Where were you when DU blew the lid off the "white privilege" subterfuge?

[11 Bravo]

Like the Kennedy assassination and the Challenger explosion, will you always remember your whereabouts during that fateful February week when a few intrepid internet truth-seekers exposed, for the first time ever, the long-hidden secret that white people ... from asshole slave-owners, to modern asshole redneck shitheads, to well-meaning white assholes eager to explain to African-Americans the real meaning of their struggle ... have always had a leg up in American society?

Was I the only one who already knew about it? Maybe it was my parents pulling me out of my segregated local Virginia elementary school and Mom driving me to the integrated school across town. And then doing the same thing when Dad was stationed in Jacksonville, Florida ... and then in Corpus Christie, Texas ... and even (thank GOD briefly) Biloxi fucking Mississippi. But I grew up knowing that being white didn't suck in America.

Of course, maybe if the internet had been around back then (late 50's, early 60's) they would have shared a bunch of self-aggrandizing "look how tolerant we white folks can be" blog posts. But Dad was a Navy fighter pilot (they kept him kind of busy back then) and Mom preferred to do shit rather than talk about it, so maybe not.

[Sheldon Cooper]

1. This should go well...

[upaloopa]

2. Wait are you saying you where aware of your privilege

at an early age? If so I have found my evidence you!

[LostOne4Ever]

3. Anyone got some butter?

I need some to go along with this popcorn:

[upaloopa]

5. No problem just put all those one trick pony

priveledge folks on ignore. Makes your stay here better.

[seattledo]

35. What does popcorn have to do with anything? (ntxt)

[LostOne4Ever]

62. Assuming you are be genuinely curious and not sarcastic

Popcorn is a type of internet slang.

It is used as a way of saying that the comment the person is replying to is flamebait; and rather than respond myself, I have decided to just enjoy myself watching that poster and others spar in a verbal war.



It alludes to the cultural tradition of eating popcorn while watching a movie (or in this case an upcoming flamewar). The following smilely references this:

[In_The_Wind]

4. I was having coffee with DU.

[img][/img]

[Captain Stern]

6. Looks like "white privilege" is the current DU 'soup du jour'.

Not enough topics about it, I guess. Oh well, the more the merrier.

[Eleanors38]

42. Take a number, get in line.

[Scootaloo]

77. Well, when so many Du'ers make a point of denying its existence...

Often the same peopel who kept their nose in Zimmerman's underpants, and have been busy telling women to shut hte fuck up and make a sandwich already...

Some things might need to be discussed, because it's becoming evident to some of us that DU is losing that liberal shine and is just a few dudebro videos shy of being the backwater of youtube.

[Captain Stern]

81. I understand the need to discuss..but do we really need so many threads about it?

Why can't the discussion take place in one thread?

I don't deny the existence of the thing that we are calling 'white privilege'. I'm white, male, straight, and born in the usa.....I don't deny for a second that my life has been easier than otherwise because of that. The only way that it could have been easier would have been if I'd been born to rich parents. So, I guess that's 'white privilege', 'male privilege', 'straight privilege', and 'geographic privilege'. I suppose that the only thing that I object to about the term is that by saying 'privilege', we are implying that white people are getting something special that's above and beyond expected treatment. How white people are treated vs how minorities are treated shouldn't be considered special....it should be how everyone is treated.

[bettyellen]

7. "Mom preferred to do shit rather than talk about it" are you implying that....

you take after Dad, with all the yakking you do around here?

[11 Bravo]

15. Well, you've been here for fewer years and have WAY more posts, so ...

whatever melts your butter.

I'm an old man, now. I've been to war and afterwards went to teaching, 40 years now.

Of course, your posts have all been cogent and well-reasoned bits of civil discourse, while I just "yak". So ... I guess you've got that going for you.

[bettyellen]

17. it melted your butter to make fun of posting here- and conversations liberals have. and you get

snide when I made fun of you back? sort of bad form, no?

[Comrade Grumpy]

8. I was shocked, shocked, I tell you, to read of this phenomenon.

Thank goodness we have a whole brigade here ready to enlighten us about it.

