Black History Month. Cultural Appropriation, Racism, Etc.

[wolven7]

Miles Davis - [Why Do I Love You? (Live)]--- Let's Make Some People Angry.

It's February, which means it's Black History Month, here in the US of A.

As some of you may know I HATE Black History Month. Simply put, i hate it because it's been nearly fifty years since Dr Martin Luther King and Brother Malcolm were shot and killed, and we still have one month out of the year, where we try to cram in all of this shit? Really? We can't yet weave all of this important information into our daily lives and education?

The same goes for Women's and Native People's History Months. They're insultingly inadequate.

I'm going to quote myself, wholecloth, with amendations, and extra emphasis:

I disagree with pretty much every view on racism, in what slides between major and very minor details. I don't think that racism is simply the fact of Power/Privilege combining with Prejudice, but I also don't think that the understanding of the place of privilege, and the blinding effect it can have, on those who have it, can be Overstated.

I believe that any person can be racist, prejudiced, bigoted, regardless of background, or history, and that those things can express themselves in unintended and unconscious manifestations. But I don't believe that anyone needs to feel supremely guilty about that fact, so much as they should recognise it, and attempt to change it.

I don't believe that the burden of proof should have to be on someone proving that they aren't racist, nor should the first reactions to People Who May Have Privilege saying something that Someone Who has No Privilege (literally "Private Law," by the way; we don't think about that enough) may not like, or may misinterpret, be the cry of "RACIST!/HOMOPHOBE!/"CLASSIST!" Because they're NOT, necessarily.

But any attempt for the accused to show why they aren't what they've been accused of being reads only the same as someone denying that they're in denial. When the real problem may be that there has been a miscommunication, and the "offending" party has been misunderstood.

If we cannot have a conversation about this, we will get nowhere.

If everyone stops at "People Who Look Like Me are oppressed by People Who Look Like You, and you should FEEL BAD ABOUT IT, So Don't Talk To Me About Racism."

If Everything a white person says in a conversation about oppression is an apologetic for the stance of The Angry Black Man.

If we don't Begin to understand the fact that racism is more multidimensional and multifaceted than "White People BAD!"

If we don't approach the things we do with the ability to say, "I may not Be A Racist, but I may hold views and FUNDAMENTAL ASSUMPTIONS about the way of the world which are visible to many others, but are invisible to me (because of privilege, placement, or a particular set of understandings), and which may impact my interactions with those people."

If "Those People" (see what I did there?), can't take a step back and say, "Maybe This is Unintentional, and They Aren't Racist, and MY Fundamental Assumptions are getting in the way."

We. Will get. Nowhere.

My white girlfriend shouldn't feel uncomfortable talking to me about racism.

My white friends should not feel completely comfortable assuming any position I have on racism.

My BLACK FRIENDS should not feel completely comfortable assuming any position I have on racism.

We should be able to speak to each other, openly, honestly, reflectively, clearly. Recognising that we each have a frame of reference which may be invisible, to us, at first. We have tentative conversations. We fumble, we try, we fail, we get back up and try again, and we Do. Not. Fly Off. The Handle.

Because assuming a white(/straight/rich/male/etc.) person is racist(/homophobic/classist/misogynist/etc/), or even unconsciously holds racist views? Detrimental to "race relations." Assuming that a person of color(/gay person/poor person/woman/etc.) DOESN'T and CAN'T hold those views, or views analogous to those? Equally Detrimental.

Holding the analogous views is especially insidious, because they allow us to say, "Well, you can't talk about this, or understand this, because you haven't been oppressed, like My People have." And if we can't talk about it or understand it. . . then we can't work through it.

And if we can't work through the problem, we can't fix it.

And I know we all want to fix it.

Björk - [Cover Me]--- So that was me talking to matociquala about representations of race in her novels, and how those representations are perceived by others.

I want to repeat that: How those representations are perceived by others.

This is the thing that pisses me off about conversations about people being offended by anything, most notably right now, cultural appropriations. (Sneaker Pimps - [Low Place Like Home]). When you tell me that I've done something offensive, you are interpreting something I'm doing. You have, by your very action, here, made a presumption about my intentions, my mental state, my knowledge, my emotional stance, whether I have respect in my heart.

You are placing a value judgment on my actions, based on knowledge which you cannot possibly have.

