My alternative is more “go back to what literally just worked like a week ago.” The BLM protests that were protesting actual harmful things resulted in change that will prevent future harm. That started happening before any of the statue stuff started. And again, the statues aren’t the point, not that anyone seems to give a damn. I’d like the useful change to continue.
The company in question produces ventilator machines, which make people not die. Now, which department do we send everyone to? Which department is it that is ultimately responsible for making people not die?
A fool stands outside the factory loudly shouting his opinion regarding which department is the important one, in spite of never having set foot inside the factory. All the people who work there watch this fool being loud while out on their lunch breaks and they mock him soundly for his invincible yet vehement ignorance.
It’s really privileged fucking arrogance of the first water to stand outside an issue loudly declaring that only YOUR order of precedence is correct, only YOUR perception of importance is right and everyone who actually is directly affected by the issue is DOING IT RONG and their feelings on the matter are immaterial because they don’t jibe with yours. Stunning arrogance there, bro.
Bree Newsome shinnying up a flagpole to take a Confederate rag down because she simply COULD NOT STAND seeing it there any more, could not continue being overshadowed by this racist bum rag for one more minute was a more powerful symbol and did more for the oppressed than anything you ever have done or will do. But please do continue being an ass and insisting that everyone obey your order of precedence. It’s going so well for you, you think you’d take a hint. And yet…
Gee, maybe people are trying to tell you that you aren’t nearly the friend you think you are. Maybe you should shut up and listen to them.
Writing letters was working a week ago?
Fine, then make an actual argument that isn’t pure pathos that explains to me why I’m wrong. I WILL take a hint if that hint contains a shred of evidence or rational reasoning that explains why any point I’ve made is wrong. This board has changed a number of my opinions in the past. I credit Left Hand of Dorkness and MaxtheVool, to name two examples off the top of my head, for changing my thinking multiple times. But they did it with reasoning and with evidence, not with pointing out that the majority disagreed with me and acting like that meant something in and of itself.
“Beep Beep. I am Ally-Bot. Ally-Bot Demands REASON! LOGIC! Give Ally-Bot Evidence! None of these human EMOTIONS! Beep Beep.”
That’s you. That’s what you sound like.
Not to mention it also shows that there are a LOT of people who don’t cling and who, in fact, violently and viscerally disagree–to the point where they’re perfectly willing to risk arrest and police violence to pull down the visible manifestation of those ideals that loom over the public spaces they also inhabit. It shows in a fabulously concrete manner that people DO NOT AGREE with the status quo, and are DONE waiting around for the magnanimous attention of those in power to address their grievances, thereby putting those in power on notice that what can be done to a statue can also be done to a person who obstructs the path of history. It’s a perfectly cromulent method of protest AND it gets rid of some titanically crappy and ugly public “monuments” so win/win.
Not my job to explain it to you in words short enough to get through your skull. Nope, it’s YOUR job to shut up and fucking sit with it until you can inhabit the mindset of those who vehemently disagree with your take on things. Until you can inhabit that head space you’re going to continue being bullheaded about why YOU ARE RIGHT and EVERYBODY ELSE IS WRONG and feeling all aggrieved about it. Do your own emotional labor for once, bro. It’s not the job of any oppressed person to EXPLAIN to you and MAKE YOU FEEL ALL BEDDAH when your feefees get wrinkled a bit. They’re busy fighting for their rights and their lives IN THE MANNER THEY CHOOSE and you standing around blethering from your place of privilege trying to direct the action like the world’s most inept symphony conductor is just cringey.
Hmm. Is it, then, your contention that there AREN’T enough of us to fill all of the riverbanks? You haven’t explicitly asserted that (yet). Or is it your contention that SOME riverbanks must be filled before anyone goes to any riverbank that isn’t on your list?
Or are you asserting some third thing that I’m not quite putting my finger on?
You’re seeing these as separate problems.
I suspect those attacking the statues see them as parts of the same problem.
If they’re parts of the same problem, then attacking the statues IS attacking people dying right now.
But you’re not agreeing with them. You’re insisting that the problem is best dealt with by tackling one manifestation of it at a time, while ignoring its other manifestations.
I suspect you’re being castigated for lecturing instead of listening.
People part of whose complaint is that they don’t get listened to may not take that well.
Or, as saje said,
Attacking symbology may well be one of the most efficacious ways of attacking racism.
I really don’t see how we’re going to get rid of racism without attacking its symbology.
Those things don’t happen without the symbology.
They are not separable.
Grow up, infantile troll.
Nice job of “checking out”, asshole.
Oh I checked out of the civil conversation. Now I’m just telling you that on top of being ignorant and wrong, you’re clearly an infant who would rather name-call. And this draws a direct line toward your obsession with pulling down statues… that pathetic, ineffectual impulse to do something, even if it’s childish and counterproductive. Your priority is feeling good by giving a middle finger to The Man. If that’s not a false, useless ally, then I don’t know what is. Keep shouting into the void, keyboard warrior of symbolic combat.
I’m almost a literal iconoclast so I don’t ever mind tearing down statues of our previous human icons. They’re nearly never great public art: the only exceptions I can think of are paired with other media such as buildings.
