Latoya has a new series up at Racialicious, "The Things We Do to Each Other/The Things We Do to Ourselves" about the ways that race intersects with other movement building efforts and despite our attempts at moving to more nuanced understandings of race in America, outside of community based organizing that is explicitly anti-racist, it is rare that you see an actual centralization of race in the mainstream gay rights movement. In discussing how we as identity-based workers and folks working for policy based changes to increase rights in our communities, we overlook the ways that we marginalize other voices. In the case of the organizing and coverage of Prop 8 it was the voices and contributions of queer people of color.
I think it is safe to say that an apt parallel is the women's rights movement and its returning insistence of centralizing the voices of white women. Whether it is intentional or not, feminism frequently recenters itself around the needs and lives of privileged women, and I think this is a point to make. Feminism has dirty baggage in its tokenization of women of color and there have been many many conversations, anthologies and organizing efforts around displacing the white center for mainstream feminism. But those of us that work from the margins can only change the history and image of feminism, along with the way that it plays out in organizing efforts, so much. If the mainstream image of feminism continues to insist that feminism is for white women, how can we reclaim it for our own communities and break it down as something that is potentially useful across sectors?
What am I trying to say? That despite our attempts at including voices of color, mainstream feminism always comes back to revolve around the voices of white women and women of color are generally put in the position of token or an addition and after thought after the omission has already been made. This stems from internal turmoil sure, but it also is damaged by mainstream messaging, marketing and distribution of resources along the lines of privileged women being centralized. The theory being, well feminism has always been for white women, so isn't it just going to be like that?
But similar to the coverage and aftermath of Prop 8, I think it is very easy for us to blame each other as opposed to looking at larger dialogs that benefit from us not getting along or being able to work together. This is not to take accountability from mainstream social reform efforts in their gender, race and class omissions but to look at the bigger narrative that benefits from the "divide and conquer" that played out so clearly in the work around Prop 8. When mainstream media outlets continually insisted that blacks were responsible for the passage of Prop 8, despite looking at factual evidence percentage wise, they were playing on racist beliefs that the black community is inherently homophobic, that 'these' people don't care about your community, so you, a monolithic gay-assumed white-community, shouldn't care about them.
Similarly, if we are to look at the way feminism is talked about in mainstream media it is rare that organizations that focus on explicitly women of color issues or on issues of class are considered mainstream feminism, even if the organization defines itself as feminist, similarly for women of color academics or writers. Women of color are always women of color first before they are defined or made legible as feminist. Naturally, the way we are represented is in some way reflected by actual history and an ongoing inability to effectively centralize marginalized voices into mainstream feminism, yet, our history bogs us down via the way we are understood and the way our efforts are translated. An inability for mainstream dialog to effectively represent different forms of feminism continue to force us on the ground to stay apart, unable to hold each other accountable in real ways to move forward with anti-racism to be part of the feminist agenda.
When my women of color sisters say that feminism has failed them, it is not just feminists that have failed us or just the movement, it is also the way the movement has been made popular, where women of color are rarely seen as feminists and feminism is rarely understood as something that speaks to or has the potential to change the lived conditions of women of color. Until we can break the inability for a mainstream dialog on nuanced feminism, the dialogue will continue to trap us.
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and often the efforts of western, typically white, feminists to make a more inclusive movement result in paternalistic rhetoric about extending feminism to women of color and women of the "the third world" who are thus perceived as marginalized victims of backwards societies (or disordered minority cultures within Western societies) in need of the white woman's enlightened thought
outside of the movement, but perhaps related in its mainstream paternalistic (co-optation of) feminism, i find it frustrating when men and women, who are otherwise anti-feminist and anti-woman in their ideology and policies, co-opt a feminist dialog to shame other cultures for their overt sexism...just the type of hypocrisy i should probably be used to by now in the attitudes of the united states toward the parts of the world it does not particularly approve of
I've been thinking about this a lot lately due in part to this post, and to the fact that here on our campus there are a number of WoC involved in Amnesty International but hardly any in the feminist student orgs. Last semester 2 of these students from AI were in one of my classes and we got into a discussion about feminism during my office hours. I suggested that they attend the Women's Action Network meetings, because I thought that would also help them drum up support for the upcoming anti-sweatshop campaign. They said it hadn't occured to them, and that they tended to focus on groups that were about human rights and social justice. Of course my first response was "feminism is about human rights and social justice!" But it got me thinking (again) about why mainstream feminism doesn't give off this vibe to everyone, and why there's not much of an attempt made to reach out to a more diverse group.
I really think it's partially tied into the human tendency to want to tell meta-narratives, to get a "big picture," to be able to have a generalized characterization in your mind of the groups or movements you encounter. Of course, this tendency leads to the othering of marginal groups. So I think you have to fight the urge to generalize and form a big picture, because this prevents you from really listening and understanding the particular, situated narratives. And if you can't understand those, then you can't work together, build consensus in the larger population, bring about change, etc. So I know the recommendation to shut up and listen has been made before, but I keep coming back to it whenever I'm pondering this issue.
I totally agree that white women are portrayed as the face of the feminist movement in mainstream culture, but I'd add a qualifier to that: upper-class, wealthy white women are portrayed as the face of the movement.
Liberal, upper-class whites (who I believe are most likely to identify as feminists) often have little more than disdain for white working-class women who sometimes vote Republican and may not believe in the entire litany of feminist positions, but who, nonetheless, are oppressed in our patriarchal society.
Likewise, class realities often split or complicate issues among people of color.
The willingness to assume that all white people are economically privileged and all POC are impoverished is a blind spot in feminist discourse.
Also, I think the fact that public policy in this country has been made mostly by members of the upper-class elite (I'm including both members of the left and the right in that statement) is the reason that domestic policy has failed those it's intended to help.
I think that for the feminist movement to be more inclusive and to have that inclusiveness be represented in the mainstream, we have to cross class and political lines as well as racial ones.
The willingness to assume that all white people are economically privileged and all POC are impoverished is a blind spot in feminist discourse.
yeah, and I think that this is really Othering (to both groups) too
Ok, I have a huge question about privilege and marginalizing groups. When is it unconscious racism, and when is it just demographics? Samhita noted, "mainstream feminism always comes back to revolve around the voices of white women" I find it really hard to tell when a case can and should be accounted for just by statistics--so for instance, the numerical majority of women in America are white, so statistically that makes sense that on average if you see an American female feminist, or read an article on one, she will probably be white. On the other hand, I do believe that most people hold unconscious racial assumptions. Maybe I'm really baffled by this because I haven't read a lot on social justice issues, but how can you tell when something is unfairly revolving around one group to the point of marginalizing others, and when a numerical majority is just manifesting a statistic?
