It’s clear that you’re upset about those comments from the other FB posters, and of course we haven’t seen them here so we don’t know exactly what they were like, other than that they included “portrait of the white supremacist patriarchy” and being “willfully obtuse”. But I’m not sure you should jump to the conclusion that the other posters were just being gratuitously mean to you.
As we’ve seen from numerous examples offered in this thread, some people do get sincerely and understandably exasperated when a white person jumps into an exchange about white-supremacist culture asking for attention to themselves and their naive-sounding questions. Expressing that exasperation, aka slapping down a (perceived) troll, may come across as somewhat abrasive but it’s not necessarily “worthless” or “mean”.
If you can’t come out the other side of this experience of misunderstanding without needing to make somebody else the bad guy(s) who deserve(s) unqualified condemnation, you might be still letting your emotions cloud your judgement.
On the internet in general (including comment pages, web boards like this), I would say most people most of the time actually, post to hear themselves or express their oneness with the like minded or their moral superiority to the non-like minded. That would seem almost too obvious to say, and only differs specifically for FB to the extent FB is a hybrid between a method of communication for people who know one another IRL (like a group chat on a phone) and just ‘the internet’. Which depends on the particular people and circumstances on FB, but it’s mainly just ‘the internet’ IMO. So yeah, obviously you can’t assume something said on FB is an invitation to a real discussion. A lot of people don’t/can’t really discuss things IRL, sloganeering and ever evolving goobly-gook jargon is all they’ve got.
So ‘open minded’ discussion on the internet, good luck (occasionally there is good luck, but not as a rule). The true point I’ve seen made on the thread though, as a tangent, is that it’s annoying as member of X to be asked by workmates (‘friends’) to ‘give X’s viewpoint’ on this or that. People go to work to make money to live, work their way up the chain, or just enjoy the work. Or OK some people go to work to socialize; it’s sad IMO if you rely on work to have meaningful social interaction but I’m not trying to bust on people in unfortunate situations. However going to work to talk socio-politics I just can’t endorse at all (though who among us has never fallen victim to it?). Whether it’s ‘race’ or some somewhat less sensitive issue just don’t bring it up at work is my advice (I mean on a social level, obviously companies have a responsibility to deal with workplace harassment issues, diversity policies, etc. related to group affiliation, that’s part of ‘work’).
So there’s nowhere to ‘honestly’ discuss it? For a lot of people, there probably isn’t. That doesn’t mean it’s fair to complicate your coworkers’ work lives by appointing them spokespeople for their group. If you have friends outside work close enough to discuss sensitive topics without risk to the friendship…not so common either I think, broadly speaking. And if you can find actually productive discussion of race on the internet, there you go, but I can’t see being surprised that a particular discussion ended with a curt ‘Google it’.
I understand that it can be tough to have a conversation about race without your feelings spilling over. I have the same reaction when talking about racism against asians. But I generally don’t direct my outrage at people who want to know more. I don’t always feel equipped to make the case convincingly and it is more acceptable in society (and this board) to pick away at claims of anti-asian racism than just about any other form of racism or bigotry, but if I said, racism is your problem, YOU deal with it. People will justifiably just shrug their shoulders, assume my concerns are trivial and get on with their day. So if the current attitude towards anti-black racism is to tell white people that it’s their problem and they should deal with it, I suspect you can expect a similar shrugging of shoulders.
—> The thread has doubled in size since I started typing this post, and I haven’t read everything.
I am in a unique position. I am a mid thirties kinda small white guy, and I have a mid 40s super tall black sister. She runs in a mostly black community. I run in a mostly white community, because according to my sister, “Black folks are smarter than to live in such a cold damn place like your dumbass does.” I’ve moved across the country and back for work, she has found success in the medical profession back home in Texas.
Anyhow, I asked my sis about your post and emailed it to her. This was her reply:
“Fuck that mother fucker. Not the Ambivalid guy, but the black dude. Fuck that self righteous piece of shit. You don’t bite hands that offer help, and you don’t shit on people that want to understand your personal struggle and to assist in some way. I can say from my experience as a black woman that his shit attitude does not help my cause at all. Not only am I black, I am a woman. People have been shitting on my gender a lot longer than the color of my skin. Both are huge problems in my life, but he just made me look like an ass as a black person because of his flippant attitude. I get his attitude, but it hurts way more than it helps. I hope someone kicks him square in the fucking nuts, that asshole.”
She is interesting, but is the most successful person in my family. I put a lot of stock in her opinion on things like this since she lives, as she puts it, “in both gutters of womendom and blackdom.”
That wasn’t the answer I was expecting, and probably not you either. I don’t mean to offend anyone.
I’m not sure, that was what my sister had written back to me. I can venture a guess as to what she meant, maybe Amby was offering up a platform or something? That is my guess though as to what she meant, I don’t like to speak for other people. I’ll ask her when I hear back from her today. She is doing rounds at the hospital now.
