getting woke and SL

[Jordyn McGregor]

If this is being "woke", don't wake me up.

And I still don't know what the "societal norm" is.

I'm off to my happy place and then to bed.  Goodnight folks.

[Innula Zenovka]

7 minutes ago, Jackson Redstar said:

the main question I have is what is this White privilege and where can I get some?  does it pay your bills for you? put free food on the table? pay rent? inquiring minds want to know!

No, it means that, whatever other problems you may have,  they're not added to by being black in a racist society.

 

[Luna Bliss]

1 minute ago, Jordan Whitt said:

If this is being "woke", don't wake me up.

And I still don't know what the "societal norm" is.

I'm off to my happy place and then to bed.  Goodnight folks.

Wait!  You haven't told us yet again that we should be focusing on Covid now.

[Love Zhaoying]

Just now, Jordan Whitt said:

And I still don't know what the "societal norm" is.

A dangerous situation to be in!

But seriously, I did not answer your question on purpose. Some things need to be investigated for one's self. Enjoy the journey, hope you get "woke"!

[Paul Hexem]

Just now, Luna Bliss said:

I think pressing the issue that "all lives matter" at this point in time furthers the causes of racists, because they often use this to minimize the problems Blacks have endured.  Racists simply can't concede that another group has had it worse via the color of their skin. Either they are unable to see it, or they see it and want to continue to have the right to stomp a disadvantaged group to the ground so they can have higher status.

I won't say you're wrong.

I'll just ask this- if it's conceivable that some people are using "all lives matter" right but most are using it wrong, is it also conceivable that some people may be using "white privilege" as an attack, even if most aren't?

[Jordyn McGregor]

4 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

Wait!  You haven't told us yet again that we should be focusing on Covid now.

 

 

[Love Zhaoying]

1 minute ago, Paul Hexem said:

I won't say you're wrong.

I'll just ask this- if it's conceivable that some people are using "all lives matter" right but most are using it wrong, is it also conceivable that some people may be using "white privilege" as an attack, even if most aren't?

Yes. 

[Luna Bliss]

1 minute ago, Paul Hexem said:

4 minutes ago, Luna Bliss said:

I think pressing the issue that "all lives matter" at this point in time furthers the causes of racists, because they often use this to minimize the problems Blacks have endured.  Racists simply can't concede that another group has had it worse via the color of their skin. Either they are unable to see it, or they see it and want to continue to have the right to stomp a disadvantaged group to the ground so they can have higher status.

I won't say you're wrong.

I'll just ask this- if it's conceivable that some people are using "all lives matter" right but most are using it wrong, is it also conceivable that some people may be using "white privilege" as an attack, even if most aren't?

Oh yes!  It's why I seldom venture into the Twitter Wars and other such places.  And I admit, yes I've seen people use it to trash others here instead of attempting to arrive at a resolution.

BTW, I've been called a racist before, and a person who is prejudiced against disabled people.  lol    And I know, it doesn't feel good when you know you are neither yet you've been attacked in such a way.

[Aethelwine]

It was only a couple of weeks ago Amy Cooper was caught on video playing the white privilege card in New York. Everyone knew what she was doing... Those on here saying they don't know what white privilege is must have been really confused by that story

[Janet Voxel]

32 minutes ago, Jackson Redstar said:

the main question I have is what is this White privilege and where can I get some?  does it pay your bills for you? pay rent? inquiring minds want to know!

In many cases, yes it does and in some cases it means the difference between living and dying. I took the liberty of taking out "put free food on the table" for you because it implies black people asking for a handout.

White privilege in employment:

https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/economy/reports/2019/12/05/478150/african-americans-face-systematic-obstacles-getting-good-jobs/

https://www.epi.org/publication/labor-day-2019-racial-disparities-in-employment/

Health care:

https://www.americanbar.org/groups/crsj/publications/human_rights_magazine_home/the-state-of-healthcare-in-the-united-states/racial-disparities-in-health-care/

https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2019/p0905-racial-ethnic-disparities-pregnancy-deaths.html

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/racial-differences-doctors.html

 

Edited June 11, 2020 by Janet Voxel

[Selene Gregoire]

7 hours ago, Paul Hexem said:

Who says they're doing nothing? You expect everyone to charge the police with weapons? Get on national TV and make a speech?

I've straight up intervened in police abuse of authority, but that was as private security on private property, where I had the authority and initiative. Not everyone has that. 

