Archive for September, 2008

Boxing Ourselves In: The Sad Irony of White Supremacy

I guess it would be amusing were it not so sad. After several days of combing through hateful diatribes, aimed at me because of previous commentaries I had written concerning racism and white privilege in the presidential campaign, it struck me: one of the most disturbing things about white racists is how they manage to […]

Racism as Reflex: Reflections on Conservative Scapegoating

If hypocrisy were currency, conservatives would be able to single-handedly bail out the nation’s free-falling financial system in less than a week, without the rest of us having to front so much as a penny. So on the one hand, folks like this always tell others–especially the poor and people of color–to take “personal responsibility” […]

Explaining White Privilege (Or, Your Defense Mechanism is Showing)

Sigh. I guess I should have expected it, seeing as how it’s nothing new. I write a piece on racism and white privilege (namely, the recently viral, “This is Your Nation on White Privilege”), lots of folks read it, many of them like it, and others e-mail me in fits of apoplexy, or post scathing […]

Reflections on White Anti-Intellectualism (Or, What’cha Want With all That Book Learnin’?)

To hear an awful lot of white folks tell it, the problem with black people is that they just don’t want to work hard enough in school. They act up and refuse to study or get good grades, because they don’t want to be put down for “acting white.” In other words, the African American […]

This is Your Nation on White Privilege

For those who still can’t grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help. White privilege is when you can get pregnant at seventeen like Bristol Palin and everyone is quick to insist that your life and that of your family is a […]