Now, let's be clear (Again): Racism exists. Racist actions exist. Sexist, homophobic, transphobic, fatphobic, WHATEVER Actions Exist. These attitudes and the people who hold them are real. And sometimes we can spot a bigot. (Pig - [The Seven Veils]). They're wearing the Double Lightning, or they're saying something like "All fat people are disgusting and should die," or whatever. But some bigots are more subtle, and their actions and attitudes more insidious and pervasive. It is only through a sustained engagement with their behaviours that we can come to understand the bigoted architecture of their thinking. (Skinny Puppy - [Pro-test]). And, yes, it's true that some people don't know what their architecture is. Some people have ingrained privilege of which they are unaware.

I call this the Invisible Architecture of Bias.

But you know what? Just because bigots exist, just because insidious and hidden bigotry is a Real Thing, just because the Invisible Architecture of Bias pervades every single one of us? That's no reason to automatically assume that someone is either A) Intentionally Bigoted, B) Ignorantly Holding Bigoted View, or C) Is Blithely Unaware of the Impact of Their Actions.

Hope for Agoldensummer - [Love Letter]--- You don't know what I know. You don't know my family history. You don't know what a Sugar Skull or a Headscarf or a Facial Veil Mean to Me. You don't know what I'm learning or what I'm trying to make them mean to me.

If I don't come from your country, your people, your specific history, then I don't get to engage in it? To find resonance with it?

I know a fair amount about the Zen principle of Kenshō. I know what that breaking through of non-duality means, in its context. (Jack Off Jill - [American Made (Tweeker Remix) pod]). But I can also take this concept, and... Not lift it out of its context, because the connotations necessarily come with it, but I can place it in a different context, next to something else, in a different philosophy or culture.

I can draw a comparison between Peter Singer and Jainism. I can use the principles of one to talk about another.

It is not appropriation. It's engagement, analogy, conceptual development.

Nina Simone - [Black Is the Color of My True Love's Hair (Jaffa Remix)]--- And it's the only way we learn and grow as a species. Fucking grow up.

Everyone.

[Edit:5.44pm matociquala wrote this as part of a very long response thread, and I think it would do good to add it here: "I think it helps to remember that everybody trying to have these conversations is in pain, scared, and feels as if they are under siege.

"All of us."]

Comments

[bakeneko.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what your personal context is here, so please don't take this as a response to whatever that is, cause I honestly don't know.

First off though, language is arbitrary. Words have multiple definitions, and uses, and contexts. Racism is used in some branches of sociology to mean power+privilege, and so by definition, racial prejudice against white people in today's US isn't racism in that sociological sense. Racism is also used in a day-to-day sense to mean bigotry, or racial discrimination, or stereotyping, or any number of different, loosely related social phenomena. An argument over which of these is the "true" definition of racism is as pointless as debating which shade of blue is the bluest. Just pick one as the point of reference.

This is the thing that pisses me off about conversations about people being offended by anything, most notably right now, cultural appropriations.

Calling something appropriative isn't necessarily about offense.

Inhumanly photoshopped female bodies on magazines are sexist. The fact that women receive lower wages, and are punished for trying to negotiate for higher ones is sexist.
The fact that the first lady of the US has to repeatedly and publicly disavow anger, lest she be labeled an Angry Black Woman, is racist. The disproportional incarceration of black men is racist.

None of these things offend me. Some days they upset me, more often I just accept them as ordinary, hazards inherent in the world. Many are so conditioned to these realities that they don't sense anything wrong with them at all.

When you tell me that I've done something offensive, you are interpreting something I'm doing. You have, by your very action, here, made a presumption about my intentions, my mental state, my knowledge, my emotional stance, whether I have respect in my heart.

Of the things I mentioned above, I have no idea how many are driven by racist intent, or bigoted thought (conscious or unconscious). Presumably some, possibly much, certainly not all. However, the outcomes stand in opposition to all the claims of egalitarian intent. Victory has a thousand fathers, etc.

If I travel to Japan, knowing nothing about the culture, and tromp around someone's house with my shoes on, I am giving offense. It doesn't have to be my intent, I might even have a good reason for keeping my shoes on, but that doesn't undirty the floors. The host is right to judge my behavior as offensive. If I do not figure it out and apologize, she may decide I am a terrible person, and not invite me back. That is her loss, but it's not her responsibility to figure out why I was acting in a way she finds offensive. It makes perfect sense for her to keep her distance from me and my offensive (if innocent) behavior.

