Would anyone be interested?……

[Anonymous]

I’m not understanding how “I think white people don’t need to beat themselves up anymore about race issue(s)…”(-ScottB) translates into: having “negative feelings towards white people.” (-JanS)?

Thanks for the link, btw, Scott. Very interesting.

Also, that sounds like an incredibly interesting course at UW, mom2soren. Thanks for sharing. Furthering my education on issues such as these is right up my alley and something I’ve been looking into doing. Thanks again!

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[JoB]

ScottB…

i think you answered my question..

i am all for assimilation.. though as you must know the doors for assimilation are more open for some than for others..

but if assimilation is your goal, why wouldn’t efforts like DanielleS’s interest you?

If we have a better understanding of what we do to discriminate and therefore consciously strive to limit that discrimination…

aren’t we making it easier for those who desire to assimilate?

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[TheHouse]

I would never speak for anyone else, but here is my take:

Making the statements like “White Privilege” or “White Guilt” are generalizations. No different from generalizing that all black people have rhythm, all Asians are smart or all Mexicans work hard. Bottom line is that they generalize a race and don’t speak to individual situations.

Jan has already stated above that she does not feel privileged, as millions of white people would agree. Some of you would probably argue that she is “blinded” by her “white privilege”. I would argue that privilege is a subjective term and is relative.

I would also agree with Dunno above. Rather than sitting around a coffee house feeling self pity for one another, look for true ways to break stereotypes. If you view your local supermarket listing foods as “ethnic”, then do you also view Black Entertainment Television, Chinatown or an area in Miami named “Little Havana” as racist terms as well?

And I wanted to interject a personal viewpoint/example. It illustrates my world view. I interviewed for promotions 3 times from 2000-2003. 2 of the 3 times, I was beat out by women (both white). The other time I was beat out by a white male. Not one time during all three interviews did I scream “Yippe!! I just helped advanced women in the workplace”. Not one time did I say that they got the jobs because they were women. They kicked my ass fair and square and I wanted to kick their ass. There was never a thought of self pity or feeling that they should have got the jobs b/c I am a man and they deserve the opportunity.

There are more resources allotted to minorities in this country than to the white majority. Show me an individual case of anyone (White, Black, Hispanic, or otherwise) who states that they don’t have opportunity in this country and I will show what they are passing up……where there is a will, there is a way.

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[Duckitude]

Hi All: I am a little late to this discussion, and possibly, at this late hour, may say something that is a bit of a detour… but here goes anyway.

Absolutely, white privilege, not dissimilar to male privilege, is alive and well. Whether discussing it or not will change things, I think, is a good question. Personally, I think it won’t. Those who are willing to discuss and self-examine are generally those who don’t need to, so to speak. For there to be a more general change in cultures and subcultures, the choir needs to speak to others, not to each other, if you get my drift. I hope I am making sense.

On the detour note — I think male privilege is a way more counter-productive and anti-democratic force world-wide, by far, and certainly still in the U.S., than any racism… but I could be wrong. What about that one, guys and women — the sexism discussion group?

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[Anonymous]

NewResident wrote:

“I’m not understanding how ‘I think white people don’t need to beat themselves up anymore about race issue(s)…'(-ScottB) translates into: having ‘negative feelings towards white people.; (-JanS)?”

I am certain that was my fault, NewResident.

I knew there was an edit button for my own posts, and I had just clicked the “Send Post” button then reread what JT wrote when I thought of something I should have written. I quickly edited my post, but by then, JanS had replied to my (unedited) post.

Here is what I added:

“I should try to clarify: my main attitude about the race issue(s) is that I think white people don’t need to beat themselves up anymore about race issue(s), and that self-flagellation is what I find boring and increasingly irrelevant.”

I tried to respond to your post a while ago, but due to my forgetfulness, I had a problem doing so. The problem resulted from a quirk of this WWW forum’s software combined with my forgetfulness. I am accustomed to Usenet and slrn, not WWW “forums.”

