honestly you guys need to stop misapplying intersectional theory. since you base your ideas on identity politics you seem to think that each “identity” holds the same weight, but in reality our lives are determined by race, class, and gender (and also ability and nationality). but these things don’t have equal predictive effects on people’s lives. you guys seem to think that if a working-class person of color is also “neurotypical” and able-bodied and cishet that the count of “privileges” to “disprivileges” makes them “less oppressed” than a white person who is not-cis, not-straight, and not-neurotypical at the same time, but that’s absolutely not how oppression works. trying to quantify oppression “levels” means you’ve already lost. even then, we have to understand this through historical transformations and labor relations under capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy. 

wrt to the working-class cishet poc, their cishet status doesn’t really grant them grand material benefits at the end of the day. they’re still oppressed by the state and denied access to material goods. like, cathy cohen talked about this in her pivotal essay in which she criticized queer theory for this exact dichotomy (queer vs cishet) in her essay “punks, bulldaggers, and welfare queens”. 

whereas even if a white person is a woman and also lgbt, their race is a huge shield against certain forms of material violence that cishet men of color face despite being cishet or male. 

oppression is continuous and sustained and it’s determined by labor relations/class relations. if there is no class or race in your analysis then it is faulty. 

we have to analyze these things through a materialist lens. so for example, a white lgbt woman may be oppressed because she is denied access to material goods either because she’s a woman (so being denied employment bc she doesn’t wear makeup, for instance) or because she’s lgbt (so being denied housing, for instance). but is she susceptible to sustained poverty, or environmental/biological racism, or urban racism, or biometric surveillance, or state violence? probably not. class has to factor into this. 

a working class cishet poc who may appear neurotypical and able-bodied (i say appear bc it’s necessary to chart the physical and mental effects of poverty onto a person and that doesn’t become immediately apparent) is not less oppressed or more privileged because they have “three” or “four” privileges (cis, het, able-bodied, neurotypical). let’s say they live in flint, michigan. they are targeted by an onslaught of environmental racism that has trickled down into the very cells of their body. so in addition to living in abject poverty, which the state ignores and even exacerbates, the environmental racism that characterized the flint water crisis affects them physically and psychologically on a daily basis. this prevents them from working, from providing for their children, from saving and investing. they have low assets and disposable income. their income probably decreases because of outrageous healthcare costs and their difficulty working due to health problems. 

their supposed “neurotypical” status or their cishet status neither shield them from this violence nor gain them any benefits. on the contrary, a white lgbt woman living in a middle-class town may have “fewer” privileged identities (if you’re using the identity politics privilege chart) but her life isn’t impacted by environmental racism or police brutality or class violence, and so she can navigate her material reality with far greater ease. of course she can still be exposed to the violence of misogyny and homophobia, but that violence is quite unlikely to come from that working-class cishet poc in flint, michigan. 

we can an apply a similar analysis to the dakota access pipeline and how that is an example of the settler colonial state oppressing indigenous people. it doesn’t matter if the indigenous person in question is straight or not - their people are universally targeted by environmental racism and state violence. 

so when like you guys call cishet poc “heteronormative” or cishet moc “patriarchal” it makes no sense bc they aren’t oppressing you and if they are enacting homophobic or patriarchal violence it’s probably and primarily against women or LGBT people in THEIR community, not against white women or white LGBT people. 

sure they can be homophobic or misogynistic. but if we’re going to analyze something such as “straight” privilege or “male” privilege in their context, we’d have to compare it against lgbt poc and women of color, not against the lgbt community or women at large. and that’s when you see like cishet moc being privileged against lgbt woc. 

oppression is not a simplistic algebra equation. it’s not like “okay, i have three privileges, and you have four, so your privileges cancel out your oppression”. it’s a complicated, interconnected matrix, primarily determined by race and class (and gender).  

White women feminists (even those who try to position themselves as different - “radical” “marxist” “materialist” etc) almost always fail to interrogate their own whiteness, and how their lives and social positioning are the product of empire and colonialism. When confronted with this reality, and when women of colour and/or nonwestern women demand that they recognise that their whiteness does not make them objective or neutral, but is actually based on our subjugation, they almost always revert to the same positions.

They either displey performative innocence and confusion (“apparently I’m not supposed to talk about this because I’m white???? I don’t understand. Explain to me why this behaviour is racist!!”) and then proceeding to disregard any criticism of their behaviour and paint woc as aggressors.

