High School Caucasian Club deemed 'culturally insensitive' by NAACP-double standard?

The BBQ Pit
121

Not so. It’s not that they can’t have the same kind of club because someone doesn’t want them to. They can’t have the same kind of club because it’s just not possible in fact. Various African-American clubs (and other ethnic clubs, perhaps) are formed for the purpose of adressing real inequalities in our culture, real discrimination against them. White kids can’t have such a club because no such discrimination against them exists.

Your accusation of racism is akin to calling someone sexist if they say a man can’t get pregnant.

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I think the problem is that a lot of people are equating African American with Black, which is not the case at all. Caucasian on the other hand, indeed is the same thing as White. So an African American club is not a club formed solely on the color of skin, whereas a Caucasian club is a club about people of a particular skin color. I don’t know how others feel, but I personally think if it were called something different, there would be no problem at all.

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People are too easily offended. Who gives a shit if this club actually happens ? Will it in any way hurt you ? You don’t like it, don’t fuckin sign up for it.
I think ANY policy or organization drawn on a racial premise is stupid. In this day and age I’d think INCLUSIVE clubs should be the norm, not exclusive ones. But we can’t have that. The US is too busy making minority friendly tests instead of addressing why they’d scored lower, making sure Halloween costumes don’t offend anyone, and making sure my smokes are as expensive as possible while obese people chow their way to heart disease unabated.
Personally, I give less than a shit where anyone is from. Interesting conversations aside, it really doesn’t matter in the big scheme of things and I’d never base a decision on it. People need to stop being so thin skinned.

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In this grand argument, what seems pretty clear to me that if this young woman wanted to explore the impact that her “whiteness” had on non-white people, she’d want to start a group that wasn’t, by name or design, going to have an unwelcome atmosphere for non-white people. One cannot learn about the interaction of races and cultures and in a vacuum. No matter how supposedly altruistic her intention, non-white people aren’t going to join a “Caucasian Club” and a half minute’s thinking (or a simple question of anyone who isn’t white) should’ve made that clear.

This leads to a number of possible conclusions:
1.) This girl is appallingly naive.
2.) This girl is appallingly stupid.
3.) This girl’s intention was to be politically provocative. (Raising a discussion of race much like this thread.)
4.) This girl’s intention was to be racially provocative. (Hoping to engender enough support to indicate to minority students that they needed to “keep in their place.”)
5.) This girl really thought that she could create a white supremacist club hidden under a glossy exterior of “discussion.” (Which would also indicate that 1 and/or 2 are true.)

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“I’m not oppressing you, Stan, you haven’t got a womb. Where’s the fetus gonna gestate ? Are you gonna keep in in a box ?!” HA !

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They are not analogous in a theoretical discussion. In real life, which is what I deal with, African-American means “black”, and you know it, or are you going to happily include all of those blue eyed, blond haired, light skinned folks from South Africa in the term “African-American”. Stop hiding behind semantics. If your point is valid, you don’t need to.
How about we examine the particulars of this discussion with a real life example. I’ll pull it out of my own life, and I will be really interested in your answers.

Back in the day, when I was but a wee weirdo, I was considering my options for college. It came down to two choices: Towson State University or Morgan State University, both here in my beloved hometown of Baltimore. Towson is what you might call a “typical” school, the majority of the students are white. Morgan is a “traditionally black school”, it’s like Howard or Florida A&M. 95% of the students are black. Both schools have an approximately equal academic reputation. I’m not saying that what I’m bringing up here factored into my decision at the time, it didn’t, I went to Towson mainly because my girlfriend at the time went there. Still, it raises certain questions that I will lay out here. Remember that my parents were perfectly capable of paying for whatever college I chose. I’m an upper middle class white male, the archetect of everything that’s wrong with America today.</light sarcasm>
#1 If I had chosen Morgan, I would have been eligable for minority benifits (finacial aid). I prolly would have taken them reguardless of weather I needed them at the time. By doing so, I would have taken that money away from a likely equally deserving black student. Should I have taken the aid? If not, why not? It was freely given.

