"... these kinds of pages have cropped up at a number of universities that have sought to have a real dialogue about race and inclusion. There is no such organization as this at NYU. We call on all parties to contribute thoughtfully and respectfully to the discourse on race and to reject efforts to derail or distort the conversation."
"A message to the NYU community" at NYU's Facebook page. I just happened to randomly click on the NYU page. Wasn't looking for this.
Here's the "Union of White NYU Students" page. Here's a Gawker article about it: "Who’s Behind the Fake 'Union of White NYU Students'?" Gawker contacted the anonymous administrator of the page, asking for proof that he was really an NYU student. The administrator responded but didn't break his anonymity, citing death threats and accusations. ("When I chose to do this, I knew that it would not be long before the accusations of KKK, Nazi etc came out. But I hope to use these to make my point. White identity cannot be discussed constructively because of this sort of slander.")
The Daily Beast take is "Racist Trolls Are Behind NYU’s ‘White Student Union’ Hoax."
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Because of course, a White Student Union is presumptuously racist, while a Black Student Union is a safe place for healing.
We're back to Black students self-segregating, but not allowing Whites to do so.
It is all about power, not race.
Trolling certainly, but the racist part assumes facts not in evidence. Perhaps they are just making a point, and doing a little old-fashioned shit disturbing.
It appears he is making his point.
The Daily Beast take is "Racist Trolls Are Behind NYU’s ‘White Student Union’ Hoax."
Impugning the motives of people you don't know is an important precursor to dialog and understanding in progressive America.
Unlike every other group of ... virtually anything you could name ... white people are not allowed to be in favor of white people, or gather with white people, or seek to advance the rights of white people, because .... RACIST !!!!
I happen to be white, and I like white people.
these kinds of pages have cropped up at a number of universities that have sought to have a real dialogue about race and inclusion.
Now that's funny. We're to believe screaming "filthy white bitch" in someone's face is a "dialogue" and somehow admirable.
I just hope they don't say anything bad about radical Muslims. That would be wrong and might provoke a backlash..
The Internet is not a Safe Space
Just as believable as any lie spouted by BLM, so who the fuck cares. I like the reportage of the BLM shooting last night. The masked Dindu's complain about masked white supremacists. Really? As most of the left, they have zero self awareness.
Could we change the headline to "Racist trolls behind Black Lives Matter" ??
'Cause it's okay to have "Whiteness Studies", as long as no unvetted white people are allowed to chime in with their silly opinions.
Racist trolls from message boards 4chan and 8chan, and the white supremacist website Daily Stormer, fabricated the Facebook pages in an attempt to create racial tension on college campuses.
Love this from the DB article. The only evidence presented of the ties to these groups is a general comment on how to create a burner gmail account. So she made it up.
“NRx” is shorthand for “neoreactionary,” a person who subscribes to the neoreaction, or “Dark Enlightenment,” movement. This school is far from unified, but subscribes to a loose collection of far-right ideologies: a rejection of “political correctness,” a yearning for religious and political authoritarianism, a return to medieval gender roles, and the open practice of white supremacy.
This is classic nuttery, thanks NYU!
I would not call them racist hoaxers.
I think that a number of these stories are generated by thoughtful, if combative students who question why it is that their college supports and funds a Black Student Union, a Latino SU, an Asian SU, a Muslim SU, a GLBTQXXX SU, etc, etc but finds the idea of a White Students Union to be a racist and divisive concept...
If it weren't for double standards... would 'they' have any standards at all?
Seems as though the anonymous administrator certainly has Gawker and Daily Beast pegged correctly.
The idea is to force people skilled in forced outrage to feel forced to feel outrage.
Since the Republicans took the lead on civil rights, the Democrats have stumbled over one violation of human and civil rights after another.
When recently in a bookstore, I flipped through a day by day calendar of events in WWII. Evacuation from Dunkirk, Sevastopol besieged on such and so date etc...
The dispatches from Beast could scarcely be more dramatic as they report breathlessly from the front lines of a War only they can see.
