Anti-Racism Revisited: The Rage of Minorities

In part one, "What About 'Reverse' Racism?" I mentioned the way racial minorities create hierarchies among themselves. because of this hierarchy--I don’t believe this following statement is true of most Asians and as true for as many Latinos—for many blacks, if we could physically hurt white people and get away with it the way whites have historically physically hurt every racial group, many ethnic groups, several religious groups, women, queers and so forth without criminally paying for it…we would. and this is why I believe black men commit so many crimes, but commit the bulk of them against blacks and some of them against other minorities with relatively few committed against whites—they know that if they directed their anger and violence at the people they really wanted to direct it towards, they would be punished much more harshly.

but the truth is black men know blacks are the least valuable people in society and, thus, the best to victimize, with other minority queers and Latinos being next, then Asians. and indeed, much of the time when blacks victimize queer minorities, Asians or Latinos, nobody hears about it but people from those respective groups, just as when those people victimize blacks you don’t hear a lot about it. and if blacks didn’t have the few very visible activists we have like the aforementioned groups don’t—activists who seem to only see in terms of black and white—you would rarely hear about white injustice towards blacks just like you don’t hear about injustice towards the aforementioned groups. The fact that black leaders only focus on whites is also one of the reasons crimes Asians and Latinos commit against blacks go unnoticed.

but let something happen to a white queer or a white heterosexual at the hands of any of these groups—trust me, you’ll know about it…with white queers because they are in activist mode right now…and the perpetrators will pay dearly. otherwise, long before I was born, white americans might very well have been eliminated and this would be a predominantly black, Asian and Latino nation. and many white fear exactly this threat from blacks, which is precisely one of the reasons for systemic racial oppression that is disproportionately targeted towards blacks in the first place—a system that, if it didn’t informally legally/criminally value whites above all others while socio-econ-politically disempowering blacks, would possibly result in more black-on-white crime and, in the past, might have resulted in white extermination.

so many blacks really are that angry, even many of the ones you perceive as “good blacks” who smile and laugh in your face, shoot the breeze with you, date/marry interracially and rarely ever mention race to you. I know, because almost all blacks like this whom I have ever met say really vile things about whites when they are among blacks and other people they perceive as allies, sometimes including whites. one piece linked to by Carmen from Racialicious basically confirms something like this as a fear of many whites, i.e. if blacks were empowered would they treat whites the way whites have treated them throughout history. I think this is less and less true as more blacks—and other minorities—become, as I describe it, more and more “naïve” about the existence/severity of racism…but I am very tempted to believe the answer is still yes, from listening to my colleagues, thinking about my own feelings/thoughts sometimes and looking at the amount of crime/anger black men commit/possess.

in fact, in the post in which I describe some of my concerns about immigration, I state my belief that once Asians and Latinos gain more power in the US they will take up the task of white supremacy towards blacks—and, honestly, even towards immigrants of their backgrounds, whom they’ve worked so hard to distance themselves from--along with whites because so many of them are more concerned with, and more able to obtain, acceptance by whites. basically, after everything that whites have done, anyone (i.e. a group of people, not necessarily every individual in the racial group that obtains power) with the power to systemically oppress and discriminate will do so, though for different reasons/towards different groups depending on the group in power.

would the angrier, less "white-washed" Asians and Latinos want to hurt whites if they could? Judging from Kim’s writings, I can’t be sure but I would guess yes--though, with Asians, perhaps not physical hurt. my guess is also that the more naïve minorities of all backgrounds, i.e. the ones who don’t experience as much discrimination as many blacks or who don’t experience that much discrimination period, do not feel like this is true or have this level of anger. after all, if you don’t experience that much discrimination, what do you have to be so angry about (even though there are definitely minorities who don’t experience much who are angry, i.e. many of the blacks at my law school)?

The funny thing is I don't think any of us would feel this way if whites hadn't done the awful things they've done throughout history. Whites try to justify their actions by pointing to blacks as dangerous/violent, but blacks do what they do in response to whites and always have. We're generally "dangerous" to whites only if we get power, and whites know it.

Next--Is Racism "Hatred"?

Anti-Racism Revisited: What About "Reverse" Racism?

First things first...obviously, class is back in session, and that is what has been keeping me away, as usual. In fact, I should be reading right now, but today was a day I just couldn't get anything going. Before the Christmas break ended, though, I actually opened up a Microsoft Word document and let a lot of thoughts just pour out, inspired by the readings I'd been doing on anti-racism and online discussions sparked by Kil Ja Kim's works. The document is long, as I'm no stranger to writing a lot, but this time I will break the posts up (the luxury of writing ahead of time). I'm also going to generally leave the editing alone, which means much of the posts will be in lowercase (a practice I usually loathe).

In my original post discussing my thoughts about anti-racism, I linked to a Livejournal discussion about Kim's writings, works that had upset some white readers. I went back and read a lot of the arguments/responses, and I got the impression that many whites who claim to be against racism or are "anti-racist" regard minorities, particularly blacks, as thinking racism only works one way. In other words, we think that we cannot be racist.

I don't know how many whites ever look at my blog, but I want to explain something to you. Minorities, absolutely, are just as racist as whites are. But we express it differently and we're affected by racism differently. Furthermore, minorities have a tendency to not only be racist towards whites; we're racist towards minorities of our group and minorities of other groups. So, yes, those of you white people who claim, for instance, that blacks are more racist than white people are...well, yes, you're right...just not how you think. Most whites, including the white anti-racists, don't run around degrading or "hating" other white people (based on race). But I can count on one hand the number of racial minorities I've known throughout my life who have never uttered a negative stereotype or expressed disdain for people of their background (based on race).

Allow me to explain a few other differences between our experiences with/perceptions of racism of all kinds, among other things. I'll kick the discussion off by telling you another of my perceptions when it comes to white anti-racists and white people, such as the ones on Livejournal, who get upset about racism/say racism is racism no matter whom it's directed at (i.e. all racism is equal/the same).

I argue that whites are interested in racism usually when something is in it for them. for those whites, including many anti-racists, what’s in it for them is the possibility of ending racism--and accusations of racism--against whites. that’s not to say they completely don’t care about ending racism against others. I just think most of them would never become interested in fighting racism if perceived racial injustices didn’t occur against whites, if they didn't interracially date and/or if they didn't adopt/birth minority children. this accompanies my theory that each and every group is primarily, if not totally, concerned with their group and engages in group identification just as much as blacks are perceived to.

most of the time, whites who claim to be against racism give several indications in discussions that much of their concern is really racism against whites, sometimes to the point of steering discussions about racism against minorities away from that topic towards racism and other forms of oppression as they specifically (or predominantly) affect whites or a white individual. thus, whites even make discussions about racism towards minorities about them. I do the same with white queers…and that’s because as much as I might be in a discussion with queers or on a site for/about queers because I’m interested in queer issues, my primary concern still is blacks, even as someone who is, herself, queer. I suspect the same is true for whites, including most anti-racists, whether it’s a conscious concern or not. I don’t believe they are ever equally concerned regardless of race, as they attempt to present themselves or argue that we all should be.

Most whites seemingly cannot talk about racism without insinuating or even outright stating that racism against minorities and racism against whites is equivalent or equally as bad. when minorities dismiss racism against whites, it’s not necessarily because they really think it’s more acceptable. it’s because racism doesn’t affect whites in the same ways as it does minorities—and doesn't affect some minority groups in the same way as it affects others, either—and because, frankly, the overwhelming majority of minorities do not really care about racism towards whites. we might not express it, acknowledge it, admit it, etc, but we know perfectly well racism exists towards whites. in truth, we don’t care. some of us probably feel that if it weren’t for whites, racism wouldn’t exist anyway and now it backfires on them on occasion. for me, I feel that if I’m forced to experience discrimination—and I do feel that, since I believe racism can’t be eliminated—so should you be. in other words, many of us find racism against whites justifiable or, on some level, even satisfying. Others of us are simply just as I described whites who are "interested" in racism, i.e. we're more interested in the racism that harms us and/or how racism harms us.

I think this is a lot of the reason why some minorities are blatantly racist towards whites or other groups—because some of us think whites…any white person…deserve it in turn for what we experience or that it’s not fair that we’re the only ones experiencing it and we see no way to stop it. so some prefer to just dish it back out as a form of self-induced equality and self-induced empowerment of which we’re robbed. as I said in my original post on anti-racism, discrimination breeds discrimination. when people are discriminated against enough, they just want to do it right back to someone else or see someone else be on the bottom. that’s why minorities create so many hierarchies amongst themselves rather than unite. and we treat other minorities worse than we treat whites because we feel we can get away with it more than with whites, as well as that we’re fighting for the opportunity to be second in society behind whites/more accepted by whites. Asians just do it more civilly than Latinos and Latinos more civilly than blacks, which is the current racial hierarchy of white acceptance—Asians, then Latinos then blacks (in my opinion).

just as much as I think whites become concerned with racism primarily when/because its directed at them or other whites, blacks are interested in racism because it affects blacks—not because it affects whites, Asians or Latinos—and I believe the same is true for Asians and Latinos, as I believe queers study or recite information about the black civil rights movement primarily to serve queer interests. although there are people from each of these groups who are concerned with other groups—once again, I would credit people like Rachel Sullivan, Kil Ja Kim (with blacks) and minorities who say “people of color” and truly mean “people of color,” not just blacks or just Asians or just Latinos—I think this predominant self-interest is the norm. we don’t care about other people’s oppression, or, at least, not anywhere near to the same extent we care about our own. and especially when we’re trying to have a conversation about racism against blacks, we don’t want to hear about difficulties whites or Asians experience. we know other people experience difficulties; generally, it’s not of interest to us. as I say about racism, I think this is human nature.

whites (and some "people of color," too) don’t really appear to believe racism and oppression are systemic, even most anti-racists. when minorities attempt to discuss systemic oppression and whites start talking about white oppression, they are pretty much pointing to social discrimination. they don’t get the distinction, and this is why they don’t understand that racism affects different groups differently. The word “racism” always has the same definitions, so, in that sense, racism is racism is racism—yes. But whites almost consistently refuse to discuss systemic racism and the fact that they don’t experience that kind of oppression in regards to race, and the ones who admit to systemic racism seem to downplay how it makes a difference.