While I think a small portion of feminist discourse could be linked to statistics, I would argue that the white face of feminism (and queer theory, and disability studies) is more linked to privilige (gah which I can never spell) and unconscious racism.
-The articles, positions given in academia, and recognition of feminist are disproportionately white, beyond simply X amount of the population is white so X amount of positions should be white.
-This is because feminist discourse has not occured in a vacum but rather is sometimes part of systems that privlige (as other people on here have noted) a white, educated, middle class background. Because of this a lot of feminist theory is not only produced by white women, but the very tenant of some radical feminists that gender is how all women are primarily oppressed. The ignores and invalidates the experiences of Women of Color and women differing abilities, and women differing sexualities. So the problem is not only statistically the production of feminism, but how some feminist discourse fails to account for other system of oppression.
-Finally along the lines of the above the privilige of some white feminist especially manifests when confronted by WoC, differing ability and sexuality, who know that gender is not the only way in which women are oppressed, white feminists dismiss these claims, on the basis that these women don't understand how they are 'really' being oppressed. Some white feminists have the privilige to do this, to assume that how they experience oppression is how everyone experiences oppression, because they are the majority and the face of feminism.
But I've been involved in academic feminism for a number of years, and in my experience there's a lot of recognition given to other forms of oppression, depending on who you read. In post-modern, Marxist, and psychoanalytic feminism, for example there's a lot of talk about "matrices of oppression" and overlapping frameworks of oppression as well as an emphasis on individual, situated narratives. I think the problem is that you can only write from your own perspective, and once the door is opened to a consideration of the intersection of various forms of oppression, others need to step in and offer these varying viewpoints. So laying it all on the doorstep of white mainstream feminists seems a bit unfair.
That being said, a lot of WoC friends I've had have been first generation college students whose families expected them to earn a degree in some area that would yield an immediate, stable career with decent pay. So teaching as an adjunct for slave wages while working in IT and writing a dissertation for 5 years so that you can go into a job market where good tenure-track positions are few and far between isn't really an option for them in the way it is for a middle class white kid like me.
Oh no, I agree...thats why I said some forms of feminism. I have personally found in my academic experience at my University there has been a wide range of discussion around different systems of oppression. However I also know that I am lucky and what sort of exposure you get to feminism can vary a lot. I think that is part of the possibility of feminist blogging and the internet is to link a lot of these different discourses.
And I don't think it its all white feminists fault, one of my critiques of theories of oppression is how many of them academically still have a white face, and that every theory thinks it is the very best to explore and change society. I think the very fact that so many people identify and want to explore different theories of oppression testifies to the need to work together between these discourses to explore opression.
Please don't get me wrong, I am a loud a proud feminist, but as a queer WoC color sometimes the agendas and discourse produced by mainstream/radical feminism fail drastically to account for how I am oppressed outside my gender, by all types individuals women included, by how society interacts with my phenotypic presentation, and my sexuality. Thats why I personally find it help to explore other discourses around oppression like queer theory, disability studies, and how race plays out in our society...no single one of these systems captures all the ways I am oppressed, and I believe the exploration of how these systems interact and reinforce each other is the best way to truly create dramatic change in our society...but thats just me.
"...Thats why I personally find it help to explore other discourses around oppression like queer theory, disability studies, and how race plays out in our society...no single one of these systems captures all the ways I am oppressed, and I believe the exploration of how these systems interact and reinforce each other is the best way to truly create dramatic change in our society...but thats just me."
Just you? I totally agree that exploration of how these systems interact is best!
Samhita, this is really smart stuff. Many of the splits among feminists and progressives are self-inflicted, but I agree that we've also let wedges from outside get into our heads. How do we combat the media narrative that every feminist is a formally-educated class-privileged white woman? Or that women of color who are activists are community activists or social justice or human rights activists rather than feminist or womanist activists (however they self-define)? I don't know. What comes to mind is to call it out, to recognize these narratives as external pressures, and to react by pulling closer instead of breaking apart. But that's easier to describe than to do.
Brilliantly put, Samhita.
I am afraid that I don't have much more intelligent commentary to add.
It starts, I suppose, w/ recognizing the privilege some of us have that can separate us, and trying to own what privilege some of us have to work in solidarity for the equality and justice we seek as a common goal.
We can't achieve it separately.
I agree with Logos...
When we look at the statistics (References included in this comment), we see that at the present moment white people make up roughly 70 percent of the U.S., black people make up roughly 13 percent of the U.S., Native Americans make up roughly 1 percent of the population, asians make up 4.4 percent, and hispanics make up roughly 11 percent. The numbers on that page may have changed slightly, but the bottom of the page lists it as being updated on July 8, 2008. The site is (http://www.census.gov/population/www/pop-profile/natproj.html).
My point is: our nation is roughly 70 percent white, so most of the women that you are going to see as feminists are going to be white women. This is not racism, this is just how it is based on the distribution of our population. For example, would it be racist if a university (in an area that had this projected "average" distribution of the population) had an enrollment of 70% whites, 13% blacks, 11% hispanics, and so on? No, because this reflects the population. Some people may look at this and think it is racist because the school is not 33% white, 33% black, and 33% hispanic, but that is not so. The first set of numbers merely reflects a distribution in keeping with the percentages of the population that are composed of each race. Now of course, not all areas have this distribution of races, but I simply use it to make a point that just because an institution is mostly white does not make it racist- to believe so is jumping to conclusions.
I see how some people would think this means that women who aren't white are being marginalized, but I don't know where this stream of thought comes from. It would seem explicitly anti-feminism for women to exclude other women based on their color. Perhaps you are trying to say that the conservative media portrays wealthy white women as the leaders of feminism? Furthermore, isn't the whole point of feminisism that women should come together despite race/class and be united as women? If so, then why do feminists continue to bemoan the white women in their ranks? So some wealthy white women are feminists (I can't think of one), what is wrong with wealthy white feminists? They are women too. I think modern feminism (and perhaps liberalism) needs to learn to stop stereotyping & demonizing based on class- there is nothing wrong with people who are rich, there is nothing wrong with people who are white, and most white people actually are not racist (shocking!)... I don't think of feminism as being led by white women, I don't think of it as being led by anybody. Feminism is a set of ideals and beliefs. about gender equality. It is what it is.
Feminism needs to catch up with the times if it is going to remain culturally relevant. It discourages me to see that a lot of liberals refuse to believe that most Americans aren't racist and have no problems with people of other skin colors.... (sigh) Just some thoughts.
-But feminism is about more then the USA...most of the world isn't white and critical thinking about this is required if we want to be able to work cross culturally.
