Armed white militants go free

The verdict is in on the colonizers' latest occupation of Native land:

How the government lost its case against the Oregon occupiers

Many people noted how the armed white militants got off free while unarmed Native activists didn't:

The Bundy verdict proves the US is fine with armed white militants—but not Native American activists

Criming While White Vs. Saving What Is Truly Sacred In This World

The Injustice at Standing Rock Is an American Story
I'm angry. White people in Oregon are acquitted while Native people in North Dakota are attacked by riot police from five states. And our politicians are preoccupied.

The protests at Standing Rock are necessary. What happened at Malheur was nonsense.

Dakota Access pipeline protesters see bias after Oregon militia verdict
Activists at the Malheur wildlife refuge were carrying guns – but ‘if native people were armed, we would be killed,’ says an activist at Standing Rock

The privileges of protesting while white

Why do we punish Dakota pipeline protesters but exonerate the Bundys?

Justice Looks Different in Indian Country

Some tweets on the subject:

Debbie Reese@debreese 3 days ago
White men (Bundy's) occupy gov land; desecrate Native lands, walk free. Native people protect water, are arrested, strip searched, maced.

Mark Cogan@mccogan 3 days ago
Let's be honest America. If a gang of heavily armed ppl of color took over a Federal facility, they'd be dead. No justice. #whiteprivilege

Mic@mic 2 days ago
America: Where peaceful activists are brutalized by the police but heavily armed protesters are greeted cordially.

Victor Laszlo@Impolitics 2 days ago
The armed terrorists who took over a wildlife refuge are acquitted on all counts following their brilliant defense strategy of being white.

BlueCornComics@bluecorncomics 2 days ago
The Bundy bunch immediately goes and reoccupies the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge. "Why not? The court said we didn't do anything wrong."

License to occupy

Some pundits warned us to expect more of these illegal stunts:

After Oregon verdict, a hot debate: A victory for liberty, or license to intimidate?

Bundy Verdict Puts a Target on the Backs of Federal Workers

Malheur standoff = white supremacy

A good analysis of Ammon Bundy's occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in January:

White Supremacy and Property Rights: Tamir Rice and the Oregon Standoff

By Anne Bonds[T]he significance of recent events in Oregon extends beyond this obvious example of the differential treatment of racial groups by the state. We argue the events at the Oregon wildlife refuge are representative of what Arlo Kempf describes as a “colonial moment,” one that bolsters white supremacy and violence against people of color, as well as the ongoing dispossession of Indigenous peoples in the U.S. settler state.

The concept of settler colonialism emphasizes the ongoing occupation and privatization of Indigenous territories and the systems of race necessary to sustain the displacement and marginalization of Indigenous peoples. From this perspective, colonization is not an event of the past, but rather an enduring process that continuously unfolds across the landscape. Colonial moments normalize white domination and the racial status quo by obscuring histories of racial violence and exploitation and by reinforcing largely unquestioned assumptions about white settler property ownership and entitlement to stolen lands.

For some, the Bundys–both Ammon and his father Cliven–have become folk heroes for their efforts to reclaim federally owned and regulated land and for resisting the overbearing, ‘tyrannical’ federal government. However, as the chairperson of the Burns Paiute Tribe, Charlotte Rodrique, has explicitly stated, the Paiute peoples had been living on these lands for thousands of years prior to the arrival of white settlers. Deep ironies abound as the militia members demand that the federal government return the land to ranchers, loggers, and miners after claiming the federal government had usurped their rights.

Though it’s quite easy to dismiss the Bundys, their followers, and other white militias in the American West as a “radical fringe” group with a poor understanding of U.S. history, we believe that to do so would be ill informed. Not only is the Oregon standoff part of a much broader political, economic, and social movement rooted in individual private property rights and undergirded by white supremacy, the event–and popular reactions to it–sustain particular understandings of whiteness and land ownership that render invisible the displacement and exploitation of people of color that enabled white settlement and the acquisition of federal lands in this area in the first place.Comment:  For more on the Bundy bunch, see Malheur Occupation Shows Toxic Masculinity and Bundys Hold Paiute Artifacts Hostage.

Malheur occupation shows toxic masculinity

As CNN reported on January 27:The weeks-long armed occupation of a federal wildlife refuge headquarters in Oregon suffered two major blows when protest leader Ammon Bundy was arrested and another key figure was killed.What's interesting is what this affair tells us about white male attitudes in America:

What The Malheur Occupation Teaches Us About Masculinity

By Susan M. ShawTo feel powerless is to fail at masculinity. To be regulated, constrained, fined and jailed is to face challenges to masculinity. And often when men don't feel like "real men," they have to dominate something or someone to reassert their masculinity. In other words, "real men" are not dominated; they dominate. And so, to re-establish their masculinity, these men took up weapons, threatened federal agents, and destroyed federal property. Apparently, running around with guns and keeping the feds at bay made them feel tough; they felt like real men.

Of course, their sense of masculinity was also propped up by their intersecting white privilege and its attendant sense of entitlement. As white men they expect that ownership, power and success are their birthright. They expect to be heard. They believe that they have the right to demand what they want, even if it is over the law and over the wishes of the people of the region.

They demanded that federal lands be returned to "the people." But by "the people" they meant themselves and other white people like them. They certainly didn't mean the Burns Paiute whose land the refuge originally was and who asked them to leave. They didn't mean the people who live in Burns; they also asked the occupiers to leave. They didn't even mean the vast diverse majority of Americans who are free to enjoy the opportunities afforded by the refuge. Somehow, all of these other Americans are not "the people."

These occupiers also counted on their white privilege to protect them from federal assault. After all, we've witnessed the willingness of law enforcement to break up, often by force, the protests of Black and Native peoples. Yet, day after day passed, and the water and electricity stayed on, supplies still came in, and the occupiers continued to destroy the refuge and threaten Burns Paiute artifacts while the federal government tried to wait them out, despite pleas from the Oregon Governor and local officials to end the occupation.Comment:  For more on Cliven Bundy, see Bundys Hold Paiute Artifacts Hostage and Bundy: Paiutes Lost Their Claim.

White male privilege in Chrononauts

A review of a recent comic-book series:

Chrononauts Review (Mark Millar, Sean Murphy)Spoilers--this comic is shit!

Meet the ultimate craptastic time-travel story: Chrononauts!

What happens when two meathead “scientist” dudebros invent time-travel? Dude--they use it to get babes, money and fast cars! Yah, brah, they like totally get laid tons and use their knowledge of history and their timesuits to jump into any timezone and get stuff to make their lives easier whenever they want!

They want to become emperors to 16th century people? Give them 21st century weaponry and lead them in battle against their enemies! Machine guns, planes and bombs will easily make them the victors against spears and horses and they’ll make you their ruler. Then you get gold and women and you just keep doing that everywhere in time because that’s what “rock star scientists” do!