See, systemic racism is the main reason (other than self-interest) minorities view racism against minorities as worse and/or more devastating than racism towards whites, although I don’t see social racism as affecting us the same, either. Whites can point to classism all they want, but classism is not racism and minorities are disproportionately affected by classism just as they are disproportionately affected by racism—which is one of the reasons the system is set up like it is. Whites can experience social racism and, though they might feel angry or hurt, they will not be held back in society because of it. Because of the importance of race to the system, whites can be poor and/or queer and have a better chance of making in farther in life than someone who is black and poor/queer--or, honestly, someone who is black, middle class and heterosexual.

When points like these are made, it’s not so much to say racism, classism, etc, towards whites don’t matter or even to say they don't matter to us. Because of the fact that whites tend to downplay, ignore or deny systemic racism, we feel compelled to argue strictly about racism against minorities just to remind/inform whites.

Then there’s social racism. The reason I still distinguish experiences here is basically because, at some point, no matter what, whites usually find themselves predominantly in environments in which they are racially accepted. One white female on the Livejournal link described being mistreated because she was perceived to have black features, basically. I would bet money that doesn’t happen as much as it used to, if at all. Particularly for blacks who grow up in white neighborhoods and white schools, many continue consistently experiencing difficulty making friends, finding romance or feeling as if some aspect of who they are is being questioned because of race (i.e. intelligence, competence, qualifications, attractiveness, demeanor, etc...even their "blackness" is questioned), and/or consistently are “stuck” in environments in which they are the minority (since getting out of those environments essentially means making a choice between success/prospering and feeling racially comfortable/the norm). Whites might not call us "nigger" in these environment or make "black jokes," but we experience consistent subtle racism while reading/watching news stories about blatant racist incidents towards blacks across the nation.

For those who still don’t understand why some of these things relate to more social racism for minorities than whites, read the third part of this post.

Next--The Rage of Minorities

Reflections on Being Mixed-Race

I recently bought this book that has stories in it from black college students about growing up black. So far, many of the stories I've read have included details about trying to prove themselves to other blacks, as well as whites, and not feeling like they fit in with black people. Whether or not the blacks are biracial or multiracial, the story is the same. Something similar is true for the mixed blacks who have stories in another book I read last year that focused specifically on mixed kids.

Lately, I've been thinking about how I write a lot about being black and black issues but never talk about a mixed identity. I'd actually started a post about it, too, but stopped because I was having a hard time telling what it was like to grow up as a mixed kid. I realized from sitting down and reading, about, three stories tonight that...I was having a hard time because I don't really feel like being mixed was a problem or an issue. It's like trying to make a story where there is none. Sure, there are stories about relating to black kids or white kids, and that has always been a problem for me--particularly relating to black kids. But I don't think the problem was unique to being mixed, and the stories I'm reading confirm that.

Unlike a lot of mixed black kids and even some "full" black kids, I did not think a lot about any problems I had growing up and race. Really, to me, when I look back on some issues--my sexuality and race, in particular--I really was just a dumb, unthinking kid. So much of what happened to me when I was younger was only understood or really thought about in retrospect. So when I was having a hard time with other kids, I wasn't thinking that much about race or really asking/analyzing why. Thinking about those things in retrospect, though, especially when people try to connect adolescent difficulty for mixed kids to being mixed, I don't hesitate to realize that so many black kids had similar problems as I did to some degree.

I've told bits and pieces of my story throughout my blog, and I really don't care to repeat. I just think that, while I was different from most black kids, I also had a different experience growing up mixed than a lot of mixed kids do. I don't think I ever really cared about being mixed, either, until I became an adult. I think mixed kids who look white, part-Asian (particularly black/Asian kids) or racially ambiguous have a harder time, honestly. Because I looked either black or mixed to most people, I thought of myself as black and so did everyone else. My parents didn't have those "you're white and black" discussions with me. If anything, I feel my parents encouraged me to be black--both of them. There were racial discussions going on in the house, but not about our races. I probably heard "she thinks she's white" in a negative connotation about other blacks from my mother more than anything else. When I was a teenager, some Latinos moved across the street, and suddenly I was hearing about them--negatively. Before that, it was mainly whites and blacks being talked about negatively, usually--if not always--by my mother.

I remember writing at various points here about the schools I've attended and the racial demographics. In conjunction with my parents being like they were, I think this also really set my experience apart from other mixed kids, because all of my schools were mixed enough, except for college and law school. I've also lived in really different environments. The first neighborhood I lived in was, I would say, mixed at one point. Then it got more black and started going downhill. Even though I spent about 12 or 13 years living in the city, I don't consider myself a city girl. There are very few "real" cities in the South, and where I was from is definitely just a wannabe city. But we deal with an extreme case of white flight, and, for us, whites move to the same areas at the same time, then middle class+ blacks move to those areas and so on. Whites were fleeing to the "outskirts," the countryside suburbs, and that was the bandwagon my parents got on as middle class+ blacks. I ended up in a white neighborhood, going to a predominantly white school that was still more mixed than most schools in white areas across the nation are.

When I was younger, I was definitely into whiteness. I'm not sure there are ever really black, Asian or Latino kids who weren't. I've discussed this a bit, too. But, basically, I found whites more physically attractive, valued white friends more somewhat, made a couple efforts to fit in with whites and like "white" things--music was the biggest thing, which I'm thankful for now. Other than music, I didn't try to fit in too many other ways because I don't think I knew what to try. I feel confident that my older sisters dealt with a little racial pressure, because they pressured me racially (and because one of my sisters told me how badly blacks treated her white best friend once they got to high school, and that was the end of their friendship)...and I don't think minorities, particularly blacks, pressure others about race unless they feel that pressure on them, as well. After all, you get it from somewhere. For me, with them, this came in the form of music.

When we were young and I was pre-elementary school age, we watched MTV all the time and listened to rock music. I distinctly remember them picking out "boyfriends" from Van Halen videos, and I would jump in and pick out one, too. Then suddenly something changed, and there was a new sound in our house. LL Cool J was on the radio, we were watching BET all the time, and they were bringing home rap tapes and records. At first, I forgot all about rock and listened to nothing but rap and R&B right along with them. But after a few years, I was sneaking to watch MTV and VH1 and was finding rock and pop radio stations on the radio, mainly because I was going to be bused to a predominantly white elementary school and had learned through my sisters that white kids allegedly liked that kind of music. I got my parents to buy me walkmans so that I could listen to this music without being teased by my sisters, because they made it clear that blacks weren't supposed to listen to that stuff. I was a tad confused because I could remember them watching Van Halen, ZZ Top and U2 in the past on MTV. They had liked Madonna and the Bangles, but they would talk about me if they caught me watching their videos later on.

At school, I would only tell my closest black friends that I didn't just like DJ Quik, 2 Live Crew and NWA. They didn't tease me; in fact, I ended up playing my favorite "white songs" for them and, because some of them were looking for my approval, they would learn the songs and "like" them, too. The funny thing is many of those songs are now my favorite songs ever as opposed to rap and R&B songs, and I have them under a playlist on my mp3 player that is composed of all my favorite songs ever. There is only one rap song on the list, and I believe all the R&B songs on it were "crossover" hits, i.e. white people liked them, too. There are probably more country songs on the list than R&B and rap ones combined, and I started listening to country music a few years later based on what my white friends seemed to like to listen to. While I would have been nervous to show anybody who was black that list 15 years ago, blacks have lightened up a bit on the music front and my family can admit to liking "white songs" now. Ironically, they are probably the only people who know I love Celine Dion and don't think that's cause to be a jack@ss like a lot of whites now do.

People talk about blacks as if there is one culture. Personally, I don't think blacks have a culture...but if you were going to talk about blacks in those terms, I think you'd need to acknowledge three race/ethnicity-based cultures within the culture: being mixed, being African and being "full" black. In retrospect, my experience was "full" black females were more aggressive, manipulative, intimidating and--I'll say it--meaner than I or white girls were. It's hard to ignore how class plays a part in what kind of black person you're dealing with, but when I was younger the black females were definitely not middle class. I've noticed since college that, though in high school some of them were middle class for our area, those black girls were not middle class in comparison to the black women I know today. I'm not sure I even am. But I do know I was not raised to be like other black girls, as I'll discuss a little more later when I write more about my father.

