How can you fight that of which you are ignorant? (dismantling racism) (long, sorry)

Great Debates
141

:dubious: Wait, are you saying that people who lazily and selfishly perpetuate an unfair oppressive status quo because “they simply lack the incentive” to act ethically shouldn’t be blamed and resented for that behavior? How you figure?

“Becoming mainstream”? What’s that even mean? Plenty of minorities are “mainstream” in the sense of being law-abiding middle-class conventionally-behaved “ordinary people”, and they still have to deal all the time with the effects of systemic societal racism.

:rolleyes: Very true, fellow white person. Amazing how much easier it is to serenely accept the natural inevitability of injustice when we’re the ones reaping the benefits of it, eh?

142

Or possibly he had a long life’s worth of experiences with white people that had led him to conclude that it’s safer and simpler to just shut up around all of us, rather than continuing to put time and energy into figuring out which individual white people he can open up around. Nobody in the room at that moment may intend to be rude; but there may have been lots of people during Cecil’s life who have been very rude indeed.

143

I think you are overplaying your hand here. Racism hardened as slavery was formalized but the vast majority of black people in Virginia were servants, indentured or otherwise. Before 1700 it was just more possible for people to buy their freedom. To do away with that, sure, racism was used as a tool but it didn’t spring out of nowhere.

144

The American system of institutionalized white supremacism was what caused 99% of the race-based suffering in America, and that was set up, purposefully, as a tool.

145

It might also be that Cecil has white friends a-plenty. They just don’t work with him.

I’m guessing that Cecil has more white friends than Urbanredneck has black friends.

146

You’re not making your point, which at least started out as “racism isn’t human nature”. Just because something is used as a tool, doesn’t remove it from human nature. “Think of the children!” is abused, but protecting children is still human nature.

147

I stand by my assertion that there is nothing at all wrong with asking and if he is a friend or just a decent person, he should answer you when you ask in a post where he is complaining about how racist white people (of which you are one) are. That’s just good manners.

Here is the basic issue. If you take a middle class white person who gets up, goes to work, comes home, drinks 3 beers and goes to bed each day, he likely meets a few black people here and there, maybe has a couple of black friends/acquaintances/neighbors but doesn’t really think about racial issues a lot.

He knows that there used to be slavery and segregation in the country, but that was before he was born and he also knows that there are laws in place to ensure that blacks are treated equally in public accomodations and at the job. Maybe he heard a few racists jokes when he was younger and laughed at them, but he never treated blacks differently or joined the KKK and really he is indifferent about them because he has other things on his mind and his wife is bitching at him to clean out the garage.

So when the accusation is made that there is systemic racism today and especially that HE is part of the problem, it is simply not too much to demand that people, especially if they want to solve the problem, to inform him and tell him what he is doing, or allowing to be done, that perpetuates the system. He doesn’t think he is privileged. He is treated like shit at work just like some blacks.

Now, simply informing him does not mean, as it does not in any other area of life, that he must agree with all of your assertions and perform all of his assigned tasks at your demand. Opening a respectful dialogue is important. What happens is that we cannot have such a dialogue because anything short of full face value acceptance is met with assertions that whites simply "don’t want to see it’ or are secretly racist or some other such thing. So people retreat and we have the uncomfortably tense stalemate where blacks think all whites are racists and whites thing that blacks are just wanting a handout and blaming everything on racism.

If someone cannot be asked to provide this explanation then they should cease posting such provocative things. There’s no sense in bitching about a problem if you aren’t working towards a solution. And that solution involves everyone. We’re in this ride together and an attitude of “I’m a victim because I’m black so fuck you white man, you figure it out or google it” is most unhelpful and serve to perpetuate the silence and lack of dialogue.

My contribution: Many of the things that blacks complain about with regard to being treated improperly is applicable to poor whites as well. West Virginia doesn’t have many blacks, so it is sort of a control group. I find that when I am in my lawyer garb, I am treated much better in public than on the weekends when I put on a hat, old shirt and jeans. My appointed clients are treated like shit by the police whereas my paying clients are given a good deal of respect.

