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The Assumptions of Whiteness
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"I've got morons on my team."

Mitt Romney
Minor Deity
Picture of Piano*Dad
posted
Yeah, really

put out by the Museum of African American History & Culture

I'll buy the critique of white "food culture." Big Grin
 
Posts: 12539 | Location: Williamsburg, VA | Registered: 19 July 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Has Achieved Nirvana
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This is one of those times when you notice the convergence between the (real) white supremecists and the new woke. They both will tell you that 'objective, rational thinking' and 'the nuclear family', 'plan for future' and 'self reliance' are white concepts.


Speaking of which, did you see McWhorter's review of 'White Fragility' in The Atlantic this morning?


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If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.

 
Posts: 33797 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Here it is:

The Dehumanizing Condescension of 'White Fragility'

Money quote:

quote:
I cannot imagine that any Black readers could willingly submit themselves to DiAngelo’s ideas while considering themselves adults of ordinary self-regard and strength. Few books about race have more openly infantilized Black people than this supposedly authoritative tome.


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Posts: 33797 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Some of those reflected my experience, maybe a lot of them.

Some of them, though, were pretty far from the way I was brought up, especially where they veered into the "wealth equals worth" area. My upbringing was so religion-oriented that an emphasis on possessions was seen as worldly and unseemly.

The ideas of rugged individualism and "if you didn't achieve your goals, you didn't work hard enough" were assuredly there, but if you poked somebody on them, they would have said that we should bow to God's will.

I grew up too close to New Orleans for "bland is best" to have any resonance for me, food-wise. Smiler

A lot of the other things, though, did ring a bell.


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Posts: 15513 | Location: Florida | Registered: 22 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
(self-titled) semi-posting lurker
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Thanks for the McWhorter link Jon, I'll read that.

Re "white culture" .... there is so much cultural diversity in the US, exactly which white people is this about? Not much in there fits with my upbringing in a presumably white family in the midwest. (Especially, but not only, the food part... being Italian-American plays a role there for sure)


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Posts: 18525 | Location: not in Japan any more | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
"I've got morons on my team."

Mitt Romney
Minor Deity
Picture of Piano*Dad
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If a "white" person, whatever that is, were to generalize in this manner about non-white people, imagine the reaction.

Especially since these "whiteness" characterizations are presumed narrow and often simply biased and wrong. It's somehow wrong to think scientifically ...

Truly infantilizing black/brown people.
 
Posts: 12539 | Location: Williamsburg, VA | Registered: 19 July 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Minor Deity
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Oy! Really?That’s wack! 何 (なに)?Alamak! 有冇搞錯?Bang Head

Pardon my multicultural expressions of befuddlement and incredulity.
 
Posts: 12692 | Registered: 01 December 2006Reply With QuoteReport This Post
Minor Deity
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quote:
Originally posted by Mary Anna:
Some of those reflected my experience, maybe a lot of them.

Some of them, though, were pretty far from the way I was brought up, especially where they veered into the "wealth equals worth" area. My upbringing was so religion-oriented that an emphasis on possessions was seen as worldly and unseemly.

The ideas of rugged individualism and "if you didn't achieve your goals, you didn't work hard enough" were assuredly there, but if you poked somebody on them, they would have said that we should bow to God's will.

I grew up too close to New Orleans for "bland is best" to have any resonance for me, food-wise. Smiler

A lot of the other things, though, did ring a bell.


The nature of statistics is that numbers arrived at are useful at predicting group but not individual behavior.

People often forget this.

(Not that the generalizations behind the description of whiteness presented here are based on statistics! She pontificates as if they were, though.)


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The most dangerous word in the language is "obvious"

 
Posts: 14392 | Location: PA | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.

 
Posts: 33797 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
"I've got morons on my team."

Mitt Romney
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One wonders who on the inside thought that chart worthy of prominent display ...
 
Posts: 12539 | Location: Williamsburg, VA | Registered: 19 July 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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quote:
Originally posted by Piano*Dad:
One wonders who on the inside thought that chart worthy of prominent display ...


Thank goodness you said this.

I saw that chart and wanted to run away. I still do.


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Posts: 34971 | Location: Hooterville, OH | Registered: 23 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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quote:
Moore expounded that white culture is obsessed with “mechanical time” — clock time — and punishes students for lateness. This, he said, is but one example of how whiteness undercuts Black kids. “The problems come when we say this way of being is the way to be.” In school and on into the working world, he lectured, tremendous harm is done by the pervasive rule that Black children and adults must “bend to whiteness, in substance, style and format.”



From the NYT Magazine piece on DiAngelo’s “White Fragility”

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/0...-robin-diangelo.html


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If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.

 
Posts: 33797 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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Matt Taibbi’s take:

quote:
The museum became the latest institution to attempt to combat racism by pledging itself to “antiracism,” a quack sub-theology that in a self-clowning trick straight out of Catch-22 seeks to raise awareness about ignorant race stereotypes by reviving and amplifying them.

The National Museum of African American History and Culture created a graphic on “Aspects and Assumptions of White Culture” that declared the following white values: “the scientific method,” “rational, linear thinking,” “the nuclear family,” “children should have their own rooms,” “hard work is the key to success,” “be polite,” “written tradition,” and “self-reliance.” White food is “steak and potatoes; bland is best,” and in white justice, “intent counts.”

The astute observer will notice this graphic could equally have been written by white supremacist Richard Spencer or History of White People parodist Martin Mull. It seems impossible that no one at one of the country’s leading educational institutions noticed this messaging is ludicrously racist, not just to white people but to everyone (what is any person of color supposed to think when he or she reads that self-reliance, politeness, and “linear thinking” are white values?).


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If you think looting is bad wait until I tell you about civil forfeiture.

 
Posts: 33797 | Location: On the Hudson | Registered: 20 April 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
"I've got morons on my team."

Mitt Romney
Minor Deity
Picture of Piano*Dad
posted Hide Post
quote:
what is any person of color supposed to think when he or she reads that self-reliance, politeness, and “linear thinking” are white values?


They're supposed to stop "acting white," of course. I'm sure you recall the long and hot discussions of Oreo behavior (acting white) in schools, and discussions of the value of ebonics. This is a set of issues most sane and sensible white commentators avoid at just about all costs. It's no win. This is a conversation that must play out within communities being patronized and infantilized by this meme-like assault on common sense.
 
Posts: 12539 | Location: Williamsburg, VA | Registered: 19 July 2005Reply With QuoteReport This Post
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