I still find the black women I knew in college and know in law school to be intimidating, but more so because of race than I did when I was growing up. When I was growing up, I didn't know a lot about being "black enough" or light skin vs dark skin, though I knew something about "good hair." Nobody ever commented to me about those kinds of things, other than my hair. I've never been accused of not being black enough, though in high school I probably had an inkling that some black students regarded me that way and that kind of thing is a lot more uncomfortable now than it used to be since I'm now aware of it...which is a huge reason why I find black women intimidating. I mentioned this to say that when black girls were mean to me as a kid, I had no idea why and I still don't know why...because they never said anything that would hint at a reason. The older I've gotten, the more open black women have been to me--at least on the surface, i.e. I feel they are being fake. I don't feel accepted by them, and I've only consciously not felt accepted by other blacks because of racial issues in my 20s (I'm almost 27).

Still, unlike a lot of the stories I read, I don't particularly care if I'm not black enough to others. I don't understand caring about that. What would be in it for me if I were--a black community? Why do you want friendship from and acceptance by people who can't accept you for who you really are? It's not worth my time. And, frankly, as much as I complain about white people, I've consistently found way more accepting and supportive whites without my having to do or prove anything. When I was younger, I think most whites liked me because I did seem "different" from other blacks. Now that I don't relate to whites anymore, when white people become my friends and support me it is totally for who I am, not because of how "white" I am.

When I was younger, I did have a lot of white friends, but that initially wasn't on purpose. I really did try with blacks because I had gotten indirect messages from my family that my friends were supposed to be black. But I just could never get along with the black girls. I think the women in my family--the blacks--both understood that and didn't understand it, particularly my mother. Whenever I came home crying or a teacher called my mother because a group of black girls and I had drama at school--usually because they'd told a lie about me, were making fun of something about me or were intentionally trying to keep other black girls from being friends with me--my mother would go off about black girls. But my parents would also later want to know why I didn't have many black friends and got upset because they felt I was too influenced by whites. But after years of the same thing over and over again with black girls, I got tired of the drama and started hanging out predominantly with whites. Black guys treated me well, so they were fine also. But I guess I also felt some societal expectation that I hang out with girls--even though I often preferred guys--and white girls were the most accepting girls.

But I could never have a real friendship with white girls back then, and that was something I never understood at the time, either. We were fine at school, but they never invited me anywhere. The one time one of my white friends did, her father was a racist @ss to my mother over the phone. Most of my white "friends" never called me. On Mondays, I would sit in class and listen to them and other white girls talk about what they did together over the weekend, wondering how I could get close enough to them to be included. Every time I did meet their families and/or end up at their houses, I would put my best foot forward but there would always be tension with their parents.

It's really hard to describe the looks whites gave me, but they obviously were not happy. And the more I tried to seem impressive, the more unhappy they were. Despite the popular rhetoric that blacks need to prove themselves to whites, sometimes whites don't like blacks who are intelligent/middle class/well-behaved/etc, especially if those whites aren't those things and/or want to hold onto the belief that blacks are not those things. A lot of whites want blacks to remain in their "place," so your proving yourself makes them even angrier. A lot of whites acted as if I'd told them 2x2 is 5 when I told them I was in all advanced courses or told them what college I was going to attend, including some white kids at my high school. Other white kids really respected me and wanted my respect. It was weird, but it was still better than how I'm completely ignored in law school.

I could keep talking about the past, but the stories are all the same--these are similar to things many other blacks deal with. To me, they aren't about being mixed. The only things I remember specifically relating to being mixed are being asked about my parents and having the racial boxes I checked on forms being changed. Being asked about my parents was nothing. For example, one time we were sitting in class and my father came by. One black boy asked me if he was white, and I said yes. That was the end of that. Another time in high school, a white guy looked at me and asked me which one of my parents is white. In college, I was asked where I'm from a few times, with the askers wondering if I was from another country. Once, it was because of how I look. Another time, this Latino kid told me I looked like this Latina he knew. Another time, it was because I pronounced a French word with perfect French pronunciation. Whenever I've told people my father is French, that has tended to be the end of that, though it was a perk in French class since one of my professors was actually French and another one wanted to be French really badly.

On that note, I'd like to say a bit about how I think of the white French vs white Americans. First thing I want to say is, yes, I have huge problems with white men. But, as I’ve mentioned elsewhere before in my blog, when I refer to white men I mean white American men. I think there’s generally a difference between white Americans and the white French, particularly as it relates to race…and, as a result, I don’t feel the same way towards the white French as I do towards white Americans. I don't have the problems I do with white Americans when interacting with the white French. My experience has always been that once they know I'm partially French, we're cool. That can never happen with white Americans, and that almost never is enough with black Americans (to be part-black or "full" black). Like I said, my French professors loved me.

That said, though, I have noted times when my father demonstrates annoying characteristics my friends and I associate with American white men. Both my mother and I have told him he acts like white American men sometimes, we mean it kind of as an insult and he knows we do. Examples are acting like he knows more than everyone else, being condescending, making fun of people/treating and talking to them like they’re stupid, trying to force his opinion on people by acting like it’s “right”/THE answer/simple “logic,” acting like people are supposed to accommodate him or as if he’s entitled to things and acting crazy (getting loud, non-violent threats, arguing over set rules/methods, etc) in public in order to get his way. These are arguably things all kinds of people do, but white men do it in a way that exudes privilege and domination (not to mention makes people without that privilege want to knock their teeth down their throats).

I think having that kind of parent, though, particularly as a white male, has been beneficial for me. This is especially so as a female who identifies more with men, because I feel I learned a sense of entitlement, fearlessness and confidence that borders on arrogance in some areas. I think this is very uncommon in black women but, I think, those traits help people—particularly white men—succeed. In other words, I learned how to think and act like a white man. Had I identified more with my mother in terms of personality, I would have less confidence and would tolerate more things I don’t like. I believe that when you feel entitled to things and when you rarely think anything is an obstacle to you, you achieve more because you never really envision having to settle for less. In general, when I want something or want something to happen, I get what I want and really can’t tolerate otherwise. While I don’t do some of the things I said my father does, we are very similar people.

In addition, even though people tend to view black women as too overbearing and emasculating, I view them as taking way too much crap, particularly when it comes to black men. Oftentimes, the kind of black women who just go off do so about relatively silly things but let important stuff that they should rip people's heads off for slide. I do think black women are picky and have high standards romantically. But black women, to me, tend to be a weird combination of feminists and traditionalists--the ways in which they are feminists turn men off (i.e. always ahead of non-black women in terms of independence, strength, place in the home, etc) while the ways in which they are traditionalists causes them to willingly be subservient to men (even if the men don't realize it), let [black] men walk all over them but keep coming back/letting them stay/insisting only on dating black men, and spout/support chauvinistic ideals. I, on the other hand, am a little too "spoiled" to put up with the nonsense other black women allow.

There are also a lot of black women who, I feel, are too afraid of whites (i.e. concerned with not being seen as the b!tch, so they won't stand up to whites or try too hard to seem like a "good black" for whites) or buy into the "prove yourself"/"work twice as hard" crap...whereas I don't care who you are. I'm not going to act like anybody is better than I am, just like white men never do. I feel that I'm better than most people and they need to prove themselves to me, not the other way around.

One misconception I think people have about people in interracial relationships is they aren’t racist or they won’t disapprove if their kids get into interracial relationships. Please. I’ve read several stories from mixed kids—all kinds of mixes, not just black/white—and transracial adoptees who grew up with parents making racist comments, telling them to date this race and not that one (sometimes one of the races was one of their own), don’t talk about race at all/deny racial problems/can’t or won’t help their kids with racial issues…just all kinds of sh!t that illustrates that a lot of people have no business with multiracial or minority kids.

You know I like to say everyone’s racist, but my mother is definitely more racist than my father or I am. Neither of my parents are fond of white Americans. My only real problem with Asians and Latinos is too many of them are into whiteness. While that’s one of my mother’s problems with them, that is most certainly not her only problem with them. And I know that my parents have a hierarchy for me—they would prefer a black [male]. My mother thinks I essentially have no choice but to date a white [American male] because I’m going into a profession that is whited-out and most black guys will not be “on my level”—that is really the only reason she’s okay with that.

A Jewish person would not be celebrated nor expected. You might be able to flip a coin on whether an Asian or a Latino would cause more of an upset, but I really think an Asian would take the cake. My mother also really hates black men dating non-black women and other races dating whites. Yes, really. She has also said she does not like dark black men and that mixed blacks are the prettiest. Hmmm…thinking about this, she reminds me of some of these people with fetishes for mixed people or internalized racism. And she is pretty sensitive about being a somewhat darker black person.

My mother and father…I don’t know what they have in common, but that might be why I like people who aren’t like me. My father is generally open to people. He is very sociable. He makes offensive jokes about Asians and Latinos occasionally, but I think he’s one of those people who has no idea what’s wrong with those jokes. I don't think he really dislikes Asians or Latinos. But I know my mother does. My mother tolerates people, in the negative sense of “tolerate.” My father is nice to and friendly with everyone regardless of race. He can’t stand to hear my mother going off about black men not liking black women. I think ultimately he would be the parent who would be laid-back if I became serious about an Asian or Latino. As far as coming out, I don’t know but I suspect the same thing is true.