But Ambivalid I think stepped into it. If you ask questions like that, you are bound to get the wrath of the internet. I think that the question might have gone better in person where no one is proudly wearing their “facebook balls”.
She said he wasted the opportunity to have the discussion about race and what he goes through as a black dude, when he was specifically asked to. She said she doesn’t like to talk about race issues that have happened to her, but when she does do so is because she was asked in that sort of way. She says that when its brought up that way, everyone listens and retains the lessons of the conversation much better.
I’m paraphrasing because I talked to her on the phone not email.
Well good for your sister! Do you want us to throw her a scooby snack for volunteering to be a good magical negro in her spare time? Is her opinion supposed to matter more than the opinion of the multiple black people who have posted here who don’t have a white guy speaking for them? There are plenty of black folks who are eager to play happy ambassador on their personal FB pages. This is not an earth-shattering revelation. But Mark obviously ain’t one of them, and he may have perfectly valid reasons for that.
Maybe your sister should try to have some compassion for both individuals in this equation instead of assuming one side must be the bad guy.
Thanks a lot for that, monstro. I mean it’s obvious you meant it in a dick way, but we all have to call my sister “the good magical negro” now when we speak to her. She has proclaimed it to be so from this day forth. That and she laughed really hard at your post. I’m going to try to convince her to join the SDMB, and maybe with that handle.
Thanks for making Christmas and Easter interesting.
Absolutely encourage her to join. This “LEMME TELL YOU WHAT MY BLACK SISTER SAYS” schtick is, let’s say, not conducive to productive conversation. But she might be a wonderful addition to the board.
To him fer sure. She’s a real person who he knows and respects. Posters here are pixels and respect for each of those collections of pixels varies.
To the rest of us? As has been noted before, Black thought is not monolithic, so it is of some interest to hear from a variety individual perspectives. More? No. Not than your opinions. You are a collection of pixels that I sometimes disagree with but respect. The opinions of some others? Well, hypothetically if there was a poster who I’ve read enough of to disrespect, then an unknown entity matters more than that.
And we all know how much Shodan disapproves of brushing off somebody who’s asking questions, and trying to have a sincere conversation, with a contemptuous unhelpful bit of snark.
I’m already reading Coates. I didnt need Google to know how to find him. And this is a bit of nitpicking but i was asked nothing. I was told where to find an answer to a question I had posed to someone individually. You clearly would like to paint me as someone that i am not. I have had this issue with you since your very first post here. I find it presumptuous of you to assume to know what i was looking for when i posted here. It was in fact anything but an echo chamber i was looking for or expecting.
I dont have a history of garnering widespread support with much of what I write here at the Dope, that’s actually what keeps me coming back: the need to be constantly on my toes and maintain a sharpness to my opinions and arguments (even if no one else agrees that I do these things).
I was looking for the opinions and insight of the few and far between who would have valuable insight and those dopers did not disappoint. Including yourself, despite the volley of not so valuable posts that had to be endured in order to glean your insight.
That was only due to unfortunate number of times i was misread, whether intentionally or not, i am not in a position to say. But a high percentage of the posts i took umbrage to were simply inaccurate surmisals of either what I’d said in my recounted discussion with mark or in earlier posts in this thread. I do acknowledge, however, taking issue with comments that i later realized i should not have done so with, and were actually valuable pieces of insight.
You are one of the biggest sources of insight for me in this entire thread. I dont think i took issue with any of your main points at any time, if my memory serves. If i did, then i fairly quickly came to a better understanding and acknowledged the wisdom of your words.
See, i have the need to play “self defense attorney” again and this is despite the fact that i have had a learning experience on this issue and ive had a private conversation with Mark and we are on friendly ground on this issue finally.
I guess you could say i was upset by those drive by comments made by non participants of the conversation between Mark and I. Who likes being on the receiving end of insults and denigrating comments made by people who have no right to make such remarks? No one does. But my level of “upset” was quite low. First of all, this “white person” did not jump into any exchange about white supremacist culture. No one had said a single word in any context whatsoever. My words were the very first on this white supremacist culture, as i was commenting and asking a question that was inappropriate not naive, about a post that a fb friend had shared but offered no commentary of his own.
And the comments were *absolutely worthless. They had not been there in any way participating, commenting or involved at all in a discussion on this post on white supremacist culture and they only came around and and accused me of being “willfully obtuse” by assuming my inability to understand why my question was being received the way it was way disingenuous and that such dishonesty made me a “poster child for this white supremacist culture”. All this based on my very first question to Mark asking him why he considered giving me his opinion to the question i asked related to the post he had shared to be “acting as my sherpa”. The only one partaking in the conversation expressed no such judgment on my question. Especially not the instant i asked about anything.
Now, do you consider this self-defense unjustified? If you do, you and i will simply always disagree. And i will always correct your mistaken retelling of events. I wish the thread didnt have to progress in such a fashion but that seems to have been the way it has.