-And even within my area the GTA, 70% of the population is at least 3rd generation immigrants, and the majority of them are visible majorities. Does that mean because statistically where I live the population is different feminism shouldn't apply to me? No, it means that for feminism to be powerful, it needs to be more than the experiences of white women...in a lot of ways it is changing but there is still work to be done...
And just to give some background context to my beliefs and the post referred written by Latoya
- Yes racism is completely anti-feminist, I don't think anyone would say otherwise. However simply being a feminist does not give one a free pass in terms of thinking about race, class, ability, and sexuality critically.
- Feminism is about uniting women, totally. However the cost of the unity shouldn't be deferring to the belief that we are primarily oppressed as women, outside of race and class. It is my belief that feminism would be stronger with a greater diversity of voices, regardless if the majority of the USA is white.
- For many people the faces of feminism is white, when people name famous feminist, they tend to be white. There is no wrong with these women being white or edcuated or wealthy, but we need to think about how their experiences as women may be different from others along the lines of race, class, sexuality, ability etc.
- I can assure you that WoC feminists and thinkers are not being duped by the conservative media...this issue has been raised long before the conservative media began its attack on feminism, before feminism was a big enough blip on the patriarchies radar. To assume that WoC like Latoya and myself are being mislead by the media again invalidates our lived experiences and knowledge of how feminism can operate.
"Furthermore, isn't the whole point of feminisism that women should come together despite race/class and be united as women? If so, then why do feminists continue to bemoan the white women in their ranks?"
the way women from different backgrounds experience sexism is not uniform. whether within their own communities or without, black women, asian women, latina women, white women, or women of different faiths, abilities, ages, sexualities and economic classes -- the ways that gender oppression targets these people hinge also upon these many other aspects of their identities.
failure to work toward a discourse and movement that takes into account these multiple identities and intersecting modes of oppression would make the feminist movement simply an extension of the oversimplified, dichotomous way of thought that functions in our society to "other" people on levels of gender, race, faith, class, ability, weight, nationality...
Thank you...you said what took me 4 posts much more elegantly.
Ughh...one last addendum
- I know Latoyas post was about Prop 8 but she has written extensively about her hostile relationships with feminism as a WoC. So while I in no way intended to speak for her, I know she has discussed this topics and you can see the threads of analysis in her Prop 8 post.
- Additionally feminism is not homogenous. There are in my experience and as others have noted here streams of feminism that do pick up on privilige and explore other systems of oppression...and this is the sort of feminism we need to keep on building...but there are many issues around systems of oppression that are far from resolved in feminism such as sexuality, gender presentation, ability, and yes still race.
also, while the "white face" of feminism may not be racism per se (depends on how narrowly we want to define that term), the blindness of certain privileges accorded by race and class are certainly forces at work in making feminism the white upper/middle class movement it tends to be. reducing this to a matter of population statistics is overlooking the power relations derived from situations in which a single dominant group is discernible.
besides, the united states is not a homogeneous society, and it is becoming less so with each passing year.
It doesn't matter if most Americans don't consider themselves racist. The fact is that the United States is a racist society with racist institutions. It is only white privilege that allows people to "not see" the reality of racism. People of color live the reality of racism every day.
Please educate yourself about racism. It is essential to an understanding of feminism. There are many parallels between the two, and we cannot be the allies of women of color if we do not study racism, and the way that racism affects women specifically, as well. Feminism should represent ALL women, not just the ones privileged enough to have their voices heard.
White women can offer more to the discussion about race than people think. As a white woman living in Atlanta, going to Georgia State University, (A school that is roughly 50% black and 50% white) I can tell you that it is not only white people who can be racist. A lot of black people here are always talking about and insulting white people- which is flat out racism. I have never seen this kind of racism before, even in the mostly white neighborhood I came from, which is ironic because the common stereotype is that white people are racist and black people are the victims of this racism. A lot of black people here don't even want anything to do with the white kids. Just because somebody may be black doesn't mean that they have a better perspective on race than somebody who is white. Everybody's perspective is equally valuable.
There is a difference white racism stems a desire to maintain unearned white privilege. Whites also exist with the power to act upon their racism in systemic ways in which blacks certainly do not have the power to do. You seem shocked that a black person would not want a relationship with anyone white. When you consider the lack positive interactions with white people over from infancy to young adulthood is it really that surprising? White people live with this idea that POC should love them even though we have been given very little reason to do so. Sometimes surrounding yourself with people that look like you and understand you culturally is a way of protecting yourself.
"Sometimes surrounding yourself with people that look like you and understand you culturally is a way of protecting yourself."
This is why I only associate and interact with other upper-middle class white people.
When you consider the lack of positive interactions with [people of other races or classes] from infancy to young adulthood is it really that surprising?
I'm being crushed under the weight of massive irony.
One does not fight injustice with more injustice, one does not demonstrate the flaws of racism with racism. Would you really be interested in hearing any excuses for why any particular white person was racist? If I grew up in a poor black neighborhood and had nothing but bad impressions of black people would you suddenly say "oh well it makes sense for YOU to be racist"? Of course not. You want to hold everyone responsible for their own actions. A black person judging all white people because of some is exactly the same as the opposite situation. It's still racism. Trying to justify it just weakens your ability to be seriously critical of it elsewhere.
Oh, and this talk about "you can't have racism outside of a power structure" is nonsense. If you want to make the claim that racism is fine if it's the oppressed group being racist against the majority group, that's fine. But it's still racism. You can't just arbitrarily change the definition of racism because you want to make it morally acceptable.
Excuse me that is not an arbitrary definition. We really need to get a Racism 101 blog up and running. Even if it is to deflect ourselves and give people things to read so we can all come to the conversation prepared. Otherwise it is just not productive.
Read this, then come back to comment here: http://mmcisaac.faculty.asu.edu/emc598ge/Unpacking.html
Yes, perhaps a Racism 101 blog would be appropriate.
But that article on "white privilege" is outdated.
I have seen everything in that article before in some form or another. I don't see how anything there relates to what I said.
Still, I have the feeling that you are trying to point out to me that racism is systematic and pervasive. I am not disputing that. Nor am I disputing that whites and males in general benefit from privilege in our culture. Those facts, though, do not change the definition of racism. And changing the definition to try to accommodate those concepts is unnecessary. One can easily describe them in the way I just have.
The word racism is used to describe a concept. Namely, the activity of making judgments about people based on their race. Attempting to change or add to that use simply leaves a void where the word "racism" used to serve.
