that thing white ppl do when they disparage 'white ppl'

Dan, that's all true and well-said, but my orig complaint was not with black people, it was with the structural problems in place that lead to those phenomena. Which is why upthread I mentioned the structural v. behavioral.

when people start thinking about class don't they do the same thing though - everybody looking down on "bourgies" when they themselves are dictionary-definition bourgeoisie - and thinking they're somehow excluded from that definition because they like to talk shit about the category - cf. also "hipster"

text:"white people" AND displayName:Whiney G. Weingarten

which is to say, "this thing people do when they disparage groups to which they belong" is a broader category maybe? and "white" is a red herring here?

that's because people don't know what the word bourgeoisie means

And my original comment was an offhand thing that I guess I figged would be overlooked because it leaned toward the obvious, but instead it was interpreted as, what, lol black people?

- black people are more than just brown and furthermore all people who would likely be classified as "black" in America don't necessarily identify themselves as being part of the same group (see, for example, the kerfuffle in Major League Baseball over African-Americans versus black Hispanics);

Others still are Africans or non-hispanic blacks from the Carribean or Brazilians... So what are some commonalities amongst native African-Americans in the various states and cities?

plus talk to any group of white 8th graders and they will ALSO tell you that being smart is gay

Yeah, but they're just copying the black kids. ;)

& you, Dan, highlighted those structural problems. I didn't meant to elide that fact in my post.

like it's more like something Liz Lemon would do in a 30 Rock episode than real people IRL. (Or I could be totally off-base and there are loads of people who do this.)

i did this last night. :/ a friend asked what i was reading and i told her it was the 33 1/3 book about neutral milk hotel, so that i could talk to my white friends about music. "white friends" meaning some of our specific mutual friends who obsess over indie rock (which i don't really listen to).

xxxxp

So what are some commonalities amongst native African-Americans in the various states and cities?

1. They were born in the US.
2. ...

these friends emailed me this morning about the national btw

2. back in 8th grade they thought being smart was gay

I still think, despite the gay point you make, Dan, that with most black youth (another generalization), there's an unhealthy societal pressure on them to be "black" as a means of fitting in and boosting self-confidence that's not as striking as pressures that average white kids face.

Jordan, did you mean it, or were you uncomfortable about reading a book about a band you felt had a very narrow cultural audience and it was a joke to elide that? (Whether or not that discomfort was appropriate or not.)

com on ppl now smile on ur brother :)

the latter

xp

lol "gay point" - I mean point about white 8th grade kids also thinking smart = gay.

re: crime stats: I read a pretty recent (2009 I think?) book which, IIRC, gave 1 out of 3 as the proportion of young black males (I forget exactly what the age range was for this statistic) currently in jail, on parole, or on probation. just in case anyone was curious.

(Punishing the Poor by Loic Wacquant, if yr interested)

why did thread about white ppl disparaging other white ppl turn into a thread about "black culture" and now crime statistics?

I still think, despite the gay point you make, Dan, that with most black youth (another generalization), there's an unhealthy societal pressure on them to be "black" as a means of fitting in and boosting self-confidence that's not as striking as pressures that average white kids face.

― bamcquern, Friday, April 23, 2010 12:25 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

ok, what's your point?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/36/Franz_Xaver_Winterhalter_King_Louis_Philippe.jpg/210px-Franz_Xaver_Winterhalter_King_Louis_Philippe.jpg

King of Bourgies

bourgeois is just secret code for jewish anyway

why did thread about white ppl disparaging other white ppl turn into a thread about "black culture" and now crime statistics?

I chuckled at the Jewish guy saying, "Keep this thread white!" Also at anyone hoping an ILX thread could remain on topic. Btw, if we're going to talk about black people on this thread, ILX protocol demands that we either start arguing over food or music w/in 40 posts.

bourgeois is just secret code for jewish anyway

And Protestant, btw, at least in France.

I am an authentic white person, please disparage me as you will.

I totally misread "despite the gay point you make" and was about to get mad again.

As far as the average white kid not having the same types of pressures re: conformity and fitting in... Have you not been watching the news for the past decade? Did you forget that Columbine happened? Have you not heard about the case going on right now in MA where 6 teens are being tried for harassing a girl into killing herself? Did you not hear about the woman who cyberbullied one of her daughter's friends into killing herself? I think there is a dangerous level of romanticism both positive and negative in your conception of teenage life in this country that privileges one type of suffering over another, or maybe more to the point only acknowledges one type of suffering as valid.

why did thread about white ppl disparaging other white ppl turn into a thread about "black culture" and now crime statistics?

this is a very funny and pertinent question

& I still think that ongoing disruption of the family unit and community increase the pressure. disruption - prison system, the razing of neighborhoods to build projects, deindustrialization, and other things.

iiijjjj - why did the conversation after my post go in the direction it did instead of toward issues such as Dan brought up in his longer post. Why was there a presumption that I didn't understand those things, that they weren't strongly implied by what I said.

Also - "what's your point?" is not being used sincerely. It's like a kid saying "but why" again and again.

This post is so outdated already

lol, i'm not yelling that the thread should get back on track or something. i think it's relevant that this comes up in this thread. like: "why do some white ppl disparage other white ppl," makes sense would culminate in a discussion about the Wire half-way down the page. cause, ya know, ways of talking about race in America (on ILX?).

