How you can tell if Sanders speaks to the concerns of people of color

[BainsBane]

96. That first sentence is precisely the meaning of my post. Exactly

You phrased it better.

I don't even go around talking about "minorities." That is your trope. I speak from my own voice. You disagree, which is your right, but to seek to delegtimate it by claiming I speak for "minorities" is weak.

I absolutely have privilege. I was born white in America. That made me luckier than most. Even though I grew up poor, on public assistance, I never went without food. I was able to get an education and now have a good job where I make just above the median US income. So you're right I'm privileged. I'm damn charmed, in fact. Know what else? I know it. That privilege also means I have no idea what it's like to experience racism or homophobia, and I never will. I will always defer to people who do experience that bigotry about what that experience means. Being gay doesn't mean you know what it's like to suffer racism, anymore than being a straight woman means I know what it's like to experience homophobia. For all your claims of my treating "minorities" as a monolith, you just tried to argue your own experience as a gay man makes you as able to talk about the concerns of African Americans as they are. No, it doesn't. If I were up here trying to argue x, y or z was best for gay people, you'd have a point, but I don't. Know what else I don't do? I don't go around insulting gay men as allied with Goldman Sachs and the 1 percent, or pronouncing that marriage equality is a rich people's issue. I respect your civil rights and consider them essential to the body politic.

You're right that I didn't treat you like an individual in my earlier post. I let my anger get the best of me.

As for your initial charge, I'll let Number23 have the last word:

Number23 (18,360 posts)
10. I think you attempt to speak WITH us. Which is probably why you piss off so many here

The only thing some people hate worse than a poc speaking for themselves is the white person that agrees with them and uses the power of their own voice to advocate with them.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1187&pid=14942