It feels redundant to say Chrononauts is a dumb and lazily scripted comic because so much of Mark Millar’s recent output has been like that; Chrononauts is just the most brazen, to date.Rob's review

As I told someone back in October, I got the first trade paperback becauseMillar is holding a contest to write a four-page (!) Chrononauts story. I know time travel, and now that I've seen how simplistic his stories are, it should be easy to come up with something better.

I'm thinking something about the battle of Little Big Horn. Because even though the Chrononauts go hopping through time, they mainly encountered the usual Euro-American highlights (Rome, Vikings, Columbus, the Civil War, 1920s gangsters, JFK). Most of their stops were confined to the white portions of Western civilization, and not a single Indian appeared.Then I got into a discussion with critic Gregory Burgas:

Except for Old Man Logan and Civil War, I haven't read much Millar, Gregory. Has he always written from such a white-male perspective? This series seems like something Mickey Spillane might've written if he were tasked with doing a modern sci-fi story.Well, I've been boycotting Millar for over a decade, so I don't know about his recent work. Wanted pushed me to boycott him, and that's totally a "I'm a white male and the whole world hates me!" whining rant, through and through. It's odd, because his Swamp Thing is superb and I've heard good things about his Superman Adventures. But your assessment is not wrong at all.The "dudebro" ethos

He isn't ranting in this series. More like celebrating the greatness of strapping white males. Who are manly enough to take what they want from every era.

The two most prominent women are also people of color. They have independent careers but they're marked to be wives and mothers. The racial and sexual implications couldn't be much more obvious.

With all of history to play with, you'd think this series would be less white and male than average. But no...its view of history seems to come from a 1950s school textbook. I bet people like Donald Trump, Rush Limbaugh, and Seth MacFarlane would love this book.Ha! Well, then he's embraced the "dudebro" ethos and is just enjoying it. Is that progress? :-)Could be. But I'm thinking it's some idea from his childhood that he recently resurrected. He saw some astronauts and thought they were mighty heroes with the "right stuff." How cool would it be if chrononauts had the same rock-star vibe?

It's like doing The New Frontier or Batman '66 and unironically avoiding every social issue of the last 50 years. You can do that for a series set in that era. But this series seems to be set in the present or near future.

Final thoughts

This book is all "What fun it is to conquer people and become king!" Much like Gunga Din, which I think Millar cited as an inspiration.

Never mind all the people our heroes must've killed to accomplish this. The murder, assassination, enslavement, rape, and pillage all happen off-page.

So stupid that these guys spent 20 years becoming top scientists, then threw it all away for fame and fortune. Hey, if you wanted women and money, maybe become a race-car driver, firefighter, rock star, or soldier of fortune. You know, a profession that might appeal to adrenaline junkies and their groupies. Scientist probably isn't a top-10 choice if you're motivated by greed and lust.

Bottom line: This may be the shallowest time-travel story ever. It's as if a men's magazine wrote about all the fun things you could do with women, cars, and guns in the past.

More reviews:

CHRONONAUTS #1

Flipping the Whitesboro script

A couple of takes on the Whitesboro seal and what they tell us:



The "Whiteburros" seal is a satire, but it makes an important point. If the real seal shows a friendly wrestling match, then revise it to show both sides as equals. Or the Indian as the superior. Putting the white man in the superior position sends a racist message--whether the town of Whitesboro realizes it or not.



Would any white folks accept this as a seal even if it accurately reflected their history? Then why do you expect Indians to accept an image of an Indian in an inferior position? There's no logical consistency here--just "whites get to show themselves winning because of white privilege."

For more on government seals, see Comedians Mock Whitesboro Seal and Whitesboro Votes to Keep Seal.

Bundy: Paiutes lost their claim

‘We Don’t Want Bloodshed’: Armed White Militants in Oregon v. Paiute Tribe

By Jacqueline KeelerThe tribe enjoys a strong working relationship with the Malheur Wildlife Refuge and participated extensively in creating a Comprehensive Conservation Plan in 2013.

“We utilize the refuge almost constantly,” Roderique explains, “We’ve had excursions where our elders sit down and practice traditional crafts and tell stories about how we once existed. There are petroglyphs down there—it’s a real valuable site for us. The youth program takes kids down and they make tule boats and swamp. Being Native people we think it is necessary to continue the practice of oral history. When you are down there these stories come naturally. When you take children out today and show them how we survived here so long it is an important tool to bringing the elders and the youth together so the youth are able to identify themselves as Paiute people.”

However, tribal council members expressed concerns about feeling unsafe with the arrival of more men with guns in their community. Tribal council secretary Wanda Johnson told ICTMN, “These people who have been intimidating our Indian men but they are unchallenged and they walk about town and our concern is if they could escalate things…we don’t want to see bloodshed or see anyone thrown in jail. We feel frustrated that these people can come and go in town and resupply. People are taking things out there and feeding them. Like they are out there in on an outing. It’s so frustrating.”

Some animosity towards Native people can be seen in the Harney County Committee of Safety, a local group Bundy started which refers to Natives as “savages" in their statement of purpose.Ryan Bundy: Native Americans have lost their claim to the Land.

By xxdr zombiexx This is the kicker though, buried all the way at the end of the piece.

"We also recognize that the Native Americans had the claim to the land, but they lost that claim," Bundy said. "There are things to learn from cultures of the past, but the current culture is the most important."

This is no different than the Taliban blowing up the Buddhas, or ISIS trying to find antiquities to destroy. No different whatsoever.

While these faux-militia assholes are technically entitled to their opinions, however fucking stupid those opinions are, they are using these “opinions” (delusions) to make real-world decisions that affect all sorts of people who have JUST AS MUCH RIGHT to these public spaces. And they are set to damage irreplaceable artifacts because they are so delusional about their white supremacy.Comment:  For more on Cliven Bundy, see Paiutes Tell Bundys to Leave and Bundy Bunch vs. Dann Sisters.

The Revenant exemplifies white privilege

In response to this:

Leonardo DiCaprio Does Not Deserve An Oscar for The Revenant. Come On.

I wrote:

Someone could do a good analysis of how this Oscar talk exemplifies and perpetuates white privilege. DiCaprio used his clout to make a movie about him--I mean his character. He chose a historical period where white men were the predominant "heroes"--unless you try to do a risky slave or suffragette narrative. And he's "due" for an Oscar because of all his previous roles--Titanic, The Aviator, Wolf of Wall Street, etc.--featuring a white male protagonist.

The odds are stacked in his favor. Good luck, Will Smith and Denzel Washington, in finding, pitching, and making a similar movie featuring a nonwhite protagonist. As for you, Viola Davis and Taraji P. Henson, forget about it.

For more on Leonardo DiCaprio, see Mixed Reactions to DiCaprio's Speech and DiCaprio's Golden Globes Speech.

Paiutes tell Bundys to leave

Burns Paiute Tribe tells armed group to leave ancestral territoryLeaders of the Burns Paiute Tribe told an armed group to leave their ancestral territory as they educated the public about the true history of land ownership in Oregon.

