Escape From the Oppression Olympics
Like most people, I have my pet theories about why tumblr is such a clusterfuck of identities and petty politics, and why so many people on tumblr engage in bizarre and reactionary behavior well past their teenage years. Even taking into account the Greater Internet Fuckward Theory, tumblr culture is of a very specific vein; the vilification of skepticism, the rejection of human empathy, the furious masturbation to textbook psychology issues to the point where you lose touch with the real world. The hydra has many heads; otherkins, transethnics, sapiosexuals, transtrenders, white knights, and social justice assholes from all walks of life, but at the heart of it is that one word that makes this damn website so infamous: privilege.
Jason Richwine’s dissertation is an example of scientific racism - the use of science or social science to explain the inferiority of a racialized group. Scientific racism has no place in twenty-first century academia.
In 2009, Jason Richwine successfully defended a dissertation at Harvard University where he wrote that Hispanic immigrants have a substantially lower I.Q. than the white native-born population and that, because of the hereditary nature of I.Q., this fact should be taken into consideration when designing immigration policy. In May 2013, Richwine’s views became public as part of his role in writing an immigration policy report for the Heritage Foundation. …
As academics, we find it appalling that, in 2009, three professors at Harvard University were willing to guide and approve a dissertation in this academic tradition. There are two central problems with Richwine’s work that should not pass muster in any dissertation committee: 1) the argument that I.Q. scores are an indication of intelligence; and 2) the idea that I.Q. is a genetic trait. Both ideas have been discredited and both are linked to an unfortunate history of scientific racism. …
Dean Ellwood at Harvard Kennedy School takes the position that this dissertation is part of an academic debate. However, there is no academic debate on whether or not Hispanics as a group are less intelligent than native-born whites. There are debates on whether or not Hispanic is a pan-ethnic, ethnic, or racialized category. There are debates on how and whether or why we should measure intelligence. There are debates on the extent to which intelligence is a heritable trait. But, there are no debates on whether or not Latino immigrants have the intellectual caliber to be part of the United States. Those kinds of debates happen in nativist and white supremacist circles, which have no place in academia, which prizes arguments and debates based on valid constructs and scientific evidence.
”ASA Section on Racial and Ethnic Minorities
academia has come so far, but still has so far to go
(via feministsociology)
Students from Humboldt State University have created a map of racism and homophobia in America after analysing 150,000 tweets containing hate words sent between June 2012-April 2013.
via rossabroad
Transnational Feminism: A Tribute to India’s Gulabi Gang
The Gulabi Gang is an extraordinary women’s movement formed in 2006 by Sampat Pal Devi in the Banda District of Uttar Pradesh in Northern India. This region is one of the poorest districts in the country and is marked by a deeply patriarchal culture, rigid caste divisions, female illiteracy, domestic violence, child labour, child marraiges and dowry demands. The women’s group is popularly known as Gulabi or ‘Pink’ Gang because the members wear bright pink saris and wield bamboo sticks. Sampat says, “We are not a gang in the usual sense of the term, we are a gang for justice.”
American/Western queers, please stop talking about hijra. I don’t know much about them and I doubt that most of the people who wheel them out as talking points do either. I doubt significantly that they understand their identities in the same way we understand ours. Trying to create a worldwide queer philosophy based on Western experiences, vocabulary, and understandings is shortsighted and paternalistic, and discourses like this are expressions of colonialist attitudes. So stop.
These are pictures from the assault and arrest of my good friend and roommate. What happened was NOT okay and we really need help getting the word out.
PLEASE SHARE!
Signal BOOST!!!! Fight police brutality!
AND THERE ARE FEMINISTS THAT THINK THE POLICE HELP LOL
This is so ridiculous.
Hari Kondabolu on the safety for South Asians today.
Breaking News: NY lawmaker wears blackface costume to party
NBC New York: A New York state assemblyman from Brooklyn is facing critics after he wore black face paint as part of his costume for a party celebrating the Jewish holiday of Purim.
Democratic Assemblyman Dov Hikind wore the face paint plus an Afro wig at the party he hosted at his home. A…
One of the most problematic aspects of discussing racism’s impact on society is the lack of admittance that racism has evolved. Far to many people speak of racism with a strong sense of nostalgia, ignorant of the fact that institutionalized racism is a very real concern. It seems in many discussions concerning racism that the belief is racism ended either in 1865 with the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation or with the end of the Civil Rights Moments. Racist attacks against blacks is largely seen as “isolated incidents” regardless of how often they may occur. Racism is not a time period, it is a ideology that has been perpetuated by ignorance and negligence. How far have we come as a society when the Voting Rights Act is being challenged as “perpetuating racial entitlement” as Supreme Justice Antonin Scalia suggested or that schools in poor communites (predominantly POC) are being overlooked in terms of care and reliable education services in favor of middle class communites (predominantly white)? The fact of the matter is that we are all born equal however we are not treated equal and the continuation of this white social construct is to blame. So instead of criticizing those who acknowledge the dichotmy between whites and POC set by this white society’s standard actually think and listen
Wow: Scalia calls the Voting Rights Act the "perpetuation of racial entitlement"
Quick, someone tell Antonin Scalia that being a white male is the epitome of “racial entitlement.”
(Source: think-progress)
White feminists:
When you discuss the wage gap, here are a few things to keep in mind:
- Only white women make $0.77 to a man’s dollar.
- Black women make about $0.68 to a man’s dollar.
- Latina women make about $0.58 to a man’s dollar.