#2 Assuming that I had attended Morgan, I might have tried to form a White Student Union to connect with that 5% of students who were like me racially. We would have been absolutely a minority at the school, nevermind that in society as a whole we weren’t. Should such a blatent congregation of white students be allowed? If not, why not? What’s the difference from all of the Black Student Unions that exist on every college campus today?

#3 Lets flip this around. I go to Towson. I try to apply for financial benefits because my grandfather was a persecuted Pole who fled to Ameirca 70 years ago. It’s tenuous, but I can make it stick, even though I don’t need it. Should I get the financial aid as a certified “minority”?

#4 Now I’m at Towson. I decide that I want to start a “Caucasion Student Union”. I simply want a forum where people who are white can take pride in the acomplishments of white folks in the past, without any context of slavery or anything else. Black folks are welcome to participate… Is what I’m doing acceptable or not?

DtC, I anticipate your response to these situations. I’d really like to hear it. I hope you can have a defense based in the real world, please, give me one.

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How about: ( and I have NO idea what this girl wanted )

  1. This girl recognized what a big deal race is in our society and wanted a forum to discuss it.

You’re assigning negative motives when such motives haven’t been shown to exist.

128

{mourns the death of intellectual rigor}
Basic principle of equality: what’s good for the goose is good for the gander. If it is morally permissible for people of race X to form a club based on X, it is also morally permissible for people of races A-Z. It can’t not be morally permissible without racism entering into it.

129

Not at all. Recognizing that racism against black folks has always existed in this wonderful country of ours (</mild sarcasm>) in no way invalidates a desire to speak about it. Your premise is flawed. You assume that any group of white folks are only going to meet to discuss how to perpetate racism. They might be meeting to fight it. If you treat people differently because of their skin color or ethnic origin, it is racist. By definition.

130

I don’t assume that, though I admit that it strikes me as the most likely possibility. I think TeaElle’s list covers it well.

Maybe, but if so, they chose a remarkably stupid way to go about it. If that was their aim, they should have called it “The Race Relations Forum” or “The Anti-Discrimination Caucus” or some such thing. Calling it “The Caucasian Club” gives exactly the wrong impression.

131

I would say that the girl was simply young. Naive, perhaps, but not appallingly so. Most of the problems with her plan seem to have been based on a lack of adult supervision (when she initiated the petition) and adult overreaction (once the petition had been circulated).

The fact that a number of people in Oakley, CA (and several people in this thread) have continued to argue (both pro and con) over the “exclusive” nature of the design of the club says rather more about the preconceptions that adults are bringing to the issue than it does about the merits of her plan. From the very first reports, in August, the fact that the proposed club was to be open to all people has been prominently noted.

132

If the girl wanted to start a club to discuss race issues she should have started a “Race in Society Club” or joined the debate team and sank her teeth into affirimative action and such.

Starting a “Caucasion Club” because you want to discuss racial issues applicable to society as a whole is like starting a “Christian Club” to discuss world religions.

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No, the assumption is that if a group of white people wanted to honestly discuss how to fight racism, they wouldn’t do anything to exclude non-white people from the dialogue, and would in fact make an effort to include non-white people in the dialogue because otherwise, they’re spinning their wheels.

When white people put together a group, which from its very inception is founded with an incredible barrier to the inclusion of non-whites – in this case, the name “Caucasian club” and the state goal of focusing on European history – it’s not at all unbelievable that there is no interest among the members of that particular group in fighting racism or in having a dialogue non-white people at all.

It’s like a group of my male colleagues deciding to hold a business meeting at a strip club/ I could certainly attend, but it’s pretty clear (no matter how much they protest to the contrary) that my presence is not particuarly wanted, and it would extremely awkward for all involved if I showed up.

How you name an organization matters, and by the time you’re a sophomore in high school you should be smart enough to have figured that out. Just as the Boy Scouts is for boys and the Christian kids don’t go swimming at the Jewish Community Center, non-white kids aren’t going to be joining a Caucasian Club. That’s a no-brainer.