Oh, and I don't have some hidden agenda here. I agree with all the principles you're espousing. It's because I agree with them that this semantic issue bothers me in the first place; because when I try to discuss these issues with people who aren't going to just abjectly agree with me, it simply weakens my position to have to convince them it's a good idea to redefine words that they're already familiar with. I view the ultimate goal of this, and all similar conversations, as changing the mind of people who would otherwise be a disagree. The goal is to get people to think about their privilege and evaluate it. To get people who aren't feminists to be feminists, and thereby effect real change.
This goal is made needlessly more difficult and painful when feminists as a group try to usurp the common use of language and turn it into "in-group" speak that simply shuts other people out of the conversation. Using words in their conventional sense, and inventing terms only when needed is a much more efficient way to engage a reluctant audience.
Um, I took a multi-culturalism class at University of Washington in 1993, and this class was not taught by a feminist, but this is the definition of "racism" that was used. So I don't think this is some new definition that feminists have just pulled out of their asses.
Precisely Rachel. I think the word she's looking for is "prejudiced."
Prejudice is universal. I can be prejudiced against people who wear green shirts. That doesn't help me with any specificity. Hmm... I need a word for prejudice, except I need to specify that it's based on race. Oh, I know, "racism"!
And some professor changing a definition for use in his class doesn't change the definition that almost all other people in almost all other circumstances are going to use.
Besides, that professor is trying to be LESS inclusive. Racism by definition already includes all of the activities you want to describe. You're just trying to limit it. I can't possibly fathom why you want to make the word less useful except as some attempt to "protect" minorities from having to worry about being labeled racists when that's what they are. Well, this person is "prejudiced" and it's based on "race", but that's not "racism" because she happens to be a minority. I'm particularly surprised that you Rachel, would want to determine the status of mental states based on arbitrary external conditions.
This is really Women's Studies and anti-racism 101. It's the difference between "essentialism" and racism or sexism. Just as you cannot be sexist against men, you cannot be racist against white people.
There are two qualifiers for -isms. They are practices that reproduce dominance through essentialism. So, you must have dominance AND essentialism. Just being essentialist (applying one concept to all members of a group), does not make you racist if it does not reproduce a social group's dominance. Even if the black students at your college are 50% of the school population, blacks are not a dominant group in the United States. Only whites are. Similarly, in the patriarchal gender dichotomy, only one group, men, are dominant.
For more reading about this (and it's very worthwhile), see "Racial Formation in the United States" by Omi and Winant. Educating yourself about racism is as eye-opening as studying sexism, and it also deepens your understanding how the patriarchy functions on many different levels.
It might be Women's Studies and anti-racism 101. Women's studies majors still don't' get to redefine words. Well, I suppose they can agree to redefine them for the sake of their own conversations.
So, I'll grant that while you're on this message board, or in other specifically academic "in-group" conversations, this is a legitimate definition, because you can arbitrarily decide to change it.
As soon as you start moving into society in general, consult a dictionary. In fact, consult many dictionaries. You'll notice that they all include some variation of this.
"1 : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race"
This does not specify anything about who's saying or doing or thinking, or in what context. Because that's not part of the bloody definition of the word. If you want to add connotations, you make up a new word. You can't just usurp one that is already in use.
Anti-racist and feminist scholars use their own definition of words just like any other scholarly group or profession. However, the definition that people of color have for racism is inherently more accurate than what the dictionary says (assuming the dictionary differs, of course). It is people of color who experience racism. The definition of racism that people who study racism have is inherently more accurate than the dictionary because . . . they are the ones who study racism. It is white privilege to assume that white culture and white institutions (such as dictionary publishers) know this better than the people who actually experience it. There is no arbitrariness involved.
"However, the definition that people of color have for racism is inherently more accurate than what the dictionary says (assuming the dictionary differs, of course). It is people of color who experience racism."
Doesn't the definition of any word depend on the people who speak, sign, and/or write the language that the word is in?
Meanwhile, if you want to get any message across, you have to say it in your audience's language(s). For example, if you're trying to get an Asian-American 12-year-old to stop harassing her or his black classmates for being black, using college-level English vocabulary may impress bloggers here more but I bet using middle-school-level vocabulary would be more likely to actually stop the harassment. :/
"This is really Women's Studies and anti-racism 101."
Meanwhile, what about talking about these issues with people who didn't take those classes?
Feminism and anti-racism aren't just for people who had the chance to go to college and had the chance to take those sociology classes. They're important for younger people, for people who couldn't afford college, for people who were limited to other majors and electives for whatever reason, etc.
"Using words in their conventional sense, and inventing terms only when needed is a much more efficient way to engage a reluctant audience."
I totally agree!
White people live with this idea that POC should love them even though we have been given very little reason to do so.
Hey, thanks for the awesome stereotype! You know, you're totally right: As a white girl, all I ever do when I walk out my door every day and see a person of color is suppress my urge to yell, "LOVE ME!"
Please don't tell me about my ideas of entitlement to be loved. Although I admit that your saying it reminded me of a few awesome scenes from my favorite movie: "Whatever you want, name it and it’s yours -- but you gotta love me!" Interestingly, that scene is weirdly racially loaded, too, and could use some serious academic unpacking. /digression
Sometimes surrounding yourself with people that look like you and understand you culturally is a way of protecting yourself.
Of course I understand (in an impersonal since since I'm white) a distrust of whiteness as an oppressive system and of white people as agents of it. However, the way you say it, it sounds like you're suggesting there's some inherent value in self-segregation beyond mere self-interest. I'm not saying self-interest doesn't suffice, but as you've written it above, the rationale sounds suspiciously similar to the rationale of a restricted country club or something. "Cultural differences" surely is one of those oft-bullshitted terms for encoded bigotry against and segregation from traditionally oppressed people.
"However, the way you say it, it sounds like you're suggesting there's some inherent value in self-segregation beyond mere self-interest."
Retreating to a social group composed of your own racial group is actually a step in healthy racial identity formation, as recognized by scholar W.E. Cross Jr. It is generally a response to a first encounter with, or burgeoning awareness of, racism. It's a necessary step for many black people in order to form a positive racial identity in the face of negative messages from society. Granted, some people never progress from this stage. However, they don't have much motivation to. Remember, people of color must live racism every day. White privilege allows whites to acknowledge it or not, because they do not have to live it.
The responsibility to end racism lies with white people, who perpetuate it, not people of color.
"The responsibility to end racism lies with white people, who perpetuate it..."
Is this suggesting "white people, all of whom perpetuate racism, have a responsibility to end it.", or does it mean "white people, the ones who perpetuate racism, have a responsibility to end it."
