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Showing results for tags 'white'.
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Dear reader, I used to think like you at one point, and I have to say it takes maturity, putting yourself in another person's shoes and actually being willing to own up to the privilege that you have for you to be able to acknowledge what they're saying is correct. Until that point, nothing I say will ever make a difference, and you will remain wrapped up in your childish haughtiness and scoffing, condescending remarks. You're too focused on yourself - you feel victimised, you feel targeted, you are offended, you aren't being catered to. You're not even considering anyone else, you're focusing on your own feelings of discomfort. (The same discomfort PoC have to face their entire lives.) The funny thing is, though you mock it, white men are privileged above everyone else. You hold the power. You have the say. You are the voice that is listened to. You always have been. The world caters specifically to you. You are the ones in control. I, too, have privilege as a white person over PoC. (And I believe the "white person killing a black person vs. vice versa" comment is likely referring to the highly controversial George Zimmerman case, which actually proves the point the OP in that post is making.) Why would I want to justify racism towards whites? I am white. You - and millions like you - are operating under the fundamental misunderstanding that things are equal. They are not. PoC experience racism and discrimination on a regular basis in a way they we don't see or experience, because society benefits us as white people. Our experiences cannot compare. We are not victims of racial profiling. We are not turned down jobs or opportunities or homes because of the color of our skin. We are not victims of ludicrous stereotypes that cause people to judge us wrongly or mock our culture. We haven't been victims of hate crimes. We are not subject to words and terms that dehumanise us. We do not have centuries of systematic oppression and abuse behind us. It was not us who less than a 100 years ago were seen as less than secondary citizens. We are never made to feel "not good enough" because of our skin. The media, fashion, marketing and what is considered beautiful, caters to us - white women, white men. We are the ones represented in films, music, books. We see ourselves everywhere. We never feel like we aren't included or do not belong anywhere (this is also why "white people" societies at university are ridiculous ideas at best.) We do not get to decide what no longer matters in racism, what is irrelevant and what is and is not racist. When we're insulted, it is not a throwback to decades of abuse and discrimination. It is at best a personal attack that briefly offends us and highlights, for a moment, our race - something that happens to PoC most days - and we feel it constitutes "racism" the same as what PoC suffer from. That is wrong. Other cultures do not have our history of invasion, of dominating other cultures and appropriating them, of slavery and imperialism. It is white people behind most of the damage done to other parts of the world, and it was primarily white men who did the damage - obviously due to women's roles in society at the time - hence why they say "white men." It is the truth, and no one is going to apologise if that makes you feel uncomfortable. They are not going to be polite and hospitable to someone who talks to them so patronizingly and ignores hundreds of years of oppression and racism to make themselves feel better, and preaches their ignorant perception of "equality" when we're not even there yet.