I’d agree that a better strategy would be to concentrate on police injustice, but there’s already enough people protesting that. Anyone who isn’t aware of that will never be swayed. The only question is whether tearing down our previous idols, who are almost always overly-simplistically venerated despite their flaws, is worth making a precedent for tearing down everything, whether or not they are icons.
And these are almost always public statues they are tearing down. While I vaguely dislike people holding up other people so much they want to erect a dead rock statue to their static symbolism, I definitely don’t want someone putatively speaking for me to do the same.
…Roland: I need you to watch this video.
For those that don’t want to click I’ll describe what happens. Its a scene from Portland at night, three street medics (yes, that’s right, civilian street medics whose job it is to give medical attention to people that have been injured by the police is a thing that exists in America now) stand around protecting a man, lying on the ground looking in bad shape, one of the medics has his hands in the air.
About ten seconds into the video a group of people arrive in combat gear and camo with comically large giant batons. They force the medics away from the man in bad shape. And then they charge. They push one man over and start dragging him away. Another man dressed in combat gear and camo with a comically large giant baton starts snarling like a rabid dog, whacking the baton on the ground as if to mark his territory.
Who are these people in combat gear and camo with comically large batons? They aren’t the local police. (Apparently) they are Customs and Border Patrol. Do you want to know a bit more about Customs and Border Patrol? Here is some history. They’ve been a white supremacist agency since the beginning. And along with ICE they’ve been emboldened by the Trump administration and one man in particular.
And that one man is answerable to nobody. He sits quietly in the background, setting racist, dangerous policy, occasionally sending out white supremacist dog whistles like the Presidents 14 words or running 88 adverts on Facebook. You can write as many letters as you like to your senator but nothing is going to happen to him.
By all rights that video I shared here should have been front-page news all around the country. A Federal agency rioting on the streets. But its ended up on reddit, where it will get a few thousand hits then will be forgotten about in the avalanche of news we are getting. the BLM protests are still happening all around the country but the media are bored of that now.
We are talking about generations of trauma. The Tulsa massacres. Lynchings. Rosewood. Right now in Indigenous American communities they are being ravaged by Covid-19. America doesn’t care. Very soon millions of people are going to be put out onto the streets, unable to pay rent, pay medical bills, all in the middle of a pandemic which has spiralled completely out of control.
And here you are, in the middle of all of this, complaining about a few statues that have been taken down. Its like you aren’t even listening. America is on the cusp of a revolution. If Trump wins again in November (and there is a very good chance that he wins again) then all bets are off. America is a country that was founded on white supremacy. It is racist to its core. This idealised America, the one that you wish it was, it doesn’t exist. The billionaires are making more money. The President uses his pardon powers with abandon. The administration is systematically destroying the Federal government, replacing the Judiciary with their own people, they are looting the country for all that its worth.
The statues should be a wake-up call. This “stupid SJW shit” are the people that are fighting for the heart and soul of America. I think its perfectly valid to think “I wish they didn’t take down the statues.” But it’s out of your hands now. They aren’t going to listen to you. Because (whether you like it or not) you are siding with the oppressors.
That footage from Portland is just one more night of same/same–they’ve been out there protesting every night for over forty nights and almost every night it’s the same fucking thing–tear gas, rubber bullets, cops targeting medics–that guy on the ground caught a “less lethal round” in his fucking face and it’s still touch and go to see if he’s going to be okay.
My grandson has been out there most nights and I’m scared shitless that he could be the next one shot or beaten or damaged irreparably. Every person out there has their own list of reasons and priority list but they’re ALL fighting for the life and soul of this fucking country and nobody, NOBODY gets to armchair quarterback and tell them how they’re supposed to be protesting and what their priorities should be. We may not agree on everything but we all agree that the current situation is untenable and that if we don’t flex our muscles and do it HARD and visibly we are going to continue to lose. Maybe we’ll lose anyway but if nothing else there will be scars left behind–the people will carry theirs with them forever but if there’s at least some empty plinths to show they were there, well, that’s something.
I’m not “complaining about a few statues that have been taken down,” and I think it’s pretty clear from my responses that I am listening to the people who’ve been kind enough to reply with actual explanations (thanks, BigT and others) rather than assumptions that I’m a troll, or that I don’t care about the feelings of those affected by institutional racism. Nothing could be further from the truth.
I think the statues that have been torn down are a good thing. I again go back to the analogy of the grocery store employee who sweeps the floor when the fridges have black mold in them. If you think that arguing against him spending his immediate time doing that means that I don’t like clean floors, you’re missing the point entirely.
…I don’t think I’m missing the point at all. This thread has 158 posts and nearly everybody disagrees with you. It seems pretty obvious to me that its you that has missed the point.
Its like blaming the employee for sweeping the floor because sweeping the floor is his job, and expecting that cleaner to shift their priorities without providing the training, without identifying the hazard, without paying any extra, without providing any PPE, without having the decency to tell them to change their priorities.
What a terrible fucking analogy. It isn’t the cleaner’s fault and it isn’t the cleaner’s problem and the way that you look at the cleaner is exactly the same way you approached “social justice” in the OP. Its an abstract problem for you, a thought exercise. It isn’t real.
And really it’s; black mold today, leaky roof next week, broken door lock on Thursday, and on and on . . . and the floor NEVER get’s swept.
CMC