Let me try this another way. You show a video of police misconduct to somebody and say, "Hey, isn't this wrong?", most reasonable people will agree with you. It's a good chance to slip in the names of some equal rights foundations, or maybe the victim's gofundme, or whatever. "Here's some resources we can use." They'll remember that video. They might even pass it on to others and do the same. 

You start lecturing that same person about their privilege or their complicity or acuse them of being secretly racist without knowing it, all they'll remember is some jerk insulting them.

If they weren't jerks to begin with they wouldn't be insulted.

[Selene Gregoire]

4 hours ago, Mollymews said:

White is a race classification used by the US government. White, Black, Asian, Hispanic being the 4 main US classifications. These have specific meanings as they relate to the USA

an example of this is here: https://www.census.gov/library/working-papers/2018/adrm/rsm2018-03.html

other countries use other official descriptors. In NZ for example the main descriptors historically are: Maori, Pacific, Asian, European. the NZ government now includes New Zealander as a ethnic classification in itself. Lots of people of all races now identify on official forms as New Zealander. In time as the generations pass then more and more people will do this 

perhaps people in the USA could advocate for the same. Have official documents include American as an ethnic identifier in its own right.  So White, Black Asian, Hispanic, American to begin with

No. We aren't all white or black or Asian or Hispanic. I am Lakota, not American. Full stop.

[Selene Gregoire]

2 hours ago, Jackson Redstar said:

There are still some issue with cops - a small minority of them. Most are good. But I wonder if the thought has ever occurred maybe just stop resisting arrest? even if is a BS stop, a profiling stop, or what ever, maybe let the attorney and courts settle it ......until we can fix (or remove) the bad cops this might help in the mean time....

You don't have to resist to be beaten. You can do everything the way you are supposed to and still end up dead simply because your skin color doesn't conform.

[Coffee Pancake]

  

8 hours ago, Chaser Zaks said:

Racism is defined as: prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.

Racist individual acts vs systemic racism.

Systemic racism is the problem, as I tried to gently point out, we're not talking about individual or specific racist acts.

8 hours ago, Chaser Zaks said:

Racism is not was not my problem, because I am not a racist person, to assume that I am racist because I am white is racist.

Which is why we have systemic racism. It's impossible to have a meaningful discussion with the vast majority of white people because they immediately take umbrage over the implication that they may in some way be labeled as racist.

Thank you for that example of peek white fragility and white privilege though, filled my bingo card.

[Mollymews]

4 hours ago, Selene Gregoire said:

No. We aren't all white or black or Asian or Hispanic. I am Lakota, not American. Full stop.

yes. I am Te Popoto Ngapuhi. The only government agency that recognises this on official forms is Te Puni Kokiri.  Every other department classes me as maori. Maori literally means people

[Selene Gregoire]

12 minutes ago, Mollymews said:

yes. I am Te Popoto Ngapuhi. The only government agency that recognises this on official forms is Te Puni Kokiri.  Every other department classes me as maori. Maori literally means people

As with all other tribes, our own name for ourselves means The People. Except we aren't just The People, we're Family too. Most never fully understand what that really means.

[Beth Macbain]

On 6/10/2020 at 2:39 PM, kali Wylder said:

Why it can feel hard to talk about racial inequality, and why you should do it anyway....

So, anyway, as i mentioned in a couple of other threads, the company I work for gave us a paid day off in response to the crazy whacked out state of the world these days, between the plague and the quarantine and 9 minute film of a black man killed by a white cop and the reaction it set off. I'm not black, and I do believe wholeheartedly that black lives matter.

Since I am white, I benefit by the racist status quo. This was not something I was aware of really, but I didn't have to be aware of it as I wasn't adversely affected by it. I'm not even sure how I even heard of the idea of wokeness.  I did know that it was slang for an awareness of something that I didn't have, that it was a "black" thing. And I knew I should be woke. And I knew I was not. 

So I did what I generally do about anything that troubles me, I went looking for answers on the internet and I found there were books tackling the issue and I started to read.  I read one called "I'm Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness" by Austin Channing Brown and now I'm reading "White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism" by Robin DiAngelo. This white fragility is really difficult to read.  Not that it's not well written or is too complex to digest, but because of the way it makes me feel.

And since I love SL and I'm an introverted recluse whose only social outlet is SL, I would love to talk about it here.