Or they resort to calling the woc misogynists (or lesbophobes, biphobes, ableists etc depending what circle you are in, despite the fact that the woc in question often face those oppressions also) for any disagreement or being rightfully upset about a racist interaction with them.

White radical women’s ability to manipulate the current discourse to use oppression that they don’t face in their feminist arguments, while failing to recognise their own social position and their own oppressor status is disgusting . To many woc they are no different to the white liberals, white conservatives, and white men whose politics they profess to object to. White women’s inability to tackle their own whiteness is one of the biggest issues preventing global feminist movements. So to all of you who are supposedly ‘antiracist’ and want to uplift the voices of marginalised women, uplift this and actually engage with the criticisms presented by us.

Honestly idk how i feel about white women being on here but otherwise, yes for the other three.

Yo don’t automatically assume that white people who happen to be a part of marginalized groups will care about your experiences of racism by default , or be able to relate to you.

In my old fandom, I had a friend who was a trans guy and he talked to me nearly nonstop about his experiences of transphobia. He talked about how his strict religious parents would force him to wear makeup and dress like a girl, he talked about how they were abusive to him, etc…etc…and how him being trans affected his life and the oppression he got from it . And I listened to him, because he was my friend. I’d stay up late listening to his struggles and give him advice that would help him.

Well, can you imagine what happened when I tried talking about my experiences of racism with him and how it affected me? It got him angry, and in the end it inevitably ruined our friendship. Places in society where he couldn’t see racism he got mad at me for pointing out. We both enjoyed a certain author’s works and when I pointed out the racism in said authors works/perpetrated by said author—he’d get mad and deny it. When I tried to tell him about my personal experiences of racism since childhood, he’d change the subject or act like he wasn’t interested. He’d act offended sometimes too.

I thought that because he was trans, and someone who knew what oppression was and faced it from society and even his strict/religious parents, then he’d understand my life to a degree. And I thought through that we could grow closer. However, I forgot to remember one thing about him, and that was that he was white. Not only was he white, but he was rich as well. I thought that because of his situation, we’d relate by that wasn’t the case. And I think people need to realize this. It also made me think of the rampant racism in the lgbt+ community, and how many  members of color have faced racism from white lgbt+ like my former friend.

So like, my point is to understand that white people in marginalized groups (white lgbt+ and white women) aren’t automatically going to take your side. They are women, they are lgbt+ but they are white first. And we are fooling ourselves if we believe that by default, they’ll side with and want to listen to our struggles of racism

One of the things the really fucks with me: people pick and choosing which forms oppression actually matter and which to completely ignore.

There’s a level of selfishness to this. A kind of biased thinking. “The only struggles that matter are the ones that affect me.” I honestly hate this way of thinking. People are so quick to scream out oppression when they are the ones being oppressed, yet can’t give two shits about the oppression of others. And the shits that they do give are the shittiest of shits. Arguments. Extenuation. Denial. Belittlement. Fucking shit! The struggles of others are just as heavy as yours, pal. The problem isn’t about race; it’s about self-centeredness. The same way of thinking could be flipped around. There are homophobic/transphobic POC who only talk about problems with racism, yet ignore, deny,or even belittle lgbtqa+ issues. No one has the fucking right to invalidate anyone’s struggles, especially if you never shut the fuck up about your own.

@lil-yandere  I was with you until this “ The problem isn’t about race; it’s about self-centeredness. The same way of thinking could be flipped around. There are homophobic/transphobic POC who only talk about problems with racism, yet ignore, deny,or even belittle lgbtqa+ issues.”

Because this is about race—not simply self centeredness. It’s about white members in the lgbt+ turning a blind eye to the racism members of color face or in many cases perpetrating it. It’s also about white members of certain marginalized groups not being able to or refusing to understand the oppression/racism poc  because of white privilege.

The person in mind—who I made this post about , was racist. He was white, trans, gay and racist. The mere thought or racism, or the discussion of it would infuriate him. When a friend of mine tried to bring up racism in our fandom, this racist white trans dude flipped and to this day he and his friends still make fun of my friend—make fun of her, and call her all types of names for bringing up racism.

This has a lot if not everything to do with race. Not just in the case of my friend but in any cases.

And that is what this is about. White people in marginalized groups (i.e white women and white lgbt+), not being able to relate or understand the oppression other, more marginalized groups go through. They cannot let go of, or see past their white privilege which makes them completely unable to sympathize or understand the struggles of non-whtie people.