Greece Falls! "The “White Student Union” Facebook pages began appearing en masse on Friday, November 20!"
U-boat spotted in the Themes! "At UCLA, then at the University of Texas at Austin, then at Washington State University, then at New York University, white supremacists appeared to be gaining sudden online footholds in America’s most liberal universities.". Eeek!
The articles walk an amusing line between trying to knock down that anything is happening, and keeping the fires stoked. If there is no threat then we cant still need mattress art and sit ins, so there must be a THREAT. But it can be a serious threat. But still man those barricades and report any suspicion of micro-agressions immediately to the local warden.
You can read what they put on their Facebook page. Is it racist? The assert that white people are at a disadvantage in academe. That may be true or false, but it isn'r racist.
But I'm sure they're enjoying all the attention.
Rick said...
these kinds of pages have cropped up at a number of universities that have sought to have a real dialogue about race and inclusion.
Now that's funny. We're to believe screaming "filthy white bitch" in someone's face is a "dialogue" and somehow admirable.
They keep using that word dialog, but it does not mean what they think it means.
To quote Althouse, "I'm skeptical." Who knows whether the "anonymous" organizer is even white? Several similar racial incidents have been exposed as hoaxes done to gin up publicity for the aggrieved.
Well, racist trolls are behind the formation of Black Student Unions on university campuses nationwide, so the Daily Beast is just stating the obvious about White Student Unions, too.
It there any proof of the race of the person who created the page?
I would think a good satirist could have some real fun with a "White Students Associate" - use humor to gently poke fun at while stereotypes, while backhandedly mocking the other ethnicity-based associations.
Seminars that they could hold:
1) Mayonnaise: It's not just for sandwiches any more!
2) White Rap: Vanilla Ice or Snow - Who's More White?
3) Sunburns: Nature's Way of Telling While People to Get Off the Beach and Play More X-Box?
4)Inter-Racial Dating: Who Is Closer To White: Jews, Italians or Tall Asians?
Rick said...
"these kinds of pages have cropped up at a number of universities that have sought to have a real dialogue about race and inclusion.
Now that's funny. We're to believe screaming "filthy white bitch" in someone's face is a "dialogue" and somehow admirable."
What I found striking about the Dartmouth library video, was the response of the whites and asians being harassed by the BLMs as they tried to study for exams. They all very clearly realized that
a) they must not allow any of the anger and irritation they were surely feeling to become visible. The penalty would be immediate violence, followed by long-term Alinskyite hate-shaming, ostracism and ultimately expulsion from their Ivy League Hate Studies Institute.
b) it doesn't really matter, though, because once you graduate and get a real job, you are never going to see any of these affirmative action charity cases again. They are just here to justify the paychecks of a bunch of completely useless administrators. They have been set up to fail, and they are getting knocked down. Of course they are pissed off, but so what? Losers gonna lose. Just sit tight, this too shall pass.
"We call on all parties to contribute thoughtfully and respectfully to the discourse on race and to reject efforts to derail or distort the conversation."
IOW, agree with our nonsense or shut up.
Or, agree with our nonsense AND shut-up:
“CU-Boulder Anti-Racism Rally Canceled Because Organizers Are White”
"That’s a slap in the face and that’s practicing racism, whether they want to believe it or not," [Black Affirmative Action Guy] said. “They used their white privilege and oppressed voices and stifled voices that are experiencing this every day.”
It's racist for white people to be against racism. Either that or the BAAG is a racist. But that's impossible.
Oh, the poor precious snowflakes are getting competition in the absurdity arena. Is the train still fine?
"Shut up!", they explained.
I'm so tired of bickering about racism that I don't even want to do it in my own behalf any more, demonic white hetero male that I am.
I'm retired.
Fuck it all. The assholes can't drag me into re-education camp any more. They can't take away my stuff. (At least I don't think so.)
Fuck all the racism hustlers!
Listen for these words: "conversation," "dialogue," "community." When you hear them, separately or together, be wary. Very wary. Because they do not mean what you think they mean.
