There is no question that right now we are living out the reverberations of a dark history. Thousands of years of war, abuse and oppression has to be addressed and integrated at some point in time, and Now seems to be that time. The internet is abuzz with threads on privilege. White supremacy is having a bizarre comeback. Black Lives Matter is desperately trying to bring everyone's attention to perpetual injustice and police brutality/murder. This doesn't even begin to touch upon the many other social dynamics being worked out like LGBTQ rights, environmental responsibility, "immigration" rights (we are all immigrants here), and ownership in the wake of stolen land. 'Endless' is the word that comes to mind.
I'm going to touch upon all this from as compassionate a perspective as I can muster without mincing words. The perspective I have is "odd" because while I have the camouflage of a light skin tone, I have a genetic thread of persecution that comes from my Jewish Heritage, and though I have yet to be threatened daily like people with dark skin, some "alt-right" lost souls are asking questions as absurd as "but are Jews really even people?" One thing is for certain, we are all in this together.
I will probably write multiple posts on these topics in stages, but I feel we need to have a chat about "whiteness" first. What is it?
From my knowledge "Whiteness" was an invention in the early days of US history. I was reading in a book who's exact title I forget but I believe was "Black Liberation and Socialism" that in the time of slaves, freed slaves, indentured servants and such there was no skin tone bias. Socialism was on the rise, and freed slaves and indentured servants were rallying together against the wealthy plantation owners. If you remember, indentured servants were people of European descent that lived in deep poverty. As the wealthy saw their system of oppression and financial slavery being threatened by the coming together of all oppressed people, they needed to divide and conquer. They created an "us and them" that wasn't there before by telling the European indentured servants that "You are white, and we are white, why are you trusting those black people?" They obviously weren't calling them "black people" yet, but you can get the point. "Whiteness" was born. The wealthy started to systematically dehumanize people of color in a sick and twisted history I should not need to delve into here. Slavery was still a thing, but freed slaves were treated just the same as poor people who were never officially slaves up to that point. There were even prominent freed former African slaves in governmental and military positions. Once socialism started to threaten the hidden form of mental, social and financial slavery the rich had created with their systems, they needed to harness fear for their purposes.
Whiteness, begot Blackness, both newly invented in the early years of the US. Public racism and oppression flourished until the 1960s, which wasn't that long ago, but integration and assimilation was never anything more than superficial. The racism and oppression became subtle to well-meaning people of this country to the point that they could not even see how institutionalized the oppression of their darker-skinned neighbors had become. Now, with social media connecting us all together, it is all in plain sight and on the table that the horrific consequences of "Whiteness" have not gone away and are looking worse than ever.
I was recently reading a really dense manifesto about Whiteness having no place in Black Liberation http://racebaitr.com/2016/03/31/white-people-no-place-black-liberation/# It was a challenging read, and I must admit that I was reading several articles at the same time and finished none of them, but what I took away from the first half of it was that "Whiteness" itself is what needs to be abolished. "Blackness" is a reaction to "Whiteness" self-perpetuating itself through ignorance including well meaning people that benefit from "white privilege" without even understanding it. #blacklivesmatter movement is trying to make people understand it, and many people are triggered by this because they didn't realize the extent of their subtle involvement.
I hate "Whiteness" and was deeply triggered during my process of understanding it because somehow I was being lumped into the same group as my oppressors. Nazis and I are both considered white, and "alt-right-ers" who question if I am a person in the first place, are also considered white. And why is it a privilege to be considered white if I am being associated with those who wish for my death or banishment? It is not an honor by any stretch of the imagination.
I have been blessed in this lifetime and I want nothing more than for all people to have the freedom, safety and opportunity to live a blessed and happy life as well. We can create this together, but learning how to address and integrate historical iniquities is far from over. Maybe if we can shatter "Whiteness" with the light of the magnifying glass, divisive labels will go away and we will all become beautiful unique brothers and sisters embodying the spectrum of light and life. We all need to do what we can to stand out and NOT blend in--ever, and stand up for justice and compassion with courage at EVERY opportunity.
Interesting read. I'm not really sure where to start but I think here is good.
