Observations...
Mar. 25th, 2007 10:07 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
There was a long rambling post here that served no purpose other than me being upset, and by proxy, upsetting whoever read it.
It's erased. So at least I've learned something. Not so sure I still won't upset someone with this, but I'm trying not to here, all right? Just trying to get a wider perspective than I apparently have.
So...okay then.
Will someone please be kind enough to tell me what would be considered appropriate ways to help fix this situation? I'm understanding the reasoning about white america needing to be held accountable for the 'crimes of the past' as well as the present, but what I'm not getting a clear idea on, is what, exactly, I can do as a person to help rectify it. Since I can't change my skin color, my racial inheritance, or what the guys who have a lot more money and power than me are doing, what can I do as a person? What are you expecting? My own ideas of treating (and thinking of, despite the examples I used first post) people as people and not skins is apparently not enough.
No, this is not sarcasm, this is a person who's been up all night reading on this and getting a lot of the 'it's our/white people's fault and we/white people need to fix it' part, but not finding a whole lot of practical application for the average person living an everyday life. Except for talking it to death. Which still does nothing to help the situation. So I'm asking for a succinct run down.
What can be done?
What do you do?
What would you want done?
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:01 pm (UTC)If you keep making it a bloody issue, it will always be an issue.
That's true, but ignoring a large issue that is currently working to undermine and oppress people in the country I live, every day, just because people are socialized not to see it? I'm not a "minority" so speaking for them here is tentative at best, but for a HUGE number of people in this country, they can't just "see past it". That's... yeah, I think that deserves to be made an "issue" of. It's not as simple as just being colorblind and hoping it will go away.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:12 pm (UTC)Yes, those that ignore the past are doomed to repeat but there is a difference between knowledge and wallowing. Making "being white" out to be a bad thing is no better than ostracizing someone else for their race or colour.
I'm not saying ignore it, I'm saying teach knowledge rather than obsessing about the past actions. I can teach my daughter that she is white and therefor will get things better and must fight against, or I can teach her to try her best, work hard, and see people for what is inside of them, colour be damned.
There is a huge world of difference between ignoring it and being an ostrich and obsessing about the wrong issues. Making white people out to be bad is no better than making blacks, or orientals or anyone else out to be bad simply because of their skin colour.
Chances are we all have ancestors that did shitty things to other people. Many of us have family now that does the same thing. We have to be accountable for our own actions. There is a difference between changing the world and taking the weight of it onto your shoulders.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-25 11:27 pm (UTC)"Past actions" have nothing to do with this. They way people act today, does.
What "wrong" issues am I/others obsessing about? I'd say the fact that there are people by and large receiving preferential treatment because of their race is a pretty big issue. And actually, no, comparing the current social standing of any race (which ties into their economic standing, their cultural mores, etc.) to any other race is incorrect and fallacious no matter how you slice it, considering each of them had and continue to have very different, distinct histories and cultures, not to mention timelines. It's not comparable. Apples and oranges.
I'm really curious -- who is making white people out to be "bad"? That seems to be a very common misconception when talks like this crop up. White people aren't a hivemind. We don't all fall in lockstep because we have the same color skin. There is, as you said, a "world of difference" between villainizing a group and presenting a breakdown of how that group is operating on a different level than everyone else in the society in which they operate and live. White privilege is a phenomenon that (unfairly) benefits white people, not a meeting of the minds that we all consciously contribute to in an effort to impede everybody else's progress.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-26 01:24 pm (UTC)It happens today. Is happening today. Will happen today. It's stressful. Like, did you hear about that poor kid who was sentenced to 7 years for pushing a hall monitor? She did it on purpose, which she admits. But the judge who sentenced her to 7 years sentenced a white kid with probation for burning down a house. (http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0703120170mar12,1,1921178.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed&ctrack=1&cset=true)
Or about the guy in Harrison County who was beaten to death by a prison guard. That news didn't make the national media.
Or about the time I was stuck in Shreveport at 3 o'clock in the morning, and the Avis attendant refused to issue me a rental car, even though I had a reservation. And that was last June.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-27 04:02 am (UTC)Would you be willing to ask her or something and let mw know? I would appreciate knowing if I still owe her CD's or not...
no subject
Date: 2007-03-27 04:05 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-03-27 04:06 am (UTC)