[liberalmuse]

9. Well, there are apparently some people here,

in the vast minority amongst the liberal ilk, and in the majority amongst the conservative ilk, who are offended at the very notion that they have had more privileges simply because they are melanin deficient. But there it is in a nutshell. Being melanin deficient has been the equivalent of winning the lottery for thousands of years. That is a fact, and poor ol' white males who take offense at that need to pull their heads out of their asses. One tiny example: If you are a person of color driving an expensive car, and a person of much less color driving a clunker, guess who is more likely to be pulled over?

[11 Bravo]

18. And that was my point. A few grumpy misanthropes posted shit poking ...

at a few rec-seeking attention junkies, and here we are. NO ONE on this forum seriously denies the fact that white people have always had a HUGE head start in this culture. Some, however, appear to need to begin a NEW DU slugfest after the last one mercifully tapered out.

[redqueen]

20. Nice that you're so tolerant of race-baiting "grumpy misanthropes".

You seem to not have a problem with them, and instead direct all your... whateverthefuck this is... at those who do not take kindly to such posters (whom you adorably label "rec-seeking attention junkies" simply for not sharing your tolerance for race-baiting assholery.)

I wonder why that is.

[11 Bravo]

22. And so it begins. I refer to the deniers as "grumpy misanthropes" and you ...

without missing a beat, tell me that I'm adorably (nice touch, that) "tolerant" and ""don't have a problem" with them.
No doubt the pile-on will commence as soon as the word gets spread.

[redqueen]

24. Nobody forced you to throw your hat into this ring.

You decided all on your own to start a whole new thread, and you decided which group should be tolerable and which ones should be encouraged via mockery to STFU.

[11 Bravo]

26. Fuck me with a rusty rake. Did you just say "Nobody forced you to throw your hat into this ring" ...

and then accuse me of encouraging someone to STFU?

The next time you visit your physician, ask for irony supplements.

[oldhippie]

45. Yep, she said that .......

....

[redqueen]

58. Did you somehow interpret that to mean that I was saying that you shouldn't speak up?

On the contrary, I think it's very good for everyone to make it plain where their sympathies lie.

I was referring to your martyriffic "and so it begins" verbage, and your "who me?" act with respect to the sentiment clearly expressed in your OP.

Throwing in the word "asshole" isn't quite the cover you seem to think it is. One group is well meaning, the other you assert are lazy blowhards just looking for recs. Most of your post was just talking about how much better your parents were than anyone here who isn't as tolerant as you are of those gosh-darned well-meaning assholes.

You tipped your hand.

[11 Bravo]

73. Is that really the best you can do?

The tried and true "I know what you meant even if you didn't actually say it" bullshit is more than stupid. It's been employed to the point of being flat-out fucking insipid.
As for your gratuitous and dishonest reference to my parents, I almost responded in the manner which you were attempting to provoke, thereby earning a hide and giving you a nice giggle. But I decided not to give someone who is neither as smart nor as significant as they think they are that satisfaction.
Finally, no one ever said that you are a well-meaning asshole. Unlike you, I won't pretend to decipher the motives of anonymous internet posters. As for the rest of it ... well ... I'll leave that for you to continue to reveal.

You can have the last word ... no doubt something as equally predictable as your ordinary screeds.

[msanthrope]

65. Hey!!! Oh...you wrote 'misanthropes.' I can live with that. nt

[kwassa]

10. I was breast-feeding my pitbull at Olive Garden ...

as I am male, this was not easy.

[Skittles]

34. SCHEDULING KWASSA FOR ASS KICKING

*EGREGIOUS*

[kwassa]

36. I swear I will never ever do it again!!!!???!!!

not a Skittles ass-kicking!

[mzteris]

57. But were you

Eating cornflake fried chicken while smoking?

[kwassa]

70. No, the pitbull was, though.

[sufrommich]

11. I was making lunch,posting on DU and watching

The Golden Girls.

[Skittles]

12. you were an officer's kid?

you were doubly-privileged

[11 Bravo]

30. You betcha! He was a JG with tower duty the night I was born in a dispensary Quonset hut.

That's some serious fucking privilege right there!

