• octopus_ink
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    14 days ago

    If you constantly tell someone they are at fault for something because they are of a certain race, if you constantly deny them any of their achievements and say is because of privilege

    I see Trump voters and people who want an excuse for their behavior saying this has happened. I’ve not actually seen it happening beyond the odd anecdotal outlier. I’ve seen people choose to interpret things like white privilege and systemic racism as if that’s what’s being said, but it always seems very clear to me that it’s not what is being said, it’s how they react to folks suggesting they be more mindful of how they interact with others or less dismissive of the ongoing impacts of historical injustices.

    Signed, a white guy, who doesn’t deny all the awful things perpetrated by other white guys in the US, nor feel personally responsible for those awful things, nor feel blamed for those awful things, despite also having struggles, no money in the bank, and plenty of my own personal challenges.

    It’s hard for me to have a lot of sympathy for the folks willing to fuck shit up for all of us (including themselves) because they aren’t willing to stop and actually consider what is being said instead of what they think is being said, or because being mindful of how they interact with the people around them is somehow just too much courtesy to ask for.

    And psst - fixing a lot of those things would help white folks too!