bigotry of low expectations

To White People Who Want to Be ‘One of the Good Ones’

There are a lot of reading lists being passed around among us whites. Besides books on racism and antiracism, there are documentaries to watch, conversations to unpack, privilege to be examined and a foreboding sense of work to be done.

We are determined to do that work and determined to let everyone know we are doing it. This work is deemed necessary so we can become better allies for black people in the fight for racial justice. There are so many anguished conversations among white people taking place right now about what to write on our protest signs, about that time we said that thing to a black friend and it changed the energy in the room, about whether rewatching the movie “The Help” counts as progress.

There is a frantic race to catch up, and that’s got to be the correct instinct, right? I mean, look at this moment in history. I swear, if I don’t do it right I’ll ask to speak to my own manager.

However, when I pause for a second I get a sneaking feeling that my ego is involved. I catch myself wanting to be “one of the good ones,” and I have to laugh at myself. Who exactly do I imagine is paying attention to me? Is somebody out there doling out points? Black people are being killed in broad daylight by the police, by actual representatives of the state, and I am fretting over the wording of an Instagram post.

One powerful lie that we were born into is that white people deserve different, better lives than anyone else.

NY Times fake news: Lumping all white people into one homogeneous group; check. Blaming all white people for the sins of a handful of them; check. Parroting lies about police shooting statistics; check.

Salon writer thinks peaceful protests are the same as riots: I can’t get past the differences between the Minneapolis BLM protest and anti-lockdown protests

The vast majority of protesters weren’t violent and none were armed. But Minneapolis police showed up ready to rumble. News photos show the cops pouring out of vehicles fully clad in riot gear and as soon as a handful of protesters committed minor acts of property damage and threw some water bottles (the Star Tribune reports that peaceful protesters pleaded with others to stop the vandalism), cops used that as a pretext to shoot tear-gas canisters into the crowd.

Could it be that cops knew that these very peaceful BLM demonstrators will riot, so they were ready. And they were right. Minneapolis had a massive riot, multiple stores and buildings were looted and burned to the ground.

But what I can’t get past — and judging from the reactions on social media, I’m not alone — is how wildly different that scene played out compared to the astroturf anti-lockdown protests staged in various state capitals across the country over the past month or so.

In places like Lansing, Michigan, and Columbus, Ohio, right-wing protesters have showed up literally armed to the hilt, carrying assault rifles and menacing state legislators who were simply trying balance public safety and the economic needs of their citizens. In Michigan, protesters literally stormed the state capitol and stood in the galley with guns, in an obvious effort to intimidate the politicians below.

Could it be that those white people with guns pose no threat? There was not a riot, no looting, no damage done.

No doubt liberals are in danger of letting conservatives drag them into a nitpicky, line-by-line debate over what constitutes “peaceful protest” and who started what in Minneapolis. But there’s no reason to get into that.

“Disregard reality, use feelings”

Fake News New York Times: It’s Not Obesity. It’s Slavery.

Dreasjon Reed, McHale Rose outrage. Hundreds blocked traffic in Indianapolis to protest the police-involved shootings of 2 black men.

• INDIANAPOLIS — Friends and family of Sean Reed are remembering him after his death was live streamed on Facebook. “He was talking to me on the live,” Jazmine Reed, his sister, said. “And he was like ‘Sis I’m sorry.’ And I’m like ‘Brother what are you doing? We can’t think for them.'”
• Indianapolis police chief talks to Dreasjon Reed’s family in emotional face-to-face exchange “Ya’ll be murdering us black people for years,” Jamie Reed, Dreasjon’s father said to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Chief Randal Taylor. “What’s going on? What’s the investigation? What’s going on?”
• 
• ACLU standing up for these criminals  Paige Fernandez, policing policy advisor with the American Civil Liberties Union, issued the following statement: “We mourn the loss of Dreasjon Reed as police yet again have robbed another Black man of his life. …fatal officer-involved shootings continue to ravage communities, particularly those of color. These police killings are not one-off incidents and are not the result of a few bad apples, but rather emblematic of the systemic problems that pervade our policing institutions.

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Black, Latino people break social distancing rules, get arrested. NYC politicians cry racism.

According to the NYPD, there have been 374 social distancing-related summonses issued since COVID-19 restrictions were put in place six weeks ago. Of that number, 304 of the summonses have been issued to black or Latino people.

That follows news that 35 of 40 people arrested in Brooklyn between March 17 and May 4, were black. Across the city, where there were 120 social distancing arrests, 68% of the people were black, 24% Latino and 7% white.

“That’s abysmal,” Public Advocate Jumaane Williams said during a Zoom meeting news conference Friday. “This is not the federal government. This is not Donald Trump.”

California State University Fresno hosts blacks-only student retreat – to promote inclusion

California State University Fresno recently held a three-day student retreat for black students that aimed to foster inclusion and help incoming African American students adjust to college life and get involved in the campus community.

The inaugural “Harambee Student Retreat,” which took place Aug.14 through Aug 17, was free to participating students, who enjoyed housing, meals, workshops and activities meant to help aid in the “successful transition of incoming African American/Black students to Fresno State,” the university’s website states.

According to the university’s website, topics broached at the retreat included information on how to receive assistance with financial aid and housing, as well as how to develop leadership skills and find a job.

Canadian Government Gave a $500,000 Grant to a Guy Filming a Puppet to Spread Coronavirus Information to Indigenous Communities

A Manitoba researcher is using part of his $500,000 federal grant to not only study how COVID-19 is affecting Indigenous communities but also to help them survive it.

One of the first projects Steph McLachlan commissioned is a public health video delivered in Cree by a raven puppet.

“We’ve kind of hit a sweet spot, which is finding something that’s useful from a health perspective but has value in itself in terms of something that’s funny and relevant from a cultural perspective,” said McLachlan, a professor in the University of Manitoba’s Department of Environment and Geography.

If coronavirus doesn’t discriminate, how come black people are bearing the brunt?

I wanted to  believe the comforting thought that, when it comes to coronavirus, we are all in this together.. That knowing we’re all equally at risk, we’re pulling together in the same direction, bearing the strain equally.

The false nature of this belief was initially most obvious in relation to class. Once the lockdown was imposed, a gulf very quickly opened up between those on full salaries working on laptops from home, fretting about having to cancel Easter holidays, and those living hand to mouth, fretting about how to feed their children and avoid being made homeless.

Government advice revealed its ignorance of how many people actually live. How do you self-isolate when you live in cramped or shared accommodation? How do you reduce shopping trips to once a week when you have little or no storage space? And if you do want to go to the park or do an extra shop, you now risk not only infection, but coming into contact with the police, some of whom are zealously taking advantage of their new social control powers.

Black People Eat Shitty Food; Get Diabetes, Heart Disease, Disproportionately Die From Coronavirus. Liberals: “This is systemic racism, classism”

Moreover, it appears that those dying of COVID-19 are disproportionately the poor and people of color, attesting to systemic inequality in the United States. This is not merely a manifestation of systemic racism and classism. It reveals a lack of situational awareness about the trajectory of the pandemic itself, which will seriously undermine containment.

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The Unbearable Whiteness of Hiking and How to Solve It

Minorities don’t want to go outdoors = white people’s fault.

So what is keeping people of color from participating in outdoor recreation and enjoying its benefits? As activist and author Glenn Nelson writes, “Because the outdoors remains a largely white domain, it is up to white America to invite communities of color in, to enlist us as allies.” Here are a few proven strategies for outings leaders (and well-meaning white folks) who want to be part of the solution.

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Salon: Charleston church massacre: The violence white America must answer for – Muslims don’t need to apologize for the Tsarnaevs