On Taking White Supremacy Personally
On Taking White Supremacy Personally
It's not personal, but we all have a responsibility to deal with it
I've lost friends - too many to count - because they decided to get up in their feelings and take personally something I said about white supremacy.
to be clear:
1. all of us (me included) have internalized white supremacy because
2. our culture is white supremacist and we can't not be internalizing that whiteness so lets
3. get over being offended by that it's not personal and
4. you and i - all of us - have a personal responsibility to do something about it cause it won't just go away on its own
5. white guys: we aren't the victims here but
6. that feeling of being offended and hurt by someone insinuating or suggesting you have a racism problem *is evidence of white supremacy operating in your life*
7. to wit: if someone called me a pedophile, i'd be bewildered and confused, but would eventually just dismiss it as bonkers because it doesn't phase me; i know i'm not a pedo and so it's your problem if you wanna accuse me of that...but...
8. the reactivity around the suggestion that white guys have a whiteness problem is an artifact of white supremacy. it hits closer to home than we want to admit - or can even perceive
9. and it's a violation of white supremacy for me to even talk about why we can't talk about this; it's considered divisive, impudent, brazen, uncouth, polemical, impolite, ill-mannered.
10. in fact arguments are made that it's the *tone* of what I'm saying that's the real problem here. the *tone* just turns off so many well meaning good white guys who would probably listen if things were said more gently, nicer, less intense, less pointed, less direct, more general, 'we are all sinners' maybe try that approach instead of singling people out...
11. this sort of *tone policing* argument has been made for hundreds (no exaggeration) of years to silence and police anti-racist/liberationist efforts and justify inactivity and lack of response from white people.
12. tone policing justice work is...you guessed it...how white supremacy works lol and *to be clear* BIPOC people face this sort of thing exponentially more than i do. But i've seen it with my own eyes and can confirm.
13. TL;dr - let's all face and befriend our hurty feelings and get to work dismantling white supremacy together, beloved.
Thank you for this. I got to dismantle a lot of my privilege and whiteness (still too much to be trash, but when we know better, we do better)) bit by bit in private when studying history—real, total (like Howard Zinn-type) history. As I taught it, I got similar reactions. I perceive most of our history as centered around the medieval explorations’ slavery practices that was carried over to the British colonies and protected. Still being protected—different tactics. Folks don’t like hearing that.
Matt, I couldn’t agree more!! Recently I, a white male realized that I grew up feeling “whiteness” was normal and every other cultural and genetic difference was abnormal. I didn’t consciously believe this, it was just a result of where and how I grew up. Any “abnormality” I encountered produced subconscious fear, which would manifest in very subtle supremest beliefs. In the last 8 or 9 years I have been actively trying to recognize the lies my white culture has been feeding me. So much of my understanding of normalcy has been based on and reinforced by limited information and incomplete history. The more I learn about the horrific and deeply imbedded history of racism in this country the better I understand how we have arrived where we are today. To be sure, I find this expanded view of history very disturbing. At my best I am thankful for a deeper appreciation for why so many of the social problems we face today are connected to the white supremacy we’ve practiced in this country since its inception. A deeper appreciation strengthens my resolve to repair the harm caused by white supremacy. At my worst I turn away and pretend it’s not my problem.