The tribe was promised the land in and around the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge by treaty that was negotiated in 1868. But the Senate never ratified the agreement and the federal government ended up taking all 1.78 million acres.

"We as a tribe view that this is still our land no matter who's living on it," Chairwoman Charlotte Rodrique said at a press conference on Wednesday, The Oregonian reported.

Tribal leaders are worried that the armed group is damaging sacred, cultural and other sites at the refuge. About 20 people have been occupying the land since Saturday.Don’t Change the Status Quo—Unless It’s to Return Land to Tribal Control

By Charlotte RodriqueThere’s no real reason to change the status quo of land ownership out West. But if anyone should assume a greater caretaking role for the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, which a group of armed protesters are occupying, it's not the state, or private owners, but the Burns Paiute Tribe.

We were forcefully removed from this land (and much more) over the course of numerous bloody disputes. Negotiated ownership terms that came later—first agreed upon, but not ratified, in a peace treaty with the government in 1868—were mostly ignored and unenforced, as ranchers and mining operators pushed further into Paiute territory over the following decades.

Our access to traditional lands has steadily eroded ever since, but the Malheur sanctuary, which is about 30 miles from our reservation, is of great cultural value to us still. Today, the Burns Paiute has a good relationship with the federal employees who work there: They have been a protector of our artifacts and history, which include petroglyphs and many natural resources that are culturally relevant to our needs. We can’t hunt on the parkland, of course, but tribal people still have a right to go in and gather certain plants, such as willow and tule.And:I am not sympathetic when I hear that a group of armed individuals want territory we have lived on for thousands of years to be “returned” to the “people of Oregon.” I’ve certainly had the urge to yell and demand for respect of our ancestral land, but these individuals certainly aren't speaking for us, let alone the ranchers, who have rejected their support.Paiute tribal chair: 'Don’t tell me any of these ranchers came across the Bering Strait'



Again, who owns the land?

Q&A: For Native Community, Irony and Shaky Claims in Oregon Standoff

By Anna ChalletWhat do you make of the Bundy militia’s demand that the federal government return the land to the people of Harney County?

It shows a lot of ignorance that most Americans have about the shaky nature, legally speaking, of the authority that the U.S. government has over the land it purports to own. It goes back to the Doctrine of Discovery, which was formulated by the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court … when a discovering Christian nation sets foot on land in the Americas, the title to that land immediately reverts to that discovering nation, and for the Native people, the indigenous people, their title disappears.

The indigenous people in the Americas are the only people in the world who do not possess fee simple title to their land. The Supreme Court has cited the Discovery doctrine as recently as 2005 as still being the law of the land, in a case between the city of Sherrill, New York and the Oneida Nation.Oregon's Land Dispute: Who Are the Original Owners?

By Jacqueline KeelerWhen Ammon Bundy, son of Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who led an armed standoff against the US Bureau of Land Management in 2014, charged into the Malheur Wildlife Refuge near Burns, Oregon, he said he was going to return the land from an overreaching federal government to its "original owners" he was not thinking of the Burns Paiute Tribe.

And he has since admitted he knows very little about them.

When he charged into town proclaiming he was "getting ranchers back to ranching, getting the loggers back to logging, getting the miners back to mining" the "original owners" he was thinking about? Without a doubt they were European Americans like himself.

But in fact, it is the Burns Paiute Tribe and other Northern Paiute tribes who are the "original owners" and possess the strongest legal claim to the land, particularly to the wildlife refuge which was once part of their former Malheur Indian Reservation. A 1.78 million acre reservation that was later opened to white settlement after the Paiute and another tribe, the Bannock, facing starvation rose up against settler depredations.Comment:  For more on Cliven Bundy, see Bundy Bunch vs. Dann Sisters and Bundy Bunch Occupies Paiute Land.

Bundy bunch vs. Dann sisters

Here’s What Happened When These Unarmed Native American Sisters Defended Their Land from the Feds

By Amanda GirardIn September of 2001, the government sent in the cavalry to show it was serious about its claim to the Shoshone tract:

The government considers it public land, and to drive the point home, 40 agents from the Bureau of Land Management descended on the Danns’ ranch in September, heavily armed and fortified with helicopters, and confiscated 232 cattle, which were later sold.

The sisters and their supporters argue that their tribe never legally ceded these range lands. Though the federal government controls 85 percent of Nevada, they contend that it has no legitimate title to the land—or the gold, water, oil and geothermal energy beneath it.

Because the Dann sisters refused to leave their land, the government once again began seizing large numbers of their livestock in 2003, claiming the horses and cattle were grazing at the public’s expense. BLM officials even deputized local cowboys to assist with the livestock seizure. At which point, the sisters were forced to remove over 400 remaining horses from the disputed range, many of them pregnant mares, but they lost track of many in the forced move.

And a comment to go with this photo:This is how the BLM and Dept of Interior handled elderly unarmed Shoshones refusing to cede their treaty rights to ancestral lands. The Dann sisters were attacked and detained numerous times over several decades sometimes with police and sometimes by mob and constantly monitored. Their horses and cattle were driven off to die of starvation. The Danns were not millionaires like the Bundys.No crackdown on whites

Other postings confirm that white conservatives like the Bundys get special treatment:

Yes, the armed Oregon occupiers would be raided if they weren’t white—same goes if they were leftists

The U.S. gov't is fundamentally right wing, and supports many of the things the Bundys & militants are calling for

By Ben NortonIn response, social media and Op-Ed pages of newspapers were inundated with condemnations of white privilege and arguments that the far-right militants would have been violently removed if they were people of color.

There is a crucial point missing from many of the liberal hot takes on the Oregon paramilitary occupation, however. In their hyper-emphasis on white privilege, many are depoliticizing the situation.

To be clear, these articles are absolutely correct. If the extremists occupying the federal building were not white, they would be attacked.

But if they were leftists, even if they were still white, countless historical examples show they would be attacked, too.Unarmed black protesters were ‘forcibly removed’ and jailed after they tried to occupy a wildlife refuge in 1979

By Travis GettysBut that’s not what happened nearly 37 years ago in Georgia.

Federal authorities secured a court order to remove the “squatters” one day after they set up camp at Harris Neck—but four of the unarmed protesters refused to leave.

They were “forcibly removed” May 2, 1979—just three days after they arrived on the land where their parents and grandparents had farmed, hunted and fished.

The four men were each sentenced to a month in jail for trespassing, and courts have ruled that the land belongs to the U.S. government—and not to the slaves’ descendants.

If you wondered if the Danns' treatment was based on racism, wonder no longer. Now we have evidence. White people get treated differently in similar circumstances. That's privilege and prejudice in action.

