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

When did I chide anyone about british colonial crimes? Lmfao

Question their relevance to this conversation sure

tbh I think a lot of this particular digression is hard to discuss in good faith due to the popularity of the ‘the Irish were slaves in America’ narrative with white supremacist Irish Americans who want to distance themselves from the idea that have racial privilege over black Americans. That’s probably a much more dominant strand of thought than ‘the Irish are genetically, rather than culturally, different from other whites’ line of anti-Irish prejudice these days, imo.

This is a good reference wrt that:

https://medium.com/@Limerick1914/all-of-my-work-on-the-irish-slaves-meme-2015-16-4965e445802a

entirely characteristic of d40 to not be bothered reading anybody elses posts ofc

sv im aware of that trash narrative and would be happy to step away from any comparison of irish historical narrative with african american for the following reasons-

- havent done it yet iirc
- dont think its comparable at all
- it appears to be a v distracting issue for ppl itt who insist the thread is about american racism
- which means that whatever the thread is about or might be about is consistently swiped right by americans barking at us to get back on track to admit our complicitude in american structural racism

The only ppl reading from a script here are the ones who go “what about the Irish” any time the convo makes them uncomfortable

my arguments here were never about irish people, i said that from the beginning and throughout. i think it's p clear that irish peoples'e experiences as immigrants in america are quite widely discussed, i was more keen to discuss groups about which i know less. i'm honestly surprised at the handwaving and kneejerk reticence to go there, like as if there's no possible solidarity in examining the discrimination suffered by other groups. i mean literally upthread we had discussions of what it's like to be an immigrant in which i'm being told what it isn't like by people living in the country of their birth.

it is strange to be forced to defend myself based on my nationality when i could literally copy and paste the 7/8 times i have had to point out i'm not talking about irish people. the only sense in which i mentioned irish people is as a frame of reference, as an immigrant myself, in which it's possible for me to imagine other immigrants having a much more difficult time integrating. to then say 'you're just saying 'what about the irish' actually comes across to me like boris johnson talking about people from liverpool. feel free to google liverpool.

tbh I think a lot of this particular digression is hard to discuss in good faith due to the popularity of the ‘the Irish were slaves in America’ narrative with white supremacist Irish Americans who want to distance themselves from the idea that have racial privilege over black Americans. That’s probably a much more dominant strand of thought than ‘the Irish are genetically, rather than culturally, different from other whites’ line of anti-Irish prejudice these days, imo.

hundred per cent. i'm surprised though that no amount of distancing from that pov is enough, or that there's seemingly no curiosity about some of the minority groups we briefly discussed itt. i mean we managed to fence in our discussion in to like 'polish people', briefly. i don't really get, even from an activist pov, how somebody tallies 'no, shut up, all immigrants stories are the same and anyway they're white so they're not that bad' with the idea that we should listen to the stories of the marginalised and not speak for them. i mean at the very least it seems hard to be certain. i wondered about, eg, romani americans upthread mainly cos i haven't got a clue what that experience would be like, and it's interesting. i dunno, i feel like specific discussions of how one group integrates into a given country are really common when travelling in europe, so it didn't feel unusual to try to have one itt.

i don't get how in some people's eyes it must, absolutely must, be a zero sum game or an attempt to belittle the issue of racism against black people when you try to discuss some groups in america who are discriminated against and lacking in privilege but are white. like surely understanding more forms of discrimination in a country widens our perspective of it generally?

if it's just because white supremacists would use this for their flat earth bullshit theories about who actually is a minority then i think it's a pretty poor concession to their logic. not least since this is a message board.

There is a bunch of interesting and important stuff surrounding, for example, the not particularly subtle right-wing attempts to re-racialise Southern Slavs as not authentically white in the Brexit narrative, the ‘Lega Nord style’ division between ‘European’ Northern Italians and ‘African’ Southern Italians, the reliance on racist tropes familiar from anti-Asian bias when discussing Russians (genetically predisposed to be cunning, devious, only respect strongmen, etc) but I can see how that all looks like a distraction from more pressing issues from a US perspective and idk if it wouldn’t benefit from a distinct thread at this stage.

The 'despotic' east. That's as old as Herodotus, right? That might be another prejudice that is kinda distinctly European.

xp like

this one?

Having just read this thread, I'm glad to have finally understood that discrimination against Romanians (or Poles or Albanians or the Irish or…) does not qualify as proper racism when filtered through the American racial paradigm which, as we know, is the nec plus ultra of hermeneutic grids. I have come at last to the conclusion that American racism is so utterly exceptional that all other forms of racism pale in comparison. Nay, they are undeserving of the appellation itself, and we would do better to avoid discussing them at all for they have not yet risen to the level of actual, extant things. Thank you.

I would also like to add that not once have I ever been called a 'dirty gypsy' despite my apparent whiteness, and that those who did (not) utter such insults were never not white.

the popularity of the ‘the Irish were slaves in America’ narrative with white supremacist Irish Americans

Never heard of this, OK so that's filled in some blanks. White supremacist Irish Americans, in other (better) words, white supremacist Americans them, after all the American part is what matters there.

Racism in the Americas is absolutely diff from other types why bcause fucking SLAVERY why is it necessary to even point this out

Justifying African slavery necessitated developing a wholesale distinct ideology, above and beyond yr standard “those ppl are worse than us because they are different”

How could I forget that the US literally invented slavery?

