Race and Progressives

Usually, my anger with respect to race can more often than not be found directed towards those on the right wing. It's usually them on opposing ends of race discussions. However, more and more, due to my experiences and the sharing of experiences from fellow anti-racists like Godheval, I'm noticing that many on the left are suffering from some different but related symptoms. Progressive whites are often times suffering from "Racism Displacement Syndrome".

RDS, as we shall abbreviate from here on out, is a common tendency amongst White Progressives to work towards progress on matters of inequalities, but choosing to remain oblivious to issues of race in the matters and how Whites experiences with race are crucial to understanding inequalities as well. This is often times a different manifestation of the "color-blind" approach to race, acting as if it doesn't exist as a solution to the problem of the social construct and it's effects in inequalities and privileges.

This is my basic message to White Progressives: wake the fuck up. Seriously. We live in a time of changing paradigms, technology spread out and information available in more ways than ever before, yet White people are found to be just as uneducated as ever on matters of race. White Progressives may know some about race here and there through education in other fields like Political Science or History, but the study of Racism is a topic that is tied into the social reality of the United States that needs to be studied, understood, and acted on as well. White Progressives, for all of their reading, blogging, and internet activism, have no excuse whatsoever to remain ignorant on matters of race. One cannot study the history of capitalism without realizing much of it's success is due in part to the subjugation by whites of non-whites. One cannot ignore the factor of race in the discussion on environmental degredation, as it is the pillaging, overuse, and plowing down of non-White lands that allows White companies to sell much of their products. One can not study inequalities in the economy without studying how race, one of Americas oldest and biggest legacies, is tied to it in ways that would be ridiculous to ignore.

My advice? To the White Progressive who knows something substantial about race relations: start speaking up more. You can't denounce your privilege by just 'denouncing' it, but you can give up the privilege to keep silent on matters of race. To the White Progressive who spends so much time on matters of Gay Marriage, Capitalism and Corporatism, Foreign Policy, etc.: your excuses are inadequate. It is time to start reading, educating yourself, and being just as active on those matters as well.

Matters of race permeate and intertwine in nearly every modern issue that faces people in a capitalist system. Ignoring it or running away from it will not make that change, but it will cement the reality that the fight against racism is largely a fight left for minorities when, quite frankly, whites are just as responsible for anti-racist action.

Break.

I won't be blogging on very much for a while. School and some personal problems are taking their toll on my time to be creative. But sometimes it's better to deal with those head on. Maybe it will give me more fuel to create with later. In any case, see you on Facebook until then.

Jaime

Words

Some words that describe Americans (not citizens, mind you, but what we know as the "model American")...add ones that you find appropriate.

Narrow-minded
Obtuse
Entitled
Myopic
Oblivious
Imperceptive
Unaware
Heedless

Any other ideas?

Founding Fathers.

Seriously, what is the big deal with these guys? They are not deities. They are not untouchable beings. Their judgement is and was not flawless.

Why do people have a hard time viewing things in context? The Founding Fathers set up a system that we enjoy today, but it is hardly the same system we had then. We live and work in a Post-Industrial society, which is much different from the Agrarian one they framed their ideas in. We live in a time when black-letter law of slavery, segregation, and oppression of women is done with, but these things were the norm in the time of the philosophical framework of the system the Founders agreed on. We offer public education for those who do not have the funds or the desire to see their child schooled privately. This option, however, was not something that was part of the framework for our founders vision. However, our society has prospered with those things implemented, and we've been fine. Why can other issues that may conflict with "The founders" intentions not be viewed in the same context?

If you lost all of your money or assets and had no more private school, you'd be damned happy there is a public option for your child to be educated under, to guarantee at least a minimum of education and opportunity in this society. Why should this be any different for health-care, the matter of life and death for many Americans? We have a "right" to buy cheap, subsidized fast-food (which was built up by government socialist subsidies to begin with), but not to be able to walk into the hospital or doctor to get care? I think this is less a question of freedom and more one of priorities. Government management was and is responsible for interstate highways, public schools and colleges, pell grants, GI Bill (albeit having a racist implemenation), Social Security, public libraries, bridges, NASA, and public transit. So why exactly is the government managing a public option for some a bad thing? Oh yeah, that's right. We already do have and have had public options for some for decades (Medicare and Medicaid). Somehow, the country hasn't collapsed into a socialist dictatorship. Imagine that.

Oh yeah, I forgot another large government beaurocracy: the military.

