I think I came to an important realization today. I think it had something to do with some of the comments on this thread.
REVELATION: Believe it or not, I try to exercise restraint with white people on the internet. But I’m feeling pretty much over it. And I’m okay with that.
In that spirit,
Sometimes a LOLcat says it best.
I am too much of a shrinking violet to get into it on threads like that, but reading the exchange about the band-aid example from the invisible knapsack was frustrating. the first time I read that piece, when I was in high school, I *thought* I already knew all about my white privilege. I was both raised and educated to be sensitive to institutional racism, so I thought I got it, and I was reading down that list all, “yeah, yeah, yeah.” but the band-aid one stopped me cold, because it had never occurred to me. I wore band-aids on my fingers constantly back then (because I chewed on my cuticles) and not once had I stopped to think about how their color was another way in which my society was made for people who look like me. I tried to picture a band-aid for darker skin and almost couldn’t imagine what that would even look like, because in my head “flesh colored” meant “white skin colored.”
so, one person’s mockable example is another person’s revelation, you know?
Have you ever looked at the color of supposedly “flesh tone” Band-Aids? Personally, I ain’t that color or even close to it…and I’m as WASP as the driven snow.
But you do make your point. Why did we chose the Caucasian shade instead of, say, a more Latino hue? If you look throughout the world, I suspect that the majority of humanity tend to run a bit darker than my pallid Irish ancestry-induced coloration.
B~
Sent here from that comment thread via link. I can’t help but check up on that mess every so often. And in the words of some people in my life, “that there is some white folk bullshit” is probably the best I can quantify that silliness.
I can’t even with threads like that during office hours, but I wanted to comment, away from the fray, that I was very impressed with your restraint and eloquence, not to mention determination. After a few rounds I couldn’t decide whether my head was going to explode, or if I was just going to have to be in hysterics all day. Not, of course, that that thread or the opinions in question are actually funny, but at the sheer bleakness of the prospect of getting anywhere. Because otherwise it just makes me want to vomit. On the commenters.
I’m also starting to really like the term “whitey”. Must be all my guilt, because obviously that’s the only motivation I could have for wanting justice (courtesy of the ableism thread, another barrel of laughs).
Oh man, are you ever patient! Seriously. I can’t even read those threads.
I saw that mess before you jumped in…kudos for actually getting that wreck of a comments thread somewhere!
Thanks for the support and/or commiseration, all!
By the way, Jack, may I link to you?
@Bq: absolutely! No need to ask permission, either. Where will the linking happen?
I understand the anger; I even agree with it, but I just can not comprehend how prejudice & hate based on skin color is going to help the disastrous state of the world.
As a white girl in Texas, I have always been outspoken against racism, homophobia, sexism, and any other form of oppression. After graduating, I was eager to work in a diverse school, but I was tired of struggling & determined to take the first job offered. It was in a mid-sized, agricultural town in Florida where confederate flag emblems commonplace on middle school student attire. I was appalled, as it was unlike anything I had ever seen growing up in suburban Houston. I tirelessly used my reading class to teach tolerance, history, & current events that the students will likely never again be exposed to in that community. It may seem minute, but I have to believe that I planted seeds of change in those students.
Upon returning to Houston, I did get that job in a diverse school. I never anticipated the racism that I would encounter from colleagues and administrators, but again, I understand. As usual, I kept to myself and despite language barriers, chose to socialize mainly with the custodial staff.
Despite my appearance, my whole life has been spent challenging the status quo, but I guess that gets us nowhere if you are just going to look at me, and then condemn me.