'Real Men' and 'Real Women': this is why we call it misogyny, folks

Cross-blogged from: http://toentertainathought.com

As many of us are wont to do, I too enjoy an updated Facebook newsfeed from time to time. I gotta say, there's a lot going on in our world, and since I subscribe to some cool pages, and have a bunch of smart and thinky-type folks as friends, I generally find my newsfeed littered with interesting topics, political points, blogs, article links, and scientific developments to sift through. It's fun, and following those links out into the webosphere takes me places I might not otherwise find myself. While sitting in the living room with three cats swarming all over the place, reenacting feline versions of scenes from the great Scorsese films of our time. There are also times when those posted things dishearten me;sometimes these links depict simple and sad phenomena like puppy mills, or the latest work on demolishing women's rights in the US (both of which inspire feelings in me of passionate, controlled rage). Other times, they're something else entirely.

This blog that you are reading now is an open letter to the guy who wrote (a now defunct) tirade about the pictures lady folks post on their profiles. Actually, I'm being facetious. He really, really wants women to know what makes a GOOD WOMAN. That said, there are everyday occurrences that speak to our collective and never-ending hope that women (and men) who speak against the socially acceptable dominant masculine viewpoint will just SHUT UP. It's very important that women stop having sex lives, personal lives, and professional lives, that maybe don't depend on our direct approval. These are the messages we send when we talk about 'good women', in relation to ladies that just...don't know what they need to do to be 'real women'. And ladies always need us dudes to tell them who 'good women' are. Because apparently, 'good men', 'real men', know who 'good' and 'real women' should be. (I hope readers of this know that I'm being very, very sarcastic.) I'm going to post the entirety of the entry, and respond within. And then I'll wind it up with a brief final analysis.

Here's the url: http://dernierevie.com/an-open-letter-to-women-what-men-really-want/. His response to people calling what he said stereotypically gendered and sexist was a pretty impressive avoidance tactic. Actually, no, it wasn't impressive; it was boringly standard and lazy. But let's get to the heart of it, shall we?

I was thinking, the most BEAUTIFUL women are the ones that are selfless. I think that submissive, caring, driven women are so sexy! I love it when I look at a woman’s page (on social media) and it’s nice and sweet. No club pics, no pictures of her in the mirror, no vulgar, drama filled updates… just her. I realized that most women draw their cues from other women. They look at big butts, huge breasts, hairstyles, and lifestyles of other women and try to imitate it thinking that it’s what men want. Well, its NOT. Yes, we give those women attention, yes those women get flown places, yes they get taken shopping, but at the end of the day (to us) they are simply something to do. (Typically something to sex). The treatment that they get is part of a contract. That is, spend a little money and a little time and her legs will always be open for you. (Dudes do just enough to keep them interested.)

This is just packed with bullshit. So, selflessness is beautiful; can't argue with that at face value. However, in this context, what he really means is that women who don't think of their own wants and needs, and cater to mens' insecurities, are beautiful. It's the old, "women who take care of men are real women," trope. If you're in service to your man or men, then you're a good woman. He touches on this a bit more later on. Then, NO CLUB PICS? What the hell are women supposed to take pictures of if they go to a club? This is code for underhanded slut-shaming, as in: 'don't be a slut and don't be out with dudes you aren't married to'. Selfies in mirrors are sociologically interesting, and sometimes hilarious, as we can see from the #selfieolympics on Twitter. And what if someone is dealing with some vulgar drama in their life? They can't talk about it? Again, this is code for WHY WON'T YOU JUST SHUT UP? What the hell, man? Okay, now imitation of others is sort of the point here. What do you think you're doing dude? Being originally masculine? We all imitate others. I imitate tons of writers, sociologists, lawyers, scholars...it's what we do as humans to try to figure out who we want to be. Who are you to tell half the population they should be doing anything other than what they damned well please? Now here's the fun part of this bit: he legitimately makes the case that women who dress a certain way are asking for it. Not rape necessarily, but absolutely as sex objects entirely. First, where the hell do you get off speaking for me? I have no interest in taking responsibility for what other adults choose as their dress code. And it doesn't matter what women wear: WOMEN ARE HUMAN PEOPLE WITH BRAINS, MINDS, BODIES, SEXUALITIES, AND LIFE TO DEAL WITH. It's your problem if you devalue women regardless of the context, not theirs. It's like saying, "look, it's not her fault she was sexually assaulted, but she went to a bar wearing that; what did she expect?" It's problematic because of the inherent misalignment of values and actions. Are we taking personal responsibility for how we treat people? Or are we blaming others for how we behave? You're blaming women for men treating women like sex-only objects. That's absurd, and should deeply insult all 'good men'.

