Rolling 2015 Thread on Race

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31wGVaDMC%2BL.jpg

haven’t followed or looked into jindal thing (beyond passing online refs), so hesitate to comment

but, of all things to criticize (or mock) jindal for…

dunno, generally speaking, more often than not, find political criticism based on ‘race traitor’ or ‘whitewashing’ theme… nagl

of course, conservative politician is likely to have certain views on certain issues related to race—
insofar as those views are objectionable, criticize those views;
but race-betrayal, race-denial angle seems like form of 'racial-identity policing' which bothers me

related trope bothers me in other areas than politics, cf criticism of mindy kaling’s show (which i haven’t seen) bc, apparently, it didn't thematize her race sufficiently

so maybe some counter-trolling is justified…? maybe i’m wrong

Jindal's official governor's portrait looks like it was literally whitewashed tho

http://images.dailykos.com/images/127268/large/jindalportrait.jpg?1423001935

xp, Yes, i think it's pretty unhelpful. Jindal is clearly a piece of work but there's plenty of room to call him out on his politics (including his political statements on race) without going down that road. For a start, positioning social conservatism and crass racial politics as "white" ignores how common those things are within sections of the Indian-American (and wider NRI) community.

The weird portrait's apparently not the official one.

xp ^def true, and works as joke
but extending that into serious criticism?
ah but then none of this is v serious, it's twittertown

agree, sharivari

xp, Yes, i think it's pretty unhelpful. Jindal is clearly a piece of work but there's plenty of room to call him out on his politics (including his political statements on race) without going down that road. For a start, positioning social conservatism and crass racial politics as "white" ignores how common those things are within sections of the Indian-American (and wider NRI) community.

The weird portrait's apparently not the official one.

― who epitomises beta better than (ShariVari), Wednesday, July 1, 2015 6:09 PM (17 minutes ago) Bookmark

yeah i feel like calling them 'white' and excluding them from the community masks the fact that those sentiments areprevalent in the community - i think it's better to try and wrestle and unearth them within the community rather than to just sweep it under the rug. same goes for conservative east asian americans imo

you think that Jindal portrait's bad, you should see the one they've got in the capitol of Huey Long.

http://i.imgur.com/kkyVPEu.jpg

what's happening to skinny elvis over there?

Not really a portrait, obv.

But it depicts Long's assassination. The other unfortunate fella is Carl Weiss, the assassin, getting mowed down by Long's bodyguards.

That illustration hangs in the capitol hallway where it all happened. You can even stick your finger into one of the bulletholes.

did they assassinate him with a poison that made his hand swell up and cause an aneurysm

wow what a weird painting
weiss as sorta hipster saint sebastian
and (uncropped below) scary eye-bulging statue looking on

http://hdtd.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/01/30/huey1_2.jpg

long doesn't seem in such bad shape there (aside from hand swelling), for a guy who's about to be dead.

Long's bodyguards returned fire, hitting Weiss 62 times

holy fuck

pplains, isn't one of the bullets still in the wall? could have sworn someone said that. the animatronic huey long at the desk that will perform speeches is still the best theme attraction in a government building I've seen.

looks like the famous painting of the zoot suit riots:

http://www.kcet.org/socal/departures/columns/assets_c/2014/02/ZootSuitRiots-thumb-630x414-69618.jpg

wau @ Long portrait, that's incredible

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOHaJizzjdg
http://everysinglewordspoken.tumblr.com/

that movie focuses on like 3 people

https://medium.com/@johnmetta/i-racist-538512462265

great read

i w/o thinking really referred to myself as a racist in conversation w/another white person and it really derailed the conversation in an unpleasant way

thanks for the link, DJP -- amazing piece.

i dont agree with the entirety of this but this part shows, i think, how pervasively this framework infests everything:

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/07/02/looking-white-in-the-face/

Postmodern theory tries to interrupt that expression at every stop, to put every word in scare quotes, to put our own presuppositions into question, to make us worry about the murderousness of “we,” and so to get in the habit of asking, “we, who?” I think that what modern philosophers call “pure” reason — the Cartesian ego cogito and Kant’s transcendental consciousness — is a white male Euro-Christian construction.

White is not “neutral.” “Pure” reason is lily white, as if white is not a color or is closest to the purity of the sun, and everything else is “colored.” Purification is a name for terror and deportation, and “white” is a thick, dense, potent cultural signifier that is closely linked to rationalism and colonialism. What is not white is not rational. So white is philosophically relevant and needs to be philosophically critiqued — it affects what we mean by “reason” — and “we” white philosophers cannot ignore it.

"Historically, there is no quotidian without the enslaved, chained or dead black body to gaze upon" - claudia explains it all

Article upthread talks about how white people don't think about where they *choose* to live as a part of their racial privilege. Something that causes a lot if unspoken tension on Facebook, Twitter and other online social groups is the difference between people from overwhelmingly white towns and those with a more diverse population. I came from an integrating suburb, I am grateful that my parents didn't want their children to grow up in a segregated environment. They wouldn't associate with people who would abandon diverse areas, let alone people who would actively oppose integration. Those people have some serious thinking to do about how segregation has benefited them, spend less time schmoozing and promoting themselves and be more circumspect in their online behavior. The actions of those pro-segregation people were very hurtful to the rest of us and it's not my job to educate or entertain people who come from those backgrounds. I don't socialize with such people in my offline life, why would I do that online?

