You know that’s not what I meant, and that this is not about agreement. The point is, this “discussion” shouldn’t be happening.
[takes bait]
What the TSA agent did to Ms Houska wasn’t only “inappropriate” but culturally insensitive. Asking whether it was or was not culturally insensitive or if Ms Houska was just being overly dramatic is not for us to discuss, especially for those of us who are not minorities and thus have never been subject to this sort of thing. It is not for those who are outside the group to determine what those inside the group consider insensitive.
Moreover, if the TSA agent did not know it was culturally insensitive, that’s on her. For example, let’s say I typically greet people with “how you monkeys doing?” It’s what I consider a fun, lighthearted greeting, hypothetically speaking. Would I greet a group of black people this way, and if I were challenged, would I simply say, “nuh uh, it’s not racist, I say that to everyone, you’re just sensitive”, completely ignoring the cultural implications of one action or word as experienced by one specific ethnic group? This TSA agent should have understood the meanings of her actions, in context, as well as the optics involved. In fact, any grown adult should.
I totally understand and agree with this point. We’re also talking about TSA employees. It’s a job that starts at $12 an hour. I can’t say with confidence that they’re hiring people with the best understanding of cultural and social taboos. That absolutely doesn’t make it OK though.
I would very much like to know how the TSA agent reacted when she found out she had truly offended someone. I know I won’t get that but it’s very telling. Was it an, “Oh, my god! I had no idea. I do it to everybody and I didn’t mean to hurt anyone. It will never happen again.” or was it a, “Well, that’s just who I am sweetie. Y’all don’t need to be so sensitive.” I’m all for people learning from their mistakes. I’m not all for people doubling down on their ignorance.
I just now read a longer article where they describe the TSA agent as continuing to laugh as Houska walked away after telling the agent that what she did was hurtful. I had missed that piece prior and this certainly sounds like we’re dealing with the second type of person that I’ve described above. I would think that a person with any self-awareness would be hanging their head in shame and apologizing profusely…or not even pulling hair in the first place.
I’m still not going to go after working class people for taking the jobs with the best pay and benefits in a particular area. Again, if your options are McDonalds or TSA… I think we can agree that the TSA sucks and not dump on working class people trying to make the best choices for their families.
Not meaning to dump on working class folks at TSA, but if you are a racist asshole, being working class is not an excuse. As I said, it takes remarkable guts to resist the pull of the institutional culture. Can be done, but hard to do. There are some who can, some who quit and some who succumb. I don’t know if it is a very progressive attitude, but I do think we need to be responsible for our actions, even in a setting like that.
Yes, I agree with that. This is not a defense of this woman or her actions (and if you can’t tell that from my comments in this thread by now…), it’s a defense of the thousands of people who are making hard choices on a daily basis and are being blamed for the rise of authoritarianism in our travel.
Maybe I just need to stop posting in this thread, since I’m not being listened to any way.
Oh, this thread has gone to hell, no doubt. Merely clarifying my own comment. More power to the men and women who work in a shitty job and maintain their humanity.
I’ll take one more whack at this, because it is an important point.
The intent of the TSA agent has absolutely fucking zero to do with whether this was a racist act.
We have no insight (nor will we ever) into her intent. We currently have no information on whether this was part of a pattern of behavior or an isolated incident. Those things have bearing on whether the TSA agent in question is a racist bigot (which is not what most people are asserting). Not on whether this specific incident was racist.
You seem to want to empathize with the TSA agent and see the incident through her eyes in order to judge whether the act itself involved racism. That is unnecessary. Doing something like that, publicly demeaning a minority person, is a racist act. Full stop. It was racist in fact. It caused harm. It propagated white supremacy. Even if the harm was accidental, it was done. And it was done by one person to another. It wasn’t force majeure. One can assign fault for an accident without intent.
I think where I’m getting beaten up here is that I’m tying to understand and decouple a racist act from a racist person. As you and others have stated there are acts that aren’t intentional but still are an aggression, micro or otherwise. Agreed. No, ignorance isn’t a blanket protection but, honestly, we’re not all born or supported by families that teach those lessons. The hugely important thing is what the agent does now that she’s aware of the impact of her actions. If she was already aware of it, she can fuck off. If she was ignorant but learned the error of her ways, great. Hopefully, she’ll share that wisdom with others.
TSA are like cops, security guards, etc: proles intended to enforce / sow seeds of discord and division amongst the proles so that they don’t go after the capitalists. If the white prole sees themselves as having an inferior class to themselves they are less likely to revolt. Centrist liberals play a role in this dynamic because when you focus solely on this division without criticizing capitalism like the left does, you just end up with white proles angry about status loss who are still too dumb to work out who / what the real enemy is.
This is meant to be informational: When it comes to Native American hair there is one thing others need to know, Please don’t touch our hair. In fact, don’t touch us at all without asking. It’s extremely rude in most of our cultures. There are well over 500 native nations in the US, so customs and traditions can vary but I haven’t heard of one yet that didn’t consider hair as a connection to Mother Earth. Someone can consider it “magical thinking” if they want to but that’s not going to change how we feel.
I live in Michigan and am lucky to have elders to learn from, though a lot have walked on now. They’ve been through a lot. Child stealing, residential schools, forced sterilization, and so much more… I will never forget the haunted look in the eyes of a few people I know. We’re trying to heal now, and we are not going anywhere.
If we seem a bit defensive at times, it’s because these issues aren’t new to us. Constantly bumping into misinformation and/or ignorance is tiring. We hear the same things over and over and try to explain our point of view, then get told we’re wrong because so and so said this or that. Yes, told we’re wrong about our own people. It’s exhausting. I’m going to lie down now. I caught the creeping crud from the nephew I’m raising. My sister had a heart attack when he was seven. He’s my child now. I’m doing my best to teach him to be respectul, kind, polite and caring. He loves learning about his heritage. I hope by the time he’s grown, more is being taught about our people, but at least he’s learning it at home., Miigwetch for listening.
But why should disrespecting parts of cultures be worth censure? There’s plenty of Southern “good old boy” culture that I disrespect. There’s plenty of Saudi Arabian culture I disrespect. There’s plenty of Venture Capitalism and Tech Bro culture I disrespect.
The difference here, of course, is that this is a mostly harmless cultural element from a culture (or set of cultures, really) that is routinely attacked and denigrated by people with power to actually harm those in that culture.
