Note: the following bit of discussion was taken from the decolonizing website of unsettling america, which has shown a penchance for not posting my posts in the past. Thus i thought it time i start posting independently, since absolutely no communication has either been allowed, or been attempted. See the original discussion of the article here: http://unsettlingamerica.wordpress.com/2013/10/13/whats-the-difference-between-cultural-exchange-and-cultural-appropriation
i think that the kind of sentiment expressed by the others besides me (my input is shared closer to the bottom) is a general orientation of many people boxed as “white” today. And that shouting them down into categorical subordination is no way to solve the challenge. Sure, my approach may be only good for a small number of champions, but perhaps i can at least get the proverbial “ball rolling” as far as thinking through the kinds of grey areas that HUMAN BEINGS need!
Final note: i do not know any of the other responders listed here (“d” and “Smitty”). If either of these folks wish to have their post erased from this site, i will comply.
d | October 19, 2013 at 09:55 | Reply
THANK YOU. My ancestors also came to North America to escape genocides, and when I get the “white guilt” or “white privilege” thing, it makes me livid. My family members did not massacre Native Americans. They did not own slaves. Just because people with the same color skin as me happened to do those things does not make me guilty. Obviously I am sensitive to imbalances of power, but my family faced the same treatment and experiences in their countries. They were terrified, starved, tortured, etc. They saw their family members and friends die. They came here and worked blue collar jobs to rise up from their circumstances. My family is middle class now, not because we benefited from this false white privilege, but because my great grandparents worked two jobs each and never owned a car. My ancestors were marginalized when they came here because they had accents; in early America, Eastern Europeans and Asians were treated poorly–being white made no difference.
And another point–you have no idea what someone’s ancestry is until you ask them. I “look white” but have other heritage. I was so sick and tired of hearing that I “couldn’t” like or use or wear certain things because I wasn’t non-white enough, that I’ve just about stopped enjoying anything from my cultural background. I have every right to my own heritage, thank you very much. So how about before we go on and on about white privilege and how white people aren’t allowed to appreciate other cultures because it’s automatically cultural appropriation (which, let’s face it, is basically what this post says at the end), why don’t we consider the fact that this attitude is grouping all white-looking people together into the same group of perpetrators. Isn’t that a little culturally insensitive? (Hint: the answer is yes.) Maybe the author needs to educate herself more on white cultures the way she says the rest of us need to focus on non-white cultures. Yes, I realize that most people don’t know anything about history. I am the first one to say that people need to stop accepting ignorance. I, however, happen to know a lot about history, and I happen to know that while white countries have had a disproportionate hand in putting other peoples under their rule and terrible treatment, white people have also been the victims of other white people in many instances–Ireland and Russia, for recent examples. This topic cannot be broken down into white and non-white, plainly and simply.
Smitty Buckler | October 23, 2013 at 18:51 | Reply
Actually genocide is still happening in the USA. People’s children are being forcibly taken from them. Lack of basic resources that are given to the rest of America are not available on the ‘reservations.’ The ‘reservations’ are also being taken away or environmentally exploited. If you have light skin and live in the US today you are participating and benefiting from racism. Period.
If your family moved to the US to escape genocide that is legit but the point is that you are still being read as a white person and benefiting from what this country was built on indigenous genocide and slavery of First Nation tribes & Africans. Wage slavery and the prison industrial complex insure that racism and slavery are still benefiting white people today.
As a light skin person with indigenous heritage that did not grow up in indigenous culture, I spend time getting in touch with the culture that was stolen from me but I am not going to go around wearing a headdress. And if I did it would be specific to the tribes of my ancestors which is not the headdress pictured in this drawing which is not a universal headdress as most people seem to think it is. & Why wouldn’t I? Because by running around with a headdress tells white people that is okay to do the same because I look white. I recognize this privilege and I appreciate my culture enough to respect it and not sell it out like that.
chaZ d. ziNg | October 27, 2013 at 17:57 |
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This is a response to Smitty Butler and others. i agree with “d” about things being way too simplified, but at the same time i recognize that talking about “white people” in generalistic terms has its values–for Indigenous peoples, specifically. To a point. That point i want to shed light on is that by reducing human beings down into such rigid categories only ultimately perpetuates that way of doing things. It’s good to reach people who are getting severely poisoned (mentally) out there, for sure. And, yes, we “whites” are certainly privileged in some ways. What the argument misses, wholesale, tho, is that our privilege is only skin-deep. Yes, we avoid being profiled by municipal soldiers (er, cops), yes we can “jump back into” settler society “at will” (if we give up on our ideals, or figure there’s a grey area approach to that), and so on.
And yet we are made war on in similar ways, tho different on their surfaces. Like Indigenous peoples the world over, we are ALSO herded into a reductionist, depressing mentality which makes war on who we are originally! Think about THAT one for awhile, please! We are all descendants of tribal peoples, and in EVERY GENERATION, we ALL (whites, etc. stuck in neo-colonial coercions) are forced (in myriad ways, mostly via threats and examples made against others) to reduce our hearts to certain “social roles” and practices “befitting our social status and position” and other such garbage. We are forced/coerced to give up our “childhood” spirit, visions, and desires, in order to become Normal Citizens of the realm, thanks to the Nuclearized family, compulsory schooling, and all sorts of other subtle and not-so-subtle ways to herd us into this One Way of Doing Things.
