Privilege and “Guilt” (UPDATED)

Posted on March 19, 2014 by wellsdc

Over the past couple of days, I have participated in several heated discussions on Facebook regarding white privilege, largely inspired by these two articles:

The 5 Stages of White Privilege Awareness, nance, The Rusty Life, March 1, 2014
Recovery From Privilege, Doug Muder, Free and Responsible Search, March 18, 2014

Some people are politely skeptical of the idea, while other are very actively hostile towards it. All I’m really trying to say is that as a white person, there’s a lot I don’t know, and we should all try listening now and then. Maybe I’m still stuck in Stage 3 as described in nance’s article, or maybe not. I’m just going to reprint some of my comments from Facebook below without any further editing, in case I need to bring them up again.

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No one is saying that people with privilege should feel guilty. In fact, the only people who routinely mention “guilt” are the privileged people insisting that they refuse to feel guilty about the circumstances of their lives, which makes me think they doth protest too much.

You are focusing on your intent, which might not be in any way malicious–but that doesn’t mean that well-meaning people with privilege can’t cause harm. (In fact, the well-meaning can often cause great deals of harm.) You have to look at it from the point of view of a person being harmed. Would you care if the person actively harming you was being malicious or not? Probably not–I know I’d want the harm to stop first, and maybe then we could all chat about it.

————————– Continue reading →

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

Posted on March 17, 2014 by wellsdc

Please drive safely.

(h/t John Cole for the photo.)

What I’m Reading, March 17, 2014

Posted on March 17, 2014 by wellsdc

How did Irish-Americans get so disgusting? Andrew O’Hehir, Salon, March 15, 2014

Irish-Americans rapidly absorbed the lesson that the way to succeed in their new country was to reject the politics of class and shared economic interests and embrace the politics of race. One disgraceful result was the New York draft riots of 1863, the low point of Irish-black relations in American history, when Irish immigrants by the thousands turned on their black neighbors in a thinly disguised race riot. Irish-Americans were under no delusions that the ruling class of Anglo Protestants liked or trusted them, and anti-Irish and/or anti-Catholic bigotry endured in diluted form well into the 20th century. But by allying themselves with a system of white supremacy, the Irish in America were granted a share of power and privilege — most notably in urban machine politics, and the police and fire departments of every major city.

*** Continue reading →

I Was Normcore Before Normcore Was Normcore, and I’ll Be Normcore After Normcore Is Over

Posted on March 17, 2014 by wellsdc

Igor Schwarzmann [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en)], via Flickr

This was the ONLY result on a Google image search for “normcore” labeled for commercial reuse. That’s just how avant garde normcore is.

I probably already missed the boat on normcore as an actual cultural phenomenon, style, or whatever, because (a) I seem to always be a few weeks, months, or years behind these things, and (b) even if I did hear about it at the right time, I wouldn’t care. (I have been told that my overt lack of caring about these things makes me even worse than the people who actively follow these things, but whatever.)

As near as I can tell, New York Magazine reported on the trend of people wearing clothes that make them obviously unobvious (that’s my description and no one is allowed to use it!), which someone somewhere apparently called normcore, and because anything that anyone wears in New York is destined to become a trend somewhere else, “normcore” was born. (Actually, the term dates all the way back to October 2013, when something called a “trend forecasting group” first used it. Here’s a PDF file the group put out that I’d prefer not to read. I’d like to think that a shipment of radioactive L.L. Bean shirts was somehow involved in the genesis of normcore, but I doubt it.) Soon, HuffPo chimed in on normcore, Know Your Meme got an entry, and Vogue ripped on the trend. In the UK, the Guardian reported on it in an effort to look cool, and the Telegraph declared Barack Obama to be “normcore’s latest poster boy.” First of all, I don’t know if they meant that as a good thing (the hip president), a bad thing (“normcore” is the new “mom jeans”), or just a British thing; and I don’t know if normcore had any previous poster boys that would let Obama be the “latest” one.

Before most of these stories even made print, Mashable was reporting on how the internet was getting sick of normcore. It barely took two weeks after the New York Magazine article before Esquire was lecturing people on how they just. don’t. get. normcore: Continue reading →

Learning Not to Hate

Posted on March 16, 2014 by wellsdc

Per a friend ‘s Facebook post, there is a rumor that Fred Phelps is dying. It is surprisingly difficult to know how to feel about this, or whether I should even feel anything at all. I like the way my friend put it: “I’m not glad he’s dying. But I sure as hell ain’t sad.”

