Oh my… m, are you in my head or what? We’re going through a spate of race and racism OPs as of late. I actually stayed away from these threads for a while, because I’ve been very disappointed with the discourse on race and racism on this board. The SDMB is a great place to learn about obscure music, catch some amusing rants about the mundane annoyances of life, and occasionally the bizarre potty/sex-related thread. Not so much on this topic.
And that’s a shame, because I see this board as a collection of highly intelligent, analytic types. The potential exists for rich, reasoned, and nuanced discussion, but so often it doesn’t go there. There are some folks who are always good for solid thinking on the issue - Contrapuntal, ywtf, monstro, Askia and some others - but a lot of discussion breaks down to “is this really racist? Because if it isn’t, let’s move on. In fact, here are multiple explanations for how this situation is not racism.” (And I should point out that while I respect the aforementioned folks’ perspectives, I do not always agree with them.)
Let’s review. If you’ve participated in these threads before, you’ll recognize biggirl. And though I don’t know her, I know her posts tend not to look at racism as the motivation or explanation for a lot of questionable actions. I often disagree with biggirl’s take on these issues. So when I saw that she was the OP in this thread, I took notice. Furthermore, however you slice it, this woman who berated her daughter is someone who certainly looks down her nose about some group membership that her daughter holds.
As someone who’s been a person of color all of my life, and at times wanted to act as if my racial identity and race wasn’t terribly important, and conversely at times believed that every negative thing that happened to a Black person was likely rooted in some act of racism, the adult, better-actualized version of me realizes that yes, there are a number of possible explanations for this woman’s jerkass behavior. However, if you live in a multicultural society as I do, you have to realize that the term “you people” has often been used to stereotype and denigrate people of color. In other words, if your head isn’t completely up your own ass, it’s a really loaded phrase and one should think long and hard before dropping a “you people” bomb. If you don’t, you strike me at best as an insensitive jerk who really doesn’t mind if your words carry an extra sting (which makes you somewhat racist, if you can’t eradicate racially loaded terms from outbursts with people who haven’t provoked you in any way and whom you don’t know) or as somebody who is quite aware of what that phrase means, and you meant it quite sincerely (advanced, high functioning racist).
Furthermore, there are all kinds of other things going on in this woman’s head. Maybe there’s a thread of classism, disdain for young people, hatred of bad customer service. Probably a nasty recipe of negativity in her mind, but I’m convinced by the reaction of biggirl’s daughter that it contained at least a pinch of the ol’ racism. Of course I could be wrong, but I’m willing to take this leap based on the evidence provided and how it parallels experiences I’ve had, and other people I know have had.
Now I’ve said this so many times on this board - but this is what Chester Pierce meant when he came up with the term microaggressions . The reality is, most people on this board, I think, will acknowledge that racism exists in American society. The gap we have, it seems, is that short of a James Byrd, Jr.-type lynching, there’s rarely consensus on what precisely counts as racist behavior. While it’s comforting to think that racism exists in the narrow minds of Idaho-based survivalist Nazis, it wouldn’t be a huge societal problem if that’s the only place one could find it.
I hope to God that nobody suffers a demise like Emmitt Till or James Byrd, Jr. did, ever again. And as civilized human beings I feel I can probably get 99% of posters to agree with this. But those people who decided it was acceptable to kill someone because of his skin color started somewhere, and it probably wasn’t at another lynching. Responsible parents act swiftly when they see their young child inadvertently pick up candy and stick it in their pocket at three because they know if you let it slide at three they might be stealing cars at 14. In my mind, subtler acts of racist behavior left unchecked beget less subtle racist behavior… and so on. Racism is like an opportunistic infection, or like being bled to death by paper cuts.
I honestly believe if we had the same reaction to racist behavior as we do to petty theft we would make tremendous strides in eradicating racism in this country. We don’t make a kid a pariah because he does it at three, but we don’t let him forget that it’s wrong and he should never do it again. We explain why it’s wrong, we explain and show how it hurts other people, and ultimately, how you might become a victim yourself. We allow teens and young people a chance to learn and grow from their missteps, but we also penalize them when they continue to steal as they get older… you get the idea. No, I’m not advocating jail time for racist behavior… but I am advocating that we think really carefully about how the truly horrible racism that we all recognize comes to pass. It’s from tolerating the minor stuff, excusing, excusing, alternately explaining… until.
Something of a hijack, so I apologize. I might start a thread about what people consider to be convincingly racist behavior…