The thing is, if any of these “White pride” people actually gave a damn about their own ancestry as opposed to just being out to shit on other peoples’, no one would say boo. In fact everyone who wasn’t racist themselves would support it and it could be a small world after all.
I didn’t see any Black Lives Matter folks protesting the Danish Seaman Church’s annual Christmas market last weekend. Haven’t heard of them busting up any feiseanna lately. As far as I know the San Genarro festival and the Sturgis motorcycle rally and all the various Pulaski Day celebrations went off without a hitch as usual this year. And White folks long dead are still being celebrated for their contributions to art and science, pretty much to the exclusion of everybody else.
Here are the first two paragraphs of the first Gawker comment. Note that every single criticism is simply invented. Then consider the assertion that "if" the site weren't driven by people guilty everyone would support it. Obviously that's false since they aren't guilty and people are literally inventing reasons to attack it.
Even if the site is done by a white person it seems clear it's intended to poke the exclusionary BLM and other radical ethnist groups and criticize their demonization of whites. So when he says the people behind this are shitting on other peoples ancestry wtf is he talking about? The people behind this didn't protest the church festival or the feiseanna, so if these non-actions are good enough to prove the BLM innocent why don't they also prove this group innocent?
Of course there are 35 people claiming this comment is insightful. How insane are these people?
White supremacy needs to go though. If you’re forming a club based around that,
Again notice the simple assumption that the "white" of this group equals white supremacy. The left ought to be embarrassed about the level of reasoning their supporters show.
Why is a White Student's Union racist?
White Students Union: A clear case of cultural appropriation
BTW: Is it cultural appropriation to want a Yale degree without contact with white students or with Newton, Leibniz, Darwin, Rutherford, Shakespeare, Milton, Coleridge, Whitman, Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Francis Galton, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Woodrow Wilson or Winston Churchill?
And aren't all these college students and their mentors being silent about the fact that African-Americans are being wiped out by abortion as provided by Margaret Sanger, Planned Parenthood and Barack Obama? And that their parents have lost their jobs to a wave of illegal immigrants as provided by Barack Obama? They turn their heads and pretend they don't see - and then are very righteous about others who did the same.
Tank wrote:
" . . white people are not allowed to be in favor of white people, or gather with white people, or seek to advance the rights of white people, because .... RACIST !!!!"
No, it's because every single white person is rich and living on inherited wealth, is a fancy lawyer, a businessman, or a school teacher. There are no poor oppressed white people.
None.
Note that I do not include people of Irish, Italian, or Sicilian descent in the category 'white people.' The Italians and Sicilians are all powerful mob bosses, and of course the Irish console themselves with drink.
The Supreme Court has ruled, that affirmative action in college admissions, despite the fact that it is clearly racial discrimination, can be justified by the educational value of a racially and/or culturally diverse academic environment. I have always thought that was an absurd rationalization for a squalid practice. But I am beginning to think I may have been wrong. Those white and asian kids trying to study in the Dartmouth Library were certainly having an educational experience. I expect they'll remember it for the rest of their lives. And it's extremely unlikely they would have learned the lessons they are learning if Dartmouth did not enthusiastically practice affirmative action.
White Student Union, huh? Where did they get that idea?
Fernandinande said...
"That’s a slap in the face and that’s practicing racism, whether they want to believe it or not," [Black Affirmative Action Guy] said. “They used their white privilege and oppressed voices and stifled voices that are experiencing this every day.”
How does saying something stifle someone else? Do they repeat such nonsense to themselves so often they forget they have to make sense when they're not around the drum circle?
I think that a number of these stories are generated by thoughtful, if combative students who question why it is that their college supports and funds a Black Student Union, a Latino SU, an Asian SU, a Muslim SU, a GLBTQXXX SU, etc, etc but finds the idea of a White Students Union to be a racist and divisive concept...>
This is, of course, the central issue here. The answer from the left is always, "the whole campus is white campus" which, they think, is akin to "We don't have a White History Month because EVERY month is white history month." They do not see the difference between those two concepts. While I can certainly agree that most American history was driven by whites, that's primarily due to blacks, native americans, etc, not having any real power to BE drivers. To say that the "whole campus is white campus" is completely different.
