Gawker: Fifty Years After the March, White People Are Still a Disgrace

[M0rpheus]

Last edited Thu Aug 29, 2013, 09:19 PM - Edit history (1)

While written by a non-POC, it's a pretty good read.

I found this paragraph spot on...

What white people fear, at bottom, is retribution. This is why discussion of actual injustice is supposed to be off-limits. Despite the glorious principles spelled out 50 years ago on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, they lack a functioning concept of justice. To admit the harms of the past is to invite payback. When Andrew Breitbart raised a race panic over Shirley Sherrod, the real issue was that he and his followers were incapable of understanding Sherrod's story of transcending racial resentment. They were too trapped by rage and paranoia to get the point

There will be the usual sparks if this makes it to GD...

http://gawker.com/fifty-years-after-the-march-white-people-are-still-a-d-1216851674

ETA: Apologies... didn't include the stupid link!

[Niceguy1]

1. I will take the bait

Personally I wasn't alivr back then and don't have responsability for past injustices... why fear retribution when there shouldn't be any?

[M0rpheus]

3. Didn't post this in GD, so this is not bait.

Did you read the article? Do you disagree with the points of the article?

If not, read it and get back to me. If you have... DISCUSS it. Don't drop the BS bomb of "that was my ancestors, I'm totally innocent in this".

While you aren't responsible for the past, you could lend a hand in the present rather than ignore a problem that some of us live with daily.

[Niceguy1]

4. I do lend a hand...

But I dispute the paragraph that you cited in your op. I have always been the defender of the underdog....

[M0rpheus]

5. Did you read the article?

It consists of many more paragraphs than the one I posted.

[M0rpheus]

6. And now that I've included the link...

it'll probably be easier to find.

[JustAnotherGen]

8. Are you certain of that?

You can't see continued dehumanization of black women (sexual objects, can't be raped, etc. etc.) and how Miley Cyrus did that . . .

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3548179


Here's a good book for you to read:

http://www.amazon.com/Sister-Citizen-Shame-Stereotypes-America/dp/0300165412

My husband read my copy and now he really sees things as they are. As a white man married to a black woman - he 'felt' some of it. . . but if you really want to be a champion of the underdog -

You'll take a moment - a week - read something that expands your worldview so perhaps you can understand why she might as well have plastered shoe polish on her face and thrown a bandana on and played mammy - it would have been less 'sexually offensive' as that stereotype to 'those who need the vapors' than the 'Jezebel' stereotype.

Here that 'Jezebel' is played out by a politician that got his ass whooped by a gulp - a disable female war vet.
http://wonkette.com/526953/deadbeat-dad-joe-walsh-rewrites-i-have-a-dream-speech-to-count-the-ways-black-people-suck

I have a dream that young unmarried black women will say “no” to young black men who want to have sex.
Stop being sluts, young unmarried black women. Please? For Joe?

[freshwest]

15. OMG, I couldn't finish that.

[JustAnotherGen]

2. That was interesting read

And the inability to understand how she could transcend that is indeed - quite telling.

In the past few weeks I've even read here at DU that President Obama was to blame for that. He wasn't. Breitbart was.

[M0rpheus]

7. Telling indeed.

The lengths they went through to turn it into the exact opposite of what she said.
Throws a wrench into the black race-hustler meme, every time it happens. These days though, no one ever gets past the soundbite for the real story. That's how they get away with it so often.

[Number23]

10. Obama is to blame for everything and MLK himself would be terribly ashamed of him

So I've read on DU many, many, MANY times. And by many of the same folks that have the most embarrassingly moronic view of MLK and the civil rights movement and American history themselves.

[JustAnotherGen]

11. +1

He does appear to be constantly cast as the Who who did it.

[JI7]

13. yeah, they know MLK ,

on the 50th anniversay of the dream speech DU was lacking in many threads and posts about it.

there have been more threads comparing Snowden to King and Rosa Parks than there were threads about MLK and civil rights during the anniversary.

a few posted about how the dream speech is famous but their favorite is where he was critical of war.

even when someone posted a positive threads about Carter Clinton and Obama being together someone decided to start some thread with some old pic with Obama and the former presidents with Carter standing apart and trying to make something out of it. i guess they coudln't stand even a few positive posts about Dem presidents together.