"But they created us and Them." This is still very true but not in the way you might think. Today with groups like LGBTQ, Black Lives Matter, Antifa are all groups created by a different, but still privileged social class. Them being the
masters of media of course. We are led to believe that social injustice in every form is rampant among white society. Racism doesn not exist unless you are white and male. What is actually being achieved is a off-shoot of cultural marxism. The Russians know a little bit about this if you've ever read "the Goulag Archepelogo." (Sorry if my spelling is wrong, the spell-check seems a bit off to me. ;) The concessions that these "oppressed" groups have made in just the last 10 years is astonishing. We now have the government making laws in their favor. (Taking closer steps to a communist government). To accomplish this you need all people of different races, beliefs, sexual-orientation to believe that they are more oppressed than ever. While the scapegoat is different this time, the technique is still the same. White men will bear the brunt of the punishment, much like wealthy landowners (farmers were considered oligarchs in the communist takeover of Russia) in Northern Ukraine did during Stalin's regime. The media is the lap-dog responsible for making it seem like its "worse than ever!!" Of course this isn't true if you ask most American's that can get up from the TV once in awhile. All this business about "white privilege," might of been true, up until the last 15-20 years or so but there is still a very anemic number of neo-nazi's aside from Richard Spencer and a few hundred red-necks. I mean really they are pathetic. Keep in mind these groups were enormous back in the 30-60's, but have been plummeting and are still very small today. I'll wait for your reply before carrying on but i do enjoy this topic. Good post!
I appreciate your comment. I feel like I can only address most of the things you brought up in the series of posts that will come out over time on this topic. It would be very difficult in a comment. What I do want to point out is that my main point in this article is that there is no such thing as "White Society." White society is a myth. We have a financially and militarily dominant society that was spawned from European Imperialism, particularly the British. In Europe, there was a lot of divisiveness, first by wealth, then by nationality, then by religion, and then by families. The Scottish resent the British, the Irish are divided by religion, the wealthy families like the Rothschilds manipulated all sides to achieve domination, the Nazis hated the Jews, the French dislike everybody, the royals were despised by the people, etc. etc. When you refer to "White Society" You are talking about Old Money born out of war and deception over thousands of years, and the Old Money that has dominated the US history books is primarily British or other European derivation . When that old money was threatened by social uprisings you first had the Revolutionary war, and after that was seemingly settled and the old money bought its way back into dominance over the US, you had the social uprisings that I spoke of, which were combated by
manipulating specifically the European-American indentured servants into believing they had something in common with their oppressors
--that they share a "race." They then created the myth that one "race" was "civilized" and the other was not, and then the notion that a race could be "superior" to the other. We know this is BS. For example, dark skin is biologically preferable than my pasty skin because it is less susceptible to skin cancer and sun burns. "Superiority" was really domination, domination was war and oppression of people who weren't fighting in the first place (Imperialism), and slavery was not voluntary. In fact the Roman Empire was built on slavery of so-called "white" people, which allowed for the European "Old Money" to fall into the hands it fell into. Old Money is theantithesis of the "American Dream" and all that the constitution and the Declaration of Independence stood for--even Capitalism has been destroyed by old money.
You mentioned Us and Them referring to oppressed groups in their current forms/organizations, but it was the oppressor that killed brotherhood, not the oppressed. Their "us" is reactionary to being placed into a "them" category they didn't ask for. They are fighting not for socialism (a whole other conversation), but for basic freedoms. And the "media masters" are not fueling the visibility of social injustice, it is social media, individuals saying "WE ARE HURTING" and sharing their stories with the world.
Social injustice is not unique to the US, there is social injustice rampant in asian societies, middle eastern societies, near eastern societies, and latin american societies as well. Light skinned men do especially have to bear the responsibility of compassionate understanding and humble acknowledgement of a troubled history, and the financial advantages and opportunities that came for light skinned people to get a stronghold in society while dark skinned people were hiding for their lives from the KKK mobs. It is not a marxist conspiracy, it is a matter of establishing and protecting basic human rights and freedoms for all people so fascism doesn't rear its ugly head again and put us all back into slavery like in Roman and Babylonian times.
Ask any historical Emperor who they thought the superior race was... Military might is all that current social dynamics are based on [...and the hidden financial warfare of Old Money]
Thanks for engaging in the conversation--it's a heavy one!
It certainly is a heavy one! While i realize that social media is a spectacular platform for raising some of the still very real injustices into the forefront, one has to really ask oneself if things aren't really better off now than before. I specifically only know one man who is obviously just a racist pig while in my childhood they seemed to be everywhere! And whether or not that is a by-product of society evolving away from such prejudice organically, or by force by those who are playing a Marxist game of identity politics. I'm guessing the prior. All these new laws and rules to live by are a cover-up to re-kindle the oppressed vs. the oppressors once again. Of course leaving out the real oppressors and merely dressing up a new face to take the blame. There isn't an IRA. There isn't a KKK or a fascist dictatorship left on the planet big enough to fill the void to create chaos to interrupt what is left of the ideals of freedom the constitution spoke of. Hence bad whitey! And while I understand your abstraction and claim that white society is a myth, many still do not. They are being fed this trash in order to continue to divide and conquer. Something i think we both agree, call it "old money or a Marxist conspiracy, the same player are at the helm.
Those who would benefit from a more authoritarian world society are the same ones that would be running it. These aren't politicians of course, but "old money" world interests. The Rothschild's being a prime example. CAn't wait for your future posts!