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I don't really mention the global news context in my journaling that much. Partly because i believe i can find the context if i am ever curious. Partly because i don't have a significant need to refine my thinking. That's not because my thinking on political topics is particularly good, but more because i am mostly in a bubble of liberal thought and my primitive* articulation is satisfactory. I also have had little time for advocacy and i simply strive to keep messages to policy makers simple. There's a certain cost benefit analysis there: i need to communicate enough to ensure that the communication ticks the box of "constituent personally communicates pro/con on topic." It's somewhat different from when i was taking time to advocate for human rights in Colombia. Then i could not lean on the discourse already being established.
I tend to write when i am trying to work out how i feel about things, and so much about recent politics has been clear to me. The outstanding question for me is how i frame and understand The Others in my political world. It's tempting to generalize "The Fox News Watchers."† Surely there are racists. I have a strong impression of people who feel economically besieged and "we can't afford to help."
And i suppose i care about understanding that group because i recognize my inner, constant refrain, the excuse of "i can't afford" the time, the energy, the risk.
Work is giving me the day off on Friday to "reflect." I've posted on Facebook that i am willing to talk to people about race tomorrow (because of this gift, i can afford it). That was kinda scary.
I flew through the first few days of White Supremacy and Me. I think that working through my own experiences of male supremacy, and then my own cis privilege and cis fragility, has provided lessons that were easy to transfer to owning my white privilege and white fragility.
I am very fortunate i wasn't directly taught racism. My parents never disparaged people of color. My dad's mother, with her multicultural background, did not bring entrenched racism to his upbringing (countering what ever horrors his south Georgia upbringing could have embedded in his soul). My mother's mother was Swedish, and from understanding the class society there in the 1800s, probably brought her a whole bunch of her hang ups, but not racial hang ups. My grandfathers were problematic, and that's why my mother didn't share a room with a black woman when i was born in Alabama in 1968. But my parents first response was that it would be fine. My dad told me that story with shame in his voice.
It's with that upbringing (relatively progressive for the Carolinas, with a racially mixed subdivision, and my parents supporting me in black friendships as a small child), that my first memory of discussing race was being horrified at with a friend who was insisting "those people were lazy" and me trying to discuss opportunities denied. I don't know where i got that - perhaps my parents, perhaps the books and news magazines they chose. It was either my freshman or sophomore year of high school in South Carolina. At the same time i was naive of the horror of swastikas, and received my first education on that when friends got in trouble for their swastika graffiti far beyond the graffiti.
When i probe memories of the three years of school in South Carolina, i know that was probably where i was in large population of African Americans, in marching band with African Americans, but the memory of being teased and picked on and finding a geeky community of guys who included me (and taught me a good deal of internal misogyny, thank you so much) overwhelms.
White silence though. Well, yes. This is where i begin.
† The echo chamber is clearly not limited to Fox and a particular political point of view.Christine watched an hour of talking heads roll their eyes about Trump taking ... whatchamacallitquine. (I'll call it Q.) It was a pretty information-light hour. I think the one useful bit of content was the observation that the White House is well supplied with medical equipment and there are medical staff to supervise his health, and thus the risk for the president in taking Q is mitigated by that care which is not available to others. That was a message that could have been amplified. An hour spent rolling eyes and bemoaning the familiar problematic behavior just served to heighten emotional reaction and enforce a certain perspective. I suspect this does not compare to some of the Fox propaganda, but it was disappointing.
* Perhaps an extreme example was on first hearing about the DC military intervention and threats of further military intervention. I said "i have no words," Christine replied, "I am scared and sad." I added, "And i'm angry."
I tend to write when i am trying to work out how i feel about things, and so much about recent politics has been clear to me. The outstanding question for me is how i frame and understand The Others in my political world. It's tempting to generalize "The Fox News Watchers."† Surely there are racists. I have a strong impression of people who feel economically besieged and "we can't afford to help."
And i suppose i care about understanding that group because i recognize my inner, constant refrain, the excuse of "i can't afford" the time, the energy, the risk.