[Number23]

9. Love it!!!

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

When white people cite this passage, they tend to replace "my four little children" with something generic—"people," for instance. The specific facts of 1963, of a caste of children born in a society that intentionally excluded them from opportunity, give way to an ahistoric (and therefore pointless) idealism. America is about how everybody is treated the same. Equality is replaced with equivalence.

Oh my God. I'm sure this will go down like a lead balloon around here.

This place, that SOO loves to whitewash, distort and minimize who and what MLK really was, will not get or appreciate this piece. I'm willing to bet the farm on that.

[JustAnotherGen]

12. Ahem

And his four little children were black - right? . Pretty soon they are going to say - No! He adopted them from Sweden!

[politicasista]

14. +1

Spot-on.

[Number23]

17. Hey! Nice to see you in here!

I didn't know if you were still on DU! (Not that I blame ANYONE for leaving this Hall of Idiocy)

[politicasista]

18. Yep. Still here

After wanting to leave, but lurking posting every now and then.

[OneGrassRoot]

16. Excellent piece. Thanks. K&R n/t

[LittleBlue]

19. "Because white people ruin everything"

Erm... what?

I made it halfway through that article. Too hateful for me.

[M0rpheus]

20. It's intended to provoke, but it's far from hateful...

However the comments/articles he highlights are.

Pulitzer Prize winner Kathleen Parker, of the Washington Post, offered the standard white take on history last week, in her column about how black people are prone to rioting and how President Obama was irresponsible to rile them up about the Trayvon Martin case:

"How sad, as we approach the 50th anniversary of the march Martin Luther King Jr. led on Washington, that even the president resorts to judging not by the content of one's character but by the color of his skin—the antithesis of the great dream King articulated."

Snip..

Yet white people are still afraid: of young men in hoodies; of being blamed for their fear of young men in hoodies. Of reverse racism. Of armies of fake voters, bent on electing white-hating militants. Of sharia law. Of mild ethnic putdowns. Of the New Black Panther Party. Of one tiny and absurd thing after the next.

This may not be the most PC of articles, but it adequately expresses the anger I feel. I'm tired of having the "conversations" co-opted, and reversed to put down black Americans. I don't need to be told to pull my pants up, or not to riot, I'm a grown man with grandchildren. And most of all, I'm tired most of all of watching my television and having a bunch of people that have no experience in the topic trying to dictate what I should and should not feel. These are the people that should be listening to what WE say for a change.

I posted it here, because this is where it belongs. While my opinions on this article may not fit for other members of this group, there is some understanding of why I posted it. Had I posted it in GD, I'm sure it would have been heart-breakingly epic, but I'm not trying to incite yet another DU war.

Try reading again, and skip past the rhetoric. If you don't/can't... well that's just fine too.

Now... Hateful is what I see in any comments section of any article with a remote connection to a person of color; I read them anyway. There's no value in hiding from the reality you live in.

Thin skin... If I had it, I'd have died 35 years ago.

[JustAnotherGen]

21. +1

Remember - sometimes the mirror is a harsh place to look.

The article is no more hateful than the idiots at DU who truly want to believe MLK was not a black man first.

[M0rpheus]

22. Oh, I'm well aware.

Here on DU, and even moreso in my real life, I struggle with the tone of my statements.
I'm hesitant to say what I really feel, because I would hurt a lot of feelings. As I get older, I'm finding that I care less how people take my statements.

I'm gonna be holding up that mirror a lot more. If people can't deal with it, well... tough.

[MADem]

37. "I don't LIKE your TONE.....!"

....is code for "I don't like the messy, uncomfortable, bitter TRUTH of what you are SAYING!!!!" in many, many instances!

[M0rpheus]

48. What's truly sad, is that I have all but given in to exactly that.

It's really quite tiring to make a point while self-censoring, for fear that the point will be missed.

