More racist bollocks in the Guardian (where else?). A few choice quotes from this dire claptrap.
In Citizen – An American Lyric, poet Rankine reflects on the black experience from the victims of Hurricane Katrina, or Trayvon Martin, a 17 year-old black youth shot dead by a neighbourhood watch volunteer who was acquitted, or black tennis star Serena Williams. In each case Rankine sees lives framed by whiteness.
She writes:
Because white men can’t police their imagination, black men are dying.
Not because young black men think that the size of their dicks are measured by carrying weapons… More black men die as a consequence of other black men being unable to control their testosterone than die as a consequence of white people not policing their imagination.
Philosophy Professor George Yancy just last week penned a letter in the New York Times addressed to “Dear White America”. He asks his countrymen to listen with love, and to look at those things that might cause pain and terror.
All white people, he says, benefit from racism and this means each, in their own way, are racist.
…don’t run to seek shelter from your own racism…practice being vulnerable. Being neither a “good” white person, nor a liberal white person will get you off the proverbial hook.
Ah, yes, the old “all white honkeys are racist” trope. Bullshit.
So, as for the Guardian’s exhortation:
Black writers courageously staring down the white gaze – this is why we all must read them…
If this nasty racist undertone is what I can expect, I’ll pass. There is no “must” about it. I read authors on the quality of their work, not because they are black and certainly not because they are whinging, yet again, about how awful whitey is. Fuck off already.
“practice being vulnerable.”
I don’t think so.
Me neither. These professional black racists can go fuck themselves.
I am with you I do no care, I wonder what impact these people have on the employability of black Americans? Chances are these lot are keeping black people down while feathering their own nests.
Post script I was in a bar in Dubai and a touch worse for wear and speaking to a black chap from Georgia, to which I said ‘you don’t look like a fucking Russian to me’ and these realised that this chap was from the States and not the FSU. This chap had a good job and was a decent bloke, now he should be an example for black Americans and he probably doesn’t see himself as a ‘black American’ just an American. Which works for me.
Dear Mr. The Guardian,
Please, for the love of fuck, can you STOP lumping all “white” and “black” people together, as if this were some scientifically recognised definition of race? I’m half-Italian and remember well the casual racism of the 1970s when I was in school in the UK. You know what? I dealt with it. And I did so without even resorting to violence or extremism.
Racism IS demonstrably possible between people of broadly similar levels of melanin. It’s just tribalism with a different logo. And Africa is nothing if not tribal.
When does the US celebrate “Chinese History Month”? Why do we so rarely see documentaries about the generations of Irish immigrants who had to contend with “NO IRISH” signs, while being constantly bombarded by documentaries and news reports about how crap life is for “black” people. Do you think Italian immigrants, who came over penniless from southern Italy and had to start with nothing, had it any easier?
The President of the United States of America is a BLACK AFRICAN-AMERICAN OF KENYAN DESCENT! Clearly, it’s not “white” people holding them back: We’ve been bending over backwards for years; when are “black” communities going to admit that they’re as responsible for their own actions as we are for ours?
Strange how descendants of the Apache and Navajo peoples, as well as their fellow native Americans, aren’t going around with such massive chips on their shoulders, yet they are arguably far more deserving of this kind of moronic guilt-tripping than any of the African American folk there.
Yes, some African Americans are descended from slaves. So what? Slavery was not unique to Africans. Most people in Europe are statistically likely to be descended from slaves too. We get it: your ancestors had it tough. So did most of our ancestors, who had to get by without electricity, running water, or even germ theory. Life was shit back then. For everyone. It was slightly more shit for slaves in the southern US, but it wasn’t that much better for most of the working classes at the time either. And they had to pay rent and buy their own food too.
Times have changed. Morals have changed. We’re better than we were. That’s how history works. That’s how societies and cultures improve. We learn from our mistakes, and grow as a species.
Sean, nailed it perfectly. If the serial whiners and race baiters gave it a rest, those of a differing heritage would all have time to settle down and integrate. Encouraging victimhood hinders, not helps, any given group.
On a related note, I’ve been struck lately with the realisation that large-scale charitable giving clearly doesn’t work.
I can see a day when Big Charity realises that the money is running out. What was once a river becomes a trickle as Donation Fatigue sets in in the West, as we realise that Big Charity isn’t working. If anything, it’s creating entire generations of people who have become dependent on charitable donations.
This isn’t how charity is supposed to work: you’re supposed to teach them how to fish, not just keep giving them free fish forever. Some charities try and do this, but clearly not enough of it is being done, or Ethiopian children wouldn’t still be dying of starvation and dehydration some 31 years after Band Aid.
There is very little in the Guardian that isn’t bollocks.