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From: jyacc!mydog!gcf@uunet.uu.NET (Gordon Fitch)
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Why I Am Not a Feminist
Message-ID: <9104292030.17281@mydog.UUCP>
Date: 2 May 91 00:23:25 GMT
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gazit@cs.duke.edu (Hillel Gazit) quotes somebody:
| >>                               "...  Specifically, this means that it
| >> is not open to debate whether a white student is racist or a male
| >> student is sexist.  He/she simply is."  -- From the April issue of
| >> "Forbes"

rivero@dev8a.mdcbbs.com writes:
| >Ms. Thompson, in saying a white student "simply is" a racist, makes a
| >racist remark. When she says a male student "simply is" sexist, she
| >makes a sexist remark. There are racists of all colors, and sexists of
| >both genders.  Pointing to one sex (race) over another for crimes that
| >both are equally guilty of is "simply not" fair.

farmerl@handel.cs.colostate.EDU (lisa ann farmer):
| I went to a seminar by Lillian Roball Rose(or Ross) last fall.  I
| think that she presented some good ways at looking at sexism,
| classism, racism, ableism, etc.  In this society(USA) we have a white
| male upper-middle class, able group in power.  If you are part of what
| is in power you are an ??ist.  For example, if you are white _because_
| whites are in power (they make the laws,enforce them etc) you are
| racist.  This means that because you are white there are certain
| attitudes that you grow up with, certain ways that you are treated by
| the people in power because you are white.
|
| Because you are associated with the group that makes the
| (sexist,racist,ableist) laws you are part of the problem.  That does
| not however imply that you can not be part of the solution.  This does
| not mean you should feel guilty being white.  etc.  But everytime you
| participate in something that is -ist and you are not part of the
| target group and you do not say "this is -ist" then you are not being
| part of the solution.                       ...  So my main point is
| you can't be an -ist if you are not in power.

I find this last idea, which has been very popular at times,
extraordinarily destructive.  It originates in what I think is a
misunderstanding of a Marxist concept, "objective racism" (or
sexism, or whatever).  This concept may be illustrated by a
white person who lives in a society where whites, as a class,
oppress blacks, as a class.  A white individual who benefits
from this oppression is said to be involved in "objective
racism" even though she may not be personally a racist.  In
fact, she may be an anti-racist; this sort of Marxist analysis
is not about personal guilt and redemption but about economic
and political relationships.

Apparently, some people found it convenient or gratifying to
take this theory out of its context and omit certain essential
parts of it, thus coming up with the idea that, if one is a
member of an oppressed group, it's all right to utter racist
ideas and commit racist acts because one can't really be a
racist if one belongs to the right race.   Guess what: this
is _exactly_ the same theory straight-out white racists
promulgate!  If you can stand it, read some Nazi literature:
there you will see that it is not only a pleasure, but a duty,
for the persecuted white race to strike back at its evil
opponents.

The fact is, racism, sexism, and so forth are symptoms of a
kind of mental illness which a great many people seem prone
to: a perception that categories of people, usually people
in some way not quite like themselves, or like the dominant
group, are less than human.  Being on the wrong end of one of
its outbreaks does not make any particular group immune to it.
Actually, it seems to increase the likelihood of infection.

The really sad part of this is that, while racism poisons a
majority, it only makes it sick.  A disadvantaged group which
takes this sort of thing seriously is on the point of suicide,
since it has fewer resources with which to cope with the
sickness.

--
Gordon Fitch  |  gcf@mydog.uucp  | uunet!cmcl2.nyu.edu!panix!mydog!gcf