Listen Up White People!
Here we go again. Bourgeoisie Black Guy telling white people they are the problem:
Condemn white supremacy? Great! But no special credit, white people
Nope. No Gold Stars, No Attaboys. Because:
That [Miss America Morgana] Wood’s condemnation of white supremacists and neo-Nazis is considered brave or especially laudable is one more indicator of how low the standards for truth-telling and acts of resistance against racism have fallen in the age of Donald Trump.
And this:
White privilege consists of the unearned advantages, opportunities and resources that white people receive in American society because of the color of their skin. It also manifests in “the soft bigotry of low expectations,” where a well-intentioned white person like Margana Wood is praised for speaking out against white supremacy while black and brown folks who do the same — see the case of sports journalist Jemele Hill — are punished and marginalized.
Did I miss something? Was Jemele Hill fired? How was she marginalized? I'm seeing all kinds of support for her from all kinds of Americans. So why and how was Morgana Wood's statement any different than Jemele Hill's comment?
Conclusion:
Margana Wood’s words were a beginning and not an ending. Those necessary next steps go beyond superficial discussion or condemnation of white supremacists, neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and the assorted human deplorables of the “alt-right.” They involve remaking the social and political institutions that maintain white privilege and white supremacy in America, with the goal of creating a more just and democratic society.
Ok. No argument there. As far as I know every single person here at c99% agrees with "the goal of creating a more just and democratic society."
I have a suggestion for Chauncey Devega. Instead of casting racist divisive aspersions against all white people. How about directing your criticism at Markos and Prof. Denise Oliver? How about narrowing your focus to Barak Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Bill and Hillary Clinton? Maybe Rahm Emmanuel could do a little bit more heavy lifting than Miss America? Hey Chauncey! Have you noticed the total silence from The Black Congressional Caucus? Did any Black Democrat aside from Maxine Waters even offer verbal support for BLM?
Hey Chauncey! This is an old white guy who was active and participated with BLM L.A. I was at Occupy L.A. from day four til the bitter end. We set up an Occupy The Hood station. Where we're you during Ferguson? Did you personally visit a single BLM protest?
I don't know and I don't care. Knock it off with the false flag attack on Miss America and other people of all races, religions and gender orientations who are doing the best they can with the tools the Good Lord gave them. Many of us are fighting the good fight and putting their life and freedom on the line.
http://www.salon.com/2017/09/14/condemn-white-supremacy-great-but-no-spe...
Comments
Some liberals
spend most of their time denouncing white people, rather than actual racism.
It makes me wonder how racism can be such a big problem when they chose to spend most of their time fighting against white skin instead.
Bernie Bros?
Doctors and Dentists maybe? Certain professions trend male and white for historical and cultural reasons that individuals are powerless to change.
Pretending that average white people can influence the system turns people against the cause you are fighting for.
Don't hate the player, hate the game.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
The liberal version of gop stunt of bake sales on campus
I thought one of the best recruitment tools for democrats were the "bake sales" held by college republicans to show up affirmative action, etc. I have seen these bake sales and they truly are vile in that they totally attack minorities and women as being illegitimately on campus just as a start. It is more than easy to imagine minorities and women being totally disgusted by the displays and republicans. End result--instant democrats.
Now this use of white privilege serves the same function as those bake sales. At a local high school in a literature course, white students were told to write a paper about their white privilege. I know this high school. and area and it is majority working class whites and Hispanics. It has thee highest participation rates in free lunches in the district. So here we have school administrators forcing students (I don't think the assignment came from the teachers) to write about their privilege with the sure bet that many of them are struggling with food insecurity, huge debt, little to no income regardless of working multiple jobs and with a number of them having their homes foreclosed. Instant resentment against all things "liberal". Edit: in this case don't mean that the students themselves are struggling with say high debt, but that as a family issue which effects things like food purchases, medicines, etc.
@gjohnsit
It's generally either propagating or falling prey to the old divide and conquer tactic.
We - the people of the world, as well as the people of America and other countries - need to stand together against injustice, and anyone attacking allies for speaking out is either misled or misleading others while discouraging universal action.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
"Unearned advantages".
It's time to put that bullshit to rest. There are disadvantages to being black, female, Hispanic and minority in this country but to generalize that all white people have unearned advantages is too much in my book. In fact, fuck that. They are not "unearned" advantages, they are mostly dismal opportunities in a stagnant and corrupt society where nearly all of us are ruled by the rich, yes, mostly white people.
It's the same theme you hear with Black Lives Matter and the come back of All Lives Matter. There's a point there too.
Relative to Hill, I thot she was on the right track but then saw she and her co-host wanted to have war criminal Obama on their show. They're fully willing to call a spade a spade in Trump, but when it comes to Obama, a racist par excellence responsible for killing black and brown babies across the planet, they'll suck up like the hypocrites they are.
Devega does the same thing regarding Clinton and the democratic party.
When you're that hypocritical, you lose any credibility in your accusations.
Exactly
For the most part White privilege is reserved for elite upper class white Americans and the "professional class" upper income whites who still have to work the system or be worked by it.
The system rewards sociopaths more than whites. Pharma Bro and Trump are examples. Did Herman Cain, Ben Carson and Clarence Thomas benefit from sociopathic privilege?
The term "White privilege" is a false flag that case divides people with common goals.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
L.I.F.E.
Life
Isn't
Fucking
Easy
Everybody pays dues and most Americans have to fight, scratch and claw for every penny they make.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
This won't be popular here, but . . .
. . . a lot of this is a matter of perspective.
Most of us here are not sitting on top of the economic pyramid. I'm guessing from what little I see in everyone's comments that we are a few steps (maybe a lot of steps) down from where the folks over at TOP are sitting as they weaponize a term like "privilege." Most who adopt that line of argument do so, in my observation, from a pretty damned privileged height.
That said, you individually, actually most of us of fair complexion who have the wherewithal to have had a range (maybe small, but a range) of choices in life, even just the little one of having computers and spending time on them discussing politics, do have unearned advantages. Some minority individuals also had some of those advantages, just fewer of them. And even when they did, it wasn't across the board. We weren't eyed suspiciously when we entered the computer store, much less when any of the few interviews for real jobs came along. Others were eyed suspiciously, putting them at a disadvantage and us at an advantage we didn't earn. That's all fair ground for discussion and comprehension.
There is unearned privilege, some of it racial or ethnic, some of it economic -- being born in the better-off circumstances. Being in the US instead of in Syria. For most of us, much of that privilege fell into our laps. And any privilege becomes the more potent when we do operate in "a stagnant and corrupt society where nearly all of us are ruled by the rich, yes, mostly white people." To deny that that advantage exists does our discussion no benefit. There are multiple forms, arenas, and degrees of privilege, and we'd do well to acknowledge them. Right now, one narrow slice of that is being used in certain quarters as a cudgel to silence any disagreement, but that doesn't mean that privilege, unearned advantage, doesn't exist, or that we are not beneficiaries of it.
Just my perspective. . . .
Not being discriminated against...
...is not an "unearned advantage".
It's just a lack of something being taken away.
Again, perspective.
To those who know only prejudice they experience all day every day, others not having to undergo that experience seem to be on an advantaged plane. You are arguing from a perspective of what should be; others argue from a perspective of what is.
That perspective means everything
By your perspective, if white people got discriminated against as much as minorities, then the world would be a "better place". Because everyone would be oppressed equally
Unless you are rich, of course. But classism doesn't matter.
I never argued a "better place" of universal discrimination.
That's your misreading.
And I am one who has the scars of arguing that class is an issue at least as much as race, if they are separable at all.
Like I said, it would be unpopular to acknowledge that all whites have an easier time in this society. But they do. Some more than others, but all of 'em have it easier. We can't fix a problem we deny.
That's not a big problem with the vast majority
I think it's obvious...on an average, and with lots of exceptions.
All whites is obviously an easily proven falsehood. You should leave off the "all" unless you want to embrace racial stereotypes.