Somehow I get the feeling we'd be "okay" in adding a public option. It's our priorities with respect to who gets kickbacks, tax cuts, and subsidies that needs to be examined.

Family

You know, I get told a week before hand that my brother coming home, I don't have time to ask off for it, but I work a 9 hour day, drive home at 10PM, get there at 11PM, ready to spend what little time I can with him before he leaves the country again. Then, you make this comment to me over and over, in front of everyone, and try to bring yourself up at the expense of me and my life. If it were almost anyone else, it wouldn't bother me, but make me laugh heartily. But since I care about you, the comment stings badly. It stings, not because others heard it in and of itself, but because my life is hard enough than to have my own flesh and blood publicly displaying their resent about my good fortune in front of a family member I hardly ever get to see and often wonder if I will get to see again once he leaves the country.

I have done nothing but bust my fucking ass, save and scrimp every dollar I can, take care of my own affairs without begging for money to bail me out at every turn for fucking myself over, and when something good finally comes my way, you took several opportunities to slight me because of it, as if I had any say in the matter. Why can't you feel good that things finally took a turn for the positive? All this after my car died in December, I had to buy a used one and do lots of work getting it in decent shape, I had to move to a new place (which meant a big increase in rent and a nice sized deposit, take on debt for the first time (which I was openly unhappy over), and deal with even more things to pay off every month. And yet, I'm the one that's open for attacks, however 'jokingly' they are supposed to have been.

I'm hurt and offended.

La Pregunta

"I'm not a nigger. I'm a man. But if you think I'm a nigger, that means you need him, and you gotta ask yourself why."

- James Baldwin, interview, 1962.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDjaqhuSqQE

Interesting clip of an interview with James Baldwin. He is one of my heroes.

To those confused.

I've received comments from people who are confused, concerned, or just flat out pissed towards me because of a misunderstanding they have about why I write the way I do about racism and what that means for my feelings on White people. This is especially pronounced in my case because in the eyes of most Americans, I am a White man.

Some feel I am guilty. I'm not guilty about anything. I didn't create the system of racial privilege and I did not choose my skin color or any other physical feature. I feel no guilt. I do, however, recognize the responsibility I have now that I have become informed. Once informed, I now feel outrage when I see things perpetrated in a systemic and institutionalized way, all the way to a personal way when it comes to racism. I feel particularly outraged due to a lack thereof on the part of other White people, though ultimately my outrage isn't landed at their feet. This leads me to my second point.

I, for the record, do not and never have hated White people as a group. I don't automatically dislike them upon meeting them. How could I? I am White, most of my family is White, and some good friends of mine are White. I love all of these people dearly. Some integral people in my upbringing were White (my Grandmother on my Dad's side being one). Many well educated and respectable people in history and society today are White.

Where my outrage is ultimately directed and where I feel the most resentment (with regards to White people specifically) is with two groups:

1. White people who refuse to learn about the society they are in and how it functions. Ignorance is one thing, but that can only be allowed for so long. Flat out willfull ignorance of the problems and manifestations of injustice in society in order to preserve some fairly tale life one wishes to remain subdued in is not an excuse. I do find that many White people fall into this category, and it is with them that I hold a lot of bitterness towards upon encountering.

2. White people who know damn well what the system is, don't care, and do things consciously or unconsciously to perpetuate it on a regular basis. I have zero tolerance for these kinds of White people.

These two groups are bunched into a group and divided by a very thin line (sometimes they overlap in small ways), but I find these two to the best most problematic, followed by the "Well-meaning, do-gooder White" who is oblivious to racial issues in any authentic manner (outside from interpersonal and overt racism).

This does not mean I hate White people. If I hated White people, why the fuck would I try to reach out to and write about them and their behaviors if I hated them? Wouldn't I let it go and allow their racism to continue if I hated them?

The truth is that I think White people are better than this shit. I know what most White people act like in all-White settings. The truth is, most intelligent and educated White people are capable of learning so much about things like religious intolerance, homophobia, global climate change, politics, etc., so I know they are capable of learning this. I just also know it is a much tougher lesson for them to learn, so I go into it with a thicker skin and an attitude that is ready for all types of responses.

I also know that I have to be on the lookout for my own racism, educate myself on these matters, listen to other POC and Whites who are informed, and continually sharpen my understanding of this issue.

I believe the fight against racism to be a worthy one, as well as the fights against other injustices. But, if I treat White people like it is not their job to work against it with minorities, then that would be the one way I could show my lack of humility and caring towards the White community.