Final word

A couple of days later, another comment on the disparate treatment of whites and Natives:

With Militants Occupying Ancestral Land, Native Tribe Is 'Very Offended'Rodrique says she's frustrated that the federal government hasn't forced the occupiers out, and compares how law enforcement treats the anti-federalists with how the U.S. historically treated native tribes. She says the occupiers are allowed to go into town to buy groceries and gas, then return to their armed occupation.

"They did disconnect their utilities and things like that, but it's not really forcing them out," Rodrique says. "You know, in our history, that was how the military got us. They basically starved us into submission. And you could do the same thing with these occupiers."

Rodrique would like the FBI to remove the armed men, and she thinks the FBI's inaction is a double standard.

"If I, as a native person, a person of color, were to go down there and do the same thing, they would have hit me on the forehead with a baton" and dragged her out, she says. But "because they're white people, I feel that they're being treated differently."For more on Cliven Bundy, see Bundy Bunch Occupies Paiute Land and Gun Nuts' Hypocrisy on Government Power.

Bundy bunch occupies Paiute land

The Bundy bunch--the offspring of Cliven Bundy and their followers--are back with another protest based on racist conservative beliefs. They think the government owes them a handout--free grazing on public land--because they're white.

At first their protest was notable because of how the government was treating them with kid gloves. Unlike, say, every protest by people of color. But then the Native connection came to the fore.

Oregon “Militia” Says Feds Stole Their Land–Turns Out It Was Stolen from Paiute Tribe

By John Paul BrammerAccording to Steve Russell at Indian Country Today Media Network, President Grant established the Malheur Indian Reservation in 1872, and it wasn’t until the Bannock War of 1878 that the Bannocks and the Paiute were removed from the reservation. Since then, the wildlife refuge has existed as an alternative use of federal land.

In other words, the only reason the militiamen feel they have a leg to stand on when it comes sovereignty over this land is because of the federal government they are attacking.

When you consider the plight of the Paiute, it makes Ammon Bundy’s Facebook post on December 30th—in which he complained about the federal government stealing land—look deeply ironic:

“Simply put, the federal government has adversely stolen the lands and resources from the people, destroyed thousands of jobs, and the economy of an entire county. Now anyone who has enough guts to stand against them, they annihilate through their own court systems…”These Aren't the First Armed Whites to Take Over That Oregon Land: Just Ask the Native Paiute PeopleJACQUELINE KEELER: Yes. Well, I’d like to start off saying that today, in January, this is the 137th anniversary of when 500 Paiutes were loaded onto wagons and walked, under heavy armed guard, from their—from the lands where the Bundys are right now holding it and to the Yakama Reservation in Washington state, some 300 miles, knee-deep in snow. And they were forced to march, shackled two by two. And so, that’s some of the background there.

AMY GOODMAN: And then, continue. Take us through to today. What happened to this land? How did it change hands?

JACQUELINE KEELER: Well, the area called the—now called the Malheur, it was called the Malheur Reservation, and it actually constituted nearly 1.7 million acres of land. But with incursions from white settlers, they basically pressured the federal government to open it up to settlement. And so, in 1876, President Grant did that. And then, after there was an uprising with the Bannock Indian War in 1878, due to issues of starvation and deprivation in the middle of winter again, the Bannock and the Paiute rose up, and then that’s when they were force-marched out of the area and lost most of the land.Bundy Militia Claims Indigenous Paiute Land as Oregon Land



Whose land is it?

Oregon native tribe bewildered by gun-toting ‘glory hounds’: That land belongs to the Paiute

By ReutersThe reservation is not far from the wildlife reserve and the tribe has been living off the arid western Oregon mountains since long before Europeans arrived in North America.

“There was never an agreement that we were giving up this land. We were dragged out of here,” Rodrique said.

The tribe’s approach has typically been less provocative than the protesters who picked up guns to further their anti-government cause.

“I’m, like, hold on a minute, if you want to get technical about it … the land belongs to the Paiute here,” said Selena Sam, a member of the tribe’s council who waitresses at a local diner.Native American Tribe Has Witty Quip for Oregon Protesters

Educating the Oregon Militia on The Northern Paiute’s ‘Trail of Tears’

By Jacqueline KeelerBurns Tribal chairperson Charlotte Roderique at a press conference yesterday, had a stern rebuke of Bundy’s occupation of her homeland, “Yesterday, the Burns Paiute Tribe joined other community leaders calling for an end to armed protestors at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge. Armed protestors do not belong to here. They are endangering our sacred sites and our children. Malheur Wildlife Refuge was a wintering gathering ground before the settlers come here.”

And tribal councilman Jarvis Kennedy had even stronger words, “What would happen to Indians who did this? We, as Harney County residents don’t need some clown to stand up for us, we are hard-working people…we survived without them. We need them to get the hell out of here. They are jeopardizing and scaring our people.”

Despite this, Bundy’s actions have brought national media coverage of the January of 1879 forced march of 500 Paiutes from the Malheur Indian Reservation some 350 miles in knee-deep snow, many shackled two by two, to the Yakama Indian Reservation in Washington State—the Northern Paiutes’ “Trail of Tears.” One group that was force-marched by the U.S. army simply disappeared. No one knows what happened to them. Still more died and when a few Paiute returned to Burns, Oregon, they were considered outlaws, many were landless as their reservation had been opened completely to settlers and large California ranching corporations.

“The one thing I’m really proud of is the tenacity of our people.” Roderique noted, “420 people are descendants of people who were able to get back here from Yakama. I wouldn’t drop my children off from Yakama and tell my children to walk back. They wouldn’t know what to eat, what river to follow.”Comment:  For more on Cliven Bundy, see Gun Nuts' Hypocrisy on Government Power and ATV Rally Threatens Native Sites.

The backlash against "identity politics"

The real reason Americans fight about identity politics

By Amanda TaubLaw professor Nancy Leong studies what she calls "identity capitalism"—the ways in which particular identities like one's race, gender, or sexual orientation have traditionally constituted positive or negative social "capital," and how the value of that capital is changing. She believes much of the backlash against so-called identity politics is really about a sense that the status quo is under attack, and fear that something worse might replace it.

She explained to me that it's really easy for people from dominant groups to assume that the status quo isn't biased, because they've never had to confront that bias themselves. And so when they see that an existing system is being changed to include minority groups or accommodate other interests, there's a tendency to assume that the natural order of things is being disrupted in some illegitimate way.

For instance, Leong pointed out, in the affirmative action debate she has noticed a tendency to assume that standardized test scores are inherently valid measures of merit—"that someone with a 160 on the LSAT is more deserving than someone with a 150 on the LSAT"—and that affirmative action that admits students with lower scores is therefore favoring "less qualified" students.

But that doesn't take into account ways in which standardized tests may themselves be an imperfect, even biased, measure of merit. Likewise, complaints that curricula now need to include certain books "just because" they are written by nonwhite, non-male authors assume that in the past, books earned their way onto the curriculum via objective merit, and that any replacements are, by definition, sacrificing quality in the name of diversity.Comment:  For more on the subject, see "It Feels Good to Be White" and How Microaggressions Sneak In.

