fifty years after the march on washington, white people are still a disgrace

[bcbm]

http://gawker.com/fifty-years-after-the-march-white-people-are-still-a-d-1216851674

[Bea Arthur]

I would like to throw into the mix of people who are still a disgrace: straight people, men, everybody who lives in the Global North, and non-vegans.

[Devrim]

I would like to throw into the mix of people who are still a disgrace: straight people, men, everybody who lives in the Global North, and non-vegans.

So the overwhelming majority of humanity (just based on the non-vegans alone) is a disgrace? Could I just add misanthropic moralists such as yourself to the list?

Devrim

[Bea Arthur]

So the overwhelming majority of humanity (just based on the non-vegans alone) is a disgrace? Could I just add misanthropic moralists such as yourself to the list?

Devrim

Maybe you're confused, Devrim! This subforum is for people who oppose discrimination!! You want false equality between the oppressed and their disgraceful oppressors. You're like the feminists I argued with constantly in the 1970s who used to think that women would be equal if they could just imitate men's masculinist traits of greed, selfishness, and aggression. I thought that right-wing way of thinking was prohibited on this forum.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

How is 'everyone who lives in the north' in a position of privilege? I can understand that Europe and co. are situated in the Northern hemisphere but privileged social relations didn't happen because they were in the Northern hemisphere - that's just silly.

Although I agree with the general sentiment, I just don't like labels that don't correctly describe the root of discrimination i.e. 'kings ate beef so everyone who eats beef is in a position of extreme privilege', as opposed to 'kings sat lavishly at the top of extremely hierarchical and exploitative power structures so everyone who is a king is in a position of extreme privilege'.

[bcbm]

I would like to throw into the mix of people who are still a disgrace: straight people, men, everybody who lives in the Global North, and non-vegans.

not sure if troll or serious

[Os Cangaceiros]

If you're a non-white vegan lesbian who lives in the "Third World", you're OK though

[Os Cangaceiros]

I think one thing that needs to be understood about white people is that they think all racism ended around 1960-1970, that was the era of racism's last gasp. Therefore poor people are poor mostly because they don't have enough initiative & don't work hard enough, too many drugs, moral and cultural degeneracy/collapse of the family, etc.

I'm generalizing of course but I think a lot of people genuinely think that way. It can be hard discussing matters of race with even radical people, because it's obviously a sensitive topic. People who are never at the receiving end of negative attitudes or suspicions about them associate racism purely with something concrete and tangible. Slavery was tangible racism, for them, as was segregation. Those things were enforced through law (there are still laws that are racist, in that they unjustly and disproportionally affect minority communities, like drug laws, but they are not explicitly racist) . It's hard to wrap one's head around or empathize with a phenomenon that one has never experienced first-hand, and a phenomenon that cannot be changed purely through legislative fiat.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

If you're a non-white vegan lesbian who lives in the "Third World", you're OK though

unless you support NATO intervention in your country. Or don't uphold North Korea as a Workers' Paradise!

In fact, Kim Jong-Un is the only decent human being left!!

Also I think the article is plainly stupid. I don't - I really don't - get this whole ability of some people on 'the left' to generalise about all white people.

Yes, white people enjoy a huge privilege in society, and that should be taken into consideration in any interaction, or theory, or practice. But the tone of the article in the OP moves so far away from class analysis that, objectively, it might be deemed reactionary. Indeed, how can they get away with calling white Americans 'defective'? That is basically pissing on the American working class - made up of whites as well as blacks, hispanics and other groups.

It's a perfect example of privilege theory on steroids - divisive, hateful, exclusive and hugely counter-productive and self-righteous. I really, really hate that sort of politics.

A white man/woman of any class may indeed have a huge privilege in society compared to a black man/woman of any class, but a white working class person in America still faces a life of misery, destitution and no hope. The last thing we should be doing is choosing a group of American that includes those living hand-to-mouth on welfare, who can't afford healthcare, who will never get a decent job, and shoving a tiny bit of their existence in their faces, screaming 'PRIVILEGE!'. It's nasty, horrible politics, and it's wrong.

[Anglo-Saxon Philistine]

If you're a non-white vegan lesbian who lives in the "Third World", you're OK though

What really made me laugh was how conspicuously absent the bourgeoisie was from the list of Bad Groups. Also cisgendered people, probably due to some fucked-up Oppression Olympics stance.

[RedCeltic]

It is easy for us to paint everyone with the same brush and say "all white people" or "all black people" and so on, the truth however is that many white middle class American males don't really get it. That isn't to say all females, or all non whites "get it" either.

