade advanced placement history course explicitly teaching to the test, tested for knowledge of White Man's supremacy. Eventually, through a shared mind-set to embrace different perspectives, and life experiences - two stances concluded to support the best candidate! Oh, which one? The candidate that won, of course. Because together, Q vs. A always comes out a winner. Or, prove us wrong!

Specifically, our bios:

Q (aka, Quinn Honig) : over-educated nonsensical who enjoys a solid debate with a side of bullshit and ambivalent convictions.  She works in homeless services for the city of Boston. In addition, her creative writing hobby has been flagrantly self-advertised at qhonig.worpress.com.

Twitter name: qforquizzical 

versus

A (aka, Ahamed Iqbal)): aspiring renaissance man with an unnatural love of confusion, contradiction and conflagrations. He is a licensed Attorney who would rather shoot things (in the photographic sense). His work can be seen on zincphoto.com and iqbalphoto.com 

Twitter name(s):aforanswers, ahamediqbal, zincphoto