Native woman has white privilege

A light-skinned Native woman talks about whether she has white privilege:

I Am a Native American Woman With White Privilege

By Misty Shipman EllingburgI’ve thought about this more and more in passing weeks. The shooting in Charleston, the death of Sandra Bland, the deaths of many, many more–all of these things have affected me on a deep level. When Mike Brown was murdered, I was so outraged that I immediately became that awkward person, jutting into a conversation not my own, all well-meaning, bumbling passion that needed to learn its place. My place, I now know, during this epidemic of police brutality, violence, and death, is as an ally. I can listen to what my Black friends share and say is their experience. I can believe them because they tell me it’s true. And I can choose to stand with them, encourage them, lift up and amplify their voices by listening, learning, and sharing what they tell me.

And part of what they’re telling me is that there are things I take for granted that I receive as a direct result of my skin color. Because I am Indigenous and I do face a great deal of challenges specific to my nationality, I have often wrongly believed that I don’t have white privilege. That isn’t true, because the larger world views me as a white woman. When I’m out and about in the rural area I live in, white people assume I am their natural ethnic ally. Police officers don’t stop me on erroneous, trumped up charges. In fact, I could, hypothetically, see a police officer, and feel either more safe, or neutral. I can look at a TV and see people who look like me. In magazines, movies, and casting calls, white is considered normal or standard. Avatar actress Zoe Saldana once said that she was turned down for a role because her skin was “too dark.” Said Zoe, “It’s only dark if you’re comparing it to something.”Comment:  Answer: Yes, she does. Because white privilege is mainly a function of skin color. The whiter you are, the more you benefit from it.

For more on white privilege, see Even Children Enjoy White Privilege and White Men = Winning Tribe.

"Restoring America's greatness" = Disneyesque dream

Those Who Advocate "Restoring America's Greatness" Are Living in a Mythology

By Mark KarlinThe United States has been, for years, on the cusp of either returning to the fantasy of a privileged elite or moving forward to achieve the creative possibilities of an actualized democracy.

Those politicians and individuals who advocate "restoring America to its greatness" are living in a Disneyesque dream, guided by the image of a Norman Rockwell portrait of a white-ruled United States that is the "greatest nation in the world." The underlying message here--which helps explain Donald Trump's appeal to an overtly racist sector of the population--is that only the continuation of white dominance in the electoral process can "save" the country. It is a vision of the United States that looks backward through a fractured, distorted lens.

The late Eduardo Galeano wrote about the European-descended ruling class at the end of the last century. He focused on South and Central America, but what he wrote in his brilliant book Open Veins of Latin America equally applies to the US:Veneration for the past has always seemed to me reactionary. The right chooses to talk about the past because it prefers dead people.... The powerful who legitimatize their privileges by heredity cultivate nostalgia. History is studied as if we were visiting a museum, but this collection of mummies is a swindle. They lie to us about the past: they mask the face of reality. They force the oppressed victims to absorb an alien, desiccated, sterile memory fabricated by the oppressor, so that they will resign themselves to a life that isn't theirs as if it were the only one possible.Comment:  For more on the subject, see The Confederate Flag Must Go and Rubio Ignorant of US History.

Even children enjoy white privilege

An excellent example of how white privilege works in the smallest of ways:

I am a recovering racist: I was somehow taught hate as a gift of love

I grew up in the segregated South. It took a question from an 11-year-old to teach me how I really felt about it

By Jonathan OdellA girl raised her hand. “Did a black person ever have to give up her seat so you could sit down?”

It was obvious they had been studying Rosa Parks.

I was still off balance from the first question, editing my race history to include the fact that I liked segregation for the feelings of superiority it gave me. The thought was disorienting.

“Yes!” I answered, and knowing where she was going with her question, I continued. “I liked that, too. To see a grown man offer me his seat because I was more important than he was a good feeling.”

Before I entered the classroom that day, I felt it was enough to have condemned my past, along with those old white men who had created my racist world. After all, I was born into that society. I didn’t have a choice. I had to follow the rules. I’m certainly not to blame for it. I figured a little liberal guilt was enough to buy my redemption.

But the kids’ questions presented me with a moral dilemma. I was not a neutral or innocent bystander after all, even as a child. My enjoyment of the privileges testifies to that. In addition, it became clear to me that I got my seat because someone was forced to give up his. For every meal I was served in the pristine restaurant, somebody had to eat hers in an alley. My college scholarship came at the expense of some field hand’s son who couldn’t afford to finish the eighth grade. Each time I benefited because of my whiteness, an African-American paid because of his blackness. Guilt or moral repugnance is not enough. There is a real debt to be paid.Comment:  For more on white privilege, see White Men = Winning Tribe and "It Feels Good" to Be White.

White men = winning tribe

5 Helpful Answers To Society's Most Uncomfortable Questions

By David Wong#1. "Why Can't We Just Put This Stupid Shit Aside And Treat Each Other Like Human Beings?"

In other words, why can't we start treating each other like individuals based on our position in life, and just drop all of this race/gender stuff that just clouds the issue? Wouldn't that be the fastest way to make things better for everyone?

Sure, and we could totally do that, if we were merely people. The problem is that we can't just collectively agree to make the context of history go away, any more than a bunch of leaves can get together and decide that there is no tree; the roots of history are still feeding us. Blacks are still stuck in neighborhoods with terrible schools and no job opportunities where they're being groomed for a lifetime in the corrections system. Women who want to get jobs as software engineers will find themselves in offices that are 84 percent male.

So, while race is a social construct as are lots of gender roles, that doesn't mean they're not real--the systems we're living under today were all built with them in mind.

And if you are a white male in America, you're among the winningest of the winning tribes--again, even if your own life is a disaster. This is why people say you have "privilege." It doesn't really refer to anything you have, but what you don't have. You may still get shot by a cop some day, but you won't get shot because you're white. As a male, your boss might be less likely to flirt with you, but will be more likely to take your input seriously. And so on.

Changing that doesn't mean they're winning, and you're losing. This isn't about you. There is no "you" at all, outside of this larger context. It's about continuing this winning streak humanity has been on, and trying to build a world in which everybody--from the poor white dude in the trailer park to the black trans woman in Russia--has the best possible chance to make something with their lives.This Comic Will Forever Change the Way You Look at Privilege

By Shahana YasminToby Morris ... places two individuals side by side, showing how financial security and benefits, or the lack of it, affects them even if they come from households that love and support them, leading to two completely different outcomes.Comment:  For more on white privilege, see "White Man" = Bogeyman and Whites Can't Handle Racial Stress.

"White Man" = bogeyman

America’s grand historical deception: Why it pretends White Supremacy no longer exists

Violence against Black Americans is real and documented, so why does White America continue to deny it?