I mean, do all blacks or latinos or whites have a single, shared experience based on race, without exception? No. Of course not. You'd only find that in a scifi novel.
But that's not The Problem.
The Problem is some people being discriminated against.
Spending time talking about "unearned advantages", which really aren't advantages, implies the problem is the lack of discrimination against some people.
Which isn't The Problem.
Logically, this is a dumb political strategy.
I fail to see the point of politics if your focus isn't on "what should be".
The focus on what should be . . .
. . . is the domain of philosophy. The point of politics is a focus on how to get to what should be from what is.
@dance you monster
You can slice that pie so many ways. A stronger case could be made that ALL people of any race who had at least one loving, nurturing caretaker as children have an easier time in this or any society than ANY child who didn't. It takes more than skin color to get an easy time in life.
Lurking in the wings is Hillary, like some terrifying bat hanging by her feet in a cavern below the DNC. A bat with theropod instincts. -- Fred Reed https://tinyurl.com/vgvuhcl
I agree.
There are many sliding scales of advantage: race, economics, geography, medical condition, family circumstances, etc., etc. Race is only one, and not always the big one in any individual case, but it IS one of 'em, and we damage our ability to improve things (not to mention our credibility in circles that want to improve things) when we dismiss it. And this is in no way a defense of those who misuse this argument for rhetorical advantage (see C. DeVega) or partisan advantage (see Markos's mudpit). My only point is to prevent our becoming denialists.
You've made some good points dym.
Appreciate that perspective, made me think.
Ouch.
It's less about "white
privilege" than it is about the "majority culture" (white) treating its own (members) on a known level of acceptance, comfort vs. treating minority culture(s) differently, more cautiously, less aware of where the level of acceptance is between the two (or more) groups (majority v. minority), if one exists at all. Any "white privilege" that comes into play simply is a recognition of a member of the majority culture (white), and the immediate level of comfort, level of acceptance expected between two (or more) members of the majority culture.
That that said majority culture (white) treats most minority cultures like $h!t and worse Does Not Mean that individual members of the majority culture (whites) harbor that sentiment. Many do! And express it whenever they can! But not all, and the "nots" population grows, is at least 50% of the majority culture. Yes, there is a certain "white privilage" here. But, I suspect and expect that that exists wherever multi-cultural populations exist, and that it is NOT special or peculiar to the U.S. of A.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
That's plain old Tribalism
"We" are "The People", and those who are "Not Like Us" are "Not-People". This is something the human race should have outgrown somewhere around the Chalcolithic, but never has - and, I fear, never will.
There is no justice. There can be no peace.
@gjohnsit
Yup, not being discriminated against would, in my view, be a basic human right - especially where (edit: typically 'unofficial') policies permitting or encouraging such discrimination exist among government bodies.
A good deal of this nonsense would have died a natural death without propaganda carried by policy-created media monopolies, lack of regulation protective of the public interest and an agenda of divide and conquer enacted against the general public by the self-interest-controlled US government.
Also edited for letter typo.
Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.
A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.
Skid Row Privilege
All homeless people are dehumanized and criminalized. That's the next step in the program of the United Carceral Militarized States of America.
The point of my essay is that marginalized people of all races have no more power to make structural and cultural changes than Chauncey Devega. Probably less.
Chauncey is targeting the wrong people. This part here:
Target the real enemy of all Americans. Target The Vampire Squid. Target Big Pharma and Pentagon spending that impoverishes all Americans equally.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
My comment was directed at Al's dismissal . . .
. . . of any advantage. I agree with you on the other point that the concept of privilege is today being aimed not at those who actually have the means to institute and defend that privilege.
I wasn't dismissing any advantage per se,
I was objecting to a blanket generalization that all whites have an "unearned" advantage in life compared to minorities. I know plenty of blacks and Asians that have had an unfair advantage at things as well. Saying that all whites have an unearned advantage at everything seems too divisive to me and too simplistic.
