General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Tim Wise: Race-Talk is a Language White Folks Need to Learn [View all]TigressDem
(5,125 posts)It's very simple. Define the problems and look for solutions. There is a world of choice there that has nothing to do with whites telling blacks how to do anything.
IF you REALLY want to stop RACISM, be the example. QUIT saying, "Black people do XYZ because they are black" and "White people do XYZ because they are white." That's racism pure and simple and you can't fix something that's so broken with it's own broken down behaviors.
People DO NOT DO things based on the color of their skin. We learn these behaviors. That means there is hope. What we learn we can unlearn and learn to do new things that work better.
All people do stupid stuff. White people are socialized to perpetuate systemic racism. But we aren't born racist.
Just like black people have been stuffed into the margins of society by a rigged system without access to equal treatment under the law. But they are not born to behave as criminals.
So if you say instead, this is a way that white people are affected by the system and have to resist the status quo to make racial justice a reality, that is defining the problem and looking for solutions.
I don't let any white people around me say, "Black people or any particular color do XYZ" because that's racist and I won't let it slide.
Every race has all kinds of people behaving along a full spectrum of behaviors. The color of someone's skin doesn't make them behave any particular way. It can affect which kinds of things influence them because there is still so much racism in the system.
BUT REAL CHANGE happens when we ALL STOP acting like the color of someone's skin can tell us everything we need to know about them. It's racist when white people do it to other races and the reverse is also true. Because defining someone by the color of their skin is the bottom line of racism.
I can sympathize that after 400 years and we still have the authorities murdering black people in the street, many black people are too tired to talk about this stuff without resorting to labeling whites the same way they get labeled.
No one is perfect.
AND we all got to do it together. I am not asking black people to spare my feelings. I DO TAKE THESE STRUGGLES PERSONALLY. Because black people are people. That means they are MY PEOPLE. I DON'T CARE WHAT COLOR SOMEONE'S SKIN IS.
I care HOW they show up in this world.
Progress not perfection.
STILL we have to be honest or we will NEVER get anywhere.
Whites justifying their shit isn't solving any problems and neither does it help when black people do it.
FORGIVE? Yes. Surely. It isn't intended to perpetuate the problem. THAT I can understand.
But calling piss rainwater doesn't make it so.