I personally brought up class in this discussion at least twice, and so have others. I’m not even sure what you’re arguing against, to be honest. But of course you’re “livestock”. Right. We’re all the same, you totes get it, you’re the one to explain to minorities how to deal with their repression. A White Dude Has Spoken, y’all!
Note: I’ve worked on the ground with homeless LGBT youth, and homeless men and women, while I lived in Phoenix, and my twin sister worked at a homeless shelter and rehab for many years in a small Arizona city that routinely has a higher homeless and unemployment rate than Detroit. So yeah. I know this subject all too well. Class is for certain part of the discussion, but you can’t separate the issues of race from class, or vice versa, not in this country, you can’t. Also: War on drugs. Which is a class AND race issue.
Oh, don’t get me wrong, I love Don Cheadle. Haven’t seen House of Lies, but he was terrific in Hotel Rwanda. And of course as Captain Planet But I fear that by the time the Iron Man storyline plays out to War Machine taking over, etc, he might be getting too old for the part. He’s the same age as Robert Downy Jr, who’s already talking about retiring from his superhero days. I’d think they’d want an actor to take over the Iron Man role who could ride it out for at least 10-15 years.
Please explain how what you’ve gathered about my critique of common Jewish American assimilation into whiteness could be construed as “bigoted”? And why do you keep ignoring the Jewish American writers I’ve referenced who have studied the same thing, and basically said the same things about it that I’m saying?
Your effort to tar me with the brush of anti-semitism isn’t getting anywhere, at least not with me. I’m basically arguing against, and wishing more people would acknowledge, de facto white supremacy. The common ethnic American willingness to basically go along with it is a huge part of that problem. And it sure isn’t just Jewish Americans who could be and have been accepted into what Karen Brodkin calls the ever-expanding notion of whiteness.
I just don’t think that calling things as I see them is “driving trollies,” especially since so many people I admire and emulate call them the same way. I mean, HOW long has “whiteness studies” been going on now, 20 some years? And is bell hooks, widely renowned author of dozens of books, merely “driving trollies” when she continually describes the U.S. as a “white supremacist capitalist patriarchy”?
If people don’t use such undoubtedly accurate terms, just how are things supposed to change? And why must I change my terms, just to suit the sensibilities of the oblivious? (Rhetorical questions – I know just how much the dominate like to insist that conversation simply can’t go anywhere unless their precious fee fees don’t get hurt.)
So some people should get used to inflammatory language, but others should speak up against the words they don’t like.
Your hypocrisy really is hard to swallow some times. Using such terms, while technically true, is not only not going to get people to see things your way, but it is going to to harden them against anything you have to say about this or anything else.
Yeah, I know I should soften and even cover up the truth to protect the dominant’s precious fee fees. But you know, sometimes I just get tired of covering up like that. I get fed up, you know? Sometimes, on those days, I just go back to using terms that accurately describe various forms of collective abuse. And it’s not like those who find such language “inflammatory” are going to listen to and be persuading by the coddling diplomacy that I usually practice. I mean, fucking hell, you know? Or wait, I guess MisterBigGun doesn’t know, or doesn’t want to know.
Whatevs dudes, stay in your protective shells. I know that no matter what language I use, I’ll never be able to coax you out into the healing light of truth.
Well, I think intersectionality as a theory and concept only has taken root in the discussion only very recently, at least in mainstream discussion. And I do think Jewish people in our country have a very specific, unique history in our (American) society and culture. Just like Hispanic people and their culture – Hispanic isn’t “technically” a race, and yet it’s treated as such in our country. As an Arizona born and raised person who happens to be liberal/lefty, a lot of what @Aloisius is talking about seems very similar to the discussion of discrimination and oppression of Hispanic people in our country, and specifically in border states.
More or less. Isn’t it obvious that those Hispanics/Latina/os who can pass for white and do exercise an “ethnic option” if and when they want to, and only suffer discrimination sometimes, on those relatively rare occasions when that option becomes apparent to certain obnoxious (and yes, even dangerous) people?
This all started with a claim that a Jewish American gets taken (or “judged”) more often as Jewish than as white. And with the implication (or was it a statement?) that that’s true for all Jewish Americans who basically look and get taken for “white.” Which might be true in some settings, granted. But emphasizing that side of oneself and one’s group surely comes at the expense of denying a whole lot else.