Only fifty years later people are totally complacent with the state of affairs. They take the right to vote for granted and do not understand the fight that took place to gain that right, both for women and for African Americans. They also completely miss a very important statement MLK made in his "I have a dream" speech... which was not just speaking of the need for black people in the south to have the right to vote, but the need for black people in places like New York to have something to vote for.

One of my favorite quotes from MLK is, "What is the point of sitting at the counter if you can not afford the price of a hamburger?"

Slavery in the United States was abolished 150 years ago, Jim Crow ended 50 years ago... what really has changed in that time? The world may be a better place but how much better? There is still voter suppression, There is still a lack of politicians and candidates who address issues for minorities. The majority of those incarcerated in Prison in America are of African decent, and don't forget we have the largest prison population of the world.

Capitalism, which feeds off of racism and keeping the working class pitted against each other, also thrives off keeping them in false hopes. By allowing a handful of people of color to rise to the top, the people by and large become oblivious to the fact that the vast majority live in poverty.

The far right Tea party in the United States are fond of complaining about an "entitlement culture." In their minds, black people are lazy and all looking for that government hand out, regardless of the fact that the majority of people on welfare are white people, not black people.

Honestly, does anyone really have the right to vote when our choices are between pro war capitalist A and pro war capitalist B?

[bcbm]

Also I think the article is plainly stupid. I don't - I really don't - get this whole ability of some people on 'the left' to generalise about all white people.

its hyperbole.

[Jimmie Higgins]

its hyperbole.Yeah I can't really fault articles like this from basically "trolling" or "being provocative" as I guess they'd call trolling when it's in article form :lol:.

The wall of denial and ignorance around race is a big fucking pain in the ass and demoralizing because it makes people feel even more isolated - like victim-blaming does. But the ruling class puts in a huge amount of energy in maintaining the invisibility and marginilization of people as well as cultivating this ignorance. Most Prisons are hidden away in small towns (like concentration camps), and the re-segregation of society allows for concentrated policing or abuse of immigrants and no one outside of that neighborhood ever sees it. Then there's the ideological shit where the local news victim-blames anyone who is a victim of police brutality as a "gang member or someone with ties to gang members" and anyone who complains of racism is "playing the race card".

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

I can never decide if the institutional racism in media (you know, white 18 year olds are 'lovely, middle class children', whereas black 18 year olds are inevitably described as 'gang members who have had brushes with the law' or whatever) is the product of conspiracy from upon-high, like a directive to use certain words to describe certain groups, or if those who write and broadcast the news are themselves 'brainwashed' in a sense, i.e. it's just become a media norm to associate certain groups with certain word descriptions.

[Jimmie Higgins]

I can never decide if the institutional racism in media (you know, white 18 year olds are 'lovely, middle class children', whereas black 18 year olds are inevitably described as 'gang members who have had brushes with the law' or whatever) is the product of conspiracy from upon-high, like a directive to use certain words to describe certain groups, or if those who write and broadcast the news are themselves 'brainwashed' in a sense, i.e. it's just become a media norm to associate certain groups with certain word descriptions.

A bit of both probably. The "On high" part probably comes into play mostly with ruling class attempts to reverse the balance of forces in regards to social movements in the 60s and 70s. On the one hand, propaganda is needed to justify the direct repression used against black militants and new leftists; politically there is also the "Southern Strategy" of creating a racial wedge by rallying the old segregationist elements behind a neoliberal program (rather than oppose school intergration, join us in smashing unions and creating privite schools which won't have to be as regulated by civil rights laws etc - "school choice" is a much more persuasive rallying cry than "segregation forever!").

In media representation, I think it's probably a convergance of different interests: the federal government started all these "war on drugs" initiatives which gave local police more money and weapons and such for more drug busts. Since they were already repressing black and poor communities and because a poor street drug dealer is less likely to legally be able to fight against arrests than someone dealing coke to bankers, it was much easier to get the federal cash by rounding up black kids on a corner. Since the local media wants sensationalism and the local pigs want to justify their repressive sweeping tactics and militarization of their forces, it's in both of their interests to have the news report that the people being rounded up are crazed sociopaths. Politicians also sell these ideas to get support and also to justify crack-downs and elimination of services. So the way I see it, it's really just a huge tangle and that's why racism is so pervasive in so many ways and we can't really just point to these bad politicians or these bad institutions... it's the whole rotten pile.