It is a hurtful thing to feel misjudged. It is also a hurtful thing to feel assaulted by shadows, and to have people pull the equivalent of verbal Aikido on you when you try to call out any one of a thousand small injuries. "How dare you!" they say. "How dare you assume that person's intent! It is you who are the bigot." Even if you never spoke to intent. "You should have known I didn't mean 'language of the ghetto' in a racist way"

It is not anyone's responsibility to never give offense, but listeners aren't being judgmental or presumptive in declaring certain words or behavior offensive to them.

I get that appropriation and engagement can look the same from the outside, and some may disagree on where the line is. To me, the distinction is about people. Are you engaging the ideas and words of actual people, or just some stereotypical idea of them? Are you crediting actual people where it's due? (This is mostly rhetorical, I know you and thus assume you are).

For example, I love Firefly, but it litters itself with artifacts of Chinese culture, while neglecting to include, or even mention, actual specific Chinese people. That's appropriation, although it is done with what I assume to be the most respectful intent. Same goes for The Last Airbender. I don't think M. Night and Joss are trying to be assholes, but they manage to take the "cool parts" of East Asia without including any actual East Asians, and that's a problem.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

I am with you on damn near everything, here.

. . . but it's not her responsibility to figure out why I was acting in a way she finds offensive.

This is where I disagree. If we are going to be said to either give or take offense, then I feel it the responsibility of myself to Not Give Offense, in the first place, but also to Try To Understand Someone Else, if they've done something I've found offensive, and to inform them of why I thought it so, so we can start on the road to making sure it doesn't happen.

For instance, a politely private question about why that person kept their shoes on can lead to a conversation about what is socially acceptable, and what can be done for someone who needs a workaround for that social more.

I get that appropriation and engagement can look the same from the outside, and some may disagree on where the line is. To me, the distinction is about people. Are you engaging the ideas and words of actual people, or just some stereotypical idea of them? Are you crediting actual people where it's due? (This is mostly rhetorical, I know you and thus assume you are).


Yes. This, an infinity-billion times. My main problem, is (and I think always has been) with Generalisations About Behaviour. What starts as short-hand for reference often loses it nuance and becomes a set of blanket assumptions about why people are doing what they're doing, and how they view themselves and others, as they do it.

. . . I love Firefly, but it litters itself with artifacts of Chinese culture, while neglecting to include, or even mention, actual specific Chinese people. . .

Yeah, this really bugs the crap out of me, too. This gets into the issue of "Enjoying Problematic Things."

Though I have no pity for and give no quarter to M. Night. His original stated intent was to make a movie for his daughter about heroes who "looked like her." Asian Culture of many kinds, all swept aside, and just... Shat upon.

Thinking about that STILL makes me angry, mainly because the show did such a Good job.

[bakeneko.livejournal.com]

If we are going to be said to either give or take offense, then I feel it the responsibility of myself to Not Give Offense, in the first place, but also to Try To Understand Someone Else, if they've done something I've found offensive, and to inform them of why I thought it so, so we can start on the road to making sure it doesn't happen.

I can dig that an attempt to do no harm to others is a human responsibility. An attempt to understand (and perhaps forgive) harms done to you is in many cases useful and a boon, but I don't believe it is an obligation. In a world where less privileged folk are often the repeatedly-harmed, it seems unfair to expect them to, every time, be responsible for engaging the person who has harmed them. If I am the 20th person to dirty my poor host's floor today, it is cruel to expect her to have the emotional energy to engage me about it. Her first responsibility is to protect herself from my offense. She does not have the right to be abusive toward me, but she does have the right to disengage from me rather than hash out our misunderstanding (which, as far as she knows, may have been deliberate cruelty).

Totally with you on Enjoying Problematic Things. It is in some ways easier to be unsympathetic to M. Night because The Last Airbender just sucked :P And yes, the show was amazing, and I think a really good example of doing it right.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

If I am the 20th person to dirty my poor host's floor today, it is cruel to expect her to have the emotional energy to engage me about it.