There is also a rumor, which the church will not confirm, that Phelps was excommunicated last summer, whatever that means.

How much real influence has Westboro Baptist Church really had? Has it really been a force for hate and/or evil in the world, or just sort of an oddity? It gave us a Supreme Court ruling that confirmed things we already knew about free speech. To an extent, though, WBC’s protests have galvanized opposition to their kind of hate.

You might say, however, that WBC has given cover to less ostentatious homophobes, who can truthfully say that whatever they may do to fight against marriage equality and LGBTQ rights, at least they never picket funerals. That said, WBC probably undercut its own mission by picketing military funerals, thereby driving away all those potential right-wing allies.

I would never celebrate anyone’s death (although I can’t say I’ve always held to that.) On a larger scale, Phelps’ death will mean that his particular brand of hatred is one step closer to dying out. On a smaller, more personal scale, it makes me sad that anyone goes to their grave with that much fear and hatred in them, and leaves that sort of legacy behind.

All I can really predict with any confidence is that Phelps and the WBC will be, at best, a footnote in the “miscellaneous” section of human history. Keith Brekhus said it quite well at PoliticusUSA:

As Fred Phelps approaches his final days, the temptation to attend his funeral, once he passes, with a “God hates Fred” sign, might be tough to resist. However, a stronger message would be to avoid his funeral altogether rather than answering hate with hate. Besides, if he was ex-communicated last year, it is almost a sure bet that the surviving members who have not yet left Westboro Baptist Church, will be picketing his funeral. Ironically they will be holding signs arguing that this bitter, hateful man was not hateful enough. If so, their hateful signs will serve as a tragically fitting reminder to the legacy Reverend Phelps will leave behind.

Believe it or not, Mr. Phelps, but I do not hate you. I also do not envy a life so full of anger and hatred like the one you seem to have led. I doubt much of anything can atone for that sort of life, but I do hope you find some kind of peace.

See also: this (h/t Sarah). Definitely see what George Takei said.

The #firstworldproblems of Shopping at Whole Foods

Posted on February 28, 2014 by wellsdc

That Other Paper [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/)] via Flickr Shopping at Whole Foods can be a remarkable experience, especially at the flagship store near downtown Austin. For years after it opened in 2005, and possibly continuing to today, the store was a destination in an of itself. People go there not just to by groceries, but to look around and, you know, like, experience stuff. This also makes going to Whole Foods one of the most infuriating experiences of modern-day upper-middle-class American life—when you think about it, that ought to make us all pretty hopeful, but it’s still an irritating experience in the moment. It definitely gets a #firstworldproblems hashtag.

An article at Medium by Nils Parker deems Whole Foods “America’s Angriest Store,” and there is much truth to that assessment.

The problem with Whole Foods is their regular customers. They are, across the board, across the country, useless, ignorant, and miserable. They’re worse than miserable, they’re angry. They are quite literally the opposite of every Whole Foods employee I’ve ever encountered. Walk through any store any time of day—but especially 530pm on a weekday or Saturday afternoon during football season—and invariably you will encounter a sneering, disdainful horde of hipster Zombies and entitled 1%ers.

They stand in the middle of the aisles, blocking passage of any other cart, staring intently at the selection asking themselves that critical question: which one of these olive oils makes me seem coolest and most socially conscious, while also making the raw vegetable salad I’m preparing for the monthly condo board meeting seem most rustic and artisanal?

I do not, as a general rule, like shopping. The ability to order stuff from my iPhone and have it delivered to me is, perhaps for me, the greatest technological achievement of my lifetime in terms of minimizing annoyance. When I do go to the grocery store, or wherever else, I prefer to get in, grab what I need, and get the hell out. I’m reasonably good at getting the lay of the land once I’m in a store so I know exactly where to go.

Whole Foods makes this almost impossible, because of the people I described earlier, whom I shall call “tourists.” I don’t think it is as bad at the flagship store as it was during the first few years, when people seemed to wander the store aimlessly, pushing shopping carts that they never actually filled with groceries, marveling at the fact that there are multiple different kinds of canned organic coconut milk. Continue reading →

A Couple of Thoughts to Get You Through Your Week as Realistically as Possible

Posted on February 24, 2014 by wellsdc

"frog in a bad mood" by Alexander Maier (originally posted to Flickr as sad frog) [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons It would appear, at least according to some researchers, that genius strikes and/or peaks in one’s late 30’s. I take this to mean two things:

At 39 years old, now is my time to shine.
It’s all downhill from here, but I might as well enjoy the ride.