I am troubled when it is (sometimes implicitly) suggested that when a black man gets a career or does anything to be a part of mainstream society he is “selling out” or some such thing.

There are more, but I’ve got to clean the garage. :slight_smile: Many things like this and more need discussed so we can see the problem and correct it. It’s not about being lectured to and told that we are wrong. Chances are like most things in life, I can tweak a few things, you tweak a few things and we come to an understanding. Cries of racism for questioning things are counterproductive.

148

Something like tribalism might be related to human nature – wanting to protect one’s in-group from outsiders. But that’s only twisted into racism by purposeful manipulation. No one is born thinking black or white people are better or worse.

149

Please tell me you are not attempting to characterize my actions with this here.

150

If you are, then you’ve made it clear you’ve read virtually nothing that I’ve actually said, in my OP or the many, many subsequent posts.

151

But it is by no means proven that racism as the world has known it for the last few hundred years actually is an innate part of human nature.

We know that humans have various innate tendencies toward tribal cohesion and inter-tribal antipathies, but that doesn’t mean that it’s natural for humans to use skin color as a proxy for “tribe”.

Certainly we don’t see a similar kind of “color prejudice” in other animals with natural pigmentation variation. Different colored horses live together in the same herd, for example, and different colored dogs in the same pack. Even geographically separated but closely related species don’t maintain a human-style “color line” when they come into closer proximity: witness, e.g., the increased mating rates between differently colored grizzly bears and polar bears in the wake of habitat compression due to climate change.

And when you consider that a whole lot of the human coloring variation that we now think of as “racial” is actually very recent in our history as a species—e.g., blond hair originated only about 11,000 years ago, and light skin among northern Europeans even more recently than that—you kind of have to wonder how this supposedly “innate” tendency for racial bias got established. Shoot, lactose tolerance is over 4000 years old and yet it’s not “human nature” to be prejudiced against other people on the basis of that.

No, while basic human tribalism is definitely a long-evolved aspect of “human nature”, there’s no convincing reason to think that human racism based on melanin levels is.

152

Ambi, what kind of answer were you looking for from your friend?

What would you have considered a “good answer”?

153

His opinion on the matters being discussed in the posts of others he had shared on FB

154

Barring that, his reasoning for witholding any sort of substantive answer at all beyond saying it “wasn’t his problem”.

155

EXACTLY! Yes, I knew this and respected it and didnt try and join in or be pushy or anything.

Matter of fact with my black coworkers I almost never bring it up but just talk everyday things.

Like last night in the breakroom the tv was on and commercial came on for a dvd of classic Soul music performances like say Marvin Gaye, The Commodores, and James Brown and we both talked the groups and people we liked.

156

Can you understand why an aquaintance may not feel comfortable sharing his (no doubt complex) opinion about a sensitive subject with you? Has this thread helped you to understand where he’s coming from?

157

What’s wrong with “wasn’t his problem” as a sufficient reason for withholding a “substantive answer”? Is he there for the purpose of providing “substantive answers” to Facebook acquaintances? Do you get how it’s possible that he might have found your request a tedious and somewhat entitled imposition in a discussion that wasn’t about providing you with Anti-Racism 101 lessons?

Because I gotta say, Ambivalid, I would have thought you’d have found it easier than this to intuitively understand how it’s possible for some people to imagine that they’re doing something useful when they’re actually not, and they don’t realize how much it annoys you to have to deal with it because in fact you encounter this exact same sort of clueless behavior all the time.

In that linked thread you were justifiably annoyed with the other person because, given your experience with that sort of situation, it was very apparent to you that he wasn’t paying any attention to what you really needed or what would have been genuinely helpful. He was just locked into his own head about what he unreflectively thought would be “nice behavior” and make him feel good. But you know, maybe he just didn’t see that because he has ambulatory privilege and he’s never had to see that.

I mean, it’s super obvious to you that people who would like to make life easier for wheelchair users should start out by paying attention to what wheelchair users actually say they want rather than what they naively assume would be a good thing to do. But that’s not necessarily so obvious to people who aren’t constantly dealing with such situations.
Likewise, maybe it’s super obvious to your friend Mark that people who would like to be better at combating racism should first go do their due diligence by finding pre-written explanations, critiques and advice to inform themselves about the issue, rather than barging into an acquaintance’s Facebook venting thread to ask him to take time and energy to educate them (while being duly considerate of their feelings as a well-meaning white person, natch). But that’s not necessarily so obvious to you.