Although my mother is also part-Native American, I would never claim to be that in any way other than saying it's in my blood. My understanding of Native Americans is they are almost the exact opposite of blacks. Blacks call anyone who has black blood "black," sometimes even if they don't look black, and want them to claim their blackness, identify with black stereotypes, etc. Native Americans will challenge you if you say you're Native American. You have to prove it. You have to know the culture, live the culture. I don't, and I shouldn't. After all, we're Native American via rape. How would I know about being Native American? And to Native Americans, running around talking about your grandmother was Cherokee is a joke to them. There are also other white ethnic backgrounds in my family, since my mother is also part-white and there is one Italian surname in my father's family tree. (Shrugs) I'm black and French. I don't know anything else about being anything else, culturally.

I started identifying as black and French more when my father's mother died when I was a teenager. It wasn't really until then that I'd heard anything about his family's background. My father is not close to his family, not because of race but because that's how he is. We'd been to see his family before, but I was too young to really remember. I've actually been told that his mother wanted to raise me, but my mother didn't want that. My sister (the one who had the white best friend) and I had asked my mother when we were kids if our father was white, but that was it. We weren't interested in his family. When his mother died, that's when we started hearing more about his background. I'd always thought French stuff was cool--after all, my idol was a French-Canadian singer--so it wasn't hard for me to want to learn the language and learn more about the culture. I wanted to go to high school in France, study abroad in France, attend McGill University in Montreal, etc. I think my other sisters were too old to care the same way I did by that time.

Even though I feel I'm mature enough not to be concerned about racial acceptance and, with few exceptions, don't think I ever was all that concerned/messed up about racial acceptance relative to other blacks...as I said, I still do feel intimidated by black women--and, honestly, blacks in general. I am still thinking somewhat in terms of the past, i.e. I'm used to dealing with negative blacks by simply not dealing with blacks. And I still expect negativity and expectations from blacks, although that is not just based on the past. I just don't have the energy to pretend or defend, and I think I am still defensively waiting for the day when some blacks will try to make me defend who I am. I try to avoid it.

There are very few blacks whom I don't feel I'd have to do that with in my environment, and those are the blacks I have as friends. Being in an environment as white and alienating as law school is makes me wish just being black was enough to bond, but it's not. But, ultimately, weighing that conflict of sometimes wishing I could relate more to blacks with liking who I am and not wanting to be something I'm not for others...I am happier with things like this. I'm aware of how this makes me look to other blacks who expect us all to gravitate towards each other just based on skin color. Like I said, I'm too old to worry about fitting in. And I have really good, supportive white friends with a few good Asians and blacks thrown in.

I don't automatically connect with people based on race. Unlike other mixed kids, though, I attribute this more to my naturally having always been different from others, growing up in diverse environments and not having the luxury to be picky about who I hang out with like whites and more "typical" blacks do since they have more people who are like them to choose from and reject. Ninety-Nine percent of the time when I meet someone who is like me or with whom I click, they aren't black. I can't discount them because they aren't black, or keep looking for blacks who fit the mode.

I do think it's sad that it's sometimes easier to find a helping hand or a community among whites than among blacks, but I think this is an issue all blacks need to address in terms of the way they sometimes treat other blacks, regardless of being mixed or not. I read a comment from a guy in one of the books about Asians that he admires blacks because they have more of a sense of community than Asians do. I would say that the black sense of community is actually either similar to or less than that of Asians. All this "community" stuff blacks talk is bs; blacks do way too much alienating for way too many reasons. I suppose sometimes it can be about being mixed, particularly if you don't identify yourself "correctly," i.e. Tiger Woods. But it has never really been about that in my case.

Reflections on Anti-Racism

Pay attention, queer people: there's a lesson about the possibility of ending homophobia and why many blacks don't sympathize with the fight against homophobia/for gay rights in here for you, as well, though not specifically referenced.

Undoubtedly, anyone who does quite a bit of reading about race online has run into pieces by "Tamara Nopper" or Kil Ja Kim. I think she is a brilliant person in terms of her ideas and the fact that she's not black but is right on about a lot of black issues. Like me, she doesn't always express herself in the prettiest/most eloquent and composed way. She let's anger come through. Some would call her--and me--bitter, which I don't understand why people mean that as an insult when it's something that, given one's life circumstances, really should be more expected and understood than it is sometimes. Because of her straightforward manner and the anger/bitterness, I've seen several times on the internet that she has rubbed many white people the wrong way, including ones who claim to be anti-racist.

One of my close white friends read Kim's piece on "white anti-racist" being an oxymoron and agreed with Kim but also agreed with me that the piece sort of deteriorated halfway through when she showed her anger. However, my white friend is the seemingly rare sort who doesn't mind that and doesn't feel offended or defensive by pieces like Kim's, probably because she is likely the kind of person who doesn't automatically equate blanketed negative statements about white people with herself and is very objective.

I know that writing the way that she does sometimes defeats the purpose of what she says, at least somewhat, because, although I believe that the majority of whites and Asians would shut down regardless of how one puts many of the comments she and I make, there are many people who only turn off their minds when ideas are expressed in a hostile manner. Personally, neither are the kinds of people I'm necessarily trying to reach--Kim might feel the same. I think some of the things I'll write later in this post will explain more why I feel that way, other than the fact that I'm not into babying people and I express myself a certain way because watering down or PC-ness defeats what I'm trying to do, i.e. say things a lot of people think the way they think it but don't say it or don't say it the way they think it.

So for starters, it's always surprising to me when I find non-black people who examine race as it relates to black people in a way that is not stereotypical and/or negative, especially if it resembles an effort to align themselves with/defend blacks. Kim and Rachel Sullivan are examples of that, as well as Tim Wise, Frank Wu and my white & Asian friends. As I've written several times, I'm a lot like I imagine most people to be, i.e. as a black person, I don't tend to care about issues that affect non-black people, or don't care to the extent to defend them as much as I defend blacks nor become equally invested. I don't understand people who do, i.e. how they got to that point (even if they provide stories that explain how they got there) or what drives those interests, nor do I understand people who expect such a thing. Still, I like to read these people's works, and that's why I did an internet search on Kim, to find more of her pieces.

In the process, I found this. I'm familiar with Carmen Van Kerckhove, particularly the Racialicious site...there's really no particular reason I haven't linked to it on the right side of my blog, except that usually when I read something on any of the blogs she's affiliated with I've found it by accident or through a link from some other site I'm reading. Quite a few people in the comments in the link provided (i.e. white anti-racist parents) comment on Kim's thoughts, some saying they are offended (and, to me, demonstrate that they miss Kim's point). The topic and the comments really made me think about my perception of anti-racists, particularly white ones. Frankly, my knee-jerk reaction was that the concept of "anti-racism" is silly, and that, once again (without having re-read Kim's piece...I read it earlier this year), I agree with Kim, or, at least, think I see where she's coming from.

To flesh out some of the thoughts I was having...one of my first thoughts was that "anti-racism" is such a typical white thing to come up with. It's funny--it's as if there's nothing white people think they can't do. I had to remind myself that it's not just white people who consider themselves anti-racist or do anti-racist work or agree with the concept. So I concluded that "anti-racism" is really for people who are naive. In actuality, it's probably just a difference of opinion about so many things, i.e. where racism comes from and whether or not it can be eliminated from society. It just so happens that I believe people who think racism can end are naive. My understanding of anti-racism is that one of the goals/desires is to engage in work/dialogue that will end racism. The reason I considered it a typical white thing, then, is that my initial thought is always that white people are the only ones who don't "get it," the only ones to have any positive thoughts about the outcome of a history of racism, because they don't experience ongoing [social] racism (just spots of it, usually). However, the truth is that nowadays, many minorities also don't experience much ongoing non-systemic racism or do but fail to recognize it, like my friend Nikki does when racist events happen to her. My belief is these are usually the minorities who agree with an anti-racist mindset--the ones who don't, in my mind, "get it."

I'm not an anti-racist. I don't believe that racism can end. I think the US is so dependent on systemic racism in order to operate that even people who experience the ongoing racism wouldn't like it if it ended since that would mean our society would change drastically. The idea of racism ending scares me simply because I can't imagine my life and the world without it--I have no idea what to expect. I think that scares white people, too, especially since they have more to lose. Part of me finds value in the racist experiences I've had. Another part of me just doesn't like the idea of everyone truly being equal, not that ending racism would mean other forms of inequality wouldn't exist. But first and foremost, this is life as I know it, and it is NORMAL to me. I'm not surprised when people act racist; I'm surprised when they DON'T.

Many of my black friends and I have talked about it, and I think this is one of the reasons black people are not activists anymore like they used to be. To us, racism is not a matter of right or wrong, equal or unequal, fair or unfair. It's life. And this is why I consider white anti-racists naive, because I don't think they have any way of understanding this "complacency" some black people feel--many don't really know such complacency exists. But to some of us, racism is something that just is. You either learn how to deal with it, or you let it destroy you, like I feel a lot of black men allow it to. You certainly don't take time out to fight it, because that gets in the way of daily survival, especially in the modern day when people view efforts to fight racism as completely unwarranted. Especially those of us who can rattle off story after story of being discriminated against--check for a few things among us.

