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September 18, 2003
Writing While White
P6 has an interesting post up about a subject he's been prolifically blogging about - identity politics. Quoting from the Feministe
cobb states in "The Mystery of the Black Blogger" that if you can't write a 1000 word essay on the topic of whiteness, the subject of race-consciousness is out of your reach. and because i believe him, i ask all of you to do a little writing.the suggested questions are aimed specifically at whitefolks, but please feel free to expound on the subject if you are of another race or ethnicity.
1. what does it mean to be white? what does it mean to be White?
2. how has whiteness affected your worldview?
3. how has whiteness affected your educational experience?
4. how has whiteness affected your experience with authority?
5. how has whiteness affected your experiences with people of other races and ethnicities?
The whole issue of "identity politics" (and no, I don't believe it's a pejorative) seems to be like the whole issue of "union politics" or some other large scale "special interest" politics. In a perfect, politically color blind world, the idea of "identity politics" would still exist and still be a meaningful term. People have distinct racial identities which give them a unique perspective on the world that I certainly don't share - at a basic level. And that perspective colors everything they care about, everything they do. Because humans are all 99.9% identical genetically, the variation provided by this racial viewpoint is necessarily small. The viewpoint colored by "identity" (which I assume to be race here) is not going to be all that different from the rest of the viewpoints of everyone claiming the Human Genome as their genetic heritage1. "Cultural identity politics" would perhaps be a better term. Maybe "Social Identity Politics".
Having said that....
From my point of view, the question "what does it mean to be white?" really needs to be seen in its proper context. What makes the "white" experience statistically different from other ethnic experiences in the US is that our racial group pretty much dominates our country. Politically and economically. Oh, and our country pretty much dominates the planet.
But that aside, as bad as the US is about so many other things, our economy has an amazing amount of economic mobility. There just isn't another country like ours on the planet where people can - potentially - move so freely between economic classes. Well, as long as you're white, that is.
And that's a pretty unique perspective on this earth. When I was working as a student assistant in college, I remember talking with the Chinese scientists who worked in the center where I slaved for them writing analysis programs. They came to the United States because in their culture - i.e. China - it is (their words, not mine) very hard to change economic and social classes. So what they did was come over here to the US, make a name for themselves, and then go back to China.
And because I'm white, I get to potentially participate in this kind of upward social mobility. That makes my whole experience very White.
My educational experience was far more affected by my parent's religious beliefs than they were by race. Soon after my parents converted to fundamentalist faith, I found myself in a private religious school. And because the primary purpose of this school was religious indoctrination, the quality of education was far lower than it would have been if I went to the public schools available to people in my white neighborhoods where I grew up. So all I can say is that my childhood education sucked even though I was white.
College was a different story. But since I didn't really grow up in the public schools, it was like a different planet to me. The entire experience was wonderfully surreal, and there were a lot of people sharing this experience with me from lots of other races. Perhaps my whiteness mattered in ways that I just didn't register. After all, what seemed to matter more when I was going to college was whether I was male or female. One of my girlfriends at the time was a pretty radicalized feminist (she actually likes Mary Daly) and so most of my experience as "identity politics" revolved around a more basic difference than my skin color.
As to my experiences with authority, I can definitely see that there's been a significant "white" experience. I never really got into too much trouble, and really didn't hang around a lot of "seedy" characters growing up. But I did have a minor scrape or two with Jonny Law and they went amazingly well. From what I have heard related to me from friends who have been unluckier than I, I have to believe that a lot of this has to do with race. A cop simply isn't threatened by this long haired white hippy driving a nice car. I doubt cops would react the same way if I was black or Latino.
Living out in California, here in the SF bay area, whites are now officially a "minority" race - meaning we make up less than 50% of the population. Most of the people I work with aren't anywhere near white. Most aren't even US citizens. So I have a pretty weird experience being white.
For example, I hate "ethnic" food. I really, really, REALLY like Pizza. I really like steaks. I love potatoes. I love hamburgers and fries.
That's my "ethnic" food. The "white" food.
But I never get to eat it. First, you can't hardly spit in the bay area without hitting some sort of exotic ethnic restaurant. Everyone wants to go out to an Afghanistan restaurant. Or it's Vietnamese. Or Nigerian. Of course, there's always the multitude varieties of Chinese and Indian food to choose from.
Pizza? Don't be so lower class.
But other than the food issue, I haven't really detected much bias - good or bad - given to me based on my "whiteness".
But this is all just my individual experience of being white. I don't think it's a common experience for a number of reasons. I think many people of my "race" even living here in the SF Bay area would tell you quite different stories and give you quite a different picture of what it is to be "white".
Because regardless of what we have that makes us unique with respect to our "race", what really makes us unique is who we are as an individual. It's the decisions we make as we progress through life and our reactions to the situations we find ourselves in through no fault of our own that give us the most interesting perspectives and experiences.
The large grained grouping by skin color is an extremely important component of the context in which we all operate. Our own particular color is simply a matter of luck. Given this, it's interesting to me - as someone of the lucky color - to hear about perspectives that only people who aren't white can have in a country dominated by white people.
I don't mind "identity politics" any more than I mind "union politics" or "rich white people politics". Well, the latter is really getting on my nerves these days. But that's the subject for another rant.
______________________
1. For example, one thing that consistently bothers me about the "Bell Curve" arguments is that no one seems to be genetically defining the "racial" groups purported to show measurable differences in IQ scores based on these racial groups. Skin color is not "race" - at least not genetically. Perhaps the genes that are actually responsible for these differences have more to do with some other factor which cuts across the pigmentation color of your skin, or the way your hair looks. Likewise "identity politics" isn't strictly skin color based.
Posted by Azael at September 18, 2003 03:01 PM
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Comments
" I really, really, REALLY like Pizza. I really like steaks. I love potatoes. I love hamburgers and fries."
You've gotta be kidding me, right? That's the blandest set of food choices known to man!
On another issue, why the choice of white text on a black background? It makes things a bit difficult to read, particularly on a low contrast LCD monitor of the sort we peons have to make do with.
Posted by: Abiola Lapite at September 18, 2003 08:01 PM
Is there a way to "skin" an MT blog. I'll look into this and see if I can change to more of a grey state of mind in the mean time.... It's just not the same without the dark background for me...
Yea, I'm serious about Pizza. Everyone who knows me universally agrees that I have the most boring taste in food on the entire planet.
It's sad.
Posted by: JohnC at September 18, 2003 08:20 PM
Personally, I like the black background. Brighter backgrounds hurt my eyes, though I suppose a nice neutral gray wouldn't hurt either.
I like pizza and hamburgers too... and fish. Not too fond of steak though, too tough and hard to chew, and sometimes I can make out the larger blood vessels and other little things that remind me that I'm eating flesh. Big no no for a finicky eater like me.
I dunno if pizza, fries, etc. qualifies as "white" food as much as it does "mainstream" food. I went to a mostly (like 99.5%) black middle and high school, and EVERY day without exception there were fries + some other food. Pizza, hamburger, taco, etc. etc. etc.
Posted by: entivore at September 19, 2003 07:50 AM
I think the gray is probably the way to go. I can see where it pretty much bursts blood vessels in the eyes to read this blog.
Yea, Pizza isn't a "white" food - I can't really imagine what is. I was thinking that probably steak was the ethnic white food, but even that.
I guess my tastes are just vanilla mainstream. And boring, too.
Posted by: JohnC at September 19, 2003 08:00 AM