158

To a point, yes. But he’s never been one to shy away from expressing his opinion, even on race related issues. And it still seems unusual to me, even for a “venting session”, for someone to post something that they are well aware that thousands of people will see (he has thousands of fb friends) and not be comfortable giving their opinion on it. What sorts of reactions was he hoping for/expecting when he shared those posts?

159

First off, i didnt barge into a damn thing. I commented on a fb post from a fb friend. Isn’t that what everyone does on fb? Or are their certain topics which are supposedly verboten for certain groups of people to comment on or express an interest in, even on Facebook, even when it’s a fb friend’s post that automatically comes up on your feed, if they come from other certain groups of people? And how do you recognize a “venting session” with no actual words or posts of venting, or in fact of any kind? I was the first person to comment on these shared posts. It was the shared posts themselves that i should have recognized as marking a “venting session”? Because sharing posts of others is a hallmark of FB.

His shared posts certainly didnt come with any disclaimers or warnings about the nature of their postings or who should be replying and who shouldnt. And maybe i wasnt even all that interested in becoming an active antiracist activist? Maybe i wad simply interested as a bystander to what i had read? Because the shared posts themselves talked about this patriarchy, what it was, how it thrived and why it persisted. However, it didnt talk about ways in which this patriarchy could be defeated or dismantled.

Yes, googling and doing research above and beyond FB is the right path. But i saw the first opportunity being that of asking one individual person, a friend that ive known for decades, what his opinions were as to ways of combating this patriarchy. I wasnt looking to him to speak for anyone but himself.

I could understand being characterized as “barging in” or “cold-calling” or as the many similar ways i have been characterized in this thread but how could that be, considering I was just asking a fb friend for his opinion re a shared post he had posted? Again, isn’t that what Facebook is all about? How was i supposed to know this was a venting session and not a normal fb post which is open to normal questions? Why am i necessarily seeking an “education” from him, i was seeking his personal opinion. His opinion could have been " honestly man, i dont know either. I’d think googling would be a start tho."

And why is the simple act of me asking for his opinion on a fb post he shared somehow turn into “Anti-Racism 101” lessons? In order for that to be the case, I’d have to view his opinions as being the opinions of all black people. I absolutely did not. I only wanted the opinion of my friend who had posted on this subject.

“Tedious and entitled imposition”? I honestly do not understand this. Entitled as if i were entitled to a substantive response? Clearly not. When he said its not his problem and that he wasnt my sherpa i did not continue to press for his opinion. My questions then became ones trying to understand why he felt that simply asking for his opinion was interpreted as “asking him to be my sherpa” or “doing my homework for me”. Thats where i used the word “substantive” and i only meant it as a response that helped me understand what i couldn’t about why he was not giving me his opinion.

I can understand how i was mistakenly seen as hardheaded by continuing to ask why he was stonewalling me. But it was just that, mistakenly. I absolutely and truly did not understand. I had never before come upon a similar situation in my life. A person makes an interesting FB post, I, a recipient of that post inquire about the poster’s opinion on the matter. The poster tells me no, in rather stark terms. And i then express my inability to understand why me asking for his opinion is so verboten. To which im given no answer that illuminates my lack of understanding.

160

If this had been s FB post in which i had shared a post from someone else re the ways in which the world marginalizes and mistreats wheelchair users, and it didnt actually talk about ways to overcome that marginalization and a FB friend, especially one i had had a long history sharing good faith debate with, asked me my opinion on such ways, i would have gladly given it.

Now its not nearly an exact comparison to the situation here but the “paying attention to what wheelchair users say they want” could just as easily be “pay attention to what the victims of racisms say they want.”

I would much rather someone hear from an actual live wheelchair user who is known to them first before starting that research into the cold, pre-written detached words of faceless disabled and nondisabled people. But i see that perhaps it’s not the same task when it comes to discussing racism to those with no experience of it.