[Skittles]

32. my dad was a two striper working three jobs

yes INDEED

[Pretzel_Warrior]

13. I am rec #5 woohoo! speaking of woo

some of the craziest serial threads I've seen in the past few months:

Porn
Woo (for and agin)
Gender Wars Parts 1, 2, 3 and the prequels
White Privilege

[geek tragedy]

14. asdf

http://www.pollingreport.com/race.htm

Per the CBS poll, 53% of white people think the criminal justice system is at least as fair to black people as it is to white people, and 67% think black people have just as good a chance of getting ahead in society as do white people.

[nomorenomore08]

51. Again, a whole lot of people just cannot see past their own fucking nose.

God knows white folks' advantages in society must be deserved, what with them being naturally superior with bigger brains and all...



One post on FR I saw years ago, which I found astonishing even for that cesspit: "White privilege = bigger brain, higher IQ." Speaking as a white person myself, that was probably one of the best arguments for "killing Whitey" I've ever seen in my life. Hell, I wanted to strangle the dude myself!

[geek tragedy]

59. Ironically his existence disproves his thesis. nt

[hootinholler]

67. What does the DU member tab in that poll look like?

Oh, wait, do they have a DU member cross tab?

[The Straight Story]

16. I keep learning we are all racists and misogynists around here

Lessons I have learned on DU - we all like whacking off to pics of women on magazine covers, we also hate women and want to keep them down, we don't like anyone who isn't white, we will spend a huge amount of time telling people that they are privileged and asking them to just acknowledge it with no input or you don't think you are and you have to be educated over and over.

Meanwhile the rich are getting away with whatever they want, Ukraine is destabilizing, women and girls in places from Afghanistan to Uganda are facing death and massive oppression, the poor and homeless are getting screwed over, children are laboring for pennies to provide us with things we just throw away and the biggest rage on a politics board is the board itself and how people won't run around waving their arms saying 'I am privileged and I know it' loud enough.

For some there is only one issue to hammer on and it is how fellow du'ers don't agree 100% with them and their take and level of outrage on an issue.

[idendoit]

25. Speak for yourself.

[KoKo]

50. I don't ever get into this stuff on here....but...

I think what you say deserves discussion. But we know there won't be any reasonable discussion. imho..you deserve to be heard because you make points about how people can tar everyone with the same brush for some political agenda and it's gotten really OTT here. I think it makes this site a place where people don't feel welcome. And that shouldn't be what a Democratic website is about.

Just saying.. K&R

[The Straight Story]

54. I think we can agree

That it has become a tad over the top.

Today I was setting up a radio interview with the Office of Refugee Resettlement (to help kick off the new radio show, part of which happens tomorrow morning with a live show on location - I won't be there because I don't feel up to the trip, have a cold) and perusing a variety of web sites and it just sort of struck me....

Du seems to be focused inward and we are battling each other over things we really do agree on but we don't always agree about how to agree on them. Issues, like human trafficking, we also agree on but discussions on that would either be wholly ignored (which, using the measuring stick some put forth means you are for it) or would derail into a subset of the issue covering a very narrow slice of it. It would get one thread, a few replies if one was lucky.

Now, I will admit, I DO understand that because people can't simply reply to every thread, in some they feel powerless to do anything about a subject and so don't comment on it, or they have just have areas they focus on and they do care but use their time and resources elsewhere.

But it makes me wonder when I see us all, and I include myself, trying to elucidate our points on a subject (thread after thread) which, in the end, revolves simply around pleasing a few here when it comes to how something is discussed. We all agree there is racism, sexism, that some folks are more privileged than others (in a variety of ways for a variety of reasons) but some folks just want to keep hammering home a single point (and, again, that whole point is how others either talk about the subject or aren't upset and showing as much outrage as they should be).

No solutions are offered, just complaining about each other and trying to one up each other to see who is the most liberal on du.

[nomorenomore08]

52. Whereas I tend to think that some have taken certain generalized statements far too personally

to the point of building them up into giant strawmen...

[The Straight Story]

55. Whereas I think some people just like finding ways to be outraged

and read into replies on a topic things which are not there.

