A 'Community for All'? Not So Fast, This Wisconsin County Says

[Nevilledog]

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Heather McGhee
@hmcghee
This sobering article about a small town refusing a simple step towards a #SolidarityDividend has it all: zero-sum thinking, white fear of retribution & responsibility, right-wing disinformation... My heart goes out to the residents. https://nytimes.com/2021/05/18/us/politics/race-inclusion-wasau-wisconsin.html… #TheSumofUsBook
Community members prepared to speak in opposition to the Community for All resolution at the Marathon County Courthouse in Wausau, Wis., last week.
A ‘Community for All’? Not So Fast, This Wisconsin County Says
In Wausau, Wis., the county board has debated a resolution aimed at embracing inclusion for nearly a year, with no agreement. Racial tensions that had simmered beneath the surface are now roiling the...
nytimes.com
11:01 AM · May 18, 2021

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/18/us/politics/race-inclusion-wasau-wisconsin.html

WAUSAU, Wis. — A standing-room-only crowd packed a drab courthouse meeting room one recent night and tried to resolve a thorny, yearlong debate over whether Marathon County should declare itself “a community for all.”

The lone Black member of the county board, Supervisor William Harris, stood up and begged his colleagues who opposed the resolution to change their minds.

“I want to feel like I’m a part of this community,’’ he said. “That’s what a lot of our residents are saying. We want to contribute to our community. We want to feel like a part of this community.”

But a fellow board member was just as passionate at the meeting on Thursday in arguing that acknowledging racial disparities is itself a form of racism.
“When we choose to isolate and elevate one group of people over another, that’s discrimination,” said Supervisor Craig McEwen, a retired police officer who is white.

When George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis last May, communities and businesses all over the world engaged in a reckoning over social justice, diversity and inclusion. But while scores of other communities adopted new policies and issued proclamations vowing to make progress, the residents of Marathon County, with a population of 135,000 that is 91 percent white, couldn’t agree on what to say.

A year later, they still can’t.

*snip*

[Demovictory9]

1. 73 year resident: "they've got to treat the Hmongs and the coloreds and the gays better"

“They’re creating strife between people labeling us as racist and privileged because we’re white,” Supervisor Arnold Schlei, a 73-year-old retired veal farmer who has been on the county board for 11 years, said in an interview. “You can’t come around and tell people that work their tails off from daylight to dark and tell them that they got white privilege and they’re racist and they’ve got to treat the Hmongs and the coloreds and the gays better because they’re racist. People are sick of it.”

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"the coloreds" yikes

[Caliman73]

2. That tends to happen...

acknowledging racial disparities is itself a form of racism.

“When we choose to isolate and elevate one group of people over another, that’s discrimination,” said Supervisor Craig McEwen, a retired police officer who is white.

That is some messed up thinking right there, but sadly, it is typical of White people with racial anxiety and animosity. Acknowledging you have cancer doesn't give you cancer, it means that you know about it and therefore, must make a choice about what to do about it. That, in my opinion, is the real problem. Acknowledging that racism exists means that you have to decide what side you are on. If you say that people of color have been treated unfairly, then you now must make a choice whether to continue that unfair treatment, or make changes to the way things work. The board member's statement is a typical stalling tactic. "If we try to make up for the racism which has benefitted us all in some way, then we are just being racist to ourselves" That is what this guy is saying.

No one is asking to be isolated and elevated. The Black community and other communities of color in that County are ALREADY ISOLATED. They are asking to be fully acknowledged and allowed to be their authentic selves. To contribute in a way that is acknowledged as valid by the rest of the community. That isn't elevation, that is just allowing a people to simply "be".

[underpants]

4. Great post.

Yes this explains something I couldn’t wrap my head around for a while. Why, I don’t know.

“Obama was racist” “Obama was the most divisive President ever”
He clears knew not to get too close to any lines but he did acknowledge that racism existed and he did publicly offer some of both sides’ points of view. THAT was the problem as you post explains very well.

[underpants]

3. Zero sum rights and the incorrect definition of "equity"

The idea that one person with rights means less for someone else is ridiculous but as we see that has been ingrained into them.

“Equity” is code for them. They are truly triggered by it. This is at least the 4th example I’ve encountered of it being understood wrongly. There’s an accounting definition of it which does deal with property but it usually is understood simply as fairness. The powers that be in their world have implanted a warped definition in their minds. They hear it and think that there is going to be an actual transfer of property.