I think it would be best if I no longer edited my posts. I think I should instead just post a new article in the thread as I would do via Usenet.

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[charlabob]

Here’s a thread-jack for you, but I think you’re right (about editing posts). Except for typos, I’ve decided just posting something new works better. Otherwise, people respond to something that isn’t there anymore and it just goes downhill from there. Hoooooray for us geezers who *remember* the halcyon days of usenet. :-)

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[beachdrivegirl]

Carrying on with the thread jack…my personal favorites are the ones that someone posts, someone responds to, and then they delete theire entire original posts.. always keeps me guessing.

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[JoB]

duckitude…

“Those who are willing to discuss and self-examine are generally those who don’t need to, so to speak.”

Too some extent i agree with you about this… those who view such a discussion as sitting around a room exchanging self pity certainly won’t attend… but those who are curious might… and everyone in the room is likely to look at something differently as a result of being exposed to other people’s perceptions…

I think awareness is like a smile… When i walk down the street smiling…

there are some people who are going to decide i must be crazy to smile and will dismiss me..

and some who will decide that i am not going to change their attitude and frown..

but for the most part people will smile back with varying degrees of feeling and for many that smile will change their attitude.. at least for a while.

It works.. they have actually studied this one:)

I think that increasing your awareness of the struggles other people face humanizes them as individuals and will ultimately change the way you view them and interact with them.

After all, the largest form of discrimination happens when we don’t recognize people as individuals worthy of our positive attention.. but as troublesome others…

I believe that the sight of even one person treating another as an equal is enough to make those viewing stop and consider that individual.. if only for a split second…

you build enough of those and you have change…

i have seen this in my lifetime. Had you asked me when i was a young woman, i would say that being of acknowledged mixed race would have been a greater barrier to a man’s success than being black.

Yet, the behavior of a few interracial couples and their acceptance by their peers during the 60s and the proliferation of children that resulted and acceptance by grandparents and then by friends of friends has definately changed that… and in only 2 generations:)

amazing….

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[Duckitude]

JoB: Nicely said. I was in a mixed race marriage that started in 1969 and went for many, many, years, until a split up over the issue of children (she didn’t want any…). She was such a “tanned” Filippino that she was essentially treated as a black person most of the time. I am white, with no mixed blood. We met in college.

There is a theory that the more intermixing that occurs, the less race has to do with interactions and power. I can’t remember who advocates mixed marriages for the purpose of moving us all along the road to humanism… but, there is someone who does.

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[shelbi]

To TheHouse – your comments are exactly what I would expect from someone with white privilege.

Just because you don’t experience it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist.

You not recognizing that a white female was promoted instead of you as women’s liberation… really isn’t the point.

People being treated differently because of the color of their skin is the point. example: To walk into a bank to open and account/loan and be concerned that the color of your skin alone is going to have an impact on how you are treated is an issue that those of us with white privilege never have to worry about.

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[TheHouse]

Shelbi, I provided you a specific (and personal) example. You continue to generalize. I’m glad you think I have something that you cannot prove or disprove.

You generalized again in your above post (terms like “people”). Provide me a specific example and we’ll discuss this further.

There is a definitive line between being privileged and working hard for what you have/paying dues. Don’t attempt to blur the line.

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[JoB]

shelbi….

there have been many times in my life when i wished i was male so that the discrimination i faced as a female simply didn’t exist…

as there have been many times in my life that i have been glad that i was born with the advantage of pale skin and coloring… so i didn’t have to face that discrimination…

but i know that i don’t have a clue what it is like to live with that kind of discrimination because i saw only the most obvious examples.

As individuals, it really is all about us, you know. We extrapolate how others are affected by challenges from those we experience ourselves.

so, the more privilege you have during your formative years the less likely you are to be able to understand the lack of privilege experienced by others and how that impacts their lives…

It takes work to see that what you take for granted about the way life works just plain doesn’t apply to everyone…

I have watched the resistance to affirmative action by those who subconsciously.. or consciously.. counted on their privilege to help them climb one more step up the socioeconomic ladder and find themselves thwarted by the leveling of the playing field… with some amusement.

