This isn’t a thread about African Americans and “Hispanos.”
Besides, white notions of superiority arose relationally independent of whatever any particular group was actually like (that whatever being the same amount of heterogeneity as exists among the members of any other group).
I’m not sure I understand your answer. My question was about your assertion that repressing feelings was a middle class white problem tied to the perceived superiority of “keeping it together” I have personally encountered this same concept well outside white people or middle class people so I am trying to get more information about your assertion as it does not mesh up with my experience. You sound like you know more about this phenomenon than I do, so I ask.
Okay, so what is it again you’re asking about white culture?
I am wondering how you came to see this phenomenon as a white problem? Unless you are merely stating a problem that many white people have as opposed to one predominantly experinced by them relative to other races.
By reading and thinking about the history of white supremacy, and by observing its lingering effects in the behavior of many white people today, especially middle class ones. There’s also a parallel phenomenon in terms of social class, as I alluded to above, and of gender (with men long assuming women are less able to control themselves emotionally).
A presumption of say, black lack of emotional control remains common among white people. One result is a common black perception of a need to maintain “composure” in predominantly white settings, lest one trigger white racism of this sort. That racist white presumption of a black lack of emotional control has a less conscious, less spoken flipside, right? That of a presumption of more ability among white people to control their emotions.
Which leads to another powerfully racist phenomenon: White Woman’s Tears. For those unaware, it’s when a white woman says something insensitive or outright racist, a POC calls them out on it, the white woman starts crying and the POC gets attacked for “attacking” the WW. Because obviously if it was enough to make a WW cry, it must have been brutal.
I hate this phenomenon, because I cry for multiple reasons. One could be because I am shocked, embarrassed and ashamed that I inadvertently hurt someone. Then there’s the added guilt that now my being upset at myself is going to be used to punish someone innocent. I also hate it, because it does get weaponized by some WW. It punishes WW who cry without ulterior motives and forces us to try (often unsuccessfully) to hide them, and worse, it is used to attack and silence POC who try to stand up to racism.
It’s a privilege and a prison. My tears are given a priority over those of others (a Black woman brought to tears doesn’t get sympathy, she’s just put in her place), but it means that unless I want to be prioritized that way, I can’t have a human reaction. It’s still the better position to be in, I just wish it didn’t exist at all.
I have never heard of this hypothesis. I am personally familiar with “showing emotion is a weakness” but I have always seen it as a Male/Female element of machismo and have never observed it as a function of race or class. I will have to clear that presumption and see if I observe this in my interactions with others.
The concept of the stiff upper lip is heavily embedded in the British class system.
That lip (along with Keep Calm etc.) came to mind for me too after writing above. In addition to the class element, I wonder if the racism inherent to colonialism is also a contributing factor.
Not just the British class system… consider Japan, for instance. And a lot of old school Chinese were brought up to keep their feelings on the downlow. There’s even a movie out called Tigertail on Netflix that speaks to this, among many experiences.
I remember reading Roald Dahl’s childhood memoir “Boy” and his description of English public (private) schools and the bullying system of “fags” where a junior would be made a servant of a senior until he took that role himself made me see them as the training schools for colonialism. That is institutional and militarily enforced racism.
You had to stoicly accep being a toilet warmer and all sorts of abuse but you got to take it out on others.
I often connect Roger Casement to these thoughts but that’s probably a derailment.
Yes, hetero machismo clearly feeds into racist abuse, and vice versa. It’s all “intersectionally” intertwined.
Wear masks, everybody!
I guess not like that.
Why? He’s 100% right!
Thread:
I also think part of the problem is that the racism/white supremacy is so deeply ingrained and like water to a fish that it’s hard for some people to twig to what they are being called out for (this is not an excuse). It takes a conscious effort not to fall into some of the patterns, for those of us brought up within that system. But there is and will forever be (until we can get rid of the entire white supremacy/patriarchal structure) a class of people who will not do the work.