First of all, we're rather emotionless when we do it. It's like it's no big thing, just another news story, just another day. We're not shocked. We're not surprised. We're not hurt. We're not really even angry. We're just telling it like it is. Second, we're emotionless when we hear about racism against blacks. Some of my black friends and I say, "Well, what else is new?" We think the black people who react are crazy. We've learned how to live with racism; why haven't they? Why haven't they learned that each new story of racism really is the same story over and over and over again? Why don't they understand these events aren't isolated or exceptions, but the rule? Why beg for empowerment from without instead of finding it within, i.e. why try to make people stop making you feel worthless by trying to eradicate "nigger" rather than teach yourself to believe that someone calling you a "nigger," regardless of the history, is itself worthless because you know that's not who you are and you cannot be made to feel worthless by that or any other form of racism?

Third, you'll rarely ever hear us say anything like "racism is wrong." For some of us, racism is unavoidable, real life--and that usually doesn't include white people. And for some of us, having these experiences puts us in an exclusive club, a "better" club that means we're not hopelessly spoiled, overprivileged, unaware and devilishly powerful whether or not we want to be seen as exceptions, anti-racists, "good white people" or what have you. And I think this was, at least, part of Kim's point. Whites can have the best of intentions, but they cannot escape their privilege. Even attempts to help blacks and do anti-racist work demonstrate an exploitation of privilege. Therefore, whites cannot engage in anti-racist work without, daily, undoing the work that they do because they cannot help but participate in and benefit from the oppressive system. She's not saying whites can't not be racist; she's saying whites can't not be privileged. White anti-racists, I'm sure, have no idea how much they'd have to give up or say "no" to if they tried, nor how little a difference a few white people doing so would make.

Anti-racists, as well as minority leaders, also seem to believe that they should be able to set out a few "solutions" and they can convince everyone to follow them or enough people to follow them to make a difference. Learn a thing or two about human nature. You'll notice that I point out a lot of problems but don't offer solutions. My blog and discussions with my friends are my solutions for myself. Whether or not anyone else decides that the solution to work on their prejudices is to admit them and discuss them with others and to work on checking themselves when they are being prejudiced is their personal decisions. Many people ultimately will not do it.

The point is we're all different and we do exactly what we want to do, so we're not all going to conform to one ideal. This is precisely why racism isn't going anywhere and precisely why group coalitions aren't possible. Some people are proud of being racist. Some people are racist but won't admit it. Some people are racist but don't know it. Some people are racist but do what I do. Some people are racist but use another tactic for addressing it. Your best bet for changing anybody's mindset in terms of racism is grabbing the people who are racist but don't know it. I'm in law school, and I believe that attempting to change people's minds about anything is generally a waste of time. I know that sounds odd since people think of lawyers as people who argue their side in order to sway people. But one thing I've learned in law school is that the only people who are swayed by arguments and opinions are people who are open to changing their minds and people who don't completely have their minds made up in the first place.

Anybody who is steadfast in their beliefs and opinions...it takes nothing short of transformative experiences to change the way they think. Even judges often go into the courtroom with their minds made up as the two lawyers essentially waste time arguing their case. As we've been shown, experiencing discrimination yourself is not usually enough of a transformative experience...otherwise, blacks, gays, Asians and Latinos could work together on the whole rather than as a relative few from each group who happen to see eye to eye. If anything, I would say discrimination breeds discrimination. And going off on everyone who makes a racist comment does not help (I actually view this as harmful). All that does is alerts them that they should not say such things around you. This contributes to the "if we don't see it, it doesn't exist" phenomenon. Understand that just because someone is not saying racist things in your presence doesn't mean they don't think them, and that you and your words are likely not magical enough to make them change their minds from something they've probably believed the majority of their lives. Problem is not solved.

Another thing I've learned in law school, courtesy of Critical Race Theory and Tim Wise, is that most people who don't view racism as their problem or who don't see any benefits for them in eliminating racism only act if they are convinced something is in it for them. Thus, many pivotal "advances" in history in terms of race have not come from convincing people of the wrongness of racism, nor from activism (at least not directly) or people truly changing their minds. The US has long been, and continues to be, considered a racist nation from the outside. During the 60s, the reputation as a racist nation was actually threatening to hurt our status as a Superpower. In addition, blacks were rioting across the nation, and powerful whites such as JFK were afraid that they would physically destroy the nation. Are you starting to see now? In other words, unless you're offering someone a reason why they should be personally invested in anti-racism, they will not become so. But realize that many people will still not be convinced. When I was reading the explanations Tim Wise offers whites in his book "White Like Me," I was not convinced.

But another clear difference in thought between anti-racists and me--and between society in general and me--appears to be the belief that racism is passed down to others and, thus, anti-racism can be passed down to others. I believe that all forms of discrimination, from small to large, are human nature and that one does not have to be "taught" to be racist in order to be racist. And if it is taught, how do you explain where such ideas even originated in the first place? In fact, I would make an imperfect analogy between racism and sex--we feel/are sent messages that it's wrong, but we feel compelled to do it and we do do it while feeling some level of guilt about it, denying that it is part of us and natural because it doesn't quite make sense for something like that to be natural.

But if you think about it, it is in our nature to think something's wrong with anything/anyone that is different, i.e. not the majority. This is why even minorities internalize racism towards self and others. Early on (but not until we've developed such critical thinking skills), we look around, see we don't look like most people and wonder why/what's wrong with us/why can't we look or be like most people. Early on, whites realize most people look like them, see some people who don't, feel that they are normal because of that and others are abnormal because of that, and wonder why they look like that/what's wrong with them/why they can't look or be like everyone else. Race, sex, sexual orientation, class and the most obvious differences get the most attention and are the easiest ways to discriminate against people because they are the most obvious differences. But we do this is so many different ways. At the end of the day, who didn't get picked on in school for being different in some way? Who has ever gone through life without feeling alienated for being different in some way at some point? And who goes through life without ever being the alienator? All ways are not equally as bad or hurtful, but they all illustrate the same thing about how people interact with others.

This is also why racism isn't going anywhere. To me, we're fighting and criticizing human nature without understanding that it is such. If anti-racism is worth the fight, it takes knowing exactly what you're fighting before you know what to do about it. If I'm right and you're raising a kid, constantly telling him or her that it is wrong to think this or that but the kid can't help but think it...without knowing it, you're making the kid feel bad about himself or herself. I think this is partially why so many people are in denial about racism in the world and in themselves--because messages from society that something is wrong with having racist thoughts and the constant "I'm not like that, and no one else is supposed to be like that, either"s make people feel bad about themselves. People deny masturbating, except people who have gotten over the uncomfortableness of the idea of doing it or admitting it and realize it's human. This is not to say nothing's wrong with having racist thoughts. I would just advocate a different approach than the one most of us take when dealing with racism and trying to teach kids about it--or, rather, not teach them about it but dodge it by telling them only some people are racist or a flat "it's wrong" or "don't think this about people".

Even though I acknowledge other groups of people who can claim anti-racists, I still believe that the majority of the people who call themselves this are white. So I still believe there is a naivete among the bunch simply because there are things many of them just could not reasonably understand and/or admit. Among the comments to the anti-racist white parents post to which I linked, I saw many that demonstrated that many of them don't "get" some things that I feel are very important for anyone who thinks they're anti-racist to know/understand. One woman makes a comment that I have discussed here before, i.e. that she feels uncomfortable because she worries that blacks assume she's a racist. I've also read Tim Wise's book similar concerns from whites, i.e. worries about how they will be perceived/treated by blacks if they get involved in anti-racism work.

The white friend I mentioned before who read Kim's piece...I am pretty sure she would never call herself an anti-racist. For one thing, I'm sure she would read this post and agree with me completely, i.e. racism is innate, racism cannot be eliminated, political correctness and confronting racists are not necessarily the way to go, and we cannot get most--or even 1/4th of--people in the US to agree on how to view or attack racism when you can't even get people of the same racial group to view it the same or agree on methods of attack. Aside from that, though, she essentially is similar to whites who are really bothered by racism against non-whites, except I think she has a much more keen understanding that most well-intentioned whites lack.

Not only does she understand black people's suspicions of her as a white person, she expects it. It doesn't make her back away from black people, and she doesn't talk about black people's reactions to her as if they are wrong or "racist." She knows some black people, particularly black women, have a guard up and are defensive with white people. She wouldn't expect blacks to be treated like they are by white people and still approach every white individual with an open mind; it's unrealistic. She knows she has to make the effort, and she doesn't have a problem with that or think it's wrong--it is to her what racism is to me, i.e. life. Similarly, she doesn't throw her interest in race out in conversations with blacks when it's uncalled for. Not that she's perfect--she doesn't understand never to compare the difficulty of managing white hair with the difficulty of managing black hair, nor does she want to believe that she can look like crap and still have white/Asian/Latino men approach her all because she's a blonde with blue eyes (though I think she knows that black men will approach any white woman, regardless of what she looks like).

Another thing I noticed on that site is a lot of white women. That's not surprising. As little faith as I have in whites on the whole, I have almost no faith in the human decency of white males as opposed to believing that there are many white women out there who sincerely are interested in racism. Given that, I couldn't help but notice that white women were commenting on the site but claimed that their white husbands had the same interests they do in fighting racism or exposing their white kids to diversity. Well...where are their husbands? Why are they all the ones visiting and posting to anti-racism sites?