Let's Assume You Are Correct
in every regard:
So now what? What can Miss America or all you white people do about it?
That's exactly why I suggested Chauncey was shooting at the wrong target. The political elites are the only individuals, and groups, who can make changes at the economic, legislative, judicial and administrative levels that actually impact people's lives.
Chauncey is a divider, not a uniter. Chauncey Devega is the problem, not the solution.
There. I'm glad we got that cleared up.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
I'm perfectly happy to admit that *I* have enjoyed considerable
"white privilege" in the course of my life, although I've enjoyed even more middle class privilege.
So, yeah, I'm sure that white folks in Appalachia enjoy an institutionalized "privilege" of first shot at the coal mining jobs, but it takes a real neo-liberal fuckwad to pretend that the biggest problem with regards to coal-mining labor is that the most wretched of white people have a toe up on the most wretched of black people.
Similarly, it's annoying to deal with people who insist that on the opposite end, the biggest problem we've got is too few women and african americans are getting their shot at being plutocratic CEO motherfuckers screwing all the rest of us.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
Yep
Ben Carson got a chance to be Sec. of HUD. Nothing but crickets now. Maybe he isn't racist enough?
Betsy De Vos got with the program and is demonstrating that a woman can be just as heartless and cut throat of a child hater as any man.
That's from someone who thinks W.C. Fields' fatal flaw was that he had too high of an opinion of other people's children.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
What's odd is the people
What's odd is the people dismissing your opinion with a line like "Well, you're probably a straight white male" or some such.
When did it become OK to judge someone by the color of their skin, what's between their legs or who they prefer there?
They say that there's a broken light for every heart on Broadway
They say that life's a game and then they take the board away
They give you masks and costumes and an outline of the story
And leave you all to improvise their vicious cabaret-- A. Moore
Is the Klan paying you, Chauncey?
If not, you ought to hit them up for some.
After all, you're doing their recruiting for them! White poors are their target audience, those who despite having white skin, have none of the "privilege" you accuse them of having. Your insults hurled in their direction will assure good turnout anywhere and at any time the Ku Klux Klan (KKK) decides to show up among them!
Like Denise Oliver Velez and numerous others, you need to start thinking before you write!
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
I am so over racist people screaming racist.
Guess what, TOP folks! When you make generalizations about a group of people based off of race, that's... wait for it... racist.
Yes, I know you have a long drawn out response for how that's not the case, but unless you can convince me in 25 or less, I ain't interested in listening to your lectures any more.
/snark.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCSi2SIUqPw]
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
Only White People Are Racist
I could not believe I heard someone actually say that. The theory was that because the white power structure had all the power that black and brown people could only be "prejudiced", but never racist.
It was one of the most hallucenogenic experiences of my life. Individuals from all racial/tribal groups can believe in racial/tribal superiority.
God didn't play favorites when she passed out Stupid. Every racial/ethnic/tribal group got their fair share.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
God didn't pass out Stupid.
God didn't pass out Stupid. It's the only thing that predates the Big Bang. So, of course, "very racial/ethnic/tribal group got their fair share".
Sometimes I get so much Stupid thrown at me that I want to fill a 4-foot Bong with a load of Kush and do it. I'm not entirely sure why this helps, but I have an idea.
I call that idea "the Big Bhang Theory".
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
heard this song years back.
part of a poisonous atmosphere.
verge of despair, really.
fifty years later.
we can not get it together.
now or then.
at the Doomsville city limits.
think what another fifty years will mean.
aaaarrgh.
I know racism isn't dead, but...
it is time to change the narrative. Black professionals are just as guilty of perpetuating racist behaviors (think Hillary) as any Klansman waving a confederate flag. If white people carried on about black people like some rants do white people, they would absolutely be called racists. To say only white people, who aren't married or related to a black person, can be racist is ridiculous.
"Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich."--Napoleon
Black Cops Are Racist
I have had two cops tell me they couldn't possibly be racist, because they married white women. Bullshit! Marrying a white woman may have been a racist power trip.