I've always seen these various centers as places where someone can go to simply be themselves, surrounded by others who may or may not be like-minded, but are at least, superficially, in the same boat, however that boat is identified. You go, you relax, and you can talk about issues that you share with those also there in a supposedly non-judgmental, supportive environment.
What do we have on college campuses right now? People afraid to speak their minds, even if it's only to pose a question, for fear of witch hunts or, indeed, violence. Shouldn't they have a place where they can talk about these feelings, these fears, in a judgement-free environment?
If I may be allowed to share here, let me tell you a story I have never told anyone since a certain night some forty-four years ago or so...
I was an eighteen or nineteen year old white boy, and was leaving the local football preseason "jamboree" that included all schools in my city school system. My friend and I traveled there in a raggedy old MGBGT that he had just bought from the money he earned roofing the previous summer, and we must have looked the proper preppy pair in the MG in our Gant button downs and freshly pressed Levis, even though we were the sons of a furniture repairman and a milkman from the wrong side of the tracks. It's that old upward mobility thing, you know.
On the way out of the parking lot, we were surrounded by a large crowd of exclusively black individuals about high school age or perhaps slightly older. I learned then that their spit smelled and tasted exactly like my own, for we were surrounded and spat upon until we could withdraw. That was my lesson that race and tribalism is a social construction, and that tribalism will eventually be the death of us all.
Not a single word was ever exchanged or offered from us. After we rolled up the windows, some rocking of the car ensued as well. I didn't know if I was going to get out of there alive, but after a period of time some local police approached from a distance and the crowd withdrew. We then drove to his house, washed his car, and never mentioned it again. I went many decades without even recalling these events, but I find myself thinking about that night more and more. There is a deep lesson in this, I believe, but it is hard for me to define just what that lesson is. Any thoughts you can share would be most helpful.
"The Supreme Court has ruled, that affirmative action in college admissions, despite the fact that it is clearly racial discrimination, can be justified by the educational value of a racially and/or culturally diverse academic environment. I have always thought that was an absurd rationalization for a squalid practice."
Grutter vs, Bollinger, 2003. I believe that this was the first time that the 14th amendment was used to strip people of equal protection under the law.
"And White folks long dead are still being celebrated for their contributions to art and science, pretty much to the exclusion of everybody else."
Right. So we have Bach being celebrated instead of ....? Shakespeare instead of....? Etc.
I like to play the culture game with progs defending primitive cultures. I always spot them a few composers, writers and painters just to rub it in.
Why is it racist? Are whites unable to organize around race like other race groups? If that is racist, then are those other racial groups similarly racist?
Shouldn't there be such a union of white students, if only so they can get together and feel bad about being white and talk about how their privilege ruins everyone else's lives? I'm sure if they stated that as their goal, the SJWs would be okay with it.
Oh who am I kidding? The SJWs would get mad that whites are trying to "whitesplain" their own privilege.
Here's what you need to do if you're white--go cower in a corner. Anything else you do will be a microaggression.
When I was growing up I learned everything I needed to know about black people from re-runs of "Sanford & Son" and "The Jeffersons."
Now that I've grown up I find that most black people are not like the ones in those shows.
I am purposefully not saying whether this is good or bad for Race in America.
Bring back the Guillotine.
I am Laslo.
The left likes to tell us that Hispanics will overtake whites as the majority by 2050 or whatever date they have assigned (of course adding 15 million or so illegals I'm sure will speed that along).
So, once we become the minority it will no longer even be controversial to have a group based around white identity. The klu klux klan can even come out of retirement and assert their bonafides. They would be the kindler gentler klu klux klan. Kind of like how the black panthers went on to make cook books or how Bill Ayers went on to teach college courses.
White power wouldnt' be anything different than black power. White is right would be no different than black is beautiful.
Why wait? Identity politics is good for everybody. Does the left really think that only oppressed minorities should be able to partake of the goodness of identity politics?