I think also a few really miss META.

[nomorenomore08]

56. Possible as well. The two certainly aren't mutually exclusive. n/t

[Waiting For Everyman]

19. I think that every one of those brave callouts deserves a medal.

I can't think of anything more courageous than a self-congratulatory callout of people who already agree on the basics of an issue.

It's a mystery why the media didn't cover such an important event, but it should have.

[1awake]

21. Me..I? Sitting right here

in my extremely uncomfortable chair that's as hard as a brick but will do because...well, I need to worry about buying other things right now, like food for tomorrow.

I learned this week that even though I have said I believe in white privilege ohhh... about 35 times so far, apparently I still don't because Im either uneducated on the subject, or disagreeing on a point that has nothing to do with it existing or not, means I really don't believe. I also learned that if you refuse to read or acknowledge what someone says, you can pretty much post anything and make believe that's whats being debated. Seems to work wonders for some.

I've learned that you can care about another person/poster and make nice... until they don't fully agree with you then they are scum and it's fair game to belittle them as well as make ignorant comments about them. It works best when you get another equally dickish poster to go back and forth making fun of them for simple amusement to shut them up. It appears also a good thing to state minorities should be directing a conversation... until a minority who doesnt agree with you speaks up and then they to need to stfu.

I've also learned that calling someone out for failing to do what they stated, is perfectly fine and required by any thinking Democrat... unless it's a Democrat in question, then stfu because you know, that's what we do.

Lastly, I learned that spreading understanding and changing negative things is great but comes second to looking good and being perceived to be valiantly fighting a cause.

[Autumn]

43. Damn good summation. I have ignored these and just started

reading these threads because of a couple of jury calls. What you said is what I have seen which leads me to believe some very vocal people don't want to talk, they want to argue and attack.

[rrneck]

23. When I knew about it or when I saw direct evidence of it?

We had an orchard and we sold peaches right off the front porch. It was always a madhouse where customer service wasn't much different from a floor show. I didn't wait on customers so much as work the crowd. One day, in a sea of retired white women clamoring for the ripest prettiest fruit, a black man sat on the porch trying to stay out of the way. Elbows on knees, eyes down, he simply sat and waited for his turn in silence.

I usually had a waiting list that stretched into the low double digits. Every change in customer resulted in a bit of a rush from those who thought they were next, or thought they should be. When his turn came up, trailing a small cluster of pushy Cadillac driving retirees, I went and found him. I looked at the rest of the bunch and said, "This man's next." There was no noticeable chagrin from the crowd.

He thanked me later. I told him he was welcome but I figured his money was just as green as anybody elses. He grinned and said, "damn straight". He came back for fruit for years after that.

The question of course is where did class privilege end and white privilege begin?

[Blue_Roses]

75. great point...

I like your post! I am writing a story about a pear orchard and it's along these lines. Would love to ask you a few questions about your peach orchard if you don't mind.

[rrneck]

79. Sure. pm if you like.

[Bok_Tukalo]

27. Epic

I love it when little bits if the Internet become performance art pieces.

[Niceguy1]

28. another thread on this topic

Kind of like the scene in Forrest Gump where he says all of the ways you can cook shrimp. ...lol

[Flying Squirrel]

29. I think it started with this OP

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024531063

which seemed to just materialize out of nowhere.

[Doctor_J]

41. hof, and that poster in particular paint with broad brushes

Their sanctimony and mutual admiration are unhealthy.

[petronius]

31. Apparently I was right there on DU, right there when it happened

And ever since that watershed moment I've been hoping that just one more glass of wine will enable me to understand what the heck is going on. Pencils? Snow? Not sure I've ever been quite this far behind the DU curve. But maybe one more glass will provide the mental lubricant I need...

[Blue_Tires]

33. Which Va. county did you grow up in?

Last edited Sun Mar 2, 2014, 12:57 AM - Edit history (1)

Just curious...

And to answer your question, it was during the Trayvon Martin case...

When that many people on a supposed Democratic message board were making excuses to justify/ignore racial profiling, it's time for a refresher course...