Granted. I just try to remind myself that people genuinely may not know any better. If they do or they should, then I get less forgiving, but I try to give some benefit of doubt.

a really good example of doing it right.

Exactly. Need to rewatcha that show, soon...

[opalblack.livejournal.com]

If I am the 20th person to dirty my poor host's floor today, it is cruel to expect her to have the emotional energy to engage me about it.

Hai. I find myself having to make this point often. Similarly, if she does engage me about it, it's downright malevolent of me to then "troll" or "play devil's advocate" or tease her in any way about it, "for fun" or as an "intellectual exercise". It's not just an "intellectual exercise" to her, it's a reality.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Similarly, if she does engage me about it, it's downright malevolent of me to then "troll" or "play devil's advocate" or tease her in any way about it, "for fun" or as an "intellectual exercise".

100% Agreed. Debate/learn about that shit. Get into a conversation about the development of cultural norms. Whatever. But do it after you take your fucking shoes off and apologise.

[erynn999.livejournal.com]

Thank you for saying these things. They need to be said more often.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Every so often I hit a threshold level, and then I yell about stuff. Then I go back and edit it so that words actually form sentences and make sense and whatnot. Then I hope it actually makes sense, and not just to me. ;)

[lillash.livejournal.com]

I recall a philosophy class where the professor regularly used the pronoun "she" as the universal pronoun, rather than the traditional "he." I thought little of it until he explained why he did so: because women had gotten the short end of the stick throughout history, and he was doing his part to "make up for it."

This said multiple things to me: A) at one time, the "male" perspective (and, indeed, in our society "white," "wealthy/middle class," "English-speaking," "straight," "Christian," etc) was imagined to be the "non," the "normal." That is, without bias or presuppositions or modifiers, a sort of "preset." B) The "female" perspective (and "non-white," "poor," "non-English-speaking," "non-straight," "non-Christian," etc) on the other hand was modified. And C) by self-consciously choosing to use "she" to "make up for" what he termed millennia of misogyny, he was holding the "female" out as different, as other. (Grammatically, I prefer using "they" as the neuter term, even though its technically plural, in reference to some unidentified or hypothetical entity, but that's beside the point.)

In other words, any History Month that is not just History still holds out the object of that History Month as Other. We have a Black History Month because Black is Other. We have Women's, Asian and Pacific Islanders, and Native People's History Month because they are Other. I hate taking a group that was Other and, in trying to prove they are no longer Other, singling them out. The same goes for Studies or Literature. Especially Literature. It's not gay literature. It's literature. It's not African-American literature. It's literature. Is it fiction? Put it in the fiction section. Is it romance? Then put it there. Fantasy goes in fantasy, biographies in biographies, and so forth. Why make it Other? It's like the "white man's burden" continues, but now the "white man" must make sure to push nonwhite, nonman, nonstraight, etc, to the fore.

As for engagement vs. appropriation. Yes, people wearing the Taijitu or a veil without understanding their history or context are ignorant. Yes, people should attempt to grasp context of cultural artifacts. But the question is: can anyone actually break through their own "stuckness," their own cultural architecture, their own world view, to understand a cultural object "authentically?" As a liberal secular Westerner, can I ever actually understand the Taijitu as a Taoist or Neo-Confucian raised in that society? Simply, no. Because I wasn't. I am culturally stuck. I can attempt. I can learn everything I can. But. I will never have the same experiences as a person raised in the culture from which that cultural object emerged. A cultural object, when it moves from one culture to another, takes on a new meaning in the new context. That's true of any cultural object, be it a symbol, a way of dress, an idea, a book, or an actual object. I don't see why that's necessarily a bad thing.

And, in agreeing, the offended must reveal they are offended, the offended must explain why they are offended, the offender must seek out the explanation, the offender must explain their intentions in the act (or whatever) that caused the offence, and the offended must seek out that explanation. Dialogue. Conversation.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

But the question is: can anyone actually break through their own "stuckness," their own cultural architecture, their own world view, to understand a cultural object "authentically?"

I would go so far as to ask "can we understand our own?" Would Jews of 2.5K years ago look at modern Judaism and understand what they see, there?

Cultures change, are appropriated, integrated, remixed, mutated. We try to be respectful of our handling of them, yeah, but anything else isn't preservation. It's stagnation and death.

Dialogue. Conversation.

Exactly.