Rachel Dolezal's new line is "I wouldn’t say I’m African-American, but I would say I’m black"

ok

Oh, I figured she'd wised up and was trying to lay low until people forgot about her. Huh.

nope she's in Vanity Fair

vanity for sure. fair? well that's complicated

I think you can see what she's getting at if you want to read the piece. I'll root for her, whatever mistakes she may have made, and glad there's more focus on trans issues through her story.

I lol'd:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rs4P1kKK-5k

did you guys see this episode? we were dying and crying. oh man so funny. "He wants to be a publican. A British tavern owner. A noble profession."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XGTPCYaBrw

http://www.longislandwins.com/columns/detail/high_school_student_proves_professor_wrong_when_he_denied_no_irish_need_app

Jensen wrote that the Irish had a “chip on their shoulder” and that they used the “myth” of having been discriminated against to justify “bullying strangers” which he says “helped sour relations between Irish and everyone else.” The delusions of the Irish did not end as they entered the middle class after World War II, according to Jensen. The NINA story was resurrected by the Irish “in recent years as the Irish feel the political need to be bona-fide victims.”

In one of the most bigoted passages of his essay, Jensen asks; “If we conclude the Irish were systematically deluding themselves over a period of a century or more about their primary symbol of job discrimination the next question to ask is, was it all imaginary or was there a real basis for the grievances about the economic hostility of Protestants to Irish aspirations? Historians need to be critical. Because a group truly believes it was a victim, does not make it so.” Jensen, of course, believes that it was not so.

academic racism denier sonned by high schooler in historian beef

http://verysmartbrothas.com/dear-well-meaning-white-people-progress-is-fucking-painful/

Putting aside people who are against racism as long as they never have to be inconvenienced, do you think these tactics targeted at Sanders events are effective? Because I'm concerned that they are not, and maybe even slightly counterproductive.

people at campaign rallies are having to confront the fact that these protestors are completely for a cause and feel its worthy of protest among groups who think they're allies. so if even some people get the message "you are not (yet) allies" then it's worth it, imo.

they've been effective in getting Bernie Sanders to address racial justice issues in his campaign & that will likely continue to snowball into greater awareness as his campaign continues xp

I remember that Jensen article, it was very patronizing. Irish people being fanciful esp. "delusional" is an old stereotype that was used to dismiss Irish grievances. They were a colonized people, you moron - that's what colonizers do. Nativism in the U.S.A. has been a very real thing, part of the whole imperialist project.

Putting aside people who are against racism as long as they never have to be inconvenienced, do you think these tactics targeted at Sanders events are effective? Because I'm concerned that they are not, and maybe even slightly counterproductive.

The word you're looking for is "appeasement"

people at campaign rallies are having to confront the fact that these protestors are completely for a cause and feel its worthy of protest among groups who think they're allies. so if even some people get the message "you are not (yet) allies" then it's worth it, imo.

― Upright Mammal (mh), Wednesday, August 12, 2015 8:48 AM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

they've been effective in getting Bernie Sanders to address racial justice issues in his campaign & that will likely continue to snowball into greater awareness as his campaign continues xp

― welltris (crüt), Wednesday, August 12, 2015 8:49 AM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

So on the first point, I just don't think a single Well Meaning White Person will get that message when it is presented as "you are a white supremacist." Because the people you're talking about don't understand that that term means anything other than a guy in a white sheet with a burning cross. On the second point, that's true, but did they ever try asking for meetings with Sanders (like some BLM activists -- not necessarily affiliated with the people at Seattle or at netroots) apparently did with Clinton? Could they have perhaps gotten him to reframe his message without these tactics?

Just to be clear, I think a lot of what BLM people have done IS effective -- the Ferguson protests, the social media usage, etc.

hi I am a person likely to go to a Sanders speech and I understand that message

Kinda take the Catholic notion that we're all white supremacists.

Well, the white ones of us at least.

I mean, didn't you already understand that message though? That's what I'm asking, is this going to reach people who didn't already get it?

yeah, but I might not walk into a Sanders rally feeling he failed to address important issues without people standing there saying "this is an important issue"

walk out, rather

I mean sure, those of us here with skin like Bernie probably get why BLM protestors shout down the police and block traffic. It's when they ("they", sorry,) turn around and speak to us, that's probably when we need to listen the most.

And I do apologize for all the we's and they's.

I was arguing with one of my college classmates about this on Facebook today. She said in the middle of the argument that BlackLivesMatter protesters don't actually matter unless they translate into votes. I am not sure she comprehends exactly how horrible that mentality is. btw she is white

So on the first point, I just don't think a single Well Meaning White Person will get that message when it is presented as "you are a white supremacist."

I think you're wrong; my anecdotal evidence is a well-meaning white dude friend who, once you get a beer or two in him, always wants to talk about how he knows he's racist -- even though, this is me talking now, he doesn't hold any racist opinions and actively works for social justice locally and internationally

there are in fact wmwp who really wanna hear this stuff, which I think is a healthy development, even if in practice it can be awkward and look like posturing...but it's an outward sign of willingness to accept one's own complicity in historical and ongoing racism & its effects. anyhow I think people in the Sanders camp are probably more inclined to be open to hearing how they have a ways to go than other people maybe, and if you still have a ways to go, then it's good to hear that directly from the people you've been leaving out