I'm quoting Kali's original post here because it needs to be seen again. 

If you don't believe racial inequality exists, and are unwilling to opening your mind to even the slightest possibility that it exists, that's your prerogative. There are several other threads for you to share your opinions. 

I think Kali wanted a thread for those of us who do believe it exists, or are at least open to the possibility, to be able to talk about it. That got shut down in the first couple of posts. Hate me if you want, IDGAF, but Kali is one of the kindest people here and didn't deserve what she got.

Please take your disbelief to one of the other threads and knock yourselves out with it. Thank you.

[Mollymews]

Just now, Selene Gregoire said:

As with all other tribes, our own name for ourselves means The People. Except we aren't just The People, we're Family too. Most never fully understand what that really means.

yes. Te Popoto is our hapu name. Hapu is the extended whanau (near cousins).  Whanau is family. Ngapuhi is the extended hapu (far cousins)

as you say, we know who we are. That who we are is not always known or recognised by others, is not something I overly dwell on. I will mention it in the appropriate context tho

that other people in New Zealand want to be classed as New Zealander rather than say European or Maori or Pacific or Asian is ok with me. There is a lot of inter-relations between the peoples in NZ, and lots of children born of these relationships. Some people can tick all the individual boxes today. They inherit from all the 4 main government race classifications     

[LexxiXhan]

Another reason it's about time we all started showing up, having the conversations, and thinking about the type of people we want to be in inclusive communities:

Janaya Khan (they/them), 2019

"Black Women Have Always Shown Up"

#Suffragettes #SojournerTruth #IdaBWells #MarshaPJohnson #BlackLivesMatter #MeToo #IntersectionalFeminism

 

[Beth Macbain]

Another reason to have these conversations.

This man is an elected official. How in every single hell did this sequence of words fall out of his mouth? Never mind that he thinks it’s true, and in his head he thinks the word “colored” when thinking of black people, he is so completely lacking in awareness that he couldn’t stop his own damn mouth from saying this into a microphone for the whole world to hear.

He’s on the health and HUMAN SERVICES committee.

This👏🏼is👏🏼not👏🏼okay.

White America has a race problem. It’s not even just that the people we're talking about are racist, it’s the refusal to listen and learn. This man has made it all the way to adulthood without realizing, or caring, that “colored” is a pejorative, out-dated racist word, AND believing black people have worse hygiene than white people.

No, the conversations aren’t easy. No one wants to admit they have racial biases, or to have them pointed out to them, but it simply has to be done because things like this are happening in 2020.

[kali Wylder]

9 hours ago, Jackson Redstar said:

the main question I have is what is this White privilege and where can I get some?  does it pay your bills for you? put free food on the table? pay rent? inquiring minds want to know!

No, that's not white privilege. It means that whatever other problems you may have, they are not exacerbated by the color of your skin.

[LexxiXhan]

While we're here, if you're saying #AllLivesMatter , & you really mean it, that means

 

#BlackQueerLivesMatter

#BlackTransLivesMatter

#BlackDisabledLivesMatter

#BlackSurvivorsLivesMatter

#BlackAutisticLivesMatter

#BlackWomensLivesMatter

#BlackMensLivesMatter

 

You get the idea. Do you really mean it?

 

 

 

Edited June 12, 2020 by LexxiXhan
links

[Beth Macbain]

I just posted this in that other thread, but I think it fits even better here.

Structural Racism Timeline

[Sylvia Tamalyn]

I think maybe my link fits better here as well.

 

[Akane Nacht]

The majority ethnicity is Chinese where I live. I've heard some people claiming "Chinese privilege" is a thing, mimicking what is going on in Western countries. I don't think this is done in good faith. It is a sneak attack at people based on their ethnicity, delivered in such a way that they are unable to defend themselves without being labelled a bad person. It has upset Chinese friends of mine who are extremely good people and are hurt and confused by it. Happily it hasn't gained a lot of traction here.

To me that is both unkind and ineffective. Pointing fingers at any group on the basis of physical characteristics that they can't change is racism, plain and simple, in my books, no matter how you spin it. If you want to aim it at yourself, fine, but you speak for yourself alone.

IMO, if you want to tackle a systemic inequality, look at economic conditions, not skin tone. Make it possible for everyone to get a good education, support lower income groups to get out of poverty, and foster workplaces that hire on merit. It other words, it takes time and effort, as anything worthwhile does.