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In reply to the discussion: I am an older white woman, a retired teacher. [View all]Baitball Blogger
(46,682 posts)Only white men can broad brush and call other white men stupid.
Now, privileged white, that might have some traction. It is easier to see in Florida suburban societies, where distinct dual societies take hold. In this environment, I have seen Dems making the same bad decisions as the Republicans. Not many, mind you. Just the ones that forget they live in the USA and allow themselves to get seduced by the local culture for the perks it offers them. I have even heard one white friend confess to me when she moved in an upscale development that she's finally leaving like a white man.
Yeah, about those Dems. The one I'm thinking about was a Commissioner. In a city meeting they were talking about getting sued because the city didn't have enough multi-family homes within the city limits. This didn't happen by accident. There was an odd movement in the eighties and nineties where a local sovereign mentality took over and the city abandoned the city designs they had submitted to the State to justify their reason for becoming a municipality.
By the time we got to the 21st Century the city had very little multi-family homes that offered affordable housing to those with minimum income means, like minorities. So they were facing a lawsuit. So this Dem Commissioner talks about her ideas about affordable housing for minorities. She said that she always anticipated spreading out those kind of homes within the city limits, instead of approving one development with affordable housing. (What could she possibly be worried about? ) However, she fully supported the idea when someone said that they could approve the multi-family home plans for another developer, who was going with a Seniors only concept.
And just in case I missed the point of that move, one particularly ignorant white woman bumps into me in a grocery store to attempt to encourage me to attend a city meeting to support the idea, because, you know, the place would accept OLDER minorities. wink, wink, nudge, nudge.
It would be wrong to forget that we come to the Democratic party bringing in our own different set of experiences. Those experiences are going to affect our perceptions, and as such, we put labels to our terms as we see them. In a nutshell, in Florida, there aren't many white liberal ladies, old or young, walking around willing to show us what we have in common. (Well, Occupy being the exception) Even madfloridian admits that she's affected by the conservative culture she lives in. So I think we can be forgiven if we don't feel any instant camaraderie with the local Democratic party, because we don't view it as liberal.
Frankly, I see too many people in local leadership basing their decisions on the statistics. Statistically, there aren't many minorities in suburban Florida, so minority issues are ignored, or they become a bargaining chip; and, let's face it, anti-minority views become a bonding tool for conservative Dems and Republicans.
I'm just saying, this is what we see on a local basis. It is also not uncommon to see white progressives promoting white candidates who have close ties with supporters who are responsible for these near segregated societies. So I think you can see why our first impulse is to go with a term that supports our perceptions. But I agree that it should be qualified somewhere in the sentence that we are primarily referring to the racist ilk who gravitate to the Republican party.