Some take that challenge on and grow from it… becoming more successful by becoming more aware of their environment and developing their unique assets.

other whine like a child deprived of their favorite toy..

I know change takes time…

i can’t speak to that which is centered on the color of your skin.. though i think that intermarriage has already made incredible inroads there…

but i can speak to discrimination against women.

A man gains a different perspective when his girls grow into maturity and begin facing the dissonance between the expectation their parent created that everything is possible and the reality of discrimination…

For some, that perspective never widens beyond the individual instances of prejudice their daughters experience.. but for many it is a wake up call about male privilege that could happen no other way…

There is always hope:)

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[FullTilt]

Before I made ice cream I was a shipwright. That is a carpenter on boats. In a shipyard it is a prima donna job. I have never seen an African American Shipwright. Seen plenty of Scalers (worst job), Welders (second worst), but in the wood shop all the faces are white.

I doubt there is any intention to keep Blacks out, but I think when they apply for the job they are just not considered. Regular carpentry is the same way. plenty of Latin and Black framers, but the trim carpenters are always white.

I know I have a privilege being white. Police don’t pull me over nearly as often as brown skinned folks. I don’t get followed around stores. I am less likely to be shot, imprisoned, and my life expectancy is nearly 20 years longer just for the color of my skin.

There has been a lot of advancements made in the past 50 years, but a lot more needs to be done on both sides. I think a Black Pres is going to help that a lot, both giving young black men a role model, and convincing people like my Grandfather that a Black man could do a job as well or better than a White Man.

For a White Male to say that everyone has the same opportunities as him, he is either ignorant, or full of it.

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[Anonymous]

I would be curious to hear from someone of an ethnicity, other than white, to share an example of how they will( or would) know that racism towards minorities is over?

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[JanS]

NR, I think you may get different answers depending on who you talk with. Youtube has some different things, interviews that are post – Nov.04 election…here’s one of them:

or this:

or this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Att2fWlVSsw

the conversation among us all needs to continue, I think…

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[JoB]

JanS…

so.. what would it look like from the standpoint of white privilege?

has anyone on youtube posted on that?

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[TheHouse]

To FullTilt, JoB and all the others on this thread that want to make themselves and others think that they are truly good doers in the world:

To assume that all white people are privileged is ignorant. Once again, you are stereotyping WHITE people!! if you don’t see that, you are blind. Perhaps you as individuals were privileged, but that doesn’t mean all white people are.

And it’s nice to be beating my head into a wall again with the same gadflys. Perhaps if you worked more than you blogged you would change your tune.

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[ToddinWestwood]

I tried to stay out of this one, sorry.

House, I agree with you.

There has to be some better way to make the world a better place than to sit around blogging or having a meeting, feeling sorry for your self because of your race and what a small percentage of that race may think about another race.

If you truly want to do something to make a difference, go to an underprivelaged neighborhood and help out by working with a center for sinlge moms, pick up trash, buy a homeless person lunch.

Sitting around feeling sorry for yourself isnt gonna get SH!* done.

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[beachdrivegirl]

TheHouse,

Come on you know both you and I only got to where we are in our careers because we are white. It has nothing to do with the sixty plus hour work weeks I have CHOSEN to work, or the constant goal setting I have disciplined myself to do. It is just b/c I am white and privledged. And you have to remember everyone else obviously knows more about myself and you then we do about ourselves.

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[beachdrivegirl]

And ToddinWestWood I 100% agree with you that is how come I have chosen to be very involved in various non profit organizations for the homeless such as Plymouth Housing. It is amazing what you can learn when you actually act on something rather than sit around and talk about it.

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[GenHillOne]

House, I was so happy to see you enter the discussion again with more than a single flaming phrase. Please stay in it – it’s constructive to have other points of view…it’s not constructive to say things like, “perhaps if you worked more than you blogged you would change your tune”…BDG works 60+ hours a week and is on here plenty. Don’t crap out with an easy insult that may or may not be true.