Work is giving me the day off on Friday to "reflect." I've posted on Facebook that i am willing to talk to people about race tomorrow (because of this gift, i can afford it). That was kinda scary.
I flew through the first few days of White Supremacy and Me. I think that working through my own experiences of male supremacy, and then my own cis privilege and cis fragility, has provided lessons that were easy to transfer to owning my white privilege and white fragility.
I am very fortunate i wasn't directly taught racism. My parents never disparaged people of color. My dad's mother, with her multicultural background, did not bring entrenched racism to his upbringing (countering what ever horrors his south Georgia upbringing could have embedded in his soul). My mother's mother was Swedish, and from understanding the class society there in the 1800s, probably brought her a whole bunch of her hang ups, but not racial hang ups. My grandfathers were problematic, and that's why my mother didn't share a room with a black woman when i was born in Alabama in 1968. But my parents first response was that it would be fine. My dad told me that story with shame in his voice.
It's with that upbringing (relatively progressive for the Carolinas, with a racially mixed subdivision, and my parents supporting me in black friendships as a small child), that my first memory of discussing race was being horrified at with a friend who was insisting "those people were lazy" and me trying to discuss opportunities denied. I don't know where i got that - perhaps my parents, perhaps the books and news magazines they chose. It was either my freshman or sophomore year of high school in South Carolina. At the same time i was naive of the horror of swastikas, and received my first education on that when friends got in trouble for their swastika graffiti far beyond the graffiti.
When i probe memories of the three years of school in South Carolina, i know that was probably where i was in large population of African Americans, in marching band with African Americans, but the memory of being teased and picked on and finding a geeky community of guys who included me (and taught me a good deal of internal misogyny, thank you so much) overwhelms.
White silence though. Well, yes. This is where i begin.
† The echo chamber is clearly not limited to Fox and a particular political point of view.Christine watched an hour of talking heads roll their eyes about Trump taking ... whatchamacallitquine. (I'll call it Q.) It was a pretty information-light hour. I think the one useful bit of content was the observation that the White House is well supplied with medical equipment and there are medical staff to supervise his health, and thus the risk for the president in taking Q is mitigated by that care which is not available to others. That was a message that could have been amplified. An hour spent rolling eyes and bemoaning the familiar problematic behavior just served to heighten emotional reaction and enforce a certain perspective. I suspect this does not compare to some of the Fox propaganda, but it was disappointing.
* Perhaps an extreme example was on first hearing about the DC military intervention and threats of further military intervention. I said "i have no words," Christine replied, "I am scared and sad." I added, "And i'm angry."
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I think that having had a first serious boyf from what it now Zimbabwe helped too. Especially back in the seventies. Racially mixed couples were much rarer back then.
Having blood from two minorities (Jewish and Romani) certainly does.
And, well, you know the bit about the lack of cis privilege...........
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I wonder if you would like to share answers & commentary with each other via DM or email? I am on Day 4 today so it sounds like we're approximately in the same place.
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I would love to be a person you could count on to engage with you and share. I don't think i am reliable over time nor do i think i am going to follow instructions. I would be happy to find a way to connect on the topic, but don't want to be my hangups about communication to put another flaky person in your life.
I'm wrestling with this answer because you are offering me a perfectly tuned opportunity and my flakiness (excuses! i list them in my mind) as well as my spouse's comment regarding something else (Say no, you are carrying enough) and and and....
anyhow. i send my mixedupness to you so you can see what my silence means.
Meanwhile, your comment in your newsletter about pandemic and gaslighting was illuminating for some of the distress i've had at feeling defensive about my boundaries. Christine and i talked about my mother and how it's hard for me to map her behavior to gaslighting, but she was an incredibly unreliable narrator. It amounts to the same thing in impact, which is the panic i was feeling before a good talk with Christine where she finally heard the affirmation i needed and gave it to me.
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Thanks for sharing what you're noticing about the possibility of connecting around the Me and White Supremacy work. I'm hearing that it would be an additional source of stress rather than support. How about if we leave it at knowing that we're both doing that work in our own ways, and you're welcome to reach out if the spirit moves you.
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