So we are ALL under fire! And there need not be a hierarchy, except, perhaps, for the need to reach marginalized groups totally used to wielding that frame of reference.
Whites may have surface privilege, but just under the surface, there are all sorts of psychological genocides (see John Trudell on this concept) taking place! From the reality of off-balanced elders reflecting their intensities at anyone they can pour that poison out on, to the realities of “the work world”, to how we are manipulated to take up the power-over positions of neo-colonialism (i.e. perpetuating the dogma of Edward Bernays and co; see Chomsky on that!) And, i think, no matter what class we are born into, we are not allowed to organize any truly meaningful organization (Chomsky again).
Lets’s face it, HUMAN BEINGS are under fire hugely in a MYRIAD of ways in the context of “settler normative” conditioning and programming! No matter our alleged status. We are “played”, mined, and tooled to fit snugly into “the interests” (severely alienated) of Misery Loves Company, Incorporated. i think. Even the “most privileged” (materially, at least), have long spoken of the hollowness of that. i’m recalling Howard Hughes’ words on that one, for one. And can such “rich” white people even trust their own kids? What “greatness” do they REALLY have??? i think it’s all illusion, mixed in with material wealth (i.e. a material sanctuary to hide in, as long as you never say your truths too much) and the comfortable numbness of “quiet desperation” (see Pink Floyd commenting on “The English Way”).
Am i making sense to any of you, yet? And the whites who do do the direct warfare against Indigenous folks of the world, they are REFLECTING their own experience of poisoning! How could it be any different?? (If we were living so great, why would we have the need to reflect out so much pain????)
Finally, whether we’ve been directly involved in warfare against other warred-on peoples is interesting when you start to look closer at that. Because while yes, such war continues (including the continued interest in stealing Indigenous land and children) overtly, the covert war is much more insidious, and much more inclusive of settler-mentality-holders being part (and parcel) of the problem. It’s called “support” by our uncritical and unaware going along with the program. By our (whites) not seeing how deep colonization warfare extends and how our going along affects and perpetuates that warfare, we inadverdantly become a part of it! It’s like the german population during world war 2 “not knowing” about the mass killings of jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and so on. They didn’t want to know, their culture made sure they could avoid knowing, and they may’ve felt too powerless to know. So i think that dynamic is worth pursuing. Because it continues today against Indigenous peoples of the world, as well as many others who are being ideologically marginalized by our (whites) basic presumptions (and the manufacture of our consent).
{Not in original response: p.s. i wish to weigh in on the idea that subordinating to the idea that wearing what appears to be Indigenous-type outfits and such is not ALWAYS bad, and that there is a strategically-challenged ideology at work that we would do well to think through carefully–beyond the pale of neo-colonial and Middle Class value-assumptions. The underlying principle is that white people HAVE TO subordinate, soldier-style, when it comes to matters of independent judgment, or we are collectively and always being “disrespectful”. Wow! What a curious emotive label to try to fasten onto every diverse voice of human being who looks or is “white”! And how convenient for the Left Wing of Neo-colonialism (not to mention the Right Wing). Keep that constituency in line, somehow!!!
i dare anyone to take me by the proverbial horns on this topic! You might be surprised in a way you never saw coming! (And, you might surprise me, too!)
:}
p.s.
And, yes, i have been one whom others have attempted to lasso me with these similar sentiments. i even lost a deep friendship with one older man who had been a sort of (white) guide to me, i think because his Middle Class Values got the best of him (noting that this value system often clouds the eyes of many who think of themselves as on the leading edge of radical thinking, when in the realities of those crushed under their egos, they come off as yet another form of religious zealot.
The thing that cannot be explored is anything outside the established rubric. My particular approach (see: http://www.angelfire.com/folk/magixnartz/flouggindex.html ) touches on Indigenous excellence (and yet i AM a descendant of tribal europe), as a way to carve out territory from What Has Been Mapped and Boxed (and rendered irrelavent by the the usual suspects –whose neo-colon job it is to sideline dissent). Some of us won’t “fit into” establishment Givens, some of us will not play those meta games. Some of us have gone “too deep” down the proverbial rabbit hole, and see the game and don’t want any part in its theater! (i.e. Left/Right “wings” of settler-normative polytricks)
We see the excellent power of world Indigenous methods and we follow our intuitions along those lines, trying on our own creatively intelligent renditions, in ongoing processes. My own trajectory comes from extended experience in diverse journeys through the Unknown (“Where White Men Fear To Tread” –Russell Means), as well as having been invited to a certain pow wow where i came up with my initial creative angle on how i might approach war Society.
So i thought i’d add this in, here. Expose that there are grey areas, and that those who are “caught” wearing such ways might be given a choice, rather than being attacked with something that comes off as a new angle on politically correct fascism (tho obviously not, on its surface, certainly peopled in the settler domain by lots of that ilk; which is “par for the course” in this day and age, i think). Certainly more sane for longhaul meaningful allies and friend ships, don’t you agree? To “arming our desires” –while ALSO letting the ideologically, and strategically-challenged have their space! –Just as long as they don’t get away with absolutes!
Dissent welcome!
unsettling.subtle.settler.unsettlers 