[drgnsyr.livejournal.com]

Ahh, you brought up Judaism for me. And here is where the limits of appropriation get fuzzy for me. I grew up loving cross culturism. I wore Celtic crosses just because I thought they were pretty, for example. But there is this idea in Judaism that you must not only DO right, but also APPEAR to do right.

This issue came up on a Jewish LJ community when a gentile asked our opinions about wearing a keepah. He is not a convert, and has no intention of becoming one. The keepah simply had some "special meaning" to him, which he never fully explained. The vast majority of the responders told him that they wouldn't be comfortable with it and he largely dismissed their objections with "Well it means something to me so you have no right to be upset about it."

However, there was one argument that sort of summed it up for me and that he never countered. He is not Jewish and not bound by any Jewish law. But with a keepah on his head out in public he LOOKS like an observant Jew. A foreign Jew who is not familiar with America sees this man in line at McDonalds. "Ahh," he thinks "that man is an observant Jew eating here. This place must be Kosher and so I can eat here, too."

In using a culture's imagery and artifacts outside of the context of that culture, how do you distinguish yourself from those who are using them in their originally intended context?

For the most part, though, I agree with you. If a couple wants to smash a glass at the end of their wedding because they find that the image of a wedding being as irreversible as the destruction of a glass, or because they feel that even in a moment of great joy they should remember that the world is still broken then I support them. These are beautiful images. However, if a gentile couple smashes a glass at the end of their wedding because "I always see it at Jewish weddings and it just seemed cool" I am going to be pissed off. I am going to be offended.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

In using a culture's imagery and artifacts outside of the context of that culture, how do you distinguish yourself from those who are using them in their originally intended context?

This is a very important point, and one for which I have no answer other than an observation of change over time. Someone, in this scenario, must be able to provide an explanation of this new context, as you have suggested, and must be able to do so in a way that readily says to others, "I am not [solely] in your context."

Without that ability to explain, then I can easily see why offense could and would be taken.

[raidingparty.livejournal.com]

Oooh... good timing.
http://yendi.livejournal.com/2204275.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika

Still having a hard time wrapping my head around what a culture is, let alone whether someone is part of it or not. The individual behavior definition is both highly precise and useless when trying to relate to others' use of same.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

These are all good things to consider.

[thehobbit.livejournal.com]

I would like to sit down and discuss this with you further in person. Not because I'm an asshole and have some sort of terrible thing to say that I don't want other commentors to read, but because I have two men getting lunch right now on my lap and forming full sentences is hard. I have an entire reply to you that's sat dormant because I haven't had the time to write it up. I don't forget that you reply to me, I just get so stinking side tracked.

But yes, I've been discussing what I call internet activism and while I support it, because we should care about causes and our fellow man, as a white woman I feel like I have no idea what I can do for any of the causes without doing some kind of blundering white move. And I get so freaked out by trying to help the wrong way that I stop wanting to help. Because I have a kid staring at me and snotting I hope any of that made sense.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

I can completely understand wanting to have this kind of conversation in person, for the sake of focus. And yes, I think that an honest desire to create a just world is the first and most important component to any social justice action.

[opalblack.livejournal.com]

I've been talking about racism a lot with my mum lately. Mainly because every now and then, we need to talk about something other than how unhappy she is, and it having just been Australia Day (AKA: *Heart* Racism Day) that's a fairly pertinent topic. Turns out, someone did a survey or a study recently that demonstrated that people with national flag stickers on their car are more likely to hold racist opinions and views (YOU NEEDED A STUDY FOR THAT?).

So ok, I rather like the Avenue Q song Everyone's a Little Bit Racist, though I often see the phrase being used (wrongly) as justification & apology for the unexamined race!fail moments everyone has from time to time (EVERYONE), denuded of its all important follow-up line about admitting being wrong. That, to me, is the operative.

Diversity is not about never sticking your foot in your mouth and saying The Wrong Thing, or even The Right Thing The Wrong Way. Our cultures, the English-speaking ones at least, are so infused with various ugly -isms that no matter how awesome you are, you'll fuck up from time to time. You might not use the N-Word, you might not use the F-Word (not fuck; faggot), but you may forget yourself and say "gypped" or "gay" or "gimp" without even realizing it, for instance.

And that's ok. We are not as individuals wholly to blame for the circumstances of our pasts, and those contribute to the acquisition of these ideas and words. Let's not beat ourselves up over that side of it. We can accept and forgive our failures to be the most right-on person evar, as long as we remember to first strive to be better, and second admit to and make amends for failure. To some extent, I do assume everyone (myself included) has a few naff ideas and misconceptions, but for the most part I accept that those are unconscious, unwanted, unasked-for, and unnoticed. You don't swim without getting a little water in your eyes. It's what you do about it, with it, and in response to it that matters.

Once a slur is pointed out, it is EPIC fail to try to claim "you know I don't mean it like that" or "I have lots of [X] friends so it's fine" or "language changes and it doesn't mean that any more". It should be obvious, but apparently a lot of people need it pointing out, if you say something racist, sexist, or homophobic, don't try to defend it!. The racist/sexist/homophobic thing said or done is infinitely less racist/sexist/homophobic than the attempt to defend it. Defending it demonstrates that you don't care about the people you've just slurred, and THAT is truly bigotry.

My radical as fuck, feminist, unionist, Very Difficult Woman of a mother has used the term "indian-giver" a couple of times recently, and I give her this look and say "did you really just say that?" and when she realises, she's horrified, because she knows how shit that type of language is, and she aspires to do better, but it's a term, with a meaning, that is part of the dialect she has been immersed in for 61 1/2 years, and sometimes, just sometimes, you forget these insidious little things are in your mouth waiting to poison your speech. Sometimes you don't even know they're there, after you've spat out all the ones you could taste, you might not notice this one hiding between these teeth and that one under your tongue.

But that ignorance is not itself a defense. It means nothing without redress; we are currently on the search for a turn of phrase to replace "indian-giver" so that it never sneaks its way in again. Intention is important, and Will, and Self-reflection. To say or do a thing in ignorance is only forgivable insofar as enlightenment and redress follow.

Honestly, a lot of people don't realise that "gypped" is a racial slur, so I tend to be quite forgiving about that one, as long as once I have pointed it out, the person makes a genuine effort to remove it from their vocabulary--and not just in my presence. Not using slurs in front of those they hurt is actually, in some ways, not as important as not using them in front of *everyone*else*. We don't fix the problem by cocooning the oppressed in a little bubble of careful language with one hand while the hold them down with the other.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

Full reply below.

[opalblack.livejournal.com]

[2/2]
As I've said, many times, I'm not saying don't use gay in the pejorative--though I would rather you didn't. I'm just saying that if you do, think about who thinks you agree with them, and who thinks you're like them. It's not that using gay in the pejorative necessarily offends all the gays, but it does make homophobes think you're one of them, and *that* makes life harder for gay people. OTOH, if you want homophobes to think you're one of them, far be it for I to dissuade you from flying your hate-flag high enough for me to see it and avoid you.

Too often I find myself shouting "It's the 21st Century WTF WHY ISN'T THIS FIXED YET?" and I feel so so sad for the people who fought so hard those fifty-odd years ago, and I wonder what those righteous warriors would think of us now, who knew that we are given only what we stand up and take, and allowed to keep only what we stand up and protect. Because we're backsliding; wage gaps are increasing, health gaps are increasing, life-expectancy gaps are increasing, and somehow there are those who believe (in spite of the mass of clear and uncontested evidence) that the fight is over and we are all free and equal, and that human rights theory (and struggle) is no longer relevant.

Which brings me, more or less, to Black History Month. I agree with you, why just a month? A month here, a day there, a week somewhere else, focusing on Black history & culture in the USA, doesn't *really* teach about Black history and culture. Or, it kinda does, but it segregates the relevance of it. Black history is a part of American history, as is Native American history, Women's history, and the history of small furry animals in Times Square. To call a myopic, patriarchal, white slice of America's history "History" and everything else "Black history" and "Native history" and whatever, says to the impressionable young people that History is universally relevant, but Black history is different, separate, not really relevant, a curious diversion.

At one stage, endeavours like Black History Month and so forth have been very important in the process of redressing the wrongs of the past, but I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that we should be beyond that now, to have fully integrated our understanding of Black history into the wider narrative of History. It's well past time to shed the colonialist presupposition that white is the default.