[edbermac]

37. I wasn't aware of it, I'm too busy reading the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue.

[badtoworse]

38. Yawn You've added very little to the debate.

[quinnox]

39. This has been a momentous and landmark achievement by an enlightened group, made up of pillars of

humanity at its most perfect. That they have deigned to educate Duers with their flawless wisdom, and grace us with their superior, august presence is an amazing gift, indeed. A nomination for the Nobel Peace Prize for a certain sub-group of these enlightened educators, along with the Congressional Gold Medal is clearly called for.

[The Straight Story]

44. A coin with some white privileged guy on them?

[quinnox]

47. oh man, you are right, whoops!

[Doctor_J]

40. I'm getting tired of the subject completely taking over gd

Jesus Christ people, we get it.

[dionysus]

46. just saying *that* will probably get people on your ass calling you an enabler of evils....

shit, I've people claim they've remember what I've said in threads I've never posted in...

[Eleanors38]

49. Well, you... You were Thinking about it!

[Eleanors38]

48. Yeah, even gunz has to take a #.

[dionysus]

53. doesn't have to! what do you think about pre- '64 Winchester 1894 models versus post '64?

[Eleanors38]

60. Well, pre-64s have superior fit; I can see light shining

through the gaping let-in on my 72 edition. Otherwise, it's a $175 rifle which shoots reliably with fair accuracy. But the blueing sucked. That's past-tense cause it isn't there anymore. Win couldn't get their early computers to work nearly as well as Rem's tape-drives, either.

Pretty much any pre-64 Win rifle sells for a lot more than post-.

[dionysus]

61. i read that after 64, some internal parts went from machined to stamped, therefore the pre 64 are of

better quality, and value.

[Eleanors38]

64. Yeah, heard that, too. The action on mine is quite smooth, however.

[dionysus]

74. i got a steal on mine... i found a website where you can type in the serial number and get an

approximate date of manufacture.

all the old 94s at the store were marked as pre 64 and carried a premium price. however, the one I found, despite being made around 1950, was only marked as being tapped for a scope, not pre 64... so I snapped it up cheap. works great

[Eleanors38]

82. I passed on a Savage M 99 lever in .243 w/ cheap scope --

$190. Should have gotten that one. The pawn shop I visit never has more than 1/2 doz guns, but always has a good one, cheap. Got my present Rem 700 in .270, w/ a big scope from the same store. No crap sold here.

[dionysus]

83. the Kittery Trading Post in Maine is a great place for all things outdoors.

[Fumesucker]

63. The most interesting aspect is how quickly we went from "objectification" to "white privilege"

What seemed to be the triggering event was the web cam spying revelations, in which threads none of the loudest "objectification" posters appeared to voice an opinion despite the obvious sexual objectification implications of web cam spying.

[KG]

66. I 'object' to 'objectification' of 'white privilege'

[Romulox]

68. Excellent spot. NSA spying, drone killing, increasing inequality, for-profit prisons?

They're not interested.

[Doctor_J]

69. They're one-issue voters, which causes a problem at times

given a choice between a DINO with ovaries (HRC) and liberal with a y-chromosome, they will generally choose "right".

[Fumesucker]

72. I've watched the damn Republicans play that to the right flank march trick enough to recognize it

Where they all pivot like a well lubricated machine from one set of talking points to the next when the first set becomes inconvenient for some reason.

At this point you could just about make it an Olympic event, synchronized spinning.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

71. at work for most of it. thank gawd.

[CTyankee]

76. Just working with my usual Dems...

we know all about white privilege, thank you very much. don't need you. never did. we know all about and you should also.

[11 Bravo]

80. Umm .. OK. Anything in my OP that led you to believe that I don't recognize white privilege?

My only point is that the requisite group of back-slappers here didn't just discover it this week.
I'm crushed to that hear you don't need me. And "never did" really stings, but I'll try to soldier on.
Now please tell me, am I still allowed to play your "Name the classic piece of art" game? I'm not good at it, but I always enjoy it.

[usa liberal]

78. lol wut

was the lid truly blown?

is there a source on this amazing instance?