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Ya know, for a bunch of folks that ain’t racist, you sure as shit are concerned with the “appearance” of things. Its gotta have the right name, its gotta have the right motives, its gotta have the right membership… :dubious:

Have all of you forgotten that this is high school? Would you rather the girl had started a High School Pregnancy club? Or would you the be debating whether the intention of the club was to increase or decrease high school pregnancies? Do you all assume that Teen Smoking clubs are where underage people get together for a relaxing cigarette and to compare brands?

There’s an awful lot of flying shoes in here, as hard as some knees are jerking.

What’s wrong with allowing the club, then basing the response on what the club actually does? Observation as opposed to supposition. There’s a stretch. :rolleyes:

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I didn’t say that others would necessarily be excluded.

I think there are some assumptions that really aren’t supported by the article in the OP. First of all, this isn’t about the white supremacy movement. I didn’t find a single shred of evidence that the girl wanted to start this club as a separate “white pride” thing. From the sound of it, she wanted to start it as an educational experience, so people of different backgrounds can learn about each other. And I think that’s a good thing. There is a lot I’d like to learn about Ireland and the Irish-Americans, because I’m not. I’m sure Airman wants to learn about the Jews in America because he’s not. Why shouldn’t there be a campus club where these kinds of things can be discussed?

Robin

136

How about “slave descendants”? That would seem to be the obvious choice (and it’s actually fewer syllables than “African-Americans”). **

So all the progeny of those blacks who immigrated here after the passage of the thirteenth amendment have had an easier time of things than the progeny of slaves?

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1.) You shouldn’t take aid you don’t need regardless of the circumstances.

2.) In the context of a white minority in a black school I could see the value in forming a support group to deal with those issues. I would not want such an organization to exclude black people, though. It may even work better simply to form an organization designed to deal with racial tensions which would revolve around a continuing dialogue between all students rather than just creating an insulated haven for one.

3.) See number one.

4.) It’s fucking offensive.

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It isn’t. What is factual is the extent to which a given definition is in popular use, of which the appearance of that given definition in a dictionary is evidence.

Diogenes did not simply say he had his own unique oddball proprietary definition of “African American” – that would have been unassailable. He said more; he said that his understanding was in popular circulation. That is a factual claim for which he has offered no evidence.

And while you’re right that the use of terms can vary from place to place (“grabbing a fag” has very different meanings in the US versus Britain), somehow I doubt that Minnesota uses the term “African American” in a wildly different fashion than New York and Texas. **

No. That’s called boostrapping: you’re saying your arguing that the term has deeper meaning is itself evidence that the term has deeper meaning.

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Malcolm X once spoke about this very issue in a speech in which he commented on the way that African immigrants were treated as exotic, interestinga nd equal by white Americans while slave-descendants were treated like crap.

As a matter of fact, dark-skinned immigrants have had some things going for them that slave-descendants have not have. Voluntary immigrants come with their cultural heritage intact. They have not suffered the trauma of of dozens of generations of degredation and slavery. They have not had generation after generation of family systems ripped apart. They know their own names.

The sociological effects of slavery are still present in those descendants. They have psycho/sociological issues which immigrants do not have. It’s a different experience.

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I’m reminded of a story from Angela Davis’s autobiography. When she and her sister were teenagers in Jim Crow south, they decided they wanted to buy some shoes at a fancy store downtown.

Normally they would have been seated way in the back of the store, but they decided to do something different. They started speaking to each other in French. The salesperson overheard them and seated them in the front of the store. He fawned over them as if they were white customers, ignoring the “regular” black folk seated in the shadows. By speaking French, they suddenly became “exotic” and thus acceptable. Before they left they exposed their little ruse. I can’t remember what happened though. I’m thinking someone was a little ticked off. :slight_smile:

Many times, black Africans and even Afro-Caribbeans (who have a history of slavery) will look their nose down on black Americans and ask “What the hell is wrong with them?” They’ve had their own problems to deal with, to be sure, but their blues ain’t like ours.