Some of us still have to make an effort to go out and learn about the histories of marginalised groups in our communities, but if the effort is made then the gaps in our knowledge are not erasure. To omit these things, whether deliberately or complicitly, from the narratives we pass on as educators is erasure. Fuck it, if you're an educator and your curriculum is all White Men with a day/month/week here and there to acknowledge all the things the Other People did, don't wait for that day/month/week to come along, jam it in every day that you can. When that day/week/month comes along, sure, focus in a little tighter, examine the contemporary relevance of the issues and interactions arising out of the things all the people did, but it's not a separate subject and this habit of treating it as such (and it has become a habit) is a bucket of shit.

And that's the thing, it's become a habit. Not just the habit of the privileged, either. We save all our Black stuff for Black month and all our Gay stuff for Gay month and all our Lady stuff for Women's month, make a big deal out of it, and the warp & weft of everyday is left more or less bereft of our contributions. We don't just allow ourselves to be made foreign, we participate, to some extent.

And here I shall stop rambling, for the moment. Not sure I was in any danger of a cohesive post today.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

denuded of its all important follow-up line about admitting being wrong. That, to me, is the operative.

Yes, precisely. We need to be able to talk about why it happens to EVERYONE, so that we can all say "And this is why privilege does that to people."

but you may forget yourself and say "gypped" or "gay" or "gimp" without even realizing it, for instance.

Exactly this. I once made it a point over the course of a month to counter any time someone said "gypped" with the far less socially acceptable "kiked." It upset a lot of people, and made them reconisder just trowing the word out there.

as long as we remember to first strive to be better...

Ultimate Key.

and sometimes, just sometimes, you forget these insidious little things are in your mouth waiting to poison your speech. Sometimes you don't even know they're there, after you've spat out all the ones you could taste, you might not notice this one hiding between these teeth and that one under your tongue.

I don't have anything to add to this, I just wanted to cut and paste it so its perfection can be in more than one place.

Because we're backsliding; wage gaps are increasing, health gaps are increasing, life-expectancy gaps are increasing, and somehow there are those who believe (in spite of the mass of clear and uncontested evidence) that the fight is over and we are all free and equal, and that human rights theory (and struggle) is no longer relevant.

. . .A month here, a day there, a week somewhere else, focusing on Black history & culture in the USA, doesn't *really* teach about Black history and culture. Or, it kinda does, but it segregates the relevance of it. . .

And this is my problem with the months, and these tiny displays of pseudo-justice. They distract from the fact that this shit isn't over. That what we're fighting for isn't won and done. In the US, giving oppressed groups a Month is the [emptily]PC version of "Put a Bird on It." Like that fucking Fixes a thing, to say a that month is about these people, without addressing the realities of what happened, why it happened, whose fault it is, and THAT IT IS STILL HAPPENING ALL THE TIME.

And here I shall stop rambling, for the moment. Not sure I was in any danger of a cohesive post today.

No, I think this all hangs together, pretty well. :)

[opalblack.livejournal.com]

Ha, put a bird on it. Yes, very exactly.

[drgnsyr.livejournal.com]

Assuming that a person of color(/gay person/poor person/woman/etc.) DOESN'T and CAN'T hold those views, or views analogous to those? Equally Detrimental.

Yes. I have slowly come to realize that I am a bit of misogynist. Not on a conscious, affects my actions or speech level (I don't think, anyway). But on that deeper, affects the sort of interactions I'm comfortable with kind of level. Being a woman certainly does not make me immune to that position.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

And it's very very important to recognise that. Do you find it something you want to change, something you're okay with, or what?

[bheansidhe.livejournal.com]

1. You are the only other person I know who listens to Hope For Agoldensummer.

2. I have, over a decade of online debates, reached the point that I immediately back out of any essay or post that kicks off with a discussion of White Privilege. There might be some terrific rhetoric and really insightful cultural commentary following that kind of open. I'll never know. I backspace by reflex.

3. I didn't even know it was okay to not be okay with discussions of White Privilege. I tried for about thirty minutes to expand on this, and everything looked so terrible in black and white that I just had to stop here.

[wolven.livejournal.com]

1) They're a pretty great band.

2&3) Again: Privilege is real, and everyone has some form of it. It's that second part that people tend to forget. Then all the defensiveness happens, all around, and it becomes a rage-orgy. A Raorgy.