I am a white person, and I don't perpetuate racism. I don't share some ephemeral responsibility for it just because I'm white. I also don't like this idea that "because you benefit from it", you have some responsibility. I can't just hand you $20 and immediately you are indebted to me. You didn't ask for that, and you don't owe me anything just because something was dropped on you. I didn't ask for any privilege. It may be my responsibility to recognize it and not to do anything to perpetuate it or exploit it, but simply because a benefit was conferred on me without my consent doesn't also import some responsibility to me.
Unfortunately because we live in a racist society, embodiment as a white person perpetuates racism even if one is not "actively" racist. You seem to understand this concept. I would argue that this does give white people (especially feminist white people) a responsibility. Only white people can change what white privilege does to disadvantage people of color. Of course, because you are white you are free to ignore your privilege. Because it benefits us, we don't have to face the reality of racism every day. That doesn't mean the reality doesn't exist. I feel that as a feminist, I must also be anti-racist. As Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." Racism is just one more symptom of the patriarchy.
"Only white people can change what white privilege does to disadvantage people of color."
I agree! That also goes for other privileges and the people who have them and the people who don't, right?
"The responsibility to end racism lies with white people, who perpetuate it, not people of color."
Doesn't that let non-whites who are racist against other non-whites off the hook?
I mean, crap like "all black guys are thugs" or "all black girls are sluts" is wrong when it comes from a white person, and it's just as wrong when it comes from someone who identifies as Asian or Middle Eastern or Latino/a or whatever instead of white or black. Shouldn't all the ones who spew that crap stop it, not just the white ones?
"There is a difference white racism stems a desire to maintain unearned white privilege. Whites also exist with the power to act upon their racism in systemic ways in which blacks certainly do not have the power to do."
Unless a black racist is racist against people in a less-privileged race instead of whites, right? Or is that still unsystemic racism? Honestly, I'm not sure.
I look forward to reading responses to this.
"I have never seen this kind of racism before, even in the mostly white neighborhood I came from, which is ironic because the common stereotype is that white people are racist and black people are the victims of this racism."
Right, because the racism that's involved in establishing and maintaining the kind of neighborhood you and I grew up in is systemic, so it's largely invisible, implicit, unspoken.
"Just because somebody may be black doesn't mean that they have a better perspective on race than somebody who is white."
I'm not trying to be condescending here, but I think this view is just based on a lack of experience. Generally speaking, the oppressed or marginalized group does have the best perspective on the oppressive structure. As the saying goes, the fish is the last one to discover the water. When you exist within the system and are privileged by it, it's hard to have the critical distance needed to really understand and analyze it. Those who are marginalized by it can observe it from a different angle. Your position really does impact your perception. This is why it's so important to have more women and minorities in the sciences, for example, because they will often see things that the white males who have been there all these years cannot.
I think though that the point being brought up by Kate and others is that individuals are not statistics, and people are not stereotypes. (Not that I think you or anyone would disagree with that statement; it's a pretty solid truism)
But in reflecting on that, there is something very off-putting by the idea that "privilege" is something that blinds ALL people of a certain type. As you yourself duly note, "Generally speaking, the oppressed or marginalized group does have the best perspective on the oppressive structure." This is a statistical claim. So, although *on average* it may be your experience that a person of color x has a more well-thought out idea on a topic than a person of color y, that does not mean that every person of color y will have a deficiency in their perspective. And that's where talking about majorities and minorities becomes so difficult--some assumptions are warranted but others aren't; and unless one knows all the experiences a specific person has had, one isn't entitled to classify that person. At least, that's a main issue I see with some of the implications that come from the notion that certain kinds of people are "privileged." It's still a guess, with varying degrees of justification.
But I think Kate is saying more than that. Her claim is that everybody's perspective on race is equal, and that seems absurd. Imagine if somebody was urging you to accept that men have the same perspective on gender as women do, and that it's perfectly OK if the only people who are speaking on behalf of women are men. You'd think there was something deeply wrong with that. No matter how well-intentioned these men might be, they have never experienced life in our culture as a woman. So I think there is a significant difference here.
When are people going to step up and admit that hatred is never okay, no matter who you are or what your circumstances are? Its still racism. Why is that so hard to admit? Its still hatred. Now, I was under the impression that liberals stood against hatred, but I guess not. I guess liberals only stand against some kinds of hatred.
The argument as I have come to understand it in different contexts is 1) Whether PoC's harmful and negative treatment of white persons is simply hatred or racism. The debate as highlighted by womnistmusings is wether racism can exist outside a power structure; can you be racist if your race is the one primarily oppressed by the powers that be. Some people believe that PoC can certainly hate white people and react as such, but that it doesn't constitute racism because of the backdrop of power. 2) The other questions this begs is can those who are oppressed systemically, oppress those who are not oppressed systemically, i.e. if myself as mixed queer women lashed out at a white rich guy, while my actions could clearly be violent, hateful and unprovoked, do they constitute oppression, if my actions only have power in the individual context of my interaction, not in the overall context of power relations?
I myself have not reconciled with an answer. I see the arguments for both sides...
There are certainly different types of racism to be distinguished on the basis of their position in the context of history and structural power relations.
And yet, as a white person, I feel like I'd be quite the paternalistic f*ck to say hostility or hatred harbored by PoC toward white people isn't really racism. It's almost like I am suggesting "they know not what they do," or like I am denying them their own agency to be hateful people...that everything PoC do and think can be explained as deriving from their oppression.
But, within the disfavorable opinions of PoC toward whites, there is a distinction to be made between perhaps the racist position of being "anti-white people" and the non-racist position of being "anti-whiteness."
Kate, this whole discussion you're trying to have seems irrelevant. Because what even makes you speak in terms of things like hatred?
Your original comment spoke of anecdotal experiences of black people, presumably ones you don't know well, insulting white people. How do you turn that into some expression of hate?
When some stranger calls me a bitch because I cut him off in traffic -- or whatever -- I certainly don't flatter myself that he has taken the trouble of hating me.
What is the reasonable response to hegemony?
For example I've met a lot of people who were more than happy to express their disproval of the US (I live in abroad). Some individuals were nasty and hateful about it too. I've taken it personally on more than one occasion; in fact Americans are stereotyped horribly abroad.
But of all of the responses that I came up with, it honestly never occurred to me to stop and say, "You know what, guys? Hate is wrong. Let's leave it at that. It doesn't matter your viewpoint or the details. In fact, you guys are starting to sound like some of the same people in the US that you are complaining about."
You said in your previous post that the at your University a lot of black people didn't want anything to do with the white people. When you asked them (the black students) why not, what did they tell you?
Sometimes things aren't justifiable but they are understandable.
Just to make a quantitative point, isn't the world's "median person" an Asian woman? Isn't that the most common demographic position?