This whole thing is a reminder of why I lurk much more than I post.

[Number23]

24. And THIS is why you are one of my absolute faves

The article is no more hateful than the idiots at DU who truly want to believe MLK was not a black man first.

[Number23]

23. Wow. Perfectly said, Morpheus

[M0rpheus]

31. Filtered rage...

That's all it was...

I think we may need to get a fainting couch installed in this place, If I keep finding provocative stuff to post.

[JustAnotherGen]

25. You didn't read it

With an open mind. It's that simple. I'm sorry - but you read it with the approach of:

They aren't right. That's not me. So I cover my eyes and move on.


And to drop this turd in this thread was disruptive.

[LittleBlue]

26. Maybe I just don't agree

It's a fallacy to assume that everyone who disagrees just didn't read it right.

And to drop this turd in this thread was disruptive.

Somehow I doubt you'd come back days later for another reply if my opinion was so easily dismissed. Maybe you perceive it as disruptive because it bothers you. There is a lot of hatred in that OP.

Accepting that kind of sentiment is a dark path that only leads to more hatred.

[JustAnotherGen]

27. There was nothing hateful

Not one single hateful thing in that op.

If that was hate speech - YOU would have alerted on it for 'Reverse Racism' and had it hidden.

The article he linked to - was straight talk.


So - if it's so hateful towards white people - why have you not alerted?


DU's TOS does not tolerate Hate Speech or Racism.


ETA: We speak amongst ourselves in the sidelines quite a bit. I'm just one of the few that will say what we are REALLY saying that hte rest of DU can't see.

That's all - you're dismissed.

[LittleBlue]

28. I never use alert

I don't believe in censorship. Even with opinions I find offensive.

When I'm presented with something like the OP, being white and not really understanding what it's like to be a persecuted ethnicity, I think of what Gandhi or MLK would do. I don't believe either of them ever succumbed to that sort of negativity and darkness, rather they overcame.

I would rather try to emulate them than succumb racial hatred and bitterness. That's all I have to say, I won't "disrupt" any more. Peace.

[JustAnotherGen]

29. Oh God

MLK again.

Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!


What part of the Letter from A Birgmingham Jail was not the word of the angriest black man ever? :rotfl:


Here we go folks:

Be good and sweet and just take that shit like a good little aa because love and light and all of that shit. :sprtay:

[M0rpheus]

30. The key...

You said it right here:

When I'm presented with something like the OP, being white and not really understanding what it's like to be a persecuted ethnicity, I think of what Gandhi or MLK would do. I don't believe either of them ever succumbed to that sort of negativity and darkness, rather they overcame.

Keep this in mind:

"Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will." - MLK- Letter from Birmingham Jail

I am a black man. I know exactly what I'm speaking of. I know exactly why I'm angry.

Have you ever considered why "Chinese water torture" is considered so effective? That same drop of water on the head, for hours... days... for what seems like, your entire life. You come to value the time between the drops, always hoping that was the last one... But it never is, there's always another one coming.

Now, imagine that happening to you and someone that looks like your tormentor comes in and tells you, "it's just a drop of water, get over it". How exactly would you feel? Helpless? Full of rage? No matter, here comes the next drop. And the next one, and the next...

I'm not MLK... What I can tell you of him, is that he felt righteous anger. He lived with, and channelled that anger for the greater good, and was murdered for it.

But on to my point: If you don't understand, listen. Listen and learn.
On this issue, you have the luxury of being offended with the likelihood of someone actually caring that you're offended. You don't have to succumb to "racial hatred and bitterness", to be hurtful. Denial and neglect work just as well.

[JustAnotherGen]

35. Yep

And LittleBlue is basically engaging in the water torture with the Professional Victim Attitude and telling us black folks "Oh well - I was offended. . . get over it. It was hateful to me so all Dominant Culture Racism to you is negated because my feelings were hurt having to read an inconvenient and cold truth."

ETA: P.S.
Pssst - Make an analogy to Snowden and the NSA - and then she'll get it. He's a victim - but you aren't. She can't empathise or see you as fully human as Snowden. Good luck!