If ever I were to offer a solution, it would be that we should do the opposite of what we do now. In other words, the "if we ignore it, maybe it'll go away" (and, in the case of slurs and racist comments, "if we stop saying it, maybe those thoughts will go away") and walking on eggshells mindsets need to stop. After all, ask yourself in how many other areas of life does ignoring problems or walking on eggshells work?

Minorities should become more willing to "teach" other races & ethnicities, explain their experiences and viewpoints and things that they associate with their culture, as well as things they associate with other people's cultures. And whites should be more willing to say what they really think, regardless of how it's perceived, and stop denying that non-whites are really different from them or insisting that they don't think non-whites are different from them. However, these things should be said to each other, not about each other--and not just when we're angry or trying to be negative. Both have to listen and learn how to control their emotions so that they can focus on what the comments mean rather than how they make them feel. It has to be a free discussion rather than one where people jump down each other's throats for "offensive" and politically incorrect ideas. Both have to resist the urge to tell other people how they are rather than disregarding what the people who would know best have to say about who they are. And we have to stop focusing so much on how things should be--we should pay attention and admit to how things actually are.

My friends and I aren't close because we act like our racial differences don't matter; we're close because we acknowledge that our racial differences do matter. I know I can say how I feel and what I think about whites without my white friends taking it personally or getting offended, and they know they can do the same. I know I can ask them questions, and they know they can ask me. They know they can joke, and I know I can joke. I can inform them of something about blacks and they won't argue with me about it, and they can do the same for whites. Notice I said my white friends--in general, my Asian friends and I don't necessarily have this kind of relationship (and here, I'm including my part-white, part-Asian friend Angel). When I was in high school and had an Asian best friend, we talked about race but it wasn't as open as it is with my white friends and I. My discussions with my white friends would offend most people--we both would offend most people; in fact, we have offended some people.

I almost think the word "offensive" should be retired just as much as some people think the word "nigger" should be. But I accept that we can't make people stop saying words--and I think that's another thing we should work on. We have to recognize the battles that are necessary to fight and the ones that can actually be won. Even if we could make people stop using slurs, there are bigger battles out there that are ignored by the public. Blacks nowadays act as if rap music and slurs are our biggest problems, but they're not. In fact, most of the problems that existed in the 60s still exist today--education and crime are at the top of my list, and rappers are not solely, or even mostly, responsible for those problems. I also mentioned self-empowerment needing to come from within rather than from how others treat you. We can address and repair these self-esteem issues without fighting pointless battles just like we can put a dent in racism without coalitions with people who don't care about our problems--if many of us just worked on ourselves, that would be a big help not only to dealing with racism against us but also dealing with our discrimination towards everyone else.

Cont'd on Jan. 24th or so starting here

Reflections on Asian & Black Relations

For some reason, I have started to think more about experiences from my younger days--saying that makes me sound older than I am, but I mean things from high school and college that I have forgotten all about over the past few years. For instance, not long ago, I remembered that I went through this "Asian phase" for about 4 or 5 years. Now, I've written a bit about how I've dated several Asians, have a bit of a preference for them and other "brown" people romantically, and so on. But this was different. For one thing, my phase wasn't like that white-guy fetish thing.

No, I think there was probably a period of time where I kind of wanted to be Asian. There was never a moment in my mind where I consciously said this to myself, but there were so many signs. I remember writing a post a few months ago in which I mentioned how during my junior year of high school, the way I thought about white people started changing because of the AP history courses I was taking, to the point of affecting who I started hanging out with. I think that was the very beginning of my "Asian phase," because up to that point I had been subconsciously trying to fit in with white people. It wasn't like I'd never had black friends; I had definitely tried to. In fact, I would say my experience up until I was 17 was trying to fit in with both blacks and whites, and having more success with whites than blacks. In high school, I think I gave up on blacks somewhat and focused more on white kids. But during/after those history courses, I found myself socializing more with blacks and Asians.

When I went to college, the overwhelming majority of my friends were Asian. My undergraduate school was very diverse, though still predominantly white. In fact, being at my law school is more shocking to me because I tend to use the amount of Asians you see at a school or company as a sign of complete racial alienation. By that, I mean that if you don't even see a good representation of Asians there, then you know that this is a place not going in the right direction because Asians are the one minority group that whites allow to be everywhere that signifies success (and I realize that sounds like a stereotype or the "model minority" myth). Although I see and interact with markedly less Asians than in undergrad, I view it more as a problem of location--my undergrad was in a diverse city while my law school is in a white college town--and the failure of the legal area in general to be racially inclusive and open. But initially, it was very weird to not see as many Asians as I did in college. Still, I have realized that the university still has more Asians than any other racial & ethnic minority.

Would I still be close with Asians if my law school had more Asians like I was in college? I don't think so. Things really have changed with me, plus I view the Asians at my law school as more "white-washed," although I have been in the presence of one Asian male who talks about whites very badly, and my friend Nikki knows other Asians who have something to say about whites. It's not as if I don't have Asian friends now, but not very many and one of them has more solidarity with blacks than whites. My junior year in college, most of the Asians I hung out with were Southeast Asian, and some of them acted as if blacks and Southeast Asians were the same race--a race called "brown."

My sophomore year, it was a different group of Asians. My roommate was Korean and Spanish, and she clearly had issues with that--in short, she wanted to fit in more with Asians, although she was like so many Asian girls seem to be in terms of preferring white males romantically. But she and I became somewhat close, I suppose, and apparently she talked about me a lot when she went home on the weekends because her mother told me so once. A lot of the time, because of her, I would be surrounded by Asians. I remember one time--and this happened in high school and my junior year with the Southeast Asians--sitting at "the Asian table" with her (yes, some colleges have this, too, just like high schools) and being the only non-Asian there. I'd told her about having accounts with some sites that were really exclusively for Asians--I had them because the Asian guys I'd dated told me about them and wanted me to look at things like pictures they'd put on the sites, etc--and how I used to go into Asian chatrooms, chat with other Asians and pretend to be Asian, even learning/using some of the Asian slang and type (i.e. aZiAn PrIdE).

By the time the year was over, she had taught me Korean words and she could say something in Korean that I could understand, to her surprise (I guess because she thought I didn't remember). I'd tried Korean food (which I didn't like, but I am very unsophisticated in my taste in food, i.e. I like junk food). Her mother came to our room all the time, which I hated because I felt uncomfortable around parents when I was younger. Her mother, sensing my discomfort, flat-out asked me once if I disliked Asians!!! Hahahaha!!! I couldn't believe she'd said that, but it is so funny to me now. My roommate was just like, "MOM, she has Asian friends and boyfriends and an account on AsianAvenue!" HAHAHAHA!!!

I would say that things started to change again my senior year in college. Finally, I'd gotten my own room on campus. Two of my roommates before had been Asian. I remained pretty isolated my senior year in college because having my own room--and a TV in it and plenty of music--meant I didn't have to engage in forced interaction with anyone. I liked it a lot. Some of my friends from junior year also lived in the same dorm, but since I stayed isolated I didn't see them a lot. Besides, college wasn't the time I made friends I'd have forever; I think law school is more along those lines for me. And then I took a couple years off from attending school and didn't think more of it. Just like that, the "phase" was over and forgotten. I can't really put my finger on a reason why, other than, I guess, for three years I wasn't really around Asians anymore and out of sight was out of mind.

I also couldn't really say what brought that particular phase on. I mean, obviously I didn't want to hang out with whites that much, sure. But I didn't consciously set out to hang with Asians. I don't remember how I got started going into Asian chatrooms, but I'm thinking it had something to do with making Asian friends for the first time at school and becoming more curious about the people and the culture. I pretended to be Asian because I was talking to guys I liked online who were Asian and I subconsciously didn't feel like it'd make sense to be a black female in an Asian chatroom or that they'd like me if they knew I wasn't Asian like them. Everybody was "pinay"/"pinoy" (Filipinos) or "viet."

Doing the readings I've been doing from and about Asians has been one of the things, I guess, that has jarred my memory. I remember while I was reading "Global Divas" "pinay" and "pinoy" being mentioned, as well as other things I remembered learning back then, and I started remembering the chatrooms and the Asian tables and everything else. It seems like I always have some race-related question on my mind that I like to raise in my blog, so the one for the past few days has been--why, considering my past with Asians, don't I see them as "allies"? Or why don't I propose such a thing or attempt to build those bridges between blacks and Asians? Why do I now view Asians more in terms of blacks vs everybody else rather than non-blacks vs whites or any other combination that does not put blacks in opposition to Asians? And how do I reconcile this view with a physical attraction to Asians?

I've noticed that there are people and works out there who/that raise a history of coalitions between blacks and Asians or suggest that blacks and Asians--or blacks and any other oppressed group--should work together. Frankly, I don't really know the history, but I like to look at what's going on today. I've seen on some Asian sites that hate crimes against Asians in the US are increasing. Be that as it may, I do believe that blacks and most other oppressed groups are moving in different directions in the US from each other. At the very least, any unity that used to be there is drifting as many Asians, Latinos, non-black queers and so on are finding more and more acceptance and support among the white mainstream.

