Friend Infected With Right Wing Brain Worms - What to Do?

i am suggesting choosing a more complete awareness of race, one where white kids have a more complete idea of where it came from and a better chance of helping to redress what it's done

so long as the parents get sent to the same camp

well, yeah

i think kids can be taught about race without being taught original sin. teach them "this is a fallacious + superficial way of dividing people that leads to cruelty and hatred and no one should be judged on the basis of the color of their skin."

I am responding directly to Treeship's dumbass, dangerous opinion here:

i think kids should be discouraged from seeing their daily lives as part of some larger culture war. maybe in high school they can start to unpack their white male privilege, but at an early age i think that message is more confusing than the classic "treat everyone equally and with respect and, if you don't, you're suspended."

1. Kids who belong to minority groups do not have the luxury of living lives where they are not pulled into some aspect of the culture war. Whether on a gross macro level or through a series of neverending microaggressions, you are going to be marked out as the "other" and treated differently regardless of your actual behavior. When you ask "why did I get into trouble for X/Y/Z when my friend (who is white) never does" or the even more classic "why did I get blamed for something my white friend did", you are told how the world works. Your parents do this because it is integral to your survival. There isn't an option.

Meanwhile, well-meaning white families are busy instructing their kids not to see color, which means glossing over/actively ignoring all of the differences in the baseline ways people of different races are treated in various scenarios. Then, when they encounter someone of color, the thing that has been teaching them how to evaluate that person is the racist society that has been feeding them caricature after caricature since they were infants. Unsurprisingly, this feeds directly into the perpetuation of the culture war.

I don't have patience for that bullshit or anyone who even hints at it.

Then they go home to parents who repeat the garbled MLK quote about a color blind society and watch the news complaining about affirmative action and men dressed as women hiding in bathrhooms

xpost

Kids who belong to minority groups do not have the luxury of living lives where they are not pulled into some aspect of the culture war

so otm, aka my life

“Identity politics is bad!” scream the people demonising kids and their families on the basis of skin colour, ethnicity, sexuality...

yes, i agree (xps). i 100% grew up taught the "it's original sin / unfortunate natural prejudice, just try to overcome it personally, ignore color" white lib approach to racism and apart from anything else i think it is defenseless against the hard right.

"Meanwhile, well-meaning white families are busy instructing their kids not to see color, which means glossing over/actively ignoring all of the differences in the baseline ways people of different races are treated in various scenarios."

We aspire to have a society where people do not see color. In the meanwhile many people in our society do treat others cruelly on the basis of their color. Those two things are not in contradiction and in fact our aspirations are tied to the latter fact.

Seeing color and sexuality and gender are good. I encourage it! I also encourage a rigorous enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment.

This Pareene piece is much better than that "my kid turned into an alt-right psycho asshole, but he's all better now, thanks" thing.

"Seeing color" isn't the opposite of colorblindness. When people talk about colorblindness they mean don't treat or judge people on the basis of their color. It doesn't mean that you don't notice physical difference (which is insane - how could you just not notice that people look different? we notice hair color, how much more so skin color - but just like hair color shouldn't inform what you think about someone's character or abilities similarly skin color should not prejudice you).

https://lithub.com/science-the-colorblind-approach-to-racism-doesnt-work/
https://psychologybenefits.org/2018/06/29/children-are-not-colorblind-4-ways-to-talk-to-young-children-about-race/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2018/10/05/white-parents-teach-their-children-be-colorblind-heres-why-thats-bad-everyone/?utm_term=.fbc840810002
https://www.naeyc.org/resources/pubs/yc/may2018/teaching-learning-race-and-racism
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/15/margaret-a-hagerman-interview-colorblindness-racism
https://www.leeandlow.com/imprints/tu-books/articles/the-opposite-of-colorblind-why-it-s-essential-to-talk-to-children-about-race
https://www.tolerance.org/professional-development/color-blindness

You have some reading to do.

xps to mordy: yeah but then you're like, wait why is everything the way it is? why does treating people differently on the basis of their skin color slot so comfortably into the arrangement of my society? isn't it the very same people telling me not to see color who are responsible for the maintenance of this civilization that clearly does? how did that happen? are they just Bad Inside and trying not to be? how do they know their inner badness is really bad and not just a harsh truth they'd rather not face? couldn't i, paradoxically, feel much more comfortable and much more like a tough guy if i just relaxed into what are clearly the actual operating rules of my society? then one day you're walking past a dark alley and a guy in a cool uniform is like psst kid, wanna feel good?

I mean, I have black children in a fairly integrated pre-K with more-lefty-than-lefty teachers and my sons have already unbidden had gems like "I don't like black guys, they're lazy" come out of their mouths. That's certainly not coming from us.

And, to be clear, I don't think it's coming from their teachers, either. It's coming from the patterns our society accepts as defaults. If you don't identify them and name them as bullshit, they're going to be accepted as gospel "this is how the world is" information.