By Chauncey DeVegaFrom initial colonial and Imperial encounters, to the later intimacy of slavery and bonded labor, Black and brown people, aboriginal and other First Nations brothers and sisters, had to invent language to describe “The White Man” they encountered for the first time and then later came to regret having ever known.

“The White Man” became a ghost or a monster. (In fact, the robes of the Ku Klux Klan represent the ghosts of the Confederate dead who have returned to avenge themselves on now free black Americans.) He haunted. He killed. He raped. He destroyed.And:Tales of “The White Man” would be used to scare children into obedience, and like most folk tales and children’s stories they were lessons to prepare those youngsters for life in an unfair world. But “The White Man” is not a chimera. He is real. We see him when cops kill and abuse innocent and defenseless Black and brown people in America. he choked Eric Garner to death. He shot Tamir Rice, stole his childhood and his life. ”The White Man” maces and electrocutes Black people who are suffering from a stroke while sitting in their car. But America does not want to confront “The White Man,” because that would mean reflecting on its own behavior and culture of racialized violence.

The innocence and nobility of Whiteness and “The White Man” are bedrock lies for America and the West that dissolve under even the most minimal levels of critical inquiry. If America looked in the mirror at “The White Man” looking back, it could be either a moment of catharsis, where the violence and meanness of White Privilege and White Racism were owned and internalized with pride (yup! that is us, White America, what a good thing, let’s stop pretending we are surprised or ashamed!) or where upon seeing “The White Man” in his full glory a moment of White Fragility would freeze the viewer in stone as though he or she were touched by Medusa.Comment:  For more on white privilege, see Black Professor Criticizes White Men and Whites Can't Handle Racial Stress.

Waco shootout shows America's racism

This is your brain on Whiteness: The invisible psychology of white American ignorance explained

The contrast in media narratives about Baltimore and Waco are undeniable—but many white Americans are blind to them

By Chauncey DeVegaThe participants in the Waco, Texas gun battle were almost exclusively white. The participants in the Baltimore Uprising were almost all black. Quite predictably, the corporate news media’s narrative frame for those events was heavily influenced by race. News coverage of these two events has stretched the bounds of credulity by engaging in all manner of mental gymnastics in order to describe the killings, mayhem, and gun battle in Waco as anything other than a “riot.”

As writers such as Salon’s own Jenny Kutner keenly observed:I use the terms “shootout” and “gunfire erupted” after reading numerous eyewitness reports, local news coverage and national stories about the “incident,” which has been described with a whole host of phrases already. None, however, are quite as familiar as another term that’s been used to describe similarly chaotic events in the news of late: “Riot.”

Of course, the deadly shootout in Texas was exactly that: A shootout. The rival gangs were not engaged in a demonstration or protest and they were predominantly white, which means that—despite the fact that dozens of people engaged in acts of obscene violence—they did not “riot,” as far as much of the media is concerned. “Riots” are reserved for communities of color in protest, whether they organize violently or not, and the “thuggishness” of those involved is debatable. That doesn’t seem to be the case in Texas.The dominant corporate news media have used the Baltimore uprising and other similar events to attack Black America’s character, values, and culture. The argument is clear: The events in Waco were committed by white men who happen to be criminals; the Baltimore uprising was committed by black people who, because of their “race” and “culture,” are inherently criminal.

Racial bias in news reporting has been repeatedly documented by scholars in media studies, critical race theory, political science, and sociology. As anti-racism activist Jane Elliot incisively observed, “People of color can’t even turn on the televisions in their own homes without being exposed to white racism.” The centuries of racism, and resulting stereotypes about the inherent criminality of Black Americans, are central to why the events in Waco and Baltimore have received such divergent news coverage.White America’s Waco Insanity: The Shocking Realities it Ignores About Racism & Violence

The response to the Twin Peaks shootout shows how privilege really works.

By Brittney CooperMore than 165 people have been arrested for their participation in this thuggish, ruggish, deadly, violent, white-on-white street brawl but there has been no mass outcry from the country about this. Though these motorcycle gangs were already under surveillance because of known participation in consistent and organized criminal activity, as Darnell Moore notes at Mic, “the police didn’t don riot gear.” Moore further notes that “leather and rock music weren’t blamed,” and there hasn’t been any “hand-wringing over the problem of white-on-white crime.”

White people, even well-meaning and thoughtful ones, have the privilege of looking at deadly acts of mass violence of this sort as isolated local incidents, particular to one community. They do not look at such incidents as indicative of anything having to do with race or racism. But everything from the difference in law enforcement response to media response tells us what we need to know about how white privilege allows acts of violence by white people to be judged by entirely different standards than those of any other group. If a Black motorcycle gang had engaged in a shootout in a parking lot, any honest white person will admit that the conversation would have sounded incredibly different.

Frequently in conversations that I have observed or participated in with white people about race, the claim is levied that it is Black people “who make everything about race.” But this incident in Waco gives lie to that claim. It turns out that when white privilege is in clear operation, white people are invested in making sure that we don’t see race in operation. Charles Mills, a philosopher of race, has a term which I think applies here: epistemology of white ignorance. By this means, he means that white people have created a whole way of knowing the world that both demands and allows that they remain oblivious to the operations of white supremacy, that white people remain “intent on denying what is before them.” Thus even though three gangs have now attacked each other in broad daylight and killed or injured 27 people, there is no nagging, gnawing sense of fear, no social anxiety about what the world is coming to, no anger at the thugs who made it unsafe for American families to go about their regular daily activities without fear of being clipped by a stray bullet, no posturing from law enforcement about the necessity of using military weapons to put down the lawless band of criminals that turned a parking lot into a war zone in broad daylight. More than that, there is no sense of white shame, no hanging of the head over the members of their race that have been out in the world representing everything that is wrong with America.

That kind of intra-racial shame is reserved primarily for Black people.

Most white citizens will insist that this was just an isolated incident, even though the gangs were already under surveillance for consistent participation in criminal activity. And this studied ignorance, this sense in which people could look at this set of incidents and simply refuse to see all the ways in which white privilege is at play—namely that no worse than arrest befell any the men who showed up hours later with weapons, looking for a fight—returns me to the words of Malcolm X. For many Americans, this is just good ole American fun, sort of like playing Cowboys-and-Indians in real life. As Malcolm reminded us, “whites idolize fighters.” So while I’m sure many Americans are appalled at the senseless loss of life, there is also the sense that this is just “those wild Texans” doing the kind of thing they do.Watch this activist politely destroy CNN for racism: ‘Whiteness gets nuance and blackness doesn’t’

By David Edwards“What’s interesting about Waco is that there was also this nuance suddenly. Because whiteness gets nuance and blackness doesn’t. So you saw with Waco, ‘These are bikers, this is just like a biker group. It’s a biker shootout.'”

According to McKesson, racism was insidious because people tended to think of it as an extreme.

“It’s this idea that like the n-word is the only signifier of racism in America when that’s actually not true,” he said. “Racism is about how power is used to negatively impact people because issues of race. So, what you saw with Waco, you saw this radical humanization of people who actually committed violent crimes, who really did violent crimes in a way you did see that same humanization with people in Baltimore who were breaking curfew.”