To Kate and and doubleb, I understand where you're coming from, but I think you're assuming two things: 1. that a critique of the feminist movement for its mainstream representation by mainly white, wealthy women is automatically a critique of those women themselves, and 2. that racism is simply hating someone based on their skin color or cultural/ethnic origins.
Historically I think the feminist movement has been represented in popular culture by wealthier, educated white women. Their privilege does not negate the crucial work they've done, and there's nothing wrong with their whiteness or access to resources. What is a problem is that other voices, like those of POC, gay/lesbian and working-class women and their unique interests have been silenced in mainstream culture. I personally believe this is due to the privilege of whites in the media, a lack of access to education and academia, and different priorities among activists in these groups.
People aren't being judged for their whiteness or wealth, rather, the system of oppression behind why white wealthy women are privileged is being critiqued here.
Likewise, racism as I understand it occurs not only when one group of people hates another group on the basis of color and/or culture, but occurs when one group has a position of power over the other that it uses to the dominant group's advantage: i.e. slavery, refusal to hire on the basis of race, imposed limits on educational opportunities, violence, segregation, etc.
I think what you're discussing, Kate, is a backlash against white oppression. Does that justify it morally? No. Is it a form of hatred? Yes. Is it exerting power over white people that denies them civil rights and equal opportunity? Probably not.
It's not really discussed how to deal with this kind of backlash as a white person, which I wish it were. But I don't think calling this backlash "reverse racism" is getting at the root of the problem.
While feminism should be about embracing many women from many walks of life, sometimes it fails to. While feminism is an ideology, there is a feminist movement too that defines the ideology. Therefore we have to make sure that while fighting for the equality of women, we're fighting for all women, not just women from a certain class or racial group.
I assume that number 2 is true if you change the word "hating" to "making and judgments about". The reason I assume this is because that is how it is defined, widely used, and commonly understood.
Racism as you understand it is how many in the specifically feminist community seem to be trying to recast the word. I am arguing specifically against this reassignment on the basis that it is unnecessary and unhelpful.
I think something else worth mentioning as a huge problem in the intersectionality of gender and race when it comes to feminism is what roles certain women are expected to take up within feminism.
White women often have a huge amount of privilege in their choice of topic. Feminist writers and academic (the white skin privilege bearing ones) can talk about queer theory, cultural studies, you name it.
Women of color are expected to take up talking about race and it is to them that the task of talking about intersectionality is left. God forbid white people talk about race to each other now and then.
God forbid white people talk about race to each other now and then.
I don't know. On the campuses I've been on white feminists do talk about race, but I think the assumption is that you cannot tell someone else's story. I realize that I don't have the experience of being marginalized in that way, so wouldn't it be incredibly arrogant of me to try to speak on behalf of a racial minority?
And I think this:
is kind of unfair. In my Feminist Theory course I cover a lot of the writings of WoC, in their original words, not secondary sources. And this is also the case for most of the courses on feminism that I've taken, at UCB, Stanford, and UCR. I realize that your experience may be quite different, but it seems unfair to characterize all courses on feminism in this way.And I don't understand your complaint that white people don't talk about race, when you just criticized the fact that they can talk about queer theory, cultural studies, etc. What are we supposed to be talking about?
So I understand that line of thinking and I've heard it before and I'm sympathetic. I'm not trying to be rude or hurtful but as sympathetic as I am, that's a complete cop-out that's allowed to us by our skin privilege.
You aren't speaking on behalf of people of color when you stand up and point out the blindingly obvious nature of institutional racism and the way that it plays out in our daily lives. The history of this stuff is only "hidden" because we've been trained to look away.
When you refuse to talk about the way race plays out in gender and the way race plays out in feminism, you ARE speaking in place of people of color by refusing to name what's going on.
Also, we whites need to be willing to take risks. I think it's better that you speak about race and fuck up and get scolded and learn from that, then not speak at all. There are worse things in life than saying the wrong thing and having to learn from it.
If you want to learn how to be an effective activist (because we need to not just limit our engagement with this issue to writing and speaking because writing and speaking is supposed to be compelling us to action and teaching us how to take better actions) against racism and patriarchy, I think it's best to engage the subject as honestly and brutally as possible.
It's also a fuckload more fun than engaging in self-doubt and works against the traumas that have created a world in which race, class, and gender intersect but we're all still somehow segregated from one another in speech and life.
Wow, I'm not sure where the idea came from that I "refuse to talk about the way race plays out in gender and the way race plays out in feminism." I thought I mentioned in my earlier comment that I do, in fact, spend a lot of time in my courses covering these things. Of course I look at how systemic forces such as racism and sexism interact. I'm not sure how to cover the history of feminist theory without doing that. But I think it would be incredibly arrogant for me to claim to speak for other marginalized groups. Imposing some narrative on them from without would be just another instance of othering. So I assign a variety of readings from WoC as well as lesbians, transgendered authors, women from other cultures, etc. and then discuss their thoughts in class and give writing assignments on them. I realize that some people view this as tokenism, but I'm not sure how to take these perspectives any more seriously than to cover them in the same way I cover Beauvoir and Butler.
To me this is an extremely important issue, but also one that's very tough to deal with. Maybe because there are a number of tensions involved that aren't always parsed out clearly. First there is the issue of feminist WoC not getting published/read at the same rate as white WoC. I think this is partially accounted for by differences in access to education, etc. but not completely. This is a deep systemic problem, and I'm not sure how to address it. Then there's the problem that feminist WoC within academia are often ghettoized into fields that are thought to be "appropriate" for them. This is a systemic problem that can be addressed easier than the problem of getting published. Finally, the way that white "wealthy" (this is a joke in my slave-wave-earning case) academic feminists deal with it is also problematic at times, but I think those who aren't in this position underestimate how tricky it really is. If you take up the position of a WoC and defend it in dialogue (as I've done on this thread and elsewhere in the blogosphere as well as in the classroom) then you will often be challenged with a "who the fuck are you?" kind of attitude. My instinctive response to this is that I'm someone who can listen, and read, and empathize. But this doesn't seem to be enough for those who think that the marginalized can only speak for themselves. On the other hand, if you don't speak for them and engage with the topic, then you're accused of copping out. So again I ask, what is it that white academic feminists are supposed to be talking about? Because from my perspective it's starting to look like this is an area in which you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.
God forbid white people talk about race to each other now and then.
Isn't that what many of us are doing right now?
There is a sheer matter of scale to consider here. Also, let's not forget the obvious: We wouldn't be having this particular conversation if a woman of color hadn't started it.
Sure, but there have been a number of posts about privilege here on feministing that were started by others as well.
