We all have opinions. Here’s why I don’t care about yours. (the Privilege Wars continue)

[Recursion]

http://jaythenerdkid.wordpress.com/2014/02/19/we-all-have-opinions-heres-why-i-dont-care-about-yours/

I spent four years in medical school. My professors were experts in their fields – accomplished physicians, prolific researchers, sometimes even pioneers in their areas of interest. From them, I learned the foundations of biomedical science – anatomy, physiology, histology, biochemistry – as well as the details of the various specialities of medicine. There was no question at any point that these people who had spent their lives and careers becoming experts, amassing lifetimes of experience between them, knew more about their areas of interest than I did. This is why I was the student and they were my teachers. Generally, this is how education works.

I was born non-white. I grew up non-white. Non-whiteness has been a central fixture in my life for every single day of my existence, from the day I was born and my mother’s doctor remarked that I looked “like a little monkey” to the first time someone called me a terrorist for wearing the niqab to the numerous times I’ve been told my looks are “exotic”. One could say that I’m something of an expert in the field of non-whiteness and how it shapes a person’s life and experiences. This is my life, after all. Who could possibly know more about it than me? According to the internet, the answer to this question is, “anyone with an internet connection and the means to communicate their thoughts to me.”

...

You know what I never did during pharmacology lectures? Interrupt my prof mid-slide to let her know I had “thoughts” on the pharmacodynamics of anti-epileptic medication. Do you know what I never said to my consultant during ward rounds? That I had “thoughts” on his catheterisation technique or his provisional diagnoses of complicated patients. Do you know what I never said to the lab techs who taught me histology? That I had “thoughts” on microscopy that I really, really desperately needed to interrupt them to share. That would have been foolish. That would have been ridiculous. They had years of experience, knowledge and expertise that I did not. How could I possibly contribute positively to the discussion by sharing my uneducated, uninformed “thoughts”?

...

Here is what white people are welcome to do when non-whites are discussing racism and white supremacy: sit down. Shut up. Take out a notebook. Start taking notes. Ask questions when invited to and not before. Be humble. Be quiet. Remember that while you may be the centre of your own universe, you are not the centre of mine or ours. This is my story. These are our stories. If you aren’t prepared to listen to a lecture or two without keeping your worthless thoughts to yourself, please exit the auditorium before class begins. People are trying to learn here, you know.

If your takeaway from a story is "but I want to know how to be on your side", you're still making her story about you.

[Android3.14]

1. Wow. What a counter-productive message

Essentially it says, "Shut up and let me tell you why you're a jerk." Didn't O'Reilly do something like this?
There are better ways.

[Recursion]

8. It's only counter productive if you think she wants you on her side

She doesn't need you, and from her post I assume doesn't want you, on her side. She just wants people not involved to shut up for a second.

[NuclearDem]

2. Pretty good rule to follow in any community.

[bemildred]

3. Oh good.

[KitSileya]

4. Yup, that's about it.

Doesn't matter what tone they take, or how bluntly they put it, when other minority groups talk about their experience, I think it's my privilege to listen, and to not invalidate their experience. If I, a white woman, interrupt a discussion on racism just to tell my story of how once, someone shouted "paki" at me because I had my scarf over my head on a cold day, and that means I know how it feels to be a person of color, I am not only clueless, I am being part of the problem.

Who posted that comic strip of women discussing feminism and the guys interrupting because they want to talk about the men? I don't know how ti is to be a person of color, I don't know what it is like to be a trans* person, I don't know what it is like to be non-straight, and if the experiences of people who are persons of color, trans*, non-straight, or belong to other minorities I am not must be filtered through my own experience before I believe the authenticity of what they are saying, I am an ass.

[ananda]

5. Absolutely.

Oppression works by taking up space, including dialogue and
conversational space. That's why oppressors need to shut up
and listen more.

The only people entitled to speak on and provide ideas about ending
white oppression are the oppressed.

The only people entitled to speak on and provide ideas about ending
sexism are females.

The only people entitled to speak on homophobia and an end to
gay oppression are gay people.

Everyone else really does need to just shut up, listen, and then act
accordingly.

[Android3.14]

11. And that's how slavery came to an end

Not.

[1awake]

13. I'm sorry and don't mean to be rude but

I disagree with pretty much everything you wrote. It's completely silly.

[jtuck004]

6. Ignaz Semmelweis, around 1845, was a doctor, a student of some of the best minds at the

time, people with years of experience in their fields. Physicians at that time, with much the same certainty of correctness that the author seems to claim, knew that there was nothing external, that the source of infections was inside the patients bodies. Semmelweis noticed that a higher percentage of women who had their children in their free clinic died than others outside of that environment. He began to do some experiments, including having his students wash their hands before they delivered a baby, and the death rate dropped. When he went to the learned people with his data, and a theory that there were small things that they carried on their hands, things they could not see with their eyes, between the cadavers they studied and the women whose babies they delivered, these wise and learned men told him that he had nothing to offer them either. He was run out of the profession and jailed a few years later, perhaps having gone slightly mad over the thought even with all the proof he had, they still didn't believe they were carrying the source of the infections around on their hands. He died in that prison of an infection. It would take another several years for them to realize he was correct.