To discuss in the White Students culturally safe space:
Some of the issues which BLM mentions seem like the issues of the white ethnic Americans - the Jews, the Irish, the Poles and assorted white trash - who began entering places like Harvard, Yale and Princeton in the Twenties. Look at a book like The Great Gatsby - what is that about except outsiders, Gatsby and Tom Buchanan's mistress idealizing an inside of wealth and privilege. Are Tom and Daisy Buchanan worth all the trouble? No, but they stand for an aspiration. What's more it is part of the story that Daisy does have a life which Gatsby entirely disregards and which, it is suggested, Tom understands. And The Sun Also Rises covers the same issues. The Jewish Princeton graduate is total outsider subjected to micro-aggressions by Brett who he idealizes but does not trouble to understand. Brett is a cultural appropriator with respect to the young Spanish matador who she runs away with and begins to destroy but never understands. But they don't understand Brett's story either or Jake Barnes.
If the blacks has been able to start to rise with the other American outsiders they might view their whole story differently because it would be in phase with other similar stories, like the Great Gatsby. But segregation prevented that. So they view the same story through a post colonial lens and hence they have this confusing way of saying "you must let us into your sh-thole culture which is destroying something better we have or you are a racist holding us down and keeping us from the good you have which is shit from dead white males like Newton and Shakespeare - in fact you are a racist no matter what and if you aren't friends with me you are sh-t and when you are friends with me you are sh-t. And I want an extension on my paper and a guarantee that I will graduate, you privileged piece of garbage with whom I can't compete successfully and that's your fault also or at rate it's you that's going to pay."
If there is a black student union, and whites are not allowed in it, and each ethnic group gets a student union, then by definition, the place where whites would congregate would be the white student union since they woudnt' be allowed elsewhere.
Or are white student unions integrated places where all are allowed? That seems kind of racist.
White areas are inclusive and open. Black areas are segregated and closed. By choice. I thought the left pushed for integration?
It seems like they are not really down with color blindness after all.
Racial identity politics trumps all that crap.
Glad to see that some students retain a sense of humor in the face of all the crap going down. The Daily Beast should loosen up and learn to laugh.
""And White folks long dead are still being celebrated for their contributions to art and science, pretty much to the exclusion of everybody else."
Because those dead white folks happened to create western society as we know it. Why would you not, then, learn about them so you know history?
Can you imagine an English major for example, not learning about Shakespeare because he was a dead white male? If you graduated as an English major and hadn't read Shakespeare, I'd question the degree you have displayed on your wall.
It sucks that western culture is based on white people, by and large. Such is the price we all must bear living in a majority white culture based around Europe. I feel bad for those who are not skin complected exactly like Shakespeare. Being the worlds most influential author, and playwright I'd think that he would speak to the human condition and thus,non whites might see stuff in his work that relates to their lives.
When I read black authors, its not like I dont' relate because they are black. Because feelings and emotions are not black things that I don't understand.
They aren't racist trolls, they are racial trolls. Its a white thing, you wouldn't understand.
This is the basic paradox of the modern social justice movement. Its entire ideology is built on the notion of respecting an individuals ethnic identity, heritage, cultural traditions, etc. However, white, European-Americans are no permitted to possess such an identity. They only collective identity you are permitted is white guilt. As a white person, you must feel collective guilt and remorse for unjust acts you had nothing to do with. What SJW types cannot seem to grasp is that a white person can prefer the company of other white people without being a hate-filled bigot.
A tolerant, pluralistic, liberal-mined society can absorb a certain amount of immigration so long as it is able to maintain a dominant cultural identity that insists immigrants accommodate themselves to it. Once that breaks down, you get ethnic balkanization. As I've said before on this blog, I'm a pessimist on the matter. I think we have passed the tipping point, and I see potentially catastrophic outcomes within the next 50 years or so.
Just like the racists trolls behind every one of the other NYU skin color based grounds.
The fact that, even with reality staring them in the face, people can't see the symmetry is a great argument for the utter stupidity of every member of the Left.
