Can a non-black person understand racism against blacks?

[ContraBass Black]

Prompted by this poll.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=5656047&mesg_id=5656047

How would you answer that question and the question in this thread's title?

[kwassa]

1. I thought the exact same thing when I saw that poll.

the answer for me is that we can all understand, via the power of empathy, discrimination, but we can't all have the experience of discrimination if we are not the group discriminated against.

[bliss_eternal]

2. Great response, kwassa!

I'm just going to trust that you guys are addressing the issues appropriately in that thread. I'm not going near that one with a ten foot pole.

[KingFlorez]

3. I think so

But it requires a great degree of open-mindedness and tolerance.

[Brewman_Jax]

4. A better question

is not "can" they, but "will" they understand? As long as the racial caste system is in place and grants unearned privilege to the upper caste (white people) and imposes undeserved burdens to the lower castes (people of color), I seriously doubt it. As long as the system works for them, there's no pressing need to evaluate and change it.

[mark414]

5. i would like to think that i am slowly becoming able to understand it

or at least understand it as much as it is possible for a small town blue-eyed white boy like me to do so.

"understand" is probably the wrong word to use - i will never understand because i will never have to.

but what i can understand is that as long as all this bullshit continues it's going to hurt all of us living in this country - not just black people.

united we stand, divided we fall...we jumped off that ledge a long time ago and we're still tumbling down towards the ground.

[TroubleMan]

6. You can definitely understand it...experience it...probably not, but

understand it, yes.

As a white person married to a black person with kids, I get to see both sides. You see a lot of comments people say when there are no minorities around (when they don't know your wife is black). 95% of the time I say something...I hate that shit. You know that these same motherfuckers will turn around and same the same shit about your wife and kids....that's when you can experience it.

To understand it all you have to do is open your eyes. To me it doesn't really seem that hard, but apparently it is. Drive through different areas of right here in West Palm Beach, and go through the "bad areas" of town, and guess what...it's 90% minority. The sad thing is that they blame the residents for their plight instead of 300+ years of institutionalized slavery, racism, and economic & social discrimination. The average joe doesn't want to believe that he's had more opportunity to succeed because of his color, because that incurs feelings of guilt and responsibility. Even in the brief moment he sees it, it becomes a revelation that soon fades, because it's such a big problem that he feels that he can't do anything. It's so much easier to just go on with your life and not worry about it, or to rationalize it away as an isolated incident.

Again it's easy to understand and see, most people just don't want to do it. Just call around looking for a job or house and say your name's Jamal or Latisha, and then call the same places and say your name is Greg or Mindy. Just look at the incarceration statistics. Hell...just go to any metropolitan area and drive though the poorest places. People are sheep, so unless the TV tells them there's a problem, anything else is just "playing the race card" or a "conspiracy theory." You didn't know that racism in America ended as soon as "The Cosby Show" started? It's scary, but a lot of people feel that way, and it's not because they can't understand or see, it's because they won't.

[jeffrey_X]

7. Absolutely....but it all depends on your environment

I was raised in a small white town in Indiana.

My wife is African American and I was able to understand racism against blacks for the first time in my about 6 years ago. After a lot of reading and listening I was able to develope a new paradigm regarding my stance and view of racism in America.

I am now more of an activist of racial (and anti-racist) issues more so than my wife. :-)

[bliss_eternal]

8. I think marriages like ours can really open up awareness...

when people are open to it, of course. Some people just aren't, and tend to make all sorts of assumptions about why we're even together. :eyes:

My dh was shocked to find the people he called his extended family were bigots.

He was also kind of taken aback by some of his immediate family's behavior. My all time favorite moment was having to explain the subtleties of racism to his mother. :eyes:

She got pissed off, when dh told her he didn't want to hear about her bigoted friends anymore, (after a particularly painful, horrible experience with them) that of course SHE said didn't mean what we thought. :eyes: As if she would recognize discrimination if it bit her in the ass. She got angry and blamed me for dh's stance :eyes: and tried to dress me down with comments like, "Well Bliss...Surely you had to expect such things when you decided to have this kind of marriage."

:wtf: As if we should run around apologizing for our marriage or expect to be treated like shit because other people are ignorant assholes. :mad::grr: Such.Total.Bullshit.

Dh still get's a kick out of recalling the reading I gave her over that one. :rofl: Thinking back, it was pretty good. :spray: So glad dh doesn't deal with her anymore, she really sucked.

[Catherine Vincent]

9. Yes.

The non-black homosexuals can.

[bliss_eternal]

10. You are so right.

Sadly, they face such discrimination...

:(

[Brewman_Jax]

11. Not necessarily so

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=2499452 and http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x4450431

I cite a couple of examples to show that the white privileged attitude goes beyond class, economic situation, and sexual orientation. Add to that the "why aren't those people supporting us" and "we won't support them if they don't support us" themes.

Like my post above, they CAN understand, but WILL they?

[kwassa]

12. Gays can be racist, too, unfortunately.

I've certainly run into it before. Racist, classist, age-ist.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/17/AR2006091700405_pf.html

Race, Class and Sex Breed Contempt in Greenwich Village
A Neighborhood Grown Older and Wealthier Is Tired of Today's Rowdies

By Michelle García
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 18, 2006; A03
(excerpt)

Forget the image of the Village as gay haven; forget the gay liberation movement that rose from its cobblestone streets. The scene has moved north to Chelsea, and what's left in the Village is a gay neighborhood gone older, wealthier and stodgier. Some in the area of $4 million townhouses and lofts says it is under siege by gay kids of color who bring loud talk, drug dealing and prostitution.

It is a conflict, thick with issues of race and class within the gay community, that is now coming to a head.


"They didn't want black faces on the street," said Bob Kohler, who is white, explaining the outcry against the pier crowd. Kohler, a longtime Village resident and former business owner on the strip, took part in Gay Liberation Front that organized some of the first gay rights protests.

He remembers the methadone-clinic houseboat docked at the piers. And the junkies who shot the real deal through their veins and nodded out on brownstone stoops. That generation now visits the gay senior center where Kohler regularly gets into heated arguments about the teenagers.

"Those kids . . . get them off the street," says Kohler, feigning the whining voices of seniors at the center. "They come here and mess up the Village. They steal." Then he adds wearily, "Meanwhile, these old men are trying to score for pot."

(much more in the article)

[bliss_eternal]

13. Of course. ANYONE can be racist.

:(

[bliss_eternal]

14. I believe a non-black person can understand racism

against blacks, when the person is yellow, beige, dark brown or any other hue that denotes them a person of color. They've been there done that in that regard. Though oddly enough, there are still some people of color that buy into the way "whites in power" try to pit us against one another. So in a strange way, they are of color but seem to think they are "better than" another race/ethnicity...sometimes because of the kinds of things "whites" say about their race as a whole.

I believe that women in our country are also in a position to understand racism--but some don't see it unfortunately.

:shrug: