Tim Wise, Reflections on Race and White Privilege

[Led Zeppelin]

Anyone heard of this guy before? I just saw an interview with him and he was great.

Right now I'm watching a really good talk he gave on white privilege, totally demolishing the liberal while guilt "I'm not privileged!" nonsense.

Check it out here, it's in 5 parts:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbNMIm8mqaU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4oUuJxJ_9fI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnBsbj8QB7Y&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdeU8X9nd8I&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM7OJ_GjISE&feature=related

[khad]

Tim Wise is completely spot on. Every leftist ought to watch this. :thumbup1:

Edit: You will see that in part 4 Wise takes quite a bit of influence from Marxist historian and activist Theodore Allen's work.

[Abdul Alhazred]

I think it's cruel the way he is secretly mocking blacks and non-whites, even whilst, most ironically of all, he is admitting that he himself is 'white and privileged'.

Even his body language and delivery is clearly a parody of black speakers.

[manic expression]

Tim Wise can, on occasion, make some good points when he actually talks about politics, and he's good at debunking capitalist claims that racism doesn't exist (I also like his defense of affirmative action). However, some of his stuff is suspect; during the general election, Wise listed all the double-standards between Obama and McCain. Sure, there were double-standards, but a lot of that is because the Democrats don't have the media power that the Republicans have. John Kerry's time in Vietnam got bashed while Bush's cushy appointment to a rich-kids' National Guard unit was defended. White privilege? No, just Democrats being incompetent.

On the video, I could go through some of his comments but it's not worth it, the bottom line is that he's being ham-fisted and ignoring the innumerable nuances of race relations. Is that so bad? No, not really, but we shouldn't expect much more than a loud attempt to make liberals think differently about racism.

And like I always say, "white privilege" hurts understanding of issues of racism more than it helps. It just comes across as finger-pointing and makes a deep social problem something to be pinned on individuals. His title, What's the matter with white people?, is a good example of this, it's like pointing out the oppression of the Quechua in Peru and saying What's the matter with Peruvians?. Does that promote unity? McIntosh-ism has to go.

Some running commentary on edit (yeah, I know, it's late here):

On edit, video 2/5, towards the end, Wise goes (paraphrased) "America doesn't think it has a right to Iraq's oil because of capitalism, it does because of white world supremacy". What an idiotic thing to say. Only a blustering fool would posit that whites wanted Iraq's oil because they felt whites deserved it; in reality, the imperialists are more than happy to give the Saudis control of the oil in their country (so long as they cooperated with the US); in reality, the US worked closely with Saddam Hussein for years before the relationship went south. So no, it's not about "white world supremacy", it's about profits, it's about capitalism.

On another edit, video 3/5 is the most anti-worker, anti-communist pot of bullsh*t I've heard in a LONG time. Tim Wise charges that whites' rational interests lie with white supremacy, and that class struggle is not the fundamental struggle in society. Not only is this the product of badly-managed white guilt, not only is this proven wrong by history, not only does this ignore all the analyses put forth by Lenin and others which directly answer these supposed "holes" in Marxism, it's basically bigoted. Tim Wise, welcome to the Peggy McIntosh Club of Counterrevolution.

Last thing, Wise talks about workers being "losers". Workers can't choose to change their identity, they experience exploitation and deprivation every day. They can't pretend to not be workers, at least not very well, and especially not very well in times of pointed class struggle. More importantly, however, has Wise ever heard of the Russian or Cuban or Chinese Revolutions? He has, but since he's a counterrevolutionary, petty-bourgeois bigot, those examples of working-class victory are of no use to him and his nonexistent platform.

[Guerrilla22]

Yeah he came to my university during the prop 2 campaign in Michigan, which was a ballot iniative started by the right to end affirmative action. He blew apart arguments that white privilege does not exist as well as the so called "reverse discrimination" argument. I went to see him speak, I was definitely impressed.

[genstrike]

I thought it was a very good talk, and something which looks like it would be very useful for a lot of white radicals (especially some of the people posting threads on the N-word on RevLeft), but maybe it is just that it is cut off, but I always find I have two questions about discussions like this:

1. Now that I recognize that I have some privilege as a white male, what do I do about it?

2. Okay, so what do I do? (because #1 is often answered in the abstract)

[manic expression]

2. Okay, so what do I do? (because #1 is often answered in the abstract)

I think you may have just answered your own question. Always be wary of ideologues who have sway mostly in academia; Tim Wise is one of those ideologues, and it's partially because his mindset doesn't speak to any sort of concrete political work, especially for whites. Whatever whites do, they apparently make it worse in his eyes. He basically rejected all of revolutionary politics in videos 3-5, and I've never seen any proponent of his type of worldview DO anything. Plus, he thinks white privilege is more important to fight than capitalism; I'm quite certain that he'd be satisfied if we just switched all the white faces of the bourgeoisie with Black ones.

That's why Tim Wise has no real place in the left. It's no coincidence that this is, in fact, the state of things.

[respectful87]

Huh I never knew I was so privledged. I am the first to admit that certain white people have doors open to them others never will. Race and class are the two reasons why. However, if your at the bottom of the pit your still getting shit on. It does not matter if your white, black, brown or yellow.

(sorry if this message is unreadable I am abit out of it will check it in the mornin)

[Prairie Fire]

Tim Wise is like Ward Churchill:

Generally reactionary when communism is presented as the alternative, but knowledgeable and well versed on his particular subject.