Terry wrote:
No, it's because every single white person is rich and living on inherited wealth, is a fancy lawyer, a businessman, or a school teacher. There are no poor oppressed white people.
None.
Chris Rock had a joke about this where he said the busboy would rather keep his whiteness then live like Chris Rock.
Have you tested that theory Chris? I'm sure a lot of white folks would LOVE to live like you do, and coast by on negligible acting talents. KInd of racist for you to assume what white folks must think about you. What privilege do you think that racist busboy gets from his white skin that you don't have being a millionaire Hollywood actor.
This is Chris Rock's house:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=chris+rock+house&view=detailv2&qpvt=chris+rock+house&id=89ED2691A31F49B508154E5ED1BCF475CA45C182&selectedIndex=1&ccid=ToAKpELl&simid=608054111623384138&thid=OIP.M4e800aa442e5daac53029af17be0cd78H0&ajaxhist=0
I'd like to see the house of the white busboy he says wouldn't trade places with him because he wants to keep his whiteness instead.
What's chris rocks net worth?
http://www.celebritynetworth.com/richest-celebrities/richest-comedians/chris-rock-net-worth/
That's not privilege? He lives better than royalty in many countries. No white person stopped him from achieving that massive wealth. And yet, hes going to tell a poor white bus boy that he is a racist and would rather keep his white ness than live like a multimillionaire in a huge mansion?
FWBuff: "To quote Althouse, "I'm skeptical." Who knows whether the "anonymous" organizer is even white? Several similar racial incidents have been exposed as hoaxes done to gin up publicity for the aggrieved."
I always wondered what Eddie Murphy (in white face) was up to these days.
Now we know.
Trolls come from European folklore. For non-whites to use this word in any way is cultural appropriation and they should stop.
SJWs try arguing that it's racist to have a "white club" where having a "black club" is perfectly fine--no matter whether both clubs are inclusive of members of other races, or whether both clubs are more about common heritage and not about hatred of others. Somehow, the "white club" is bad in and of itself.
The only way to understand this is to accept that whites are inherently oppressive and negative. To be a true SJW, you have to at some level hate whites, particularly white men, and while you can "accept" a self-hating white you still have to consider them second-class and illegitimate. It's simply a part of that worldview.
So there's no point in trying to understand why a "white students' union" is a bad thing, while a "black students' union" is okay, knowing nothing else about it--just consider that whites are bad, so any group for them must be bad. "Black pride" may mean proud of one's blackness, but "white pride" must mean "hatred and oppression of non-whites". That's all that the SJW can fathom.
Also never mind the absurdity of "white supremacists" at NYU. Yes, very wealthy white supremacists who decided to attend college in the heart of Manhattan and one of the most left-leaning schools in the country. A regular KKK haven.
I wonder how long until it's revealed that this was a prank by some attention whore SJW?
wildswan said...
White Students Union: A clear case of cultural appropriation
BTW: Is it cultural appropriation to want a Yale degree without contact with white students or with Newton, Leibniz, Darwin, Rutherford, Shakespeare, Milton, Coleridge, Whitman, Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Francis Galton, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Woodrow Wilson or Winston Churchill?"
Why yes it is and yes the irony escapes them.
jr565 said...
Terry wrote:
No, it's because every single white person is rich and living on inherited wealth, is a fancy lawyer, a businessman, or a school teacher. There are no poor oppressed white people.
None.
Chris Rock had a joke about this where he said the busboy would rather keep his whiteness then live like Chris Rock.
Have you tested that theory Chris? I'm sure a lot of white folks would LOVE to live like you do, and coast by on negligible acting talents. KInd of racist for you to assume what white folks must think about you. What privilege do you think that racist busboy gets from his white skin that you don't have being a millionaire Hollywood actor. "
Perhaps Chris would rather be a white busboy than black and rich. He seems to feel that way. No other explanation of such a stupid comment.
Norman Poderhoretz wrote a middling-famous essay on 'the negro problem' back in 1963. It can be read here:
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/articles/my-negro-problem-and-ours/
It shows how different peoples' experience of America's racial and ethnic divides can be. Podhoretz gre up in a poor NY neighborhood. He knew poor and working class Jews, poor and working class Italians and Irish, and Blacks. That was it.
