Kinja reply list

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Maiysha KaiMichael Harriot
11/20/18 6:44pm
“Imagine if a white person said ...” is the most typical straw man argument I encounter from those accusing me of one. Because as you so aptly said:

“...the narrative of defining the rules [of] racism is often used to deflect from the actual work. Everyone knows racism. Those who pretend not to or who argue about the definition are only doing so in an attempt to mitigate their own racist actions—because “belief, intent, and animosity” will always be invisible.”

In other words: They tried it.
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  Lizard BreathMaiysha Kai
  11/20/18 7:13pm
  The hypothetical ahistorical plane on which they want to have a debate doesn’t actually exist, so it is impossible to have a rational discussion with them.
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  VinMaiysha Kai
  11/20/18 7:24pm
  They always try it.
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Not Enough Day DrinkingMichael Harriot
11/20/18 5:00pm
White supremacy is a measurable, tangible reality that is upheld by white people and it can only be dismantled by white people.
Disagree. We can dismantle that shit brick by brick. In my city, we had 2 white judges that were filling prisons with black and brown children while white children were usually diverted to other paths. We voted them out 2 weeks ago.
Is that going to fix all structural racism in the city? No, obviously not, but it did take 2 bricks out of the white supremacy wall. The more bricks we remove, the less insurmountable the problem looks. Because there’s not going to be an option to blow it all up and start over. It’s going to be slow and methodical, and everyone’s going to have to do a little bit.
But white people will not fix it own their own. They built it and they benefit from it. Expecting them to undo it for us because we asked nicely is absurd. We need to undo it for them. And sure, they’re going to be upset, but like you said, fuck their feelings.
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  Michael HarriotNot Enough Day Drinking
  11/20/18 5:11pm
  Are the majority of voters in your city black?
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  AndTrollingIsHalfTheBattleMichael Harriot
  11/20/18 5:20pm
  Do they have to be just black or will other colors work as well?
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VinMichael Harriot
11/20/18 6:11pm
In fact, even if it might feel like it, there is not one segment of American society in which white people are disadvantaged because of their race.
Name one.
I’ll wait.
Seasoning.
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  VinVin
  11/20/18 6:12pm
  On-topic: I’m not giving the Federalist my clicks, so I’ll assume it was a Costco sample-sized bit of fuckery and nonsense.
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  Kool-Aid-CongoVin
  11/20/18 6:38pm
  Agreed. I don’t have a problem reading opposing viewpoints on most issues, including race relations, but based on the excerpts in Harriot’s story, it’s reads like a rambling “thought” piece about White victimhood for not being able to say the N-word or making racist jokes without acknowledging the history of the U.S. to suppress Blacks from social and economic progress.
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ElusiveCupcakeMichael Harriot
11/20/18 9:24pm
Do you enjoy being embarrassed by me? Literacy is not a skill you possess. The article CLEARLY states that the manager was fired for asking those customers to prove that they could afford their food BEFORE ordering. This was at a Chipotle. At Chipotle, your meal is assembled in front of your face by the restaurant’s employees as you order it. You only pay once your meal is fully complete at the end of the assembly line. At no Chipotle are you supposed to be asked if you could afford your meal before the ordering process begins. You cannot dine and dash at a Chipotle as they will not give you your meal until the food is paid for. So, in short, the Manager was dead wrong, you fucking troll.
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  ElusiveCupcakeElusiveCupcake
  11/21/18 12:01am
  Now you’re just embarrassing yourself. Enjoy your dismissal.
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  ElusiveCupcakeElusiveCupcake
  11/21/18 1:08pm
  Another day, another burner. Tsk. Tsk. Tsk.
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kidelo gave up commenting for 2019Michael Harriot
11/20/18 5:24pm
As usual Michael, you write a smart, well-thought piece that will be thoroughly misinterpreted and that you will have to re-write for a series of paleface knuckleheads in the ClapBack. I look forward to eating leftovers and reading you on Friday.
What I think is that your argument comes down to a fight between the tangible (the results of racism) and the intangible (White feelings/fragility); when there is a battle between the abstract and the concrete, in this case, the concrete should win — and the concrete results of racism trump (ahem) White fragility.
Or, tl;dr: fuck your feelings, ofay.
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  I amkidelo gave up commenting for 2019
  11/20/18 5:58pm
  I would like to say that I am a Pakistani but never really thought about racism till I came to the UK. Now I notice it all the time. I lived in America and still think about it all the time.
  One thing to note is racism is a universal problem and in just as bad in other countries as in the US. It nearly always involves a rich powerful majority suppressing a poorer minority. It is actually worse in other countries such an India where the Untouchables ( literally everything they touch becomes unclean) have been oppressed and killed for thousands of years.
  This is my thinking about white Americans who I divide into three categories
  A
  the bullies and racists- these people have to hate or hurt someone and that is going to be black or brown person as they are the easiet target
  B
  The racist majority. They will not make the first move to hurt us but are the harshest defenders of the system that cages us. They may be nice people is other aspects but refuse to understand that the thoughts and beliefs their ancestors taught them are a problem. Unless they admit that their ancestors were murderers and rapists things will never change.
  C
  The woke. Despite what we see good people exist in white people. They are definitely the minority but exist everywhere even in the south.
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  Tool of the Matriarchykidelo gave up commenting for 2019
  11/20/18 7:16pm
  ...your argument comes down to a fight between the tangible (the results of racism) and the intangible (White feelings/fragility)...
  Beautifully summed up.