Though at times it looks as if blacks are also finding that acceptance, there are also many indications that signify blacks are moving backwards in the US for various reasons but including racism. The same complex dynamic is true for other groups, too, but in a different way. For example, while immigration might be under attack and hate crimes might be rising, the Asians and Latinos who were born here do have many white friends and are generally acceptable spouses to white parents for their kids (Asians more so than Latinos). In turn, it's very difficult to discuss who is progressing more than others because each group is progressing in different areas than others while falling backwards in others. Though some Asians such as Frank Wu and "Tamara Nopper" readily acknowledge that blacks are viewed and treated more negatively in the US than Asians are, other Asians still don't believe it even despite their own racism towards blacks.

This tug of war, the similar anger to blacks expressed by some Asians--not to mention the comparisons to blacks--and the insistence that Asians also experience racial discrimination & alienation are the reasons I have started doing this reading. Yet, except some major exceptions such as more recent hate crimes, I've yet to see much of anything about the Asian experience that approaches the difficulty of the black experience. I've read book after book, article after article, message board after message board...and the discussions seem to be similar time after time, with Wu probably offering the most depth of analysis and discussion.

To me, their major concerns in the US are not being considered American--which, as I've written in my blog before, applies to everyone except whites in the US, though in different ways, and is something Asians do to Latinos and blacks just as much as they say whites and blacks do to them by making the term "American" synonymous with "white" and only accepting whites as friends and romantic interests--wanting to fit in with whites and/or other Asians and balancing that with more traditional Asian culture, and occasional racial incidents such as racial slurs/actions and stereotypes.

So, to me, it makes no sense to say that Asians tolerate more racism from whites than blacks, especially if you're not black and, thus, have no real idea what blacks deal with. Similarly, I cannot definitively say that blacks tolerate more racism than Asians, just that I believe this is so. That's the point of my "research"--to try to learn more about what Asians experience in the US. But this minimizing of experience back and forth--the same thing that goes on between blacks and gays--is one of the reasons why coalitions of the past are, to me, impossible to form in the present. I think that people like Asians, Latinos and whites--including white gays--are tired of hearing from blacks...but I also think that's one of the reasons why racial incidents can happen to blacks and all kinds of people will react. It's not because they all think it's wrong; more like, "we don't want to hear those niggers' mouths anymore, so let's pretend like we agree with them to shut them up." Similarly, people don't respond to incidents against Asians because Asians are seen as not reacting and because Asian issues don't exactly make the front page or the evening news, especially since the white agenda is to convince everyone that Asians have no problems...which most black people believe.

But I also like to point out that we're selfish, all of us. Asians care about Asians. Blacks care about blacks. White gays care about white gays. We're not interested in coalitions because we don't believe and/or don't care if other groups have problems. Nearly every oppressed group in the US right now believes they are the only oppressed group or that they are the most oppressed group. It's not like the past when women obviously couldn't vote or work certain jobs, or blacks obviously couldn't frequent the same spots as whites. Discrimination is so hidden and subtle now that people not of a particular group are fooled into believing it's not there. So we'd have to spend time convincing our would-be partners against oppression that we have problems, too, which...as I said, we don't want to hear about anybody else's problems.

Finally, just because one group is oppressed doesn't mean that they identify with other oppressed groups or don't play a role in their oppression. In fact, I believe that being a member of an oppressed group makes you more likely to discriminate against others, not less likely. We all want to feel like we're better than someone else in society. For whites, that's everyone else, except sometimes Asians. For blacks, it's queers. For queers, it's blacks. For Asians and Latinos, it's blacks and queers and "fresh off the boat" immigrants from their backgrounds. In other words, if we're going to get together to fight white supremacy, we first have to settle our own sh!t with each other...because, trust me, we all have sh!t with each other. But, as I said before, we don't want to settle our sh!t with each other...we just want to settle our own problems. Some people think that this divide between Asians and blacks is the result of whites using Asians against blacks as the model minority, which I did point out in one of my recent posts. But discrimination against "dark people" is also just a part of the Asian culture, i.e. it's there with or without white people doing anything.

Long story short--I don't believe in the possibility of coalitions. I do believe that it's "us vs them," i.e. blacks against non-blacks, and will continue to become even more so. It doesn't make sense to even me, as a black person, that Asians and Latinos and white queers would align themselves with black people when they are staring the opportunity dead in the face to advance by getting on straight white people's good side. After all, it's easier. It doesn't exactly allow you to be who you really are, I think, but that's a sacrifice that, particularly many Latinos and Asians, seem to take rather gladly. White queers don't have to do much of anything, as, being white, they are already much more accepted than they think they are. The same is true for white women who view themselves as still oppressed.

I say that anyone who wants to align themselves with another oppressed group or start such organizations should. After all, the more I learn about Asians and discrimination against Asians, the more I notice discrimination against Asians, the more I check myself on it, and the more I correct other people on it. Fighting for Asians is still not my priority, just like fighting for gay rights isn't--I still can't naturally help but to care most about blacks and black issues (although the argument is frequently made that you can't discuss identities in isolation, as I demonstrate quite often in my blog...but, for example, I don't mean that we shouldn't discuss black gay issues, but that we shouldn't be worried about building coalitions with white gays). Then again, fighting for Asians is not every Asian's priority, and fighting for blacks is not every black's priority. And I'm certain that fighting for blacks is not most Asians' priority.

What about romance? I've noticed something with blacks and Asians, that is mentioned somewhat briefly in the last link above in this post...and that is that neither group considers the other a suitable romantic option. But there are different reasons. For Asians, it's obviously more culture-driven. For blacks, given the comments I've heard from my mother and the surprise other blacks have expressed at my interest in Asians--particularly black women--many blacks just don't find Asians physically attractive and don't view them as date-able. It's funny to me how some do like white people do, i.e. try to paint blacks as the ones who are racist against them out of absolutely nowhere--Asians haven't done a thing to blacks, yet blacks just hate them.

Well, Charles Barkley has this book called "Who's Afraid of a Large Black Man?" or something along those lines that I read a couple years ago. In it is an interview with a Jewish man who, if I remember correctly, relays a joke of sorts that goes a little something like: "What do blacks think about Jews?" Answer: "They don't." I would say that, for the vast majority of blacks, the same is true of Asians. Sure, sometimes some blacks pull out an offensive Asian joke. But for the most part, Asians don't exist to blacks, especially blacks who have very little interaction with or see very few Asians. As much as the world is Asian and white to Asians, it's black and white to blacks. And from the way many Asians complain about being left out of racial discussions, I'd say they know that.

So if Asians don't exist to blacks, then dating Asians never enters their minds. So, pretty much any black I've mentioned that possibility to, it's out of this world. You might as well have said you're thinking about dating this puppy you saw outside--it's just as unfathomable. Puppies aren't things people date. They aren't romantic beings. They have no sex appeal. They are just there. And Asians aren't people anybody but Asians should date, to so many blacks. They aren't romantic beings. They have no sex appeal. They are just there. And they might as well be a completely different type of being than blacks are.

I worry about it because I know that my mother would not get it if I really did bring an Asian home. I'm not sure it'd be like how an Asian or white parent might react if you bring a black person home--it's not like, "you're dating beneath you" or "you'll be shunned in the community." No...more like total bewilderment. What do you see in this person? This person has those funny eyes--they couldn't possibly be attractive with those eyes. My friend Angel, who is white and Asian but looks more white...what would she do if I brought someone like her home? I've told my mother before that there are some Asians who don't look like she insists all Asians look, regardless of being mixed or not, and I told her Angel doesn't look that way. She doesn't believe it. Would she be relieved if I were dating Angel and she saw that Angel didn't look like that? And if she were, how would I deal with that? Because I don't think that's any better than being upset that she's Asian and "looks Asian." It's the same as how people comment that mixed blacks look better than other blacks or are prettier than everyone else, or that mixed people in general are good-looking. It's a "compliment," but it's still offensive.

I could almost hear my mother saying, "Oh, she's pretty!" about Angel in this imaginary scenario where I'm dating her and bring her home, and that pisses me off. Angel might look white, but she's also Asian, she knows she's Asian, she asserts that she's Asian (though not in an unnecessary, defensive, abrasive or I-have-to-prove-myself way, but I still wonder how my family would deal with her looking like she does but identifying as Asian). And I like that about her, and I wouldn't like someone as pretty and as great as her but with more typical Asian features less. Obviously, with the way I describe the kinds of features I like, if anything, I think more typical Asian features--particularly the darker skin color--are more attractive. I don't want my saying "Angel doesn't look Asian" to my mother to seem like an implicit statement that I wouldn't be interested in her if she does. It was one of the ways I have to nicely tell her that what she thinks is so true is really so dumb.

Aside from thinking about what it would be like to take her home, I'd love to date Angel if she were available to me. Although I don't think blacks and Asians have the best of relations, I just don't see her or my other Asian friends in those terms. I don't generalize or stereotype my friends the way I do people I don't know. I have never felt like any of them were anything but on my side; in fact, I almost think of us as having our own race because we tend to think so similarly on social issues. When I was angry at whites in general about the affirmative action ban in Michigan and didn't even want to see other whites, I talked to all of my friends about it. It really was almost as if they weren't even white to me because all that really matters to me in my personal relationships with people is how they think. It's the closest we get to transcending race, although we still acknowledge and discuss our races. Of course, I wouldn't be able to do it if I weren't lucky enough to sense when someone would make a great friend for me...I'd be in huge trouble, not to mention alone, if I couldn't do that.