[MADem]

36. I don't think you're ever going to get a flash of insight over there.

Look downthread at my brief interaction....

Even when the poster was carefully pointed to the last paragraph, where the author reveals himself to be a white guy, the point was STILL not taken.

It's just "wrong" for even white guys to paint white guys in a less than halo-bathed light, I suppose?

[JustAnotherGen]

38. That's what I'm thinking

It's just "wrong" for even white guys to paint white guys in a less than halo-bathed light, I suppose?

And I read that below before I responded to morpheus this morning.


So in addition to your statement being bang on -

She is being willfully ignorant AND passive aggressive. Must be a hard life for her. . .

[MADem]

43. Look again!

It gets better...and by better, I mean worse!

I can't believe that the argument being pressed here, in this group, especially, mirrors in a rather petty fashion the "What's he TALKING about?" rage expressed by the guy at the turnpike diner.

It's like the damn article....writ SMALL!

The sort of thing you just can't make up, I fear.

And I use fear in every sense of the word...it's still a long road, even on "progressive" websites like DU!

Damn!

[MADem]

32. Read the last paragraph--then you'll want to go back and finish it, maybe? nt

[LittleBlue]

33. I read it. And?

It didn't tempt me to read the entire article.

[MADem]

34. Well, it wasn't so much "hate" as an honest critique of the author's own group, to my POV.

But the white guy at the rest stop is an asshole. This isn't white guilt; it's white blame. It's infuriating that he expects anyone to agree with him, in his willful ignorance, his disingenuousness amped up to rage. As a white person, I want him to shut up.

I certainly am not about to try to convince you to see that, but that was my read of the piece.

[LittleBlue]

39. His picture is next to his name at the top of the article.nt

[MADem]

40. And you can seriously see that? And it informed your attitude?

Here he is, a better shot, nice and big, thanks to SLATE:

[LittleBlue]

41. I did not take it into consideration

when judging the piece, no more than Juan Williams when he bashes blacks. It doesn't legitimize racial generalizations and hatred for me.

[MADem]

42. If you truly believe that this guy's essay is about "white hatred" then I have

nothing I can say to you to open your eyes and make you understand what the man is actually saying.

It's infuriating that he expects anyone to agree with him, in his willful ignorance, his disingenuousness amped up to rage.

This essay has nothing to do with "hatred." It has nothing to do with "racial generalizations." It has to do with those in the majority, those with privilege, acting like assholes--and being clueless as to how they are perceived. Willful ignorance, indeed.

I'm afraid the point has flown right over your head.

[LittleBlue]

44. He expresses his frustration with hate-filled generalizations

This seems like an attempt to recharacterize a silly tirade as legitimate criticism.

I will just point to my original response: sometimes you just have to deal with the fact that others understand your point, but that it isn't persuasive.

[MADem]

45. I am sorry, I'm afraid you have missed the point. Quite robustly, too.

And I have to say, it's rather, er, INFURIATING that you expect anyone to agree with you.

Not persuasive, indeed. That's why you're feeling a bit of push-back, here.

[JustAnotherGen]

46. MADem

It hasn't. She's being passive aggressive and is probably flying off the radar to Admin. In time she will reveal her 'true' face. For now - this is just a good start.

Keep calm - first thing the Power Structure Manipulators Do - is 'control the media'. Web interaction - and yes - even DU is a part of that.

If she tells the lie over and over and over again - it's supposed to become true. But time and human progress are on our side.


Goes back to Zimmerman and Martin - Look at the crew that 'controlled' the conversation. Probably sent in here to do a hit job.

[MADem]

47. I am good, but thank you for caring. I mean that.

Years ago, I read somewhere that if you put "Accent" food additive (do they even make that anymore?) on a bee sting, it would draw the stinger out of your flesh.

I have no idea if this is true, but I was trying to shake a little "Accent" on this situation here!

Sunlight and clarity reveal all--and I am pretty amazed, I must say. One good thing about DU3, this stuff isn't swept under the rug any more.

[Blue_Tires]

49. brilliant...