^^^

I'll repeat this once but it's so simple I feel like a fool for having to say it:

Teaching about the historical and current existence of bigotry (whether on the basis of race, gender, religion, etc) and teaching that we aspire to a society where people are not judged negatively on those characteristics are not only not inconsistent but they are complementary. There is no point to teaching the former unless you're trying to get to the latter. It doesn't mean not seeing those things as being important (either qua themselves or qua their treatment in society), nor does it mean pretending like bigotry doesn't exist.

If you're opposed to the aspiration to a society where people are not judged discriminatorily on the basis of those immutable biological traits (or even non-immutable group differences like religion or culture) then you're doing something but it's not an anti-racist agenda. There's no contradiction between teaches kids about the reality of bigotry and teaching them that we don't believe it's our value and we would like to eradicate it from society. It's bizarre that anyone might think there is a contradiction here between the two. Since it's Yom Hazikaran tonight it's worth pointing out that there are two takeaways you can have from "never again." You can say "never again" will we allow people to be marginalized and massacred on the basis of their group identity (this is the liberal takeaway from the Shoah). It's a bit naive and lacking but it's consistent with liberal values. You can also say, "never again" will we, Jews, be vulnerable to genocide again, and we will do so by becoming strong and powerful so we can defend ourselves. This is more practical and has become fulfilled but it is not necessarily consistent with liberal values (as anyone can see). Worth thinking about if you're parsing this issue.

When people talk about colorblindness they mean don't treat or judge people on the basis of their color.

yeah, this is an idea that doesn't always work in practice. I asked a guy at the bar -- last week, even! -- who was getting change if it was for one of the places down the street. my thought was "oh, he's probably working the door at the music venue that's owned by the same people, they get change or trade liquor between venues all the time"

it took me a moment to realize the way it was received was as if I was implying he should be at a different venue because he was black

@ mordy - but is the issue a desire to fight bigotry, or determining whether "not seeing color" is a useful framework for fighting structural racism? see also DJP's links above. it's been really clarifying for me as a white person to listen to black people expressing their frustration with the "color-blind" paradigm i grew up with, as in "if you don't see my color, you don't see *me* and what i actually live with in this racist society." if we want to get kids to the point where they're really fighting racism and not just repeating boomer feeling-good-but-not-dealing-with-it talking points, we should grapple with this.

none of which directly bears on the anonymous story which i agree is complete bullshit that reads like it was crowdsourced on 4chan. and I am someone who was repeatedly and infuriatingly sent to the office for nonsensical kafkaesque bullshit in high school. it's all just too tidy and perfect! reminds me of those political cartoon fantasy school districts where teachers are flunking any student who questions evolution or w/e. it's particularly insidious since in reality if secondary education has any ideological bias it's conservative! it's a right-wing-brain-worm dystopian construction.

yeah, this is an idea that doesn't always work in practice.

I will go a step further and say this is an idea that never works in practice, as the most racist people I interact with are the ones who loudly and incessantly claim they "don't see color" when interacting with others, by which they think they mean they treat everyone the same regardless of their ethnic background but in practice actually means they internalized a whole bunch of bullshit stereotypes about the way people are and are very comfortable talking shit about anyone and everyone on every ethnic axis imaginable and never, ever seem to know or associate with more than 1-2 non-white people.

I will also say, Mordy, that what you are grasping for is exactly what all of the literature I posted says parents should talk about. You need to recognize/acknowledge differences so that they can be categorized as "not a big deal" and not a reason for you to default to treating someone poorly. It is the exact opposite of "colorblindness" and it's very weird that you are super-invested in calling it that.

I read this this morning as well and I think the writing of it makes it seem more false than I suspect it is; that is, it's overly written in a creative-non-fiction manner. It's detailed enough in weird ways though that I don't really think the core story of it is untrue. The presentation doesn't do it any favors though.

in next week's episode, I undoubtedly make some offhanded "the restrooms here are terrible, huh?" comment to a trans person who just returned from the toilet

it helps to pay attention to how other people might experience the world, is all I'm saying

btw DJP thanks for compiling those links, really good to have these in one place and i'm encountering some really cool/thought-provoking proposals.

xpost mh, when I was at my last consulting job in nyc I was introduced to some guy who looked maybe hispanic and I said "Hola!" and then I was horrified and overexplained myself that I usually live in a spanish speaking country and just flew in the day before. My coworker who introduced us was dying laughing.

Also DJP OTM as usual

anyway this story did resonate with me. My son is almost 13. He spends too much time online. I did get onto his instagram once and he was following a number of stupid meme accounts which would sprinkle in some pretty insidious shit among the other dumb crap they posted. I kind of read him the riot act on that. But I could never tell what he thought about things. LIke he suddenly would say "Ben Shapiro is the smartest person in the world!" but he was clearly trying to be funny. But there's a line there where you think you're giving someone shit but at the same time you're paying too much attention to them...dunno. One of his friends who is sullen, white, and a dork was posting what I just felt were quite blatnatly racist and sexist memes. I haven't been into his instagram account in some time because he changed his password and now I can't get into it on my phone (he'd logged into it there at some point and forgot to log out, which is why I even had access for six months). He doesn't really discuss politics and seems uninterested. We live in Berkeley and he goes to the middle school that was very widely derided by the alt-right for having a teacher on staff who hit some neo-nazis in SF (something that is actually way more complicated than it seemed to outsiders, because she's actually a completely shit teacher who never comes to work, and seriously does spend her time indoctrinating and trying to attract kids to BAM, which I think doesn't belong in the school and I seriously wish they'd just fire her), and yes, there is a shitload of left-wing talk in Berkeley public schools...the only thing I worry about there is that there's so much of it, and some kids are so inherently reactionary, that having that present might exacerbate contrarian behaviors because kids want to rebel. Anyway. We try to remind him he's 1/4 middle eastern, 1/4 Oglala Sioux and a registered member of the tribe and hope for the best.