Also, relying solely or primarily on positive thinking might make you less likely to succeed. (Put another way, it’s further evidence that “The Secret” doesn’t work.)

Happy Monday, all.

Photo credit: “frog in a bad mood” by Alexander Maier (originally posted to Flickr as sad frog) [CC-BY-2.0], via Wikimedia Commons.

“You’re no longer the underdogs, it’s very important that you realize that.”

Posted on February 21, 2014 by wellsdc

John Oliver rips into Silicon Valley douchebags, and it is glorious. Hopefully the video embeds below (WordPress can be weird about that):

Just one of many awesome quotes:

There are only winners here this evening. There are winners, and people who failed to win. So if you don’t win an award, you are not a loser; you are a failure. There is an important distinction there.

To quote Salon’s Andrew Leonard, “[Y]ou really need to watch the entire nine-minute video for maximum effect. And decide for yourself, is the laughter that greets Oliver’s bracing jabs the sound of people who are in on the joke?”

Get Your Mind Back in the Gutter

Posted on February 18, 2014 by wellsdc

"Free Sugar Baby Puppy Dog and Pink Rose Petals" by Pink Sherbet Photography [CC-BY-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/)], via Flickr

Try this: Whenever you think you’re about to start thinking of gay stuff, picture this puppy covered in rose petals instead. Feel better?

According to at least some people, growing tolerance of LGBTQ individuals and issues (this really only applies to the “G” part, I guess) is due to the fact that people just aren’t thinking about gay sex, and about how icky it is, nearly enough. If people could just get an image of anal intercourse back into their minds, then, uh, things would improve or something.

Alicia Colon, who writes for the American Thinker, really thinks we should be thinking about rectums and poo more often. Roy Edroso at alicublog quotes her as saying:

Those lovable characters in the sitcoms are robustly healthy and affluent, cuddly folks who never even hint at any of the negative consequences that follow on a lifetime of practicing anal intercourse. Nobody wears Depends, nobody deals with feces-borne diseases, and the devastation of AIDS is left for a few feature films that generate sympathy for the victims without addressing the behavioral component of the disease vector.

He goes on to add:

Colon obviously missed that very special Will & Grace episode, “Giardia is Not a River in Italy.” Colon does approve of gay Catholics who do not have anal intercourse, and hopes a book her friend is writing about them “may enlighten others and be helpful to Catholic gays as Bill W’s book was for alcoholics.”

It’s almost charming that such people still exist; they’re like bigot Shakers. I wonder if they ever perceive the irony of the likelihood that the carriers of the Gay Plague will outlast them.

Seriously, what is it with people and their obsession with same-sex sex? Specifically, gay sex, because no one ever quite seems to get so perturbed by thoughts of Sapphic lovemaking (or at least they don’t embarrass themselves in public about it as much.)

I like the way Allen Clifton put it when speaking of that Duck Dynasty guy and his apparent inability not to think of gay people primarily in terms of appendages and orifices:

When I read Phil Robertson’s comments, I wasn’t mad – I felt sorry for him. I couldn’t imagine feeling such disdain toward so many people based on who they love – something that has zero impact on my life. I can’t even wrap my mind around what it must be like to obsess so much about man on man anal sex to the point that it would bother me. To be honest, I never think about it. But then again, I’m straight and don’t care what other people do in their own bedroom – so why would I think about it?

Photo credit: “Free Sugar Baby Puppy Dog and Pink Rose Petals” by Pink Sherbet Photography [CC-BY-2.0], via Flickr.

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Category Archives: Culture

Privilege and “Guilt” (UPDATED)

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

What I’m Reading, March 17, 2014

I Was Normcore Before Normcore Was Normcore, and I’ll Be Normcore After Normcore Is Over

Learning Not to Hate

The #firstworldproblems of Shopping at Whole Foods

A Couple of Thoughts to Get You Through Your Week as Realistically as Possible

“You’re no longer the underdogs, it’s very important that you realize that.”

Get Your Mind Back in the Gutter