My wife grew up in the NY area and northern New Jersey in the 1950s. Her ethnic environment was similar to Podhoretz 1930s' Brooklyn, with the addition of a few wealthy Jews and WASPs.
I grew up in a working class suburb of a large Midwestern city in the 1960s. I knew no Blacks or Jews. Virtually everyone was of German, Scandinavian, or Polish descent, divided about equally between Catholics and Lutherans. If you saw a Black person you stared. The first Jew I knew was a girl in middle school. I only knew that she was a Jew because she didn't stand up and sing Christmas carolls with the rest of us. One of my classmates asked her why, and she said that was Jewish and didn't believe in Jesus. The girl who asked why she wasn't singing blurted out that she would go to Hell.
I had one grandfather who was a vicious racist. He was born to desperately poor family of Georgia sharecroppers in the 1890s. You know that fire chief in the movie Ragtime? The one who dumped a bucket of shit into the Black guy's car because he thought no Black man should have a car while there were still white people who didn't have a car? My grandfather was like that. He din't mind Mexicans though. He was in Texas in the cavalry in the 1910s, and he sympathized with Mexicans. They worked themselves to an early grave as sharecroppers, like the poor Georgians he knew.
That grandfather was also a socialist and an atheist. The rich and the bosses used religion to keep people down, tadpoles proved that evolution was real, In Russia the workers were the bosses, etc.
My other grandfather was a Jehovah's Witness. He was not a racist. He blushed when he had to describe a part of town I should stay away from as 'niggertown.' He told me that Jews were still God's chosen people. His JW congregation (or whatever they call them) was about 20% Black. At meetings they called one another 'brother' and went canvassing door-to-door, Blacks and whites together.
Both grandfathers despised the federal government They thought that it existed to keep the high, high, and the low, low.
Can you imagine an English major for example, not learning about Shakespeare because he was a dead white male? If you graduated as an English major and hadn't read Shakespeare, I'd question the degree you have displayed on your wall.
This does happen today.
I love these students (and faculty, who are more gung-ho in most cases) who want to remove names from buildings --- but giving back the PROPERTY that was bought by people of dubious moral character seems to be a non-starter.
Rockefeller wasn't always nice. Let's tear his libraries down.
Didn't Jefferson found U. Virginia? Well, we need to do away with THAT, too...right?
Overt white "pride" groups, operating openly and with growing support, are inevitable. Such identity politics is just part of the progressive utopia.
The U.S. reached a fork in the road back in the 1970s, when the civil rights movement had achieved majority support. We could continue down the road toward color blindness and common values, or choose identity politics and relentless racial conflict.
History is being rewritten so that each group can have its own. Our present, we're told, is a simple narrative of Oppressor v. Oppressed. And our future is more of the same as far as the eye can see.
That we chose the wrong road is obvious. Where it leads is not.
Since this club is designed to talk about "white identity" it really is racialist in structure. One of the key issues in talking about white privilege, for me, is that doing so erases real issues and concerns within the contexts of European history. It’s ahistorical and focused only on a narrow system in a much broader and more complex environment.
Not all were privileged in Europe, that there is some kind of shared history doesn't even work in America, where the Irish had a different experience than the English or Germans, and the Spanish have a different history on the continent than the French. That we could see even some common identity between different European cultures is pretty silly.
A 1000+ years of warfare between different regions in Europe and suddenly we're all one big happy racial group who watch out for each other? Sheesh, now the proletariat and the bourgeoisie are really just the same? What was Marx all bothered about?!
Different history and different families have different privileges and experiences. In contrast, there really is a shared history and experience for most Black Americans.
I could see there being a Scottish heritage club, or a German club, or a Greek club, or Russian fellowship, etc. But a "white" club is just silly and feeds into the same sort of dysfunctional assumptions currently dominating academic institutions.