(sorry, teacher hit neo-nazis in Sacramento, in case anyone cares)

hola, Yerac!

my take on speaking with people from a variety of backgrounds is if you never feel mortified by something you've said you're either an amazing cultural polyglot or you've probably missed something

btw DJP thanks for compiling those links, really good to have these in one place and i'm encountering some really cool/thought-provoking proposals.

I'd just like to point out that I typed "colorblind study children racism" into Google and posted most of the links on the first page of search results; if you are interested in finding this information, it isn't exactly hidden.

I did get onto his instagram once and he was following a number of stupid meme accounts which would sprinkle in some pretty insidious shit among the other dumb crap they posted. I kind of read him the riot act on that. But I could never tell what he thought about things. LIke he suddenly would say "Ben Shapiro is the smartest person in the world!" but he was clearly trying to be funny. But there's a line there where you think you're giving someone shit but at the same time you're paying too much attention to them...dunno. One of his friends who is sullen, white, and a dork was posting what I just felt were quite blatnatly racist and sexist memes

this is pretty frightening to me -- the fact that there is a meme culture that's accessible to kids that is trying to indoctrinate them into a racist and sexist ideology. how prevalent actually is this?

@ DJP - fair! just saying, you took that step and i am benefiting from it. whereas without it i would not have learned as much and prob would have just clicked into another thread, since i agreed with your global point.

and treesh uhm... yeah, that's the internet these days. at the very least since gamergate, in terms of kid-friendly indoctrinating memes and youtube channels and all that.

yeah so like, in this environment... that's what post upthread was about. what's the way to teach kids an egalitarian perspective that allows them to resist this. if they're clumsily getting messaging that they're somehow already on the "other side" because of their race-- as DJI said his kid got, when he said that he might "deserve" getting bullied for being white -- that seems like it makes them more vulnerable to this

i think this is to do with teachers being clumsy messengers of a very complicated topic. and kids being black and white thinkers, sometimes. also i don't think i have the answer

using black and white metaphorically

poor choice of words, maybe.

idk, i'd be interested to hear from educators about what efforts if any schools are making to resist this.

i think maybe child safety locks on all computers and smartphones

thats your answer to burnt soup and everything above it

I think the articles DJP posted are great, but not really relevant when a white kid is the minority in their school and is getting teased for it. akm otm:

there is a shitload of left-wing talk in Berkeley public schools...the only thing I worry about there is that there's so much of it, and some kids are so inherently reactionary, that having that present might exacerbate contrarian behaviors because kids want to rebel.]

I think that is basically what happened to the kid in the article I posted. That doesn't mean we should stop teaching kids about race and privilege, but it does mean that maybe we should knock it off with some of the more toxic forms of callout culture, especially when it comes to kids.

And don't let your kids have instagram! Especially not until they are 13, at least (even Instagram agrees with this)

yes otm

Idk what kinds of conversations you've already had with your son, DJI, to unpack the complicated stuff that is being packed into "I guess I deserve it," but maybe it's time to have another convo about it or probe a little more?

some kids are so inherently reactionary, that having that present might exacerbate contrarian behaviors

now this really is a force we will never get rid of no matter how we arrange our society. i was pro-iraq-war in 2003 just because i knew no one else who was. the cure turned out to be to collect information, not to accept the necessity of deference to a moral authority.

they need to have access to the right information sources though. the 2k19 internet has plenty of "information" that will lead them to become more entrenched in reactionary ideas

sure, and i read plenty of christopher hitchens columns.

idk, i'd be interested to hear from educators about what efforts if any schools are making to resist this.

― Trϵϵship, Tuesday, May 7, 2019 8:40 PM (ten minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

In my school, we're majority immigrant, starting with Chinese, with Latinx as the second largest category, and then Russian, Georgian, various Arabic-speaking people, and a bunch more. Only about 10% of our students are African-American, which is not what ppl expect from an "urban" school.

Tbh I wish we did MUCH more explicit instruction in anti-racism but a) not everyone agrees that it's necessary, and b) this area is the most right-wing part of NYC and full of "Blue Lives Matter" stickers and NRA and Trump bumper stickers on cars, so evidence suggests that any white privilege language would have to be delivered extremely carefully from a trusted source. We do a lot of "equity" instruction and have LGBTQ supports and mental health supports and we have a very diverse staff with lots of POC, but we don't have the demographics to commit to more open racial privilege work.

Which is a shame because afaict everyone in the NYPD is from here so if we did a better job maybe someone would accidentally learn something.