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[Kayleigh2]

House, it’s too bad you can’t seem to post without insulting people. It alienates people when you demand respect but don’t give it.

Talking about white privilege is not stereotyping, much as you like to think it is. It’s a matter of citing decades of research, science, and even *facts* that point to the advantages you have just by being culturally white. Conservatives often hate science and facts that don’t jibe with their world view, but it’s there nonetheless.

It doesn’t diminish any individual’s accomplishments to say they benefited from white privilege. Lord knows I have benifted tremendously from it. I also benefited from being petite and considered pretty. That takes nothing away from my talents, smarts, accomplishments, or efforts (or lack thereof). I own my successes and failures and I am grateful for the advantages I was given. It’s not a matter of either/or.

To read some very good scholarship on the issue:

http://www.redroom.com/blog/tim-wise/explaining-white-privilege-deniers-and-haters

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[GenHillOne]

I might suggest, too, if this thread continues to dissolve, and you’re interested in having the discussion, use the PM function to organize details and by all means, get together. As with any other topic, those not interested, don’t need to participate.

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[beachdrivegirl]

GHO-I am on here as a break as i am making me cold calls on the phone. :) Typically keeps me in a more cheerful mood when peeps are being rude to me. :):)

Kayleigh2 thanks for the link I have actually enjoyed the links others have left on the topic and look forward to reading it when I get a chance.

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[alki_2008]

Interesting viewpoints here. Guess I’ll throw some of my own opinions into the fray.

There are certainly instances when being caucasian provides an advantage, but there are also instances when the reverse is true. For example, a caucasian college student looking for scholarships to apply to…finds plenty of scolarships that require x% of “xyz” ethinicity, but no scholarships for being caucasian. Some would argue that, since s/he is caucasian, then s/he doesn’t need a scholarship…but there are plenty of ‘poor’ caucasians out there struggling to pay for college. That is just an example.

Basically, I think there are some cases where being of “xyz” ethnicity provides advantages over being caucasian. Whether or not those advantages outweigh the disadvantages of not being caucasian is another argument.

As others have noted, a person’s ethnicity (whether they’re in the majority or minority) is not the only thing that’s going to determine the outcome of their lives. No one is destined to be rich or poor just because of their race. There are a lot of other factors that come into play…culture, financial status (not all whites are rich nor all blacks poor), individual personality, intelligence, environment, etc.

The role of culture can be seen in homelessness, for example. The proportion of homeless that are Asian is very small (various surveys that can be googled) – this is not because all Asians are such hard-workers or so smart that they never become homeless, but because of their culture. In many Asian cultures, the extended family is such a huge thing and so if someone is too poor to afford a roof over their head, then they are taken in by other family members.

On a side note…

One thing I’ve always thought interesting was about ethnicity vs nationality. For example:

“White” vs German, Irish, French, Russian, Australian, etc

“Asian” vs Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, etc

“Black” vs Somali, Zimbabwean, Haitian, Malawi, etc

“Hispanic” vs Mexican, Portugese, Spanish, Brazilian, etc

ETC

The racism that some Hispanics experience (ie, Mexicans) might be different than the racism that other Hispanics experience (ie, Spanish)…so this is an example of where generalizing all “Hispanics” as the same “people” can pose a problem.

I also think it’s interesting that people see Obama as “black”, even though he’s 50%. I wonder if some caucasian voters would have been less likely to vote for him if he was 100% black.

Anyway, not sure where I’m going with all this rambling. Still interested in whether or not a discussion group happens. I agree that there is racism exhibited by white people, so “racism is a white problem”. If you meant to say that “racism is ONLY a white problem”, then I don’t agree…as there are certainly cases of racism amongst and between other ethnicities/nationalities. So, not sure if I’m eligible for the discussion group. :p

For now, I’ll finish some work and then read McIntosh and Hsu. :-)

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