“They were treated in ways that criminalized them, really intense ways. In a way that you didn’t see with actual criminals.”Comment:  For more on white privilege, see Whites Can't Handle Racial Stress and "It Feels Good" to Be White.

Debating Professor Grundy's tweets

Yesterday I posted this link about a black professor's tweets to Facebook:

Boston University Professor Tweets ‘Your White Ancestors Were Land Thieves, And Slave Owners–Nothing More’

I tagged the posting with this line:

I'd tweet that my ancestors were land thieves and slave-owners too if I knew it for sure.

Then added more comments:

My Mayflower ancestors

I don't understand the Ben Affleck "sanitize one's history" approach. I've posted before about my ancestor who may have massacred Indians.

Why wouldn't I? The only way it reflects on me is by showing how forthright I am.

If you go back enough generations, everyone's related to someone "bad." It probably doesn't require that many generations, either. Maybe half a dozen.

For every king or president in your family tree, you probably have several rapists, slave-owners, murderers, and so forth. Everyone does.

It's ridiculous to highlight one "good" ancestor as if that proves anything about you. Or proves anything, period.

I wouldn't give people a pass because their ancestors lived in Europe. Those people financed and managed the conquest of America and the slave trade. As well as oppressing their own people.

I wouldn't give people a pass if their ancestors came over "only" a few decades ago, either. Once you're here, you become complicit in the system. If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

If people came over in 2015, I might give them a pass. They missed the last national election, so they haven't had much chance to change the system.

The Native aspects

A couple of Professor Grundy's tweets focused on Native history:



One Facebook friend criticized Grundy for these tweets:And this just shows that extremism and nuttiness are not just relegated to the conservative side of the spectrum. While there is definitely some truth to what she says, she paints with the same broad brush and selective history as those who criticized, say, the Baltimore protests and their ilk. In fact, the ancestors of the overwhelming majority of white people in the United States did not own slaves nor kill Natives. In fact, more died to secure their freedom in the Civil War. Yes, whites have benefited from those who did steal land and enslave humans, and certainly need to face up to that history and have a reckoning with it, but to reduce a diverse population of people to a simplistic caricature is as overly simplified and bigoted as anything coming out of the Tea Party. I mean, seriously, what exactly are Poles and Slovaks who worked the Chicago stock yards guilty of? What about Italian longshoremen in New York? Or Irish day laborers in Boston? Even on the so-called frontier, what about the Scots-Irish who would both fight and intermix with Southeastern Indian tribes? One of their descendants, btw, was Sequoyah. This isn't even to mention the rich, and yes, sometimes tragic, culture and history that came from the Europeans and Natives mixing in Mexico and the Southwest. My problem is that left-wing radicals can be as susceptible to divisive pseudo-intellectual bullshit that attempts to masquerade as legitimate grievance and historical redress. This is not the real McCoy and shouldn't be mistaken as such.My responses:

I don't have a problem with Grundy's five tweets. I'd try to avoid saying "all," as in all white people are Ben Affleck. But the percentage who call their ancestors benign terms like "pioneers" and "farmers" must be incredibly high. Perhaps 90-95% or more. So "all" isn't much of an exaggeration.

A phrase like "kill Natives" is obviously open to interpretation. Did most Americans point a gun at Natives and shoot them? No. Did most Americans vote for politicians who implemented policies that had the predictable effect of killing Natives? Yes. Therefore, most Americans did kill Natives indirectly if not directly.

Most Americans accepted a system in which some of them owned slaves or killed Natives. For the sake of argument, it doesn't matter much if most Americans benefited from theses crimes directly or indirectly. The point is they were complicit: guilty of aiding and abetting crimes against humanity. They were not innocent "farmers" and "pioneers."

And again, no free passes for recent immigrants. Americans of every vintage are fighting against treaty rights, land-into-trust deals, and casino expansions. They're building on sacred sites such as Mauna Kea or Mt. Graham, or allowing it.

Unless recent immigrants are willing to stand up against these practices, and call their fellow Americans "land thieves," they might as well be land thieves themselves. Again, they're part of the solution or part of the problem. They don't get to be neutral if they're US citizens with the right to vote.

"She paints with the same broad brush and selective history"...you realize these are 140-character tweets, right? It's nutty to expect a nuanced argument in that limited space.

I'm guessing her academic papers and teachings are as nuanced as anyone else's. It's ridiculous to chastise her for being slightly inflammatory when she makes a completely valid point. Namely, that the word "pioneer" is a euphemism for people who routinely broke treaties, invaded "foreign" territory, and introduced diseases. And sometimes killed Natives outright.

For more on America's colonization and genocide, see Whites Destroy Other People's Homes and America Constructed to Erase Indians.

Black professor criticizes white men

Another racial controversy broke out this week. This time it was a black professor tweeting mean things about white people.

Here's the first thing I read about the controversy--a right-winger's take on it:

Boston University Professor Tweets ‘Your White Ancestors Were Land Thieves, And Slave Owners–Nothing More’

By Lauren RichardsonBoston University Professor Saida Grundy, a feminist sociologist of race and ethnicity listed as an incoming assistant professor of sociology and African-American studies at B.U., has come under fire for her Tweets that essentially argued that white people were the worst people, and biggest slave owners in history.

I could not have said this any better than Turtleboy:So let me get this straight. Saida Grundy is going to be teaching a whole bunch of white boys at BU in the near future. And she’s going into her job while publicly stating that “white college males” are a “problem population.” Not just SOME white college males, like the Oklahoma frat boys from the racist video. ALL white college males. They are all a “problem population.” I’m sure white dudes will definitely get a fair shake in her class next year. Definitely.
Note that Grundy didn't say all white college males. At most she said white college males in general, which is different.

In fact, the term "problem population" strongly implies it's a generalization about a group. Some people in this population are a problem.

So conservative critics are wrong from the get-go. As they usually are.

Critics defend poor white folks

Some people couldn't let the persecution of the underprivileged white majority go unchallenged:

Fox Host: ‘Last Acceptable Form Of Discrimination’ Is of White Men

By Ahiza GarciaFaulkner said the university was standing by Grundy, saying she was exercising her right to free speech. Faulkner then posed a question to Tantaros.

“If this were in the reverse and she were an incoming white professor saying this about black men, she would be eviscerated. No?” asked Faulkner, who is black.

“So this is the debate,” Tantaros said. “This is, I think, an applicable debate to ‘Is this free speech or is this hate speech?’”