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Old white guyMichael Harriot
11/20/18 7:12pm
Michael, it’s two days before thanksgiving. It’s the time of year we’re supposed to put aside our discussions of the racist ways whites have (mis)treated blacks over the last 400 years in this country, and focus on how whites have (mis)treated Native Americans in this country!
Then we can go back to ignoring them like white people have done for 400 years. Except, of course, when they have something the white man wants (usually this is land, be it to live on, or to run a pipeline through).
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  Vanessa FutrellOld white guy
  11/20/18 8:32pm
  Hey Old White Guy,
  You seem to be oblivious to the fact that you just used your white privilege to tell a black man what he should be doing during this Thanksgiving season.
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burrrnsMichael Harriot
11/20/18 5:01pm
This is the Federalist you’re talking about. Every word comes from a place of deliberate bad faith. This is a group that exists only to eliminate taxes on the unearned income of billionaire trust fund babies.
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  Old white guyburrrns
  11/20/18 7:23pm
  No, it comes from the written words in the constitution! And what the writers intended (hence the reason they keep reciting the federalist papers like those are gospel).
  Except the parts they don’t like, of course.
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ChonkimonMaMichael Harriot
11/21/18 7:10am
I’d like to address the myth of the meritorious Asians/Indians in America. For a long time now, the USA has been seen as the ultimate destination for higher and well-educated elite classes in India to settle in. They have enough money to migrate to the USA -neither visas nor tickets are cheap - when they’re still young, they have a suitable background allowing them to study advanced degrees and they have backup in the form of rich parents. Most of these in India would be from the upper caste people that have traditionally been rich and were allowed access to education. For centuries the lower caste peoples hadn’t been allowed access to various resources, including schools and job opportunities and that has held them back. (There’s good progress being made in catching them up but it isn’t easy) The poor or lower middle classes can't afford migrating to the USA. They might be more likely to migrate to the Middle East for blue collar jobs.
In other words, if Asians/Indians in America seem like a model minority, meritorious geniuses and are now considered white-adjacent, that’s in large part because they come from the “white” people of their own hierarchies.
The Sanskrit word varna means both caste and color.
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  Kyo Soma A.ChonkimonMa
  11/21/18 10:15am
  Thank you for bringing this up. I am not from that cultural background but the caste system their frightens the shit out of me. Case in point: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2018/11/02/asia/india-teenager-caste-killing-intl/index.html
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  Ray-HanChonkimonMa
  11/23/18 3:20am
  Exactly.
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Lizard BreathMichael Harriot
11/20/18 7:12pm
I tried explaining to a friend the other day that Trump supporters are dooming their personal legacy in history. People who joined the Nazi party because of economic insecurity are remembered simply as Nazis. Their grandchildren have to live with that shame. It doesn't matter a bit if they didn't feel badly towards Jews deep down in their heart. They were Nazis. There is no nuance to that. Trump supporters will be the same. They are Trumpists. They are white supremacists.
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  beetleLizard Breath
  11/21/18 4:49pm
  I’ve said the same thing, over and over.
  Even the few people particular enough to call weak-tea, “but-but-but-economic-policy!!!!” Nazis “sympathizers” . . . were and are still really calling them Nazis, just like everyone else is. INCLUDING actual Nazis. Ain’t nobody got time to figure out any one Nazi’s specific level of Nazism. Teaspoon or tureen, they’re just a fucking Nazi and that’s all history will and should remember. One can’t go to the potlucks, wear the uniforms, and shout the catchy slogans, then not take everything else that comes with being a Nazi—including the mantle and moniker. Nor should they be able to, as a bunch of fired/censured tiki torch-wielders found out.
  It’ll be the same with Trump supporters and already is. Someone who sympathizes with the Trumpian ethos (I’m using that word VERY loosely) will be lumped into the same esteem and regard as Confederacy hold-overs and people who insist on calling the Civil War the War of Northern Aggression. That’s how history works. It’s written not just by winners, but by survivors who remember and pass down what happened to their kids and grandkids. And to those kids, they don’t say: “Oh, well, only the men who physically lynched my brother were evil. Those fine folks cheering it on and enjoying picnics nearby, like they were watching a show? They weren’t evil people. They were just evil-adjacent, and making the best of it with unseasoned chicken and raisin-laced potato salad!”
  “Evil” is evil. If some asshat’s in that shit and happy about it—wallowing willfully in it—nobody in the present or the future’s going to stop and take time to gauge their Actual Evilness Decibel-level. Nor should they. We’ll treat them as adults, take as writ the, ahem, courage of their convictions, and call a Nazi a Nazi. No “sympathizer”-ing required.
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loracksMichael Harriot
11/20/18 8:46pm
Also, not enough widespread acknowledgment by white people of the history of slavery, and how many of the same tactics used by slaveowners to break up black families and keep the black population destabilized are still used by our government and police forces to this day.
And that that history is FACTUALLY based in racism, not some feelings mess about racism, so to continue perpetuating the policies and tactics that were directly begat from that history, is IN FACT, racist.
They skipped that part in my U.S. history class (which is institutional racism at its finest).
“All things being equal” is a fun exercise, but this is not a thought experiment. Once race has been scientifically devising ways to hurt and weaken the other for over 400 years, kidnapped them and enslaved them, brought them forcibly to a foreign land they did not ask to be brought to, and has continually perpetrated the horrors they devise upon the other. No amount of whataboutism can make Becky jokes equivalent to that.
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