What men, GOOD MEN, REALLY want is a GOOD woman! PERIOD. Give a man your (undivided) attention, time and affection and he will give you love and respect. If you cater to him, nurture him, mend his wounds and encourage his dreams he will lay down his life for you!

The last sentence here is fine-ish, as long as we're okay with a little Romeo & Juliet-esque dramatic style, and we assume that men should also 'care, nurture, mend wounds, and encourage dreams' in heterosexual relationships. But from what I know, most people would prefer that relationships take the form of a reciprocal, equitable time-sharing. It's shared time, not given time, that we might focus on. But again, dude, you're saying that women should service men. And that is a sexist idea. Remember, I'm disagreeing with you and labeling your words misogynist, not you the person. You can change your world view if you choose, but your words are what they are.

A man, a REAL MAN, takes pride in being a man! He will sacrifice EVERYTHING if it will put one smile on his woman’s face. No mountain will be too high to climb and no ocean too deep to swim. A man will go to the ends of the Earth to provide for the RIGHT woman.

More with the Romeo & Juliet fallacy. You know that was a story, right? Fiction, anyone? And one single smile? That's not a very high standard you're setting for yourself and all the rest of us. Now we're getting to the 'providing' action, and it is glorious! Let there be gendered separation! Men provide, women accept those providings with sexytimes and quietness. Yeah, here's what you're implying brosef: even if women have their own lives, they should spend extra time taking care of our needs, without regard for theirs. Because that's what the RIGHT women do to be GOOD.

Ladies, take pride in being a WOMAN. Take pride in the fact that you are the backbone of mankind. The power, majesty and beauty of civilization comes from your womb! We (men) recognize that. We long for the woman that understands that as well.

Alright. This womb-worship is all fine if that's your thing, but it's a bit overblown. To the point where it's pretty obvious that the exchange implied is: ladies, if you cater to our fragile little egos, we'll say we love your wombs, and that you're everything to us, except in charge of your own life choices that we don't necessarily feel totally comfortable with. Which is sexist and misogynist. Your words, not you as a person. I'm not attacking you, I'm appropriately labeling your publicly published thoughts.

Allow us to take the lead. Not to control you, but to protect you. Let us clear the path so that your walk will be made easy.

This makes me shudder. Slightly reminiscent of, "men may be the head of the household/relationship/whatever, but women are the neck." Also, "you need us to protect you. Because you cannot take proper care of yourself." Look, everyone's relational dynamics are their own, but it's wholly ridiculous to presume that women need 'protecting' more so than any other gender. Patriarchal, sexist, misogynist. Your words, not you as a person.

Submit to us. Not for us to stand over you, but so that we can extend our hand to lift you up, over our heads.

Physics! Science! God references! Submission! I fully support everyone interested in establishing a healthy and fully equitable dom/sub relational dynamic. But I know that's not what you meant. And if you're lifting someone up, it means you were STANDING OVER THEM! Now there's physics involved here, and it's getting serious. And then you say that we'll position women above us...uh, not to nitpick (okay, well, to nitpick), if women submit to us, there's a perpetual power imbalance in the relational dynamics. I'm also relatively sure that one of your other implications is that women should be willing to be held up, by men, as trophies of our position as dominant. Right? Yeah, that's what I thought. Nice try though.

Ladies, in our eyes (a REAL man’s eyes), there is NOTHING more precious than a woman. NOTHING.