What actually are ppl arguing about tho

I dont know anymore

Sounds about right

Racism in the Americas is absolutely diff from other types why bcause fucking SLAVERY why is it necessary to even point this out

so you agree that the american definition of racism is useless for evaluating discrimination in other countries?

as "racist" is used colloquially there isn't a power requirement.

Don't want to get too into this other than to point out that I don't think this is only true of the colloquial usage at present. Language can change but, fwiw, the current OED doesn't stipulate a power requirement either:

A belief that one’s own racial or ethnic group is superior, or that other such groups represent a threat to one's cultural identity, racial integrity, or economic well-being; (also) a belief that the members of different racial or ethnic groups possess specific characteristics, abilities, or qualities, which can be compared and evaluated. Hence: prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against people of other racial or ethnic groups (or, more widely, of other nationalities), esp. based on such beliefs. Cf. racialism n.

Anyway, if we're talking about SWPL and its ilk, "that thing white ppl do when they disparage 'white ppl'" is the grossest shit and amounts to racial humblebragging most of the time.

good post, fernando

Racism in the Americas is absolutely diff from other types why bcause fucking SLAVERY why is it necessary to even point this out

― Οὖτις, Sunday, 5 August 2018 14:39 (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

if i were to ask what was so different about american slavery vs all other previous and subsequent types, can you understand that i do so to understand the point you think youre making here as opposed to expecting an argument that brilliantly ends the discussion itt

slavery, est. July 4th 1776

heh

appropriation n'est pas

though to your question I'd estimate the Civil War, an entire huge, horrible almost nation ending war being fought over slavery between the North and South is pretty unprecedented? (though I could be wrong) (and the fact that you still see the rhetorical war being waged to this day with the controversy over Confederate statues etc)

not a bad point tbf

tbfttusa

American chattel slavery was an institution that formed the basis of the nation’s wealth, irrevocably shaped its constitution and form of government, and provided a totalizing epistemic framework that 150 years after the end of slavery still enmeshes every US American to the point that to every outside observer it appears that we are “obsessed” with race. I don’t know much about most of history in most of the world but the legacy American white supremacist chattel slavery of black people is if not “unique” then at least probably a whole different kind of thing from the ethnic tension that Balkanized the Balkans.

Indeed, you are not unique: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_slavery

It is well studied when and how various light-skinned non-Anglo or non-Protestant immigrant or insular groups “became white” in US history, from Germans to Irish to Italians to Jews; the prejudice that operated and operates against those populations is starkly distinct from the systems of white supremacy and anti-black racism in the USA.

It’s worth reasserting that the category of “white” is only a term of solidarity or identity for white supremacists. “White people” is more or less definitionally “the set of people who benefit from/are maximally privileged by white supremacy”; as I think our European friends are trying to point out, “white” is a mysterious category when white supremacy is not the population’s dominant ideological frame.

It’s worth reasserting that the category of “white” is only a term of solidarity or identity for white supremacists. “White people” is more or less definitionally “the set of people who benefit from/are maximally privileged by white supremacy”; as I think our European friends are trying to point out, “white” is a mysterious category when white supremacy is not the population’s dominant ideological frame.

― devops mom (silby), Sunday, 5 August 2018 17:35 (two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

its worth reasserting that this is a p strikingly modern liberal american lens at best and a v deliberately forced pov at worst

white people is definitionally people who are white, for a start

I can’t help being what I am (modern, liberal, and forced in this case)

Anyway that thing white ppl do when they disparage “white ppl” is mostly a nervous tic to expurgate bad feelings ime; it’s probably better to say nothing.

Idk yes obviously “having light skin” is an adequate definition of “white” for many purposes but I don’t think it sufficiently explains the phenomenon of “white people” but I’m not an expert I’m just online a lot yknow

xp agreed on second part!

the phenomenon of white ppl should be explicitly declared as the phenomenon of american white people

for a gang as antsy about words and definitions, the.......antipathy to simply acknowledging this is v interesting to me.

why is the complicity of everyone else in yr couple hundred year old mess so important!

once weve answered that i think we can move on to possibly discussing what i think soref posted a few days back to kick this off again, which is.....does what wite ppl do when the disparage wite ppl (nb american wite only) help?

As to the last, I doubt it!

ok i move to officially end the policy

meet ye back here after lunch, next motion let me see hmm: james gunn for democratic nominee wait is this right

white people is definitionally people who are white

got it. albinos.

if the theory were true, those bucks would obv be running thongs, QED

running thongs, theres a fucking concept

Depends on if you mean the undies or the flip-flops

would a red neck be sufficient to definitionally disqualify a person as white? Or does one's whiteness appertain only to certain areas of the body? if so, which ones?

bedsheets

Of course there are distinct aspects to American racial discourse but the notion of racism as distinct from ethnic discrimination or ethnic cleansing or ethnicity in general is an international concept. I’m not claiming the superiority of an American frame for understanding racism; I think a pervasive sense of “whattaboutism” is happening whenever people bring up ethnic conflict as a response to concerns about racism or anti blackness, and that this problem transcends national boundaries

This is not saying ethnic conflicts are irrelevant or not important just that it is definitionally not an example of racism

http://www.writtalin.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/photo-11.jpg

Ethnic conflict between hutu and Tutsis in Sudan, or Irish and English in Britain, are not examples of “racism”. This does not mean that Sudanese people will not suffer disproportionately on the national stage due to racial caste structures of ie colonialism than the British

I pretty much agree with all that but the USsplaining on ILX gets pretty relentless at times.