I’m trying to make the point that any given pet issue is secondary to our collective disenfranchisement. Black, white, male, female, your odds of making a dent are miniscule, because we have no real agency.
Whether it’s sexism, racism, specism, or any other idiocy you want to tackle, it makes the most sense to start with trying to achieve some sort of footng before you go and waste all your effort. Countless crusaders wear themselves ragged, in uncoordinated ad-hoc skirmishes, while a highly organised war is raged against us. Good people’s lives’ work, continually erased with the stroke of a scumbag’s solid gold pen.
Any conversation that’s about trying to radically improve the world that doesn’t start with the 0.01% is futile.
Tell that to the almost exclusively black protesters who eventually, finally got the Feds to investigate the shenanagins of the Ferguson “justice” system. Tell that to-- ugh, never mind.
Soooo, we’re part of the “white supremacy” as you put it because we only get discriminated against sometimes?
Just out of curiosity, where exactly is the cut off point? How many times do I need to be called a kike before I lose my white supremacist card? One time? Once every year? Do I need to be assaulted or do swastikas drawn outside my house count?
I only ask because over the last 3000 years, we’ve been in this situation repeatedly and for some reason it never seems to last. Some asshole always points out that we’re privileged and then they try to kill us. I’d like to know beforehand when I lose my white supremacist card so I can get out of here before they finish warming up the ovens.
“Jews the kings of passing as white”
This idea really bugs me, for several reasons, but the main one is that it’s denying that a childhood friend of mine, who’s naturally blond and blue-eyed, is also white. It seems completely insane for her to be classified as non-white, when everyone around her would see blond. It seems both insulting to her and insulting to people of a darker skintone, who would have suffered different experiences of racism.
“Jews and Jewish stories are post-WWII”
One example springs to mind that disproves this; I would bet there are more.
Whether it’s sexism, racism, specism, or any other idiocy you want to tackle, it makes the most sense to start with trying to achieve some sort of footng before you go and waste all your effort. Countless crusaders wear themselves ragged, in uncoordinated ad-hoc skirmishes, while a highly organised war is raged against us. Good people’s lives’ work, continually erased with the stroke of a scumbag’s solid gold pen.
Do you think this is a “conversation that’s about trying to radically improve the world”? It’s just a bunch of vague opinions with no real actual solution or suggestions, let alone any sort of connection to actual, specific issues that I and others have been speaking about at length.
What “countless crusaders” are you talking about? What “uncoordinated ad-hoc skirmishes” are you speaking of? Be specific.
Seriously? Perhaps if you think the most interesting, film-worthy stuff happens to people with the most privileged lives, but that is pretty clearly bullshit.
Let’s think about your gritty cop drama example, and I’ll draw on The Shield. Personally my favourite character was Julien, the mainly-in-the-closet black gay cop. Is this character likely to make up the majority of any police force? Obviously not, and if he did, his story would be boring. It is interesting precisely because so much of his story is about the challenges he faces being such a vulnerable minority in a police force highly comprised of bigoted thugs.
The same goes for film-friendly groups like lawyers, business moguls, affluent young people who can afford zany hijinks, and super heroes.
This is precisely the point @CarolineSiede is making. The stories we get are constantly being rehashed precisely because we start with such a narrow field of “what is acceptable in film”, yet when someone does something different it can clearly be a huge success: Oz, The Wire, Breaking Bad.
I am 100% comfortable in stating that @chipandre’s claim that that “it’s “fact” that most of the interesting, film-worthy stuff happens primarily to white men” is complete racist bullshitthrough and through. In an utterly offensive and “dude, it’s 2015, shut the fuck up with that racist bullshit” sort of way.
Like, really? It’s “FACT” that “most of the interesting, film-worthy stuff happens primarily to white men”?? REALLY @chipandre?? REALLY? FACT??
But I fear that by the time the Iron Man storyline plays out to War Machine taking over, etc, he might be getting too old for the part. He’s the same age as Robert Downy Jr, who’s already talking about retiring from his superhero days. I’d think they’d want an actor to take over the Iron Man role who could ride it out for at least 10-15 years.