I've met a lot of people like this. When they speak from their own experience and their own areas of expertise they do fine, but when they stray out of it onto the subject of communism, they instinctively revert to the bourgeois narrative.

Here is Tim in a moment of pre-class concious brilliance, though:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3Xe1kX7Wsc&feature=related

[Pawn Power]

Tim Wise is like Ward Churchill:

Generally reactionary when communism is presented as the alternative, but knowledgeable and well versed on his particular subject.

I've met a lot of people like this. When they speak from their own experience and their own areas of expertise they do fine, but when they stray out of it onto the subject of communism, they instinctively revert to the bourgeois narrative.


You mean they stray from the party line. :lol:

[Stand Your Ground]

I watch his movie just the other day. Very good indeed.

[manic expression]

You mean they stray from the party line. :lol:
No, Prairie Fire probably means that they engage in anti-communist, anti-worker nonsense because they're more interested in delirious self-flagellation than in doing anything in the real world. See my post for more info.

[willdw79]

I thought it was a very good talk, and something which looks like it would be very useful for a lot of white radicals (especially some of the people posting threads on the N-word on RevLeft), but maybe it is just that it is cut off, but I always find I have two questions about discussions like this:

1. Now that I recognize that I have some privilege as a white male, what do I do about it?

2. Okay, so what do I do? (because #1 is often answered in the abstract)

I am a black man and it does not qualify me to give advice, I just thought that you may think that it is relevant.

I think on the issue of white privilege/white guilt, there is nothing that needs to be mended. I say, everyone, regardless of what people say; the social construct of race should be rejected. This is difficult because it has been inculcated in us. However, I think the key is to not be racist and never ever support identity politics.

It seems difficult because I think often people may perceive it as some kind of racism, but I say, don't support nationalism, or any form of ethnic identity as a political goal. I am just saying what I believe, but, I would say, support multi-racially unified communism. Also, I think that sexism and hatred for homosexuals is connected, I say to resolutely support organizations that denounce racism, sexism, and gay-bashing as tricks of the capitalists for dividing and conquering society for exploitation, including white men. True equality for all workers needs no concept such as race to divide us.

[Organic Revolution]

Tim is a good friend of mine, and I love to hear him speak. I think his analysis has been spot on for years, and I think this kind of race politics are ignored by the mostl white "left" for obvious reasons.

[manic expression]

I think this kind of race politics are ignored by the mostl white "left" for obvious reasons.

You mean how we're all secret racists? Way to add something constructive to the discussion. I think your self-applied label of "race politics" confirms everything I've said on this thread already.

[Prairie Fire]

Manic Expression:

No, Prairie Fire probably means that they engage in anti-communist, anti-worker nonsense because they're more interested in delirious self-flagellation than in doing anything in the real world. See my post for more info.

Um, sort of...

I'm not necesarilly criticizing them for being critical of the system, and not doing anything to change it. Some people are more useful in a capacity as academics and lecturers than they are as organizers (although, ideally, anyone presenting politics should also be organizing to attain them).

What I am saying is despite their in-ability to break away from the bourgeois narrative, from metaphysical ideas, etc, they are still valuable sources of information on the subjects that they have done the research on.

Despite their knee-jerk rejection of communism as a political/economic alternative, their own experiences and research tends to validate the working class views allready found among socialists.

Tim Wise, especially in recent clips, does seem to kind of forsake the views of solidarity that he presented in my clip above, but the fact I think is that he has done the research on racial inequalities in the United states, and he is in possesion of valuable statistics that he presents in a hard-hitting way. This is analysis that should be taken.

For Ward churchill, I have read his polemic on communism. As an aboriginal womyn myself, let me say that it is a bunch of voodoo-priest metaphysical nonsense about how aboriginal people are "naturally more in tune with the land", and how we need to return to the old traditionalist ways.

This is obviously a silly and reactionary analysis, but on the subject of genocide against the aboriginal peoples of the United States, Ward churchill is still an authority. His analysis and condemnation of the genocide against aboriginal people is not sugar coated in the least, and he clearly identifies that this genocide was state policy of the United States government, rather than the un-coordinated and random actions of various settlers with rifles.

I'm reading a book right now, by Ronald Wright, called "Stolen continents". It is very knowledgable at presenting the societies of North and South America, and the savagery of the european conquest of these continents. The man did his research well, and his sources are well backed up.

On the flip-side, he is a bourgeois historian, so in addition to painting some of the genocidal acts against aboriginals as random settler actions (rather than state policy), he also inserts the obligatory anti-Stalin, anti-communism fail-safes in a book talking about the European conquest of North and South America ( He compares the client city states of the Aztec sphere of influence to the Eastern bloc :rolleyes:).

Howard Zinn will condemn United States imperialism from dawn until dusk, and he does this with scathing criticism. However, even in the illustrated version of "A peoples history of the United States", he still devotes a whole page to obligatory distancing himself from Stalin/USSR, with no specific references to historical incidents.

What I'm trying to say is that it is possible to eat the peach and spit out the pit.

The scientific, informed, and historical stances that they take are informative and are useful information to have that usually bolster our position. When they stray outside of their research, though, into emotional, metaphisical, vague condemnations of communism, then that part of their analysis that ceases to have a base in reality should be disregarded.