Oh, that's a good point, Dan.

have u guys seen the bottle openers they sell overseas

Which I wanted to post before things slid by, but I never meant to distinguish different kinds of suffering as more or less valid than others. The scope is certainly different, though. News stories versus numbers.

Also - "what's your point?" is not being used sincerely. It's like a kid saying "but why" again and again.

nah, i meant that quite sincerely. you obviously put a lot of thought into your generalization and now i'm just wondering what you're going to do with it.

why did thread about white ppl disparaging other white ppl turn into a thread about "black culture" and now crime statistics?

― Mordy, Friday, April 23, 2010 5:28 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

... which, to put it rather crudely, is something you'd only really feel the need to do if you were aware of, and felt guilty about, your own white privilege.
... any discussion of which will necessarily have to touch on certain structural features of modern american society.

that's the point?

Oh, iiijjj, I think I'm going to drop it to take a nap. Not to be dismissive of anyone, but for practical reasons.

I think the way white & black feed into each other is interesting and it's just something I like to talk about, but it's easier to do with someone in person.

really? i think it's what people do if they don't feel too guilty, they're pointing out someone else who is guiltier/whiter than they are. can be pretty annoying though i've done it. i'm v v v white btw

though a lady at work did say i was "thug"

btw I only posted crime stats cuz I wanted to find a concrete middle ground between bamcquern's meaningless 'black majority' and hi dere's anecdotal "no one in my family outside of one urban area". no, 1/3 isn't a majority by any means, but it's still a distressing number.

i'm distressed.

you're maybe missing the point that this isn't about "disparaging other white ppl" so much as "taking an ironic distance towards one's own self-acknowledged whiteness in order to harmlessly mock it"

... which, to put it rather crudely, is something you'd only really feel the need to do if you were aware of, and felt guilty about, your own white privilege.
... any discussion of which will necessarily have to touch on certain structural features of modern american society.

Well... yes and no. I don't see why black people automatically have to be dragged into a conversation about why white people make fun of themselves. There are a bunch of reasons that have nothing to do with black people (interesting that everyone jumped on and ran with the "liberal guilt" side but totally ignored the "redneck humor" side; it seems it's easier for people to handwave self-deprecating humor when it's done to highlight and elevate how much more enlightened you are now than it is to confront and acknowledge humor that points out all of the warts on your body).

I only say "black majority" because Houston Baker, et al. say it. I thought it had common currency, so yeesh.

see i'm not sure if bamcquern is right with all of his crude generalizations but his observations are preferable to just mumbling about problematics and avoiding any consideration of nonwhite ppl as having some wilful agency determining their cultural outlook beyond the history of their oppression, which seems to be a fairly common timidity among american left-'white ppl'

they seem to be afraid they will be seen as eliding the contribution of white racist ppl (govt etc) to poverty, incarceration rates etc among nonwhite ppl, which oughtn't to be the case if their rhetorical poise is up to the ask

whether bamquern's is, i dunno, but that's a very profound and interesting question in itself

it seems it's easier for people to handwave self-deprecating humor when it's done to highlight and elevate how much more enlightened you are now than it is to confront and acknowledge humor that points out all of the warts on your body).

I had a long argument with my lol black friend about that Tiger Woods woodpile cartoon when he said he didn't think it was racist if there was some truth to the joke.

... which, to put it rather crudely, is something you'd only really feel the need to do if you were aware of, and felt guilty about, your own white privilege.
... any discussion of which will necessarily have to touch on certain structural features of modern american society.

It's odd to me that often identity turns around negativity. Black people have the history of racism and enslavement, Irish people their oppression by the Brits, Poles the animosity towards them both as slavs but especially as Catholics (at the beginning at least), etc... My ancestors may have been the white people who were doing the hating and the oppression but not suffering from anything worse than having to live amongst inferior races and suffering immigrants to come and screw up our little paradise or Indians encumbering the land that God intended for us so we (or at least I) don't have much of a sense of 'white culture' apart from its racism, its grim religiosity and its bland food so I don't really identify with my Anglo-American side very much or feel much attachment to it except maybe to a certain strain of American liberalism and a respect for the Common Law.

you're maybe missing the point that this isn't about "disparaging other white ppl" so much as "taking an ironic distance towards one's own self-acknowledged whiteness in order to harmlessly mock it"

this is pretty otm

Crude generalizations - 1 part laziness, 1 part presumptuousness, 1 part typing on tiny netbook keyboard without a mouse.

you're maybe missing the point that this isn't about "disparaging other white ppl" so much as "taking an ironic distance towards one's own self-acknowledged whiteness in order to harmlessly mock it"

and simultaneously disavowing their commonality with mnstrm 'white ppl', in many cases

Michael White - I think it's inevitable that things get defined negatively.

(interesting that everyone jumped on and ran with the "liberal guilt" side but totally ignored the "redneck humor" side;

Larry the Cable Guy or Jeff Foxworthy or whatever = sympathetic mockery of traits presumably shared by audience and performer
"that thing white ppl do" = please don't associate me with the target of my withering progressive scorn