This isn’t about poc being homophobic/transphobic. While that is something that needs to be addressed fully , and something I have addressed various times in the past…that is not what this post is about.( And even with trying to take this argument and turn it on poc, you are ignoring lgbt+ poc and their existent and the racism they face from white lgbt+ members)

This post is about the racism perpetrated from white women and white  lgbt+, but mainly white lgbt+ because people tend to act like being lgbt+ exempts you from racism and exempts you from being an oppressor. No, these people are white so they still are oppressive and racist and many refuse to understand our struggles as poc—that is my point.

We know she’s just mad cause they have more melanin than she’s used to seeing

Lol I used to work at target and know for a fact that that’s literally one aisle sandwiched between several containing several an array of bland white dolls why would you fake a struggle like this?? It’s so flawed 😩😂

^^^^^^^

White girls are so pathetic

And…there’s absolutely no reason she couldn’t’ve bought one of those for her cousin, anyway? (I mean, no reason beyond “that cousin is probably being raised just like her and would do terrible things to the doll”)

i found this post on facebook this morning and went to My Generation to tally their dolls by skin color just to see how absolutely out of proportion the OP was blowing things. they have 106 dolls total on target’s website. 87 of these dolls are white. 46 of those white dolls are blonde. counting all their total dolls of color, you get 19 (and that’s being generous and tallying any exceptionally tan ones). only one of these dolls resembles someone east asian. so yeah, this lady only found 8 dolls (two of which are from seperate brands) and she’s still steamed when the brand she was looking at has 87 white dolls for her racist ass to choose from.

It got better!

“I’m only 19…”

91% said NO redemption for you

Translation: This went viral and now my racism is affecting me negatively so I am going to try to get sympathy with my age/ignorance with out actually doing anything.

Get real. People have been prepped for this for years of political leaders doing the same thing reading the same paper. Everyone can see though it.

“i got caught so give me a second chance”

how about no

white actors: dropped out of school to pursue acting, told a joke once, got discovered  and starred in a blockbuster actors of colour: attended tisch julliard rada, studied acting for years, did othello, joined a theatre “for people of their ethnicity”, did hamlet, auditioned for everything, did macbeth, won prestigious theatre award that no one cares about, got their big break delivering one line in a blockbuster

Actors of color: still got to change their names to get good roles

Actors of color: have to accept stereotypical roles or bastardise their own cultures

Actors of color: have to wait while white actors tell them to “wait for their turn” because there’s always something more important to do before hiring them

Actors of color: get their careers destroyed over the smallest things while white actors get 2 million second chances

White actors: “yeah I was standing near a truck and some guy told me ‘you look hot, hired’ and now im a millionaire”.

white actors: get a tan to play actors of color

Corporate feminism vs real feminism

And look at how non threatening the Kendall/Pepsi cops are. In uniform, attractive, standing peacefully at the sidelines. Versus what we see at many peaceful protests with full on riot gear, instances with people getting sprayed, arrested, ect….its making it seem like protest cops are always peaceful  and the real life protestsers must be doing something wrong. Way to go Pepsi

Iconic

amen.

The white male style of debate is to antagonize you until you snap. Then they win by default, because they make up their own rules in which being upset automatically invalidates your argument. The key is also to argue about things that they have no stake and experience in, so they dont snap first. Of course in the event that they do snap first, its of course passion, not anger…

White people are like little kids who make up new rules and obnoxious powers to keep themselves from losing….

At the end of it all, they are happy that you are so civil and can debate things rationally and clearly without getting upset. Everyone shakes hands and thanks everyone for being able to discuss “conflicting” viewpoints. Because after all everyone needs to hear the opposing side to truly be sophisticated. Even if you’ve heard that side all your life and it completely devalues you as a human being.

What i hear is that the mark of civilization to white people is being dehumanized and taking it like a champ. 

They also have little to no concept of power dynamics in these ‘sophisticated” discussions.

Why I stopped indulging people who followed this argumentative “format”

This is so real and applicable to every dinner party I’ve ever been to

Oh this, thank goodness it got put into words.

Attention Black people:

STOP EXPLAINING SHIT TO WHITE PEOPLE. THEY DONT DESERVE YOUR SANITY. THEY DONT CARE ANYWAYS. MOST OF THEM ARE TROLLS. DONT FUCK UP UR HEALTH CUZ OF THESE PEOPLE.

Racist white people get the broomstick treatment around here.

www.google.com

“Sealioning is the name given to a specific, pervasive form of aggressive cluelessness, that masquerades as a sincere desire to understand.