Reflections on Affirmative Action

I've been mentioning sports a bit in my blog lately, which I think is a very good topic to intersect with the topic of affirmative action. You see, apparently, along with missing the story about the trans sports commentator, I also missed a story about former NFL football player and current Stanford football coach Jim Harbaugh accusing the University of Michigan, his alma mater, of lowering academic standards for athletes--particularly in admissions and steering them towards "easier" majors. Another interesting thing, though, is several football players from several colleges have not and will not be playing in this season's bowl games because they are academically ineligible or are involved in academic scandals. This is not the first time, either.

These are big stories in the sports world, for sure, but how many people outside of sports who would claim to care about academics or fair admissions standards know about these stories (you see how I didn't know about the Harbaugh story?) or are up in arms about them, using them to say that this is the reason why we should stop admitting "dumb jocks" or lowering the standards for them? I mean, other than Harbaugh?

All I really want to know is--why is it okay for someone--usually black, but often white and occasionally Latino or Asian--who may or may not care about a good education to make 1000 (on the old 1600 scale) on the SAT I or a 17 on the ACT and have a 2.8 GPA but be given a scholarship to schools out of their academic league, such as Michigan, Duke, the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, UCLA, UC-Berkeley, USC and so forth all because he can play football or basketball...but a black kid who has, say, a 3.7 GPA in an advanced curriculum, a 1250 SAT I (on the old 1600 scale) or a 25 on the ACT, has written a great personal statement about his or her life struggles, has strong recommendations from teachers, leadership positions in organizations, community service experience and such a strong desire to attend one of the best universities in the nation that he/she is willing to borrow $30000 a year...should be denied admissions to these same schools? And why do some of us complain when the latter student is admitted but we have nothing to say when the first student is, with a scholarship to boot?

The same can be said--and is more often said--with legacies, i.e. people with a parent who attended the school, often having donated money to the school or being famous. But I think using athletics sinks in better with people who are dead-set against affirmative action, because many of these people will not be sports fans and getting into schools that one academically doesn't deserve to happens more with sports or, at least, is more visible. Athletes play games, representing their universities, weekly for months, oftentimes on TV.

Sure, there are positives to the practice of admitting athletes who don't make the grade academically. But the same can be said for minorities who, by many people's very narrow standards, don't appear to make the grade academically. There are just different lines of reasoning to support each. Athletes contribute to the school. Their sports bring in a lot of money, and they entertain people. You don't get that with black students who don't play sports, sure. Indeed, most people don't really feel there is a benefit to them, personally, in having minorities at university--and that's what matters. Remember, everyone's selfish. The US is about "what does this do for me?" Okay. But minorities who attend universities contribute, too--to society. Nowadays, it seems that everyone has something to say about blacks and crime, blacks and hip hop culture, blacks and sexism.

Look--black people who attend and graduate from good schools generally don't commit crimes, generally don't fit in with hip hop culture nor become rappers, generally don't even agree with so-called hip hop culture and generally are more aware and understanding of gender issues. So, perhaps...if you really want this stuff to slow down, you'll want to make good education as accessible to blacks as possible. People love to generalize that education doesn't matter to blacks. Well, education doesn't matter, in general, to the majority of people in this country. But if you really knew, you'd know that racial & ethnic minorities take education for granted a lot less than whites do. That's because whites can spend their days as a teenager skateboarding and getting drunk, then spend college days getting drunk and hooking up, and still fall into a good job. The difference with blacks than with everyone else is that blacks don't see college as a possibility, not just because of admissions but because of affordability and--believe it or not--simple things that everyone else takes for granted such as knowing how to apply for financial aid, knowing all the different forms you have to fill out, knowing how to fill out those forms and then having to pay for many of those forms on top of everything else you have to pay for.

I saw personally when I was applying to law school--and continue to see now that I'm trying to figure out how to pay for the Bar exam and the Professional Responsibility exam (not to mention how I will get to those exam designations or how I will afford to live this summer as I prepare for the Bar exam)--that everyone else, but especially whites, take so many expenses and hurdles that are present in application processes for granted and are clueless that these things are not simple for everyone else. My brother-in-law's sister and brother could not get the help they needed in trying to apply for financial aid, and they have the kind of parents who refuse to help with those things and who don't know when their kids are in danger of failing until the last minute. But all kinds of people have bad and/or uninvolved parents, especially today, not just black parents. And it's hard to expect people who never went to college and never thought of attending college because they didn't have to opportunity to, to understand the importance of it or know enough about the process of applying to help their kids do it.

Yet, the obstacles remain, and non-blacks remain clueless or uncaring about them. Everyone should be treated the same in admissions, only we're not treated the same in every other aspect of life. We should forget the past, only the past still affects the present. Martin Luther King Jr says people should be judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin...only taking race into account in admissions is about judging people by their character, not their skin color. For so many minorities, their race shapes their character. Those admissions officers at Michigan or Harvard who read the personal statements blacks submit will tell you that, because a lot of blacks cannot write about the person they've become without writing about how race played a role in getting them there. It's not as if admissions officers see that an applicant is black or Latino and admits them on the spot just because of that. All the factors I mentioned above in comparing an athlete to a black academic student play a role, which means admissions officers look at the totality of the person--every person. It is society that still judges people by their skin, not their character...which is the main reason why I consider racial stereotypes and generalizations racist.

I realize that I am not discussing affirmative action and Asians & Latinos (or women and queers, etc), pretty much just blacks. I am also using "minorities" at times, but this is not really an inclusive discussion. As a black person, I know more how affirmative action affects blacks, and I do believe that it is more--if not solely--necessary for blacks than others. However, I do believe that "affirmative action" is not the correct term for what colleges and universities do, particularly the more prestigious universities. "Affirmative action" is the guarantee that those schools will not discriminate on the basis of race. Schools use a diversity policy. In using such a policy, I believe that it is absolutely correct to consider each and every applicant on an individual basis, using several criteria in order to assess each person's total background. I am quite familiar with some schools' admissions process, particularly Michigan, Michigan Law and Harvard & Harvard Law.

Before the affirmative action ban in Michigan, Michigan Law had the best admissions process of any program in the nation, because, the way they did things, a white or Asian student who had a compelling total package but a low LSAT score had as good a chance of being admitted as a black student who did--and, indeed, Michigan Law has admitted many white students with lower GPAs and/or LSAT scores. Michigan Law doesn't have perfect racial & ethnic representation, but they have really good diversity in the true sense of the word because diversity to them was not and is not just about race.

Unfortunately, now diversity will likely continue in every sense but racially--they will still have tons of white queers and white women, white kids who grew up poor and white kids who were adopted by minorities, white kids who are from places as diverse as Germany, Montana, Canada, Alabama and New York, and Asian kids, too...but they won't have that many black or non-white Latino kids. In other words, anyone can go to Michigan Law except blacks and Latinos, unless they're [likely] an (speaking in terms of social class) uppity black or Latino, many of whom will choose Harvard or Columbia instead now because Michigan Law will not be the best school they get into. This is not what admissions policies should be in the US; the way Michigan Law did things prior to 2007 is the way every school and every program in the US should do things.

I have a joke about schools like Michigan now, or schools in lily white states (or states I tend to think of as white) such as Idaho, Delaware and West Virginia: the only black people there are the schools' athletes (or in Michigan's case, I say "the only black people who will be there after a while are the black athletes"). It's sad, but that's probably not all that far off. As much as I love college football, if I could choose between affirmative action and great but academically unqualified athletes, I would choose affirmative action. I just don't know how it makes sense that a black guy who doesn't care about the school's academics, prestige or job appeal can be more embraced by the university and the entire country than a black male or black female who will work hard and give 100% to the classroom...all because the former can throw a ball but the latter didn't perform as well on a test made predominantly by white males with a historical purpose to demonstrate that some groups of people are superior to others. I believe that blacks who want to be in college for college's sake should be the ones who have the doors opened and the red carpet rolled out for them...not athletes.

I think this phenomenon picks up where I was starting to go before, which is that many blacks don't view college as accessible or helpful...unless you're a black male going to play a sport. Because, in truth, unless you're upper-middle class+ and black, and/or have parents with a college+ degree, college is not that accessible to most blacks. But if you can play a popular sport, as I said, it doesn't take much for a college to call you. Suddenly, you don't have to know anything about researching colleges, financial aid forms, application fees or how you might go about paying back college loans. Suddenly, you don't have to worry whether or not you can get a job upon graduation, because you have the chance to go Pro and make millions if you can just stay healthy and at the top of your game. Is it any wonder that paths such as athletics and music are such popular choices for black males? To many, they seem like the only paths for black males.

By the same token, is it any wonder that black females outnumber black males in college? After all, if black women didn't rely on college...there's not much else out there they can do. Going Pro isn't the same for us, and, as women, we're taught about needing stability and security...so we're more practical than to run around trying to score record deals or an agent who will get us auditions for movies/TV shows, even if we can sing or act. Besides...how hard is it to make a hit rap song, do you think? Now answer the same question for black women. Becoming a rapper might be harder than it seems, but I believe the reason so many black males want to do it is because they also believe it's not that hard. Still, more black women might attend college, but the best schools still don't see anywhere near as many black women as schools held in less esteem do--and, as I said, black females at schools like Michigan and USC tend to be from the middle and upper-middle classes+. Those schools still remain much more accessible to black male athletes whose application package would be much less impressive than the non-high-falutin' non-athletic blacks' application packages.