Intersectionality matters.
Any stats on Asian women? Just curious…cause I am one, and there’s A LOT of us.
according to aauw.org asian women make 77% to a man’s dollar.
welp…
(Source: sexnegative-cyberslut)
Clueless Idiot Jim DeRogatis Uses the Newtown Shooting to Condemn Chief Keef
“Of course, saying that carries the risk of being dismissed as clueless and chronically out of touch—a “rockist” (code for “racist”) who doesn’t understand hip-hop culture unless it’s of the positive (code for “boring,” “feel-good” and “phony”) variety that, as noted here before, previously characterized much of the rap music that brought the national spotlight to Chicago in the past, courtesy of artists such as Kanye, Common, Rhymefest, Lupe Fiasco and Kid Sister.”
uh, well, yeah, Jim.
Crackers be fucking cracking
dagArchives: Writing about Whiteness, White Privilege, Crass Libertarianism Super-Post
Always looking for conversation about these things.
In June last year, I began working on how I write about whiteness, white power, capitalism, and anti-capitalism mainly to develop concepts that are central to a manuscript I’m working on. Immediately, I was engaged by two groups of tumblr bloggers: libertarians and social justice bloggers. Neither appreciate my representations of free market capitalism and white social justice activists. Too bad, right.
I’ve received several requests for a post with links to what I’ve written. This is not everything, but it includes the posts where I work on concepts I think are significant.
I’m into revision, so I’ve edited and proofed and added a little here and there, but this is mostly as it was posted. You can use this long post if you like as each entry is present after “Read More”, or save the individual links. I’ll add to it as people help me find things I’ve written that they’d like included.
- dagNotes: Notes On Whiteness, White Power, Capitalism & Anti-Capitalism
- On Crass Libertarianism (a vehicle for white supremacist capitalist society)
- dagNotes: A little bit on how I see privilege and white power working, even in Korea
- White Power 101: White Privilege Denial Discourse
- Why it’s racist. In one sentence.
- (On why colorblindness is white supremacist.)
- To Ziggystardyke: On Being White
- dagNotes: The reason I wrote “White is not a skin color”
- dagAsk: Three Lessons
- Possessive Whiteness
- 11A. Possessive Whiteness and Liberals:
- dagNotes: on writing about whiteness
- My Super-Post on Crass Libertarianism, Liberty, Ideology, Ron Paul fans
Laws against Romani people in America
For the person yesterday saying they find it hard to believe that there actually are laws against the Romani people in the United States. These are only a few, some of which are still in effect, the one from New Jersey was only repealed in ‘98.
gypsies … for each county … shall be jointly and severally liablewith his or her associates [to a fine of] two thousand dollars (State Code of Mississippi, Section 27-17-191).
The governing body may make, amend, repeal and enforce ordinances to license and regulate … gypsies (New Jersey Statutes, 40:52-1).
After the passage of this act, it shall be unlawful for any … gypsies … to … settle within the limits of any county of this state [without having first obtained a yearly license to do so] (Pennsylvania Statutes, Section 11810).Any person may demand of any … gypsies that they shall produce or show their license issued within such county, and if they shall refuse to do so … he shall seize all the property in the possession of such [Gypsies] (Pennsylvania Statutes, Section 11803).
Gypsies [in the State of Maryland] must pay jurisdictions a license fee of $1000 before settling or doing business. When any gypsy is arrested, all his property and all the property of members of any group with which he may be traveling, can be confiscated and sold to pay any fine a court may levy against the arrested gypsy. Sheriffs are paid a $10 bounty for any gypsy they arrest who pays the $1000 fee after he is arrested (Logan, 1976).
Whenever … gypsies shall be located within any municipality … the county department of health or joint county department of health shall have power … to order such [Gypsies … ] to leave said municipality within the time specified (Pennsylvania Title 53: Municipal and Quasi-Municipal Corporations, Chapter xvii, Section 3701).
It is illegal in Pennsylvania to be a Gypsy without a license … Any Gypsy who insists on being what he was born - a Gypsy - without a license, is liable to up to $100 fine and 30 days in jail. A constable may confiscate and sell a convicted Gypsy’s possessions to satisfy the sentence … any person may demand to see a Gypsy’s license. If the Gypsy cannot produce a license, the person may turn the Gypsy in to any convenient justice of the peace (Smart, 1969).
Upon each company of … Gypsies, engaged in trading or selling merchandise or livestock of any kind, or clairvoyant, or persons engaged in fortunetelling, phrenology, or palmistry, $250 [is] to be collected … [from those who] live in tents or travel in covered wagons and automobiles, and who may be a resident of some country or who reside without the State, and who are commonly called traveling horse traders and Gypsies (Georgia Acts and Resolutions, 1927, Part I, Title II, Section 56, p.3).
Texas law refers to “Prostitutes, Gypsies and vagabonds” in the same breath, and charges the Romany people $500 to live there (Bernardo, 1981:108).
Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Indiana, that it shall be unlawful for any band of Gypsies … to camp in tent, wagon or otherwise, on any public highway in this state, or lands adjacent thereto … Any person or persons violating the provisions of this Act shall be deemed guilty … and upon conviction shall be fined not exceeding twenty-five dollars or imprisoned in the county jail not exceeding thirty days, or both (State of Indiana Statutory Regulations, Section I). “This statutory law has been used so often against the Gypsies in that state, that Indiana has not been visited by Gypsies for a long time” (Marchbin, 1939:152).So, there you go.
