How To Protect White People's Feelings In The Workplace (or DU)

[LiberalLovinLug]

16. Thankyou for your detailed response

OK, yes "real racism" is a loaded statement and there is a problem with generalizing. But I was attempting to for the sake of argument.

Of course there are nuances and nothing is black and white (!). Some would say that almost everyone is a racist to at least a tiny degree. By that I mean that we may generally feel more comfortable with those that have experienced the same culture, grown up in the same neighbourhoods. Of course more and more new citizens are growing up in more multicultural environments. The point is growing up with suspicions of the 'other' doesn't mean as humans we can't overcome those more juvenile impressions. We learn as toddlers that we can trust others outside of our immediate family and slowly, hopefully, expand our social awareness to the point where we, while not ever completely understanding, at least be open to empathy and historical education of others race, gender, or sexual orientation.

For the sake of argument, I would say that 'real racism' is when a person actually thinks that other races are inferior. They may overtly spout out their bigotry ie. white nationalists, or they may hide it from most of their community and only express themselves say if they've had a few drinks sitting with an acquaintance or two that feel the same.

The characters in these videos, as I read it, do not knowingly have those beliefs and this video is, comedy aside, a statement on warning fellow whites, on how POC will feel (implying that they will always have a knee-jerk victim response) and that they should hold back, think before they speak, to avoid something called "white guilt". That they may say something inadvertently that a POC will take as racist. In fact the first POC uses that charge. You say " You are actually making assumptions about the thoughts and feelings of women of color". Its not me that is assuming how POC will feel, it is the maker of the video. This assumption is the basis for the theme of the video, to warn whites on how to avoid the guilt of making POC feel slighted, as defined by the Caucasian woman that made the video.

I do think the video is somewhat confusing in that some of the examples are 'spaining to whites how to avoid "white guilt", but at other times, it is whitesplaining to POC how to set aside a perceived racist act or comment to avoid a tense situation. My issue is that most of these examples are not based in RACISM, and more about general insensitivity. ( Other than the last one that I said was borderline racist....ie.. more extreme than the other examples, not less) And in so doing, the video redefines 'racism' falsely, and thus makes defeating 'real' racism, as I defined it, an even tougher task, because those that actually need the help, even though you don't give two shits about them, will never even attempt to empathize with the very real issues that BLM is championing, if one hands them an easy way out by punching so many holes in the definition of racism.

I'm not a woman. I guess my handle shows that. But I've worked in enough mixed workplaces to know that it is not unusual for women to comment on one anothers hair, and even reach out and touch it. I don't know how you think this is some kind of odd behaviour. This video is implying that that kind of behaviour jumps to RACISM if it happens between those of different skin colours. If it were a Chinese person or other minority who commented (positively) on the hair of an AA, or if the races were reversed in characters would it still be a racist act? To be honest, when I first started watching this, I thought it might be a right wing attempt at satire, in an attempt to ridicule elite white PC liberalism.

Anyways, I think its important to be able to talk about issues from each others points of view. I appreciate that. I don't think we should dismiss being made aware of how insensitive or ignorant we may come across to others, but that is a much broader issue than racism. I just think fighting racism is much too important to create a radioactive environment where the definition of these kinds of commonly rude or insensitive situations can be interchanged with definition of racism.