I watched a racist black cop who was treating a black man with extreme contempt for no reason. Cops are racist towards anyone on the other side of "the blue line".
Racism is a very complicated social system. I get that. Not all pathological hatred of "the other" is technically racist. I have met all kinds of people who are brothers and sisters united in our common struggle.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
When my black ex-husband told a young
black woman he worked with that he'd married a white woman, she looked at him and said "oh man, we lost another one." He looked at her and said, "What? I'm not black anymore, WTF?" He did love to argue my ex, and I don't think he set her straight that day, but he was surprised enough at her behavior to tell me about it.
Of course, this is the same man who helped me see that all is not always so easy. In the early days I was all happy with this whole "post racial" thing as I saw it, and we were on a military base where inter racial couples are fairly common. He looked at me and reminded me that there were still places in this country he could be shot for being with me. It was a hard moment, for both of us. But he was right. He had me so damned paranoid when we drove through southern states after that, took me a while to put that fear down.
Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur
(N.I.N.) Negro In Newport
I used a euphemism, but I was amazed to find out that N.I.N. was still be used by the Newport PD. DWB only worse. It was reported by The O.C. Register.
I asked one of my homeless friends about it and she confirmed that it was very real. She was an attractive young black woman who grew up in O.C. and quite naturally had white boyfriends. Everytime they drove through Newport they were pulled over. This was approximately 2008.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
racist cops
You could say they're racists against the human race.
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
article turns "soft bigotry of low expectations" on its head.
the phrase refers to expecting ( and accepting ) less from members of the disadvantaged class.
in this case, however, more was expected from a member of the disadvantaged class.
so whatever it is, it isn't "the soft bigotry of low expectations".
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
Exactly What I'm Talking About
LIE DETECTOR TESTS: LATEST EXAMPLE OF HOW TRUMP MAY FURTHER ENTRENCH OBAMA’S WAR ON LEAKS
https://shadowproof.com/2017/09/11/lie-detector-tests-latest-example-tru...
How is Obama any different from Jeff Sessions? Immigration, the war on drugs, drones and etc. Trump is a logical extension of Obama and Sessions is simply continuing the racist policies and failures of Obama.
Skin color has very little to do with racism or racist policies.
"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn
Folks like Chauncey, Brooklyn Bad Boy and DOV...
Are just as bad as those folks I like to call 'Larry Elder Republicans'. They talk a good game about civil rights but side with the fascists every chance they get if it means they get a few more dollars in the bank. The only difference between the Larry Elder Repigs and Kos Identitarians is the latter don't bitch about single mothers and fatherless families every chance they get, but they ignore economic and class issues all the same.
Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.
Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.
Yeah, right, thank you, Mr. DaVega.
Margana Wood’s words were a beginning and not an ending. Those necessary next steps go beyond superficial discussion or condemnation of white supremacists, neo-Nazis, the Ku Klux Klan and the assorted human deplorables of the “alt-right.” They involve remaking the social and political institutions that maintain white privilege and white supremacy in America, with the goal of creating a more just and democratic society.
And whose fault is it that the fight against racism is now more about words than about deeds? Or, God help us, institutional structures, which we barely have a language for anymore?
Certainly Donald Trump's comments on Twitter get far more attention and opprobrium, than, for instance, his lack of a Black Small Business Initiative or a 21st-century War on Poverty or a thorough investigation, Eliot Ness-style, of our nation's police departments and the academies that feed them, to root out the white supremacist infiltration there (the best anti-racists can do on that count is to decry, justly, his pardoning of Joe Arpaio.)
What you all have been asking White America to do is precisely what that lady just did. You asked them to condemn, with words, racist words, images, and beliefs, in particular the neo-Nazi and white supremacist variety.
I think the lady in question could be forgiven for being confused when you respond to her doing exactly what you all asked her to do by criticizing her for her white privilege and saying that her actions are insufficient.
What other actions have you ever asked her to take? Oh, yeah, taking down statues of Confederates and other slaveowners of the past. Well, maybe if she takes down a few of those, she'll get on your good list. But I don't think so. I suspect that the only way to get on your good list is to attack white people in the exact same way you do.