“The last acceptable form of discrimination in this country now is two groups—one, Christians and, two, white men,” Tantaros said. “And that’s why she can get away with this. Why? Where are the organization in defense of white men? Where are the marches? Where are the editorials penned?”Even some liberal writers joined in:

“Deal with your sh*t, white people”: Professor ignites a right-wing firestorm over “white college males as a problem”

Two recent university controversies have sparked discussion on just who can be racist and sexist

By Mary Elizabeth WilliamsOver the weekend, BU spokesman Colin Riley issued a statement that “While we recognize that Dr. Grundy has the right to hold and express personal opinions, BU does not condone racism or bigotry in any form, and we are offended by such statements.” The university has not said whether Grundy faces any disciplinary action. And she has also found plenty of supporters, like student Noor Toraif, who told the Boston Herald, “You need to have institutional and systemic power in order to be racist. People of color like Professor Grundy don’t have that. … I’m 100 percent supportive of her and excited for her to come to campus.” That idea—that you can’t be racist if you’re a certain race—was echoed at Goldsmiths University this week when diversity officer Bahar Mustafa hosted “a BME Woman and non-binary event only” and then responded to criticism of the limited guest list by explaining, “I, an ethnic minority woman, cannot be racist or sexist towards white men, because racism and sexism describe structures of privilege based on race and gender. Therefore, women of color and minority genders cannot be racist or sexist, since we do not stand to benefit from such a system.” Wow, really? They can’t? Ever? How conveniently self-exonerating!

You want to acknowledge that the way you look at the dynamics of race or religion or gender or orientation are profoundly influenced by whether or not you are a member of the group that traditionally wields the most power? I am entirely with you. You want to create safe spaces for typically marginalized groups? Got my support. You want to say that we live in a culture that overwhelmingly favors white people, males and heterosexuals? No argument there. But you want to say they’re the only groups that can be biased? Uh, no. You don’t have to go all hand-wringing about “reverse racism” or the supposed plague of misandry to still be really concerned about a university educator going on record as expressing serious and sweeping hostility toward any population, and passing off personal judgments as facts. And call me a crazy dreamer, but I believe there’s opportunity in this world for ANYBODY to be prejudiced. Anybody can be close-minded. Anybody can be wrong.Rage at the machine

Others defended Grundy by noting the obvious: that she was tweeting provocatively to, well, provoke people. Not to deliver a nuanced lecture in 140 characters, but to vent at America's ongoing racism and sexism.

What Happens to Black Women Who Boldly Speak Truth About Racial Inequality

The controversies surrounding Michelle Obama’s commencement speech at Tuskegee and incoming Boston University professor Saida Grundy’s tweets remind us of the ways in which intellectually provocative black women are forced to navigate the public sphere.

By Peniel E. JosephMichelle Obama’s painful discussion of America’s racial inequality and deep misogyny exists, for many, on the same spectrum as Grundy’s blunt remarks about race, power and privilege. Where the first lady used her commencement speech at one of the nation’s premier HBCUs to deliver a seminar on institutional racism and our nation’s anti-black culture, Grundy’s social media commentary dispensed with complexity to deliver screams, sometimes angry, other times humorous, that reflect equally important truths about contemporary race relations, black women’s activism and the limits of freedom of expression in the 21st century.

The piercing anger behind Grundy’s tweets is rooted in recent events in Baltimore and Ferguson, Mo., a mixture of protests, demonstrations and violence that have, as she reminds us, made race an unavoidable topic. On social media, Grundy removed the academic hat for the identity that black women, including Michelle Obama, are always accused of donning—that of an angry black woman.

Neither Michelle Obama’s eloquence nor Saida Grundy’s passion can ultimately insulate them from the onslaught of criticism that, at its core, is based more on antipathy toward the messenger than on the meaning of her words. Allegations of reverse racism, hatred for America and a lack of patriotism are routinely wielded against America’s first lady, so it should come as no surprise that conservatives have now targeted Grundy for punishment.

The irony here is that some in America remain violently frightened of intelligent black women who achieve greatly, act boldly and move forward courageously in a world that continues, no matter how great their achievements, to find them unworthy of being allowed to succeed or fail on their own terms.Comment:  For more on white privilege, see Whites Can't Handle Racial Stress and "It Feels Good" to Be White.

Whites can't handle racial stress

Why It's So Hard to Talk to White People About Racism

By Dr. Robin DiAngeloMainstream dictionary definitions reduce racism to individual racial prejudice and the intentional actions that result. The people that commit these intentional acts are deemed bad, and those that don't are good. If we are against racism and unaware of committing racist acts, we can't be racist; racism and being a good person have become mutually exclusive. But this definition does little to explain how racial hierarchies are consistently reproduced.

Social scientists understand racism as a multidimensional and highly adaptive system--a system that ensures an unequal distribution of resources between racial groups. Because whites built and dominate all significant institutions, (often at the expense of and on the uncompensated labor of other groups), their interests are embedded in the foundation of U.S. society. While individual whites may be against racism, they still benefit from the distribution of resources controlled by their group.

Yes, an individual person of color can sit at the tables of power, but the overwhelming majority of decision-makers will be white. Yes, white people can have problems and face barriers, but systematic racism won't be one of them. This distinction--between individual prejudice and a system of unequal institutionalized racial power--is fundamental. One cannot understand how racism functions in the U.S. today if one ignores group power relations.

This systemic and institutional control allows those of us who are white in North America to live in a social environment that protects and insulates us from race-based stress. We have organized society to reproduce and reinforce our racial interests and perspectives. Further, we are centered in all matters deemed normal, universal, benign, neutral and good. Thus, we move through a wholly racialized world with an unracialized identity (e.g. white people can represent all of humanity, people of color can only represent their racial selves). Challenges to this identity become highly stressful and even intolerable. The following are examples of the kinds of challenges that trigger racial stress for white people:

Suggesting that a white person's viewpoint comes from a racialized frame of reference (challenge to objectivity);

People of color talking directly about their own racial perspectives (challenge to white taboos on talking openly about race);

People of color choosing not to protect the racial feelings of white people in regards to race (challenge to white racial expectations and need/entitlement to racial comfort);

[Etc.]

Not often encountering these challenges, we withdraw, defend, cry, argue, minimize, ignore, and in other ways push back to regain our racial position and equilibrium. I term that push back white fragility.

This concept came out of my on-going experience leading discussions on race, racism, white privilege and white supremacy with primarily white audiences. It became clear over time that white people have extremely low thresholds for enduring any discomfort associated with challenges to our racial worldviews. We can manage the first round of challenge by ending the discussion through platitudes--usually something that starts with "People just need to," or "Race doesn't really have any meaning to me," or "Everybody's racist." Scratch any further on that surface, however, and we fall apart.

Socialized into a deeply internalized sense of superiority and entitlement that we are either not consciously aware of or can never admit to ourselves, we become highly fragile in conversations about race. We experience a challenge to our racial worldview as a challenge to our very identities as good, moral people. It also challenges our sense of rightful place in the hierarchy. Thus, we perceive any attempt to connect us to the system of racism as a very unsettling and unfair moral offense.Comment:  For more on the subject, see "It Feels Good" to Be White and Whites Too Fragile to Discuss Race.