Let's be real here, would bell hooks have been recognized as a leading voice in feminism if she hadn't written so forcefully about intersectionality and instead written as forcefully about wage differentials or reproductive rights or women on television at the outset of her career?
Women of color don't have the luxury of leaving race (or class) out of their analyses because it's a direct, looming trauma and danger in their lives and communities. All too often though, we treat women of color as if they are *supposed* to talk about race and class.
Like, "Let's listen to the black woman for a few minutes to get the RACE AND GENDER unit of the class out of the way" and then it's back to white faces talking about problems that are somehow presumed to be universal.
Agreed, and conveniently people like bell hooks seem to function for professors often as killing two tokens with one assignment -- to totally butcher a metaphor.
(Of course, this is an extension of the similar ghettoization of women and minorities in curricula more generally: With the exception of courses specifically about women, I don't think I had a single survey-type course in college where non-white authors cropped up in any capacity other than writings on race and ethnicity and where female authors were read for anything but discussions of gender [I'm talking Fanon, Said, Butler and Wollstonecraft]. Obviously the solution is not the elimination of discourse on gender and race by women and minorities but rather multiplicity: inclusion of writings on more varied topics by women and people of color.)
The other irritating phenomena is that I've heard the complaint from people of color broadly that when they go to universities to teach, they somehow get shunted into INSERT ETHNIC GROUP THAT WE GAVE A TITLED SUBJECT AREA HERE.
I do think that a real solution to this, within academia, is that we need to force universities, across the board, to start taking interdisciplinary studies seriously rather than treating it as a quaint artifact. Social theory/social sciences/humanities/what have you need to start seeing some broad integration across the curriculum.
This doesn't address the broader problem that I'm talking about or that Samhita started talking about at all though.
I do think that a real solution to this, within academia, is that we need to force universities, across the board, to start taking interdisciplinary studies seriously rather than treating it as a quaint artifact. Social theory/social sciences/humanities/what have you need to start seeing some broad integration across the curriculum.
This is spot-on. This is one of the things that kept me out of the Women's Studies department, because it really irritates me how even having departments like this allows the university as a whole to dismiss the need to integrate discussions of race/gender/sexuality etc. into the "mainstream" disciplines like history. My Women's Studies friends argue with me about this. But in the Philosophy department I teach things like critical Thinking, contemporary moral issues, and intro to philosophy, and that way I can assign readings by non-Western and female philosophers to give a more complete view of philosophy. Unfortunately I have to find stuff outside of the textbook, since intro to philosophy as it is currently taught is still actually just intro to white, male, ostensibly heterosexual philosophy. At the same time I can teach philosophy of feminism and feminist theory through the Philosophy department (dual-listed with WS) and have the best of both worlds. So maybe we just need more feminists (of all racial backgrounds) to go into other fields and start integrating them whether the administration goes along with it or not. After all, your syllabus is yours to write.
"I do think that a real solution to this, within academia, is that we need to force universities, across the board, to start taking interdisciplinary studies seriously rather than treating it as a quaint artifact."
...and to make it truly inter-disciplinary. For example, including all history classes in the history department instead of putting the African-American history classes in only the African-American Studies department and the South Asian history classes in only the Asian Studies department and leaving the history department whitewashed. Fortunately, when I went to college the admins understood that some topics are in more than 1 discipline at once. I've taken classes that were in 2 departments at the same time. :)
This reminds me of a comment (OK, one of my comments) on a post about women's studies:
"For example, NU has a lot of programs that don't have departments, including women's studies: http://www.northeastern.edu/cas/programs/index.html
"...What about when women's studies programs aren't in women's studies departments but are interdepartmental programs? Instead, courses that count for the program are in usually in other departments and count for those too (see see http://www.dac.neu.edu/womens.studies/undergraduates/ ). A few do get the interdisciplinary label instead of having a department to call home (see http://www.neu.edu/registrar/ocs-mn-fl08-u-c-hk.html#CINT , including not only women's studies courses like INT U103 Women's Studies but also some non-women's studies courses like INT U210 Marine Mammals and INT U699 Advanced Television Production ).
"For examples:
INT U103 Women's Studies
SOC U402 Feminist Perspectives on Society
"AFR U185 Gender in the African Diaspora
BHS U105 Nutrition
CJ U500 Gender, Crime, and Justice
ENG U613 Shakespeare's Tragedies (my guess is that course content includes women even if the title doesn't)
"I bet those women's studies professors are doing their research in interdisciplinary ways too (taking women's experiences and perspectives into account while doing research in their departments)."
I have been watching this thread go on pretty much all day and I've been trying to stay out of it. It saddens me that I see this time and time again. Sami puts up a really thought provoking posts (and I feel she is the poster on Feministing that really puts the most indepth analysis on her posts) and it seems like it always degenerates into a "don't call me racist" paradigm. Feminism is a movement and culture unto itself, it has hierarchies and power players just like any major segment/movement in society. Noone is calling white feminists racist, or saying that white feminists who have made it "big" are racist. The fact is that we should acknowledge that there is a power dynamic and that if you're white you get more privilege be it through getting book deals or writing offers. There was a pretty big blow up around five months ago when people like BFP were doing great writing and analysis and were getting no credit or even link love from white feminists.
We always talk about how sexism is instiutionalized and inherent, well so is racism. I benefit from the color of my skin every day in ways I may not even recognize. Does that make me racist, no...does that make me part of a biggers system...yes. and there is little i can do to make the privilege stop. Alll I can do is acknowledge it and work to be a good ally for POC or any other minority that I have an advantage over. I just wish we would stop attacking and maybe let some of feministings readers who ARE POC get a chance to respond to Samihita's post and let them start and direct the dialog instead of immediately saying things like reverse racism and such.
ok, off the soap box
Also I may be sucking up to her :P but if you look at Renee's writing a Womanist Musing, you would see someone who puts in at least two VERY thought provoking posts and that often deal with racism and privilege and yet she deals with trying to get a small article picked up in a magazine. She gets the highest readership when people like feministing link to her but do we go back and help her create the community she needs or do we return to our other feminist blogs and wait for them to tell us that something she wrote is worth writing?
I meant two posts PER DAY sorry
and worth writing...sorry apparently my self-righteousness prevents me from spelling well or organizing coherent sentence structure
I want to throw some things into this discussion.
Thought #1: Atomizing racism in feminism and larger society- insisting that "racism" be broken down to individuals and individual anecdotes- ignores the systematic nature of racism.
Thought #2: The issues one deems important for the movement of feminism may change based on your perspective. When white women dominate, so do their ideas of what feminism should focus on. WOC have to fight to get their different needs included in "feminism" or count themselves out.