Dearest author...you may not have all the answers you ever need to listen to, even with all your vast experience. If you really want to solve the problem, and not just feed your own ego, maybe it will take everyone.

[Recursion]

7. Are you actually talking about medicine before the germ theory was established?

I just want to make sure I read that correctly.

[jtuck004]

14. I just used that as an example. More about any field where the experts are so cocksure they

have all the answers that they have no need of listening to anyone else, while all around them the problems they are supposed to be such experts in don't get solved. Sometimes the problems are just ignored.

I could have used police departments and how they treat citizen input, lots of other examples.

To tell people they know nothing and you know everything is an attitude that I have found less than helpful for problem solving over the years. But, not everyone is really about solving the problem.

[MrScorpio]

9. The author gets one Damn Skippy from me

And you get another Damn Skippy for posting.

My first double Damn Skippy ever.

[Recursion]

10. I am honored. My ctl-c ctl-v skills are unmatched

Any text out there, I can damn sure copy and paste.

[MrScorpio]

12. It's the choice to post that's commended

The mechanics are secondary.

[Bluenorthwest]

15. And yet straight folks, the OP even, often do exactly that to LGBT people

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023794015



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x9014601

[Recursion]

17. You mean where I posted an Advocate article, read your response, and self-deleted?

But, yes, that's a good example.

[Bluenorthwest]

21. It is a good example. You did not 'read then self delete' I was about the 5th

person to point out the problem, and your reaction was this:
"Are my views so important and informed that they make you furious?"
Listening? Or telling? Telling or demanding? Respecting or condescending?
Characterized me as 'furious' for daring to question your lecture about LGBT history.

Did you look at the second link, actually locked as flame bait? Both threads are examples of straight folks doing to LGBT people exactly what this OP criticizes.
I could find hundreds of such posts on DU.
Do unto others. That's step one. Damn Skippy.

[Nuclear Unicorn]

16. Damned if you don't speak-up. Damned if you do.

Here is what white people are welcome to do when non-whites are discussing racism and white supremacy: sit down. Shut up. Take out a notebook. Start taking notes. Ask questions when invited to and not before. Be humble. Be quiet. Remember that while you may be the centre of your own universe, you are not the centre of mine or ours. This is my story. These are our stories. If you aren’t prepared to listen to a lecture or two without keeping your worthless thoughts to yourself, please exit the auditorium before class begins. People are trying to learn here, you know.

I doubt this demand was made of the white president that sent federal troops confront the governor of Arkansas, the predominantly white congress that passed the CRA or the all white Warren court that unanimously rendered Brown v Board of Education.

I understand there is pain. I understand I cannot relate to every type of pain this world seems so prepared to inflict but what I cannot understand is the idea that demeaning tones and antagonistic attitudes will do anything other than propagate the pains that diminish us all.

How is this OP any different from telling whites, "Yeah, legally I think you have the same rights as me but when you're in my space you're going to have to sit in the back of the bus." I know I'm white and don't have permission to speak but I thought the boycott was to allow us all to sit together, not to merely change seats.

As a woman I am confronted by things that men -- even non-white men -- cannot possibly understand. That doesn't make my issues more profound or meaningful but the last thing I want to do is alienate those who can make contributions. I invite men to be a part of the discussion because at the end of the day all of us sharing the same space equally is what I'm striving for.

The OP saddens me.

[deutsey]

19. +1

[Inkfreak]

18. Nope. I won't sit & shut up during anything.

I'm capable of discussing any subject thru questions & comments. And that doesn't mean I won't come away with a better understanding of the discussed topic. I believe it's a bad analogy anyways. I'm not ignorant of the facts when it comes to America & black people. Unlike a freshman student is to a college course.

This is just the viewpoint of an individual who believes they must have the one & only word. I suggest that's the best way to alienate people.

What if Allen West was the individual who was telling me to sit down& shut up? Think his views on race are different? I do.

[greytdemocrat]

20. And I don't care much for his.

Arrogant jerk.

[Adrahil]

22. I HATE this title....

... and frankly, anyone who rejects my opinion out of hand should not look for my support.

[treestar]

23. That's not going to convince anybody

that needs convincing. True it's hard to get through to people who won't listen. But that's not going to work to get them to listen.

[leftyohiolib]

24. sounds like priviledge to me. sit down shut up and bask in my self-importence

[Separation]

25. Meh

Join the military. Where we all get treated like shit, and continued to be shat upon after we get out. Regardless of creed or color.

[Smarmie Doofus]

26. Good god. How idiotic. n/t