It's lucky I don't care what you think.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
I expect that what he is waiting for is her apology for
having two parents with insufficient melatonin expression in their genetics.
The earth is a multibillion-year-old sphere.
The Nazis killed millions of Jews.
On 9/11/01 a Boeing 757 (AA77) flew into the Pentagon.
AGCC is happening.
If you cannot accept these facts, I cannot fake an interest in any of your opinions.
That pretty much says it
The worst thing is the contempt that infuses these statements. To say that all whites are racist,that they can't help it because of their inherent privilege, forces white people to make a choice. To keep listening or stop listening. It forces people too defend themselves, personally, when there is no defense, because they are inherently racist. For me, the problem is the institutional racism that is mostly invisible. In banks, jobs, wages, insurance, education, commerce, health care and justice that shapes how we live. That is the unasked for privilege that whites have. It can be measured, it can be brought into the light of day. It's not bestowed equally on all. For most it's not much different once you near the lowest economic level. There is very little at that low level whites, or anyone, can do to influence those institutions individually. That's why we have to stand together, because republicans and democrats both support and serve those institutions. Yes, there are racists, but to drive away allies because they don't meet your standards only weakens all of us.
@Snode I stop listening
I stop listening because they've got no game. Well, unless they're playing a different game than what they say, in which case I've still got no time for them.
"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha
"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver
Senor de Vega rides again,
or some folks just never shut up.
First, maybe he could explain why the blazes I am supposed to be paying attention to anything some airhead beauty queen said.
After that, maybe Senor de Vega would like to share with us the time(s) he confronted or even complained about the conduct and attitudes of Her Wickedness, Mme. Clinton herself, who is without a doubt the most privileged, enabled, coddled, entitled Dumb-Ass White Female currently alive in the US of A, and a major embarrassment to the rest of us WFs who actually do things like, oh, raise our own children, pick up after ourselves, pay our own bills, and even, wait for it, take some responsibility for our own screw-ups.
Oh, never. Gee, I wonder why not. Maybe, yah think, it is because Shill and the Big Dog were where the money was, and the likes of De Vega could hardly exist, never mind be important, without that Dim Party patronage machine?
Mary Bennett
Once again, the pitch for reparations
Chauncey de Vega tells us:
Well that's nice. What happened? We had the omigod First Black President in the White House for eight years. Didn't that solve the "white privilege" problem? Apparently not, because now we've got Chauncey de Vega (who is in all likelihood named so because he's got an ancestor who was owned by someone named de Vega) telling us that social change is now totally kewl.
So (as a revolutionist myself) much as I'd like to celebrate the fact that social change is now totally kewl, I feel obliged to ask: where were y'all since 2009? Oh yeah, that's right. Before Donald Trump moved into the White House all the kewl people thought the most egregious sin in the world was calling Barack Obama racist names. You know, that half-Black son of a recent immigrant from Kenya who identified with his white Mom, whose philosophy and politics were deeply neoliberal, and who married a genuine descendant of slaves because he thought it would be good for his career. Don't say anything bad about him!
The obvious truth of the matter here is that Chauncey de Vega is never going to get what he wants if he continues to argue that the real problem is merely "white privilege" and the real solution is merely "remaking" institutions. Now, there's a different tack he might consider trying, say, demanding reparations for the descendants of slaves and of victims of Jim Crow segregation, something significant enough to erase most of the theft of legacy that has, over dozens of generations, been suffered by the descendants of slaves. In promoting such a solution Chauncey de Vega would be taking a cue from the great orator Frederick Douglass, who argued that "power concedes nothing without a demand."
So perhaps a "beginning," for Chauncey de Vega, would be to distinguish himself from the folks who don't really want to do anything about structural racism as such because they support what is commonly called a "misleadership class."
“When there's no fight over programme, the election becomes a casting exercise. Trump's win is the unstoppable consequence of this situation.” - Jean-Luc Melanchon