A Sealion is a person who, when confronted with a fact that they don’t care to acknowledge, say, the persistence of systemic racism in America, will ask endlessly for ‘proof’ and insist that it is the other person’s job to stop everything they are doing and address the issue to their satisfaction.

Sealions are just ‘asking nicely’ but they are asking questions that have been asked and answered fully many times, and are unwilling to so much as open a tab to look up the answer, nor will they recognize the validity of your sources, your experience or expertise.”

— Erica Friedman

^Comic of origin for the “sea lioning” term, very very relevant. Google exists. It is not hard to use. Do not spend your time and effort and emotional labor explaining shit to lazy racist assholes (also applies for sexists/homophobes/transphobes/etc,)

“poc people”

so you nearly died in that taxi?

ryan lochte:

whites always want people to spoon feed them and educate them when they literally can just use google.com find 5000006467755 articles in .003 seconds. like no one educated me on a lot of the shit I know regarding social issues I went out looked up the material and read it. that’s it. but you expect every oppressed person to come to your feet and lay out the information like a banquet? lmao bye.

THIS IS HOW YOU FUCKING ALLY!

“White Nonsense Roundup (WNR) was created by white people, for white people, to address our inherently racist society. We believe it is our responsibility to call out white friends, relatives, contacts, speakers, and authors who are contributing to structural racism and harming our friends of color. We are a resource for anti-racist images, links, videos, artwork, essays, and voices. These can be used by anyone for a DIY white nonsense roundup, or by the WNR team to support people of color upon their request.

If you are a Person of Color (POC), you have enough on your plate! It’s not your job to educate white people about privilege, racism, and what’s really going on in the world. If a white person is filling your social media with white nonsense – anything from overt racism to well-intentioned problematic statements – tag us and a white person will come roundup our own. We welcome your involvement, resource suggestions, and will take your feedback seriously. We are also happy to boost the signal of voices of color.”

Gentrification creates a stifling homogeneity in urban areas that makes it less suited for the everyday lives of the lower class and more suited towards the leisure and tourism of those with expendable income.

An old, decrepit laundromat gets replaced by an upscale bakery? And people are mad? It’s not that the poor hate organic vegan cupcakes, it’s that most of us don’t have a way to do laundry in our own home.

Run-down corner stores replaced by hand-made designer clothing boutiques? We don’t hate your eco-fabric shawl, but I can’t eat that for dinner after work like I could have a can of beans I grabbed from that corner store when I don’t have time to take the bus to the real grocery store after work.

What gentrification brings in and of itself is not typically bad, it’s that gentrification brings institutions of leisure and pleasure and makes it so that the poor have to go farther out of their way for basic necessities. It turns low-income living spaces into local tourist attractions. It can even create food deserts by putting restaurants, grocery stores, etc. in that the majority of the lower class cannot afford.

Imagine if someone totally renovated your house and turned it into a mini theme park - they took away your sleeping space, where you prepare food, where you clean yourself and get ready for your day, and replaced it with things that will please people who are visiting, who have their own homes they can go back to, who are here not for their entire life but just as a distraction from their otherwise mundane existence. It’s not that you hate theme parks, it’s not like you’ve never been to a theme park and vow to never visit one again. It’s just that you need to live! To survive! And the leisure of those who have more than you should not invalidate your existence.

i don’t like the idea that poc need to clarify that we don’t hate white people. reasonable white people should understand our rage and discontentment. why should i have to explain the need for the protection and unity of my people when the basis of white racism has no valid explanation or justification, other than false generalizations about poc?

White privilege is real. 

The fact that white people can walk down the streets without the fear of being shot is privilege. 

The fact that white people dont have to shave their beards and fear a “random” security check at the airport over suspicious of their name, is privilege. 

The fact that they can get away with things like school shootings whereas brown people are labelled as terrorists if they do the same, is privilege. 

The fact that they are more likely to be called in for a job because their name sounds white is privilege. 

The fact that they can ignore the #blacklivesmatter movement because it doesn’t effect their sons and daughters is privilege. 

Not having to sit your son down and tell him he might be shot for his color is privilege. 

Having constant representation of your race in society and media is privilege. 

The list goes on and on. Yes, white people suffer but they don’t suffer because they’re white.

On another note: if youre white, what can you do? You can’t control your skin color and neither can you control what your ancestors did. What CAN you do to help?

If you are white, no one wants you to feel guilty for being so. You are who you are. Just use your privilege and help people solve their problems . That’s it.