(earlier comment edited and reposted for grammar, spelling, and other embarrassing mistakes)
@jr565, not only does it happen today -- as Gahrie points out -- but the whole business is actually of long standing. Forty years ago I met a man with an MA in Russian History who could not read nor speak the Russian language. The dumbing down of America has been going on for quite a while.
@Terry,
I grew up in a working class suburb of a large Midwestern city in the 1960s. I knew no Blacks or Jews. Virtually everyone was of German, Scandinavian, or Polish descent, divided about equally between Catholics and Lutherans.
Thanks for the interesting memories!
What I find strange is that, growing up in the 60's & 70's in a small-ish town in northern Alabama (pop. 42,000), I knew blacks, Asians (Indians, Chinese), Jews, Protestants of all sorts from Episcopalians to Holy Rollers, and, of course, Catholics, being one myself. Yet, if we were to meet a total stranger, he would probably assume that, you, living in a major Midwestern metropolis had a much more varied background than me, the southern hick. I mean, honestly, I'd assume you'd have a more varied background than I did. But, that wouldn't be true. I still find that so strange......
"This does happen today."
THats' for sure. But its still hard to imagine. and for the cultural Marxists its something to brag about. But its still almost inconceivable. (as someone who believes in the merits of a classical education). If the school is run by SJW's then its totally conceivable.
Big Mike wrote:
"Forty years ago I met a man with an MA in Russian History who could not read nor speak the Russian language."
In 1977, Umberto Eco wrote a guide to academic writing: How to Write a Thesis. It is dated, but it is still a good guide for any student. Eco wrote it in Italian (you can get the English translation here: http://www.amazon.com/How-Write-Thesis-Umberto-Eco/dp/0262527138), and wrote it for Italian university students. The Italian university experience Eco describes was unusual. There weren't required classes. You went for four years, took the classes you wanted, and to graduate you submitted a long (> 150 page) thesis. Apparently the university assumed you had learned to read and write properly in secondary school.
Anyhow, Eco spends a longish part of a chapter dealing with language. He said that you could use translations (into Italian, I assume) for secondary and tertiary sources, but if your primary source was in another language, you had to learn to read and write in that language. Eco wrote this advice to students who waited until their third year to begin their thesis: if you were a late starter, pick a subject with primary sources in Italian or whatever language you already knew.
I can't believe nobody wants to debate the relative merits of Snow vs Vanilla Ice?
How about Eminem vs. Mad Child from Swollen Members? Anyone?
What goes around comes around.
"I would not call them racist hoaxers."
Gawker is a failing left wing internet site. Not even the NY Times thinks they are succeeding.
They are like left wing talk radio and "Coffee Parties" which are just imitating the conservative hold on media not part of the DNC nexus.
Michael K wrote:
Gawker is a failing left wing internet site. Not even the NY Times thinks they are succeeding.
Progressivism is a moral issue to liberals. There is no joy in being just as moral as the average person. There is no joy in holding merely popular political views. If you do, you aren't progressive, you are merely average.
Nevertheless, they want themselves and their ideas to be popular and successful.
When they aren't -- when their crappy plays close, when their crappy movies lose money, when their crappy radio programs get canceled, when their crappy magazines' deep-pocket liberal backers get tired of losing money and pull the plug -- they don't blame themselves.
They are simply too good for the Americans they hold in contempt.
PaddyO at 3:40pm, I'm betting more white students have shared experiences and history as Americans than their ancestors, from various European countries did. And at this point in racial identity politics, they have a legitimate gripe. Safe spaces for everyone!
"I love these students (and faculty, who are more gung-ho in most cases) who want to remove names from buildings --- but giving back the PROPERTY that was bought by people of dubious moral character seems to be a non-starter."
Good point--do they wish to return the money and earnings from any of Woodrow Wilson's family's donations? Are these genius students willing to accept a surcharge on their tuition to make up the shortfall? If not, they can have a steaming cup of STFU.
Nothing quite like craven hashtag activism--screaming about buildings named after the wrong people, but not a single risk taken or sacrifice made to actually improve anyone's life. We are truly seeing the dregs of modern social movements.
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