Thought #3: WOC are not critiquing white feminists because they want "more than their fair share" of space in the feminist movement, which is what some comments above seem to suggest.
Thought #4: Critiquing white people or middle- to upper-class people is not the same as saying they are less valid. It is not racism. It is not unfair.
Those of us posting who are white, let's please not busy ourselves explaining to WOC how actually, it is they who are the racist ones. Bleh.
Atomizing racism in feminism and larger society- insisting that "racism" be broken down to individuals and individual anecdotes- ignores the systematic nature of racism.
I definitely agree with this, but I think there's an important distinction that has to be made. Racism and sexism are systemic and need to be understood at that level. However, experiences of racism and sexism, and the impact they have are particular. I think the problem is that when you start telling meta-narratives you inevitably make some experiences "the norm" while all the others are marginalized. So it can be really hard to strike a balance between being inclusive and looking at deep systemic issues.
I think this post completely overlooks the fact that the image of feminism is largely created internally. The way it is written is as if to absolve feminists of their role in creating their own identities, as if mainstream feminism doesn't itself exclude women of color and other marginalized groups. "Divide and conquer" only works when it plays off of already existing conflict within a particular group, as was so clearly exemplified with Prop 8.
Also of note is that the mainstream media that you speak of is not disconnected from feminism. Many of the people writing these pieces for or being interviewed in mainstream media ARE white feminists who claim to represent "feminism" themselves and paint feminism in these cliched ways. They do not demonstrate a critical, intersectional analysis nor speak about feminismS.
The way that feminism is represented in the mainstream will only change as feminism changes - internally. And that means a lot of privileged feminists are going to have to start doing some responsibility claiming of their own part in systems of oppression. Let's just say I'm not holding my breath.
Sure, but Samhita still has a point - when the mainstream media decides to do a story on feminism they generally don't seek out a Renee or Samhita. The choice of which faces you pair with a movement does have an impact on how the general public views that movement.
I'm late to this thread, but just wanted to say something on this point. Rachel, you're so right. What's particularly frustrating (at least from what I've seen from the media requests we get at Feministing) is that when one of the editors here are contacted for a quote - most often me or Courtney, I believe - our policy is to send the request around to the whole group. That way who ever has a particular interest in a story can put their two cents in. (And sometimes that means recommending a blogger or activist not from Feministing, of course.)
So we're trying to disrupt the whole "let one woman speak for feminism" thang. Sometimes this works, but other times the press request mysteriously disappears when it's clear they're not going to speak to the person they originally emailed. Incredibly annoying. If anyone has good media strategies re: this problem, I'd love to hear them.
Right, and what I am trying to point out is that yes, white feminists benefit from it and the racism embedded in feminism frequently translates to the opportunism of white women to advance, but ultimately it is a market that demands the voices of white women as feminist that creates the demand for the voices of wealthy white feminists. I am not placing blame on one group over another, but pointing out the ways the discourse gets translated privileging certain voices over others. That is not mutually exclusive from white leaders in the feminist movement (who frankly several of which showed to hold deeply racist sentiments during the election) held accountable for their own role in the producing the image of mainstream feminism.
I guess I feel like this is a chicken and egg situation, that both reinforce the other. The media seeks out those who are most palatable, who they feel most represent their audience (or at the very least won't scare their audience away) both demographically and politically. This isn't me. This isn't BFP. From what you say, this isn't you either. On the other hand, the feminists that they approach aren't saying, "You know, (insert name of radical queer WOC) would be a good person for you to talk to about this. Her analysis is awesome." And they aren't saying, "You know I'm not representative of all feminists, right? Just the privileged ones." They're leading the journalists that they speak with to believe that they ARE the voice of feminism (singular). And that's just as much a part of the problem.
On the other hand, the feminists that they approach aren't saying, "You know, (insert name of radical queer WOC) would be a good person for you to talk to about this. Her analysis is awesome." And they aren't saying, "You know I'm not representative of all feminists, right? Just the privileged ones." They're leading the journalists that they speak with to believe that they ARE the voice of feminism (singular). And that's just as much a part of the problem.
This is certainly true.
Another one I see a lot is how disability gets handled. As one who has a non-visible disability in many ways (in others it becomes painfully visible), I can move in between abled and disabled groups and see what's going on. Abled people walk right over disabled people every single time, whether they are FOR them or AGAINST them. Seriously.
Same thing at work here with POC/white folk, and I see this because I see the other patterns.
Mainstream narrative spills into this same reinforcing pattern.
The underlying point is that when you have privilege (whether as white, or as male, or as able bodied), you have the power. You have the power to frame the issue, the power to make your concerns central, and the power to make others invisible. Whether you want that power or not.
I'm not entirely sure how to break the privilege+power equation. I can make people think, surely, by stepping outside of my ability to pass, but it doesn't shift the power balance; I lose power by revealing myself and don't really get it back once that's known.
Ironically enough, because of the same ambiguity, I amass unwanted power within my community because able bodied people have a tendency to listen to me over a more visibly disabled persion, which inevitably leads to resentment.
There are MANY complex issues here.
Unless a person's consciousness has been raised by their own direct experience or by study of another group's suffering or culture, (or even, sometimes, by literature), people live their lives largely unconscious of their effects on others...in my opinion. We have to communicate how we are harmed by privilege, and I think this is impossible to do without showing anger, frustration and feelings of betrayal.
I've been on many different spins of this Wheel of Blame, and it always amazes me how many varieties of us/them can exist. When I was doing my MA in feminist psychotherapy, the mostly lesbian class looked down on their hetero or bisexual sisters! In certain contexts, I've been chastised for using a college level vocabulary because it excludes co-workers who didn't go to college. I've been called insensitive for holding hands with my husband in public when gay people could get attacked for it in certain parts of the country. My list goes on, and probably everyone has a long, confusing list. Hell, I'm confused and tired of it all, and frankly, weary of the intense theorizing around these issues.
I'd like to see group discussions that allow for real feelings to get expressed, owned, heard, understood, empathized with, and then left unresolved, to be returned to over and over again, as long as it takes to get it all out. Is anyone doing this work? I hear about some occasionally, but usually the report I get is that everyone left feeling angry, unheard and lectured.
I don't know how we as human beings are going to solve our mutual problems unless we allow real anger and real grief into the room, and see other people as mirrors of our own turmoil. I'm hoping to bring diverse groups together to tackle some of these issues. Obama can be a leader in this, and I'm hoping he will get out from under the current crises and show his leadership in dealing with our own need for truth and reconciliation. We need to cry and scream about what we are doing to one another and to the world...there's a lot of suffering that needs to be witnessed before it can be solved...in my opinion...