You called ladies precious! That's cute! Like kittens, or puppies, or baby talk. Because nothing says REAL MEN and REAL WOMEN like baby talk. Again, if that's your thing, cool with me. But basing an entire gendered relations viewpoint on that? Naw.

One thing that I have realized about relationships is that people are continuously responding to the actions of others. What that means is, the best way to be happy, the best way to have a healthy, meaningful relationship is to give what you expect to get. If you want to be cherished, respected and valued, give us those things!

You keep mixing things that sound halfway decent, with things that are so obviously sexist it's staggering my fragile little mind. But what we're getting to here is that you're implying that if women want to be treated well by us in their heterosexual romantic relationships, they better cater to our egos and wants. Which is sexist and misogynist. Your words, not you as a person. Because I don't know you, but I'm getting to know your words intimately. And I'm getting more irritated and pissed off by the minute.

The treatment that a man gives to his woman starts and ends with her. Consider us, our feelings, our expectations, and the fact that we want to be treated EXACTLY how you want to be treated and watch as the world opens up to you.

We men can open the world up to women! I never knew! Where are the world-opening club meetings held? I haven't been to them, but I'd like to know how to open worlds for women with my magic. I bet that goes fantastically at parties (but not at clubs), where all the women are dressed in pillowcases not showing their cleavage or 'big butts' and just waiting to submit to me so they can be protected from themselves. I hear volcanoes are also very in right now, along with the opening of the world.

Ladies, we love you, we need you, and we want you to understand that the way you treat us (and YOURSELF) dictates the way that we treat you.

You insulting prick. We men aren't responsible for how we treat women because if they don't service us, we don't owe them any respect? I've held it together pretty well over this whole thing, but I'm at the point where I'm just going to say it: if you cannot treat people with respect regardless of whether they service your fragile little ego, YOU ARE NOT A REAL MAN.

Lastly, understand that your beauty and value ARE NOT defined by how you look or what you own. Your beauty and value is defined by your heart and it’s ability to give and RECEIVE love.

Women are constantly bombarded by imagery focused on inspiring body insecurity, cultural narratives (like the one you so eloquently wrote out) dictating wholly submissive and narrowly defined cultural politics, and political, social, and sexual violence. It's all cute and Disney (which is meant as a bit of an insult) to say things like it's what's inside that counts, or your heart and how you act are what really make you beautiful, but your sheer density is making me nauseous. Men have always been able to look like pretty much anything, and it's kinda alright. Yeah, there's a bit of body shaming in our culture toward men, but to nowhere near the volume, ferocity, and emotional violence as that directed toward women. So you don't have to excuse my anger at you for talking like such a typically uninformed and unaware male, and I don't really want you to. I want you get angry...at yourself, at our culture, at our gendered presumptions built into us by that very culture. To say that women should just BE THEMSELVES AND BE BEAUTIFUL INSIDE is like saying that everything we experience is just silly nonsense, and women should let men bring them up above it all, except that's exactly the problem in the first place.

I’m done being sappy.

You were a little sappy, and that wouldn't bother me one little bit if it weren't for you letting your sexist socialization and internalized misogyny dictate the thoughts you put into words. Sappy is fine with me; we all get a little gooey for the people we are attracted to. Totally normal in our context. The thing that bothers me is you took the bits of our cultural heritage of feminine servitude, tried to pretty them up with low-level platitudes about gendered submission being somehow romantic and lovely, and then tried to sell it like you were just trying to be helpful. Us guys do that helpful thing all too often, and I'm sure I have as well. We're built to do it by society; we are conditioned to think the way that you obviously think. No one is immune from cultural influence, and your writing is a perfect example of this cultural narrative training.

But here's my challenge to you: question why you would ever ask a heterosexual woman to submit to you, or any other male partner. Because if there's one thing I think I can guess, it's that you aren't secure enough in your masculinity to have a truly equitable relationship without that power imbalance specifically in play. That means, along with a whole host of mostly-hetero men out here, that you've got some work to do on becoming that good man you seem to idolize. And if there's anything else I know, working to be a good man intending to create gendered and sexual equity, never stops, and never should. But this? The words you wrote that popped up on my Facebook newsfeed from an old college friend? This perpetuates gendered inequity in such a subtle way to us, the heterosexual men, because 1) we don't have anything to be concerned about unless we care about pervasive misogyny in the form of 'protective masculinity', and 2) it's highly likely that if we want women to just be themselves as you so succinctly put it in your first paragraph, we sure as hell better start demanding that us men treat ALL WOMEN, ALL TRANSGENDERED PERSONS, AND ALL OTHER MEN, as worthy of our respect, regardless of how they decide to present themselves to the world.

So, instead of being done being sappy, which I actually think is good for us overly-masculinized men, try being done with imitating all the other egotistical, self-centered, culturally twisted men out there. Try being done with falling back on your (and mine too) straight male privilege. It's old, it's tired, and frankly, it's insulting to me as a man and it pisses me off.

My first To Entertain a Thought Blog

This is a blog I just posted on the new group blog http://toentertainathought.com/. To Entertain a Thought is all about discussion, interaction, and making positive contributions to a thought process. Check it out, get a Wordpress account, and join us for fun and interesting everything! This is my first post over there, mostly an intro to who I am and my perspective on doing things social and researchy. Enjoy.

Greetings Wordpressers! Nick Gibson here, to say hello and whatnot. The topic of this introductory entry is basically what makes me tick...like a clock with a nice clear set of directions, here we go.

My love affair with sociology began in my undergrad program at Cal State San Bernardino, and was buffered by my master's work at Cal State Fullerton and three years of Ph.D.-level work at the University of Hawaii at Manoa. That sociology applies to all facets of life is intrinsic to an explanation of what sociology is; yet without a concrete example of how the application of sociology works, the waters of thought can be murky. My first, and most direct example of 'anything is fair game in sociology' came when my undergrad mentor introduced me to the study of conspiracy theories. It wasn't just about what the theory was; we dug into how theories are transmitted, what people did about belief in conspiracy theories, and the effects conspiracy theories have on micro and macro-level relationships. A professor of mine from UH Manoa said once (Nandita Sharma who kicks ass professionally): at its most simple, sociology is the study of relationships in all forms, places, and spaces. Relationships between people, relationships between people and institutions, relationships between institutions themselves, and how people socially exist and create the social experience within institutions, and about narratives and definitions. So, with an eye toward an analysis of relationships, I have managed to explore a whole lot of social phenomena, including 9/11 conspiracy theories. And boy, is it fun.

Sociology can also be exhausting. By exhausting, I mean that it is very difficult to turn the sociology off. Or, as a friend of mine now holding an assistant prof position at Pacific U in Oregon puts it, it is practically impossible to 'put the sociology back in the bag'. Even while watching comedy, I see and hear things that trigger a sociological cringe and discussion in my head. But it's much more wonderful than not, and I'm grateful. Here's why: there is an important message that I learned, and it is that as a relatively very socially privileged straight, white, cis-gendered male, I have always been able to, and still can, ignore the effects of a privileged social position without much thought. To be perpetually tuned in, is to attempt to mirror the social locations of people without the same kinds of identifiable social indicators. To be always aware, is to attempt to pay attention to the presumptions and assumptions that most of us, at least those of us who grew up in the United States, share. I have been taught, indoctrinated, trained, pick-your-forcible-learning verb, to believe and act upon narratives about other people at a basic, fundamental, and usually unconscious level. Those unconscious lessons become real-world experiences, typically to the detriment of people without social privilege. And that, dear readers, pisses me off.

Yeah, I get angry about social privilege. Mostly because I didn't earn it, yet benefit from it almost all the time. As an undergrad instructor at UH Manoa and Hawaii Pacific University, I explained this to my students in every course I led. We are taught through media programming (movies, TV shows, music, news shows), political discourse, our social networks, and our legal system, to believe things about our fellow human beings that simply are not true. To me, this is scary. Most folks react in defense, yet given enough time, most folks also seem to eventually get 'it'. That 'it' is what is most important here. That 'it' is the thing that makes all the socialization and social training we experience understandable. That 'it', is the realization that we learn everything we know, and if everything we know about the world isn't always true, the fault doesn't necessarily lie with one person and their belief system. The term 'fault' isn't necessarily the most accurate term to describe what this means. Tim Wise discusses this interplay of blame, fault, guilt, and responsibility quite nicely. Guilt is something we should feel, as people aiming to treat others well, when we do something that harms another. Responsibility is something we decide to take because of the kind of people we try to be. What does this mean? This means that if we are attempting to add goodness to the world, we must explore the experience of becoming comfortable with being uncomfortable. We must willingly engage in discussion about those things that involve feeling vulnerable, allowing for growth and self-reflection. We must take some risks, to feel positive change and shift our world toward a more just future.

I self-reflect on a constant basis, as many folks do without putting the same term to the behavior. I teach my students to self-reflect. I catch myself thinking things that piss me off, and work to shift what that means about what I have been taught against my will. My gender, assigned to me and taught to me without my active knowledge, provides me with social comfort. I must pay attention to that if I am to live what I believe. My race, assigned to and placed upon me without my active knowledge, affords me generous comfort. I must recognize the experiences shaded by race (all of my experiences, as far as I can tell), and talk about what that means. My sexuality, taught to me as the standard and 'normal', provides me a very comfortable social existence. If I do not work to build a more just and equitable world in my relatively tiny existence, I am not taking responsibility, and I am not living my beliefs. It is these three huge concepts that I work to make obvious to others. They inform why I do what I do, and why I aim to accomplish more as time passes.

Let's entertain some thoughts, and make our world what we wish it to be. I wish for an equitable, just, thoughtful, and welcoming society. Even though I experience mostly the best that people have to offer, I want better for everyone. Myself included.

That's it for now. Go like our Facebook page, and follow the To Entertain a Thought blog on Wordpress, and join us in entertaining some thoughts.

Zimmerman, Martin, and the Case for a Dose of Sanity

Over at the Book of Face, I've been adding to a small discussion prompted by Andrew Pegoda, a fellow academic and speaker on social junk and stuff. Check out his blog here. The original question was:

Should "double jeopardy" be OK in cases where it is quickly discovered the lawyers and/or judge put together a set of evidence and jurors that GUARANTEED the defendant would walk away. Consider the composition of the jury, statements by the jurors as they were selected (esp racist statements by B37 then, and now). Consider the directions they received [from the judge] (see first comment). I still wonder why we don't have a better system to decide supposedly clear cut issues [such as innocence or guilt]... [do typical juries] allow too much for prejudice, see second comment. Read, set, discuss! :)

I added the things in brackets. 

Interesting discussion. At the latest point, one person asked, "...it sounds like you went into this case knowing the outcome you wanted." A little later, "Of course, you had no opinion before this?"

I think this is disingenuous, to assume anyone is objective, without opinion. Further, to think race played no part in all of this is purely bullshit, whether intentionally bullshit or not. Here's what I said:

 We all have opinions. This discussion seems similar to the argument for 'objective analysis' or 'objective science'. No one is completely objective, or devoid of opinions, in any situation, ever. No one lives in a vacuum. This point is completely unnecessary. What makes most science, or social science or law 'good', is the attempt to be willing to change one's mind based on the observed stuff that happens. 

I figure it's not a real thing that Bigfoot exists. Haven't seen much solid evidence for that claim. But if there was a whole lot of solid evidence that bigfoot existed, as a social scientist I then change my perspective and assumptions to meet the reality of the observed stuff. This whole 'racism isn't a thing anymore in America' is contrary to the decades of social science evidence both in legal and social aspects. To say a grown man can chase an unarmed teenager, only doing so because of institutionalized presumptions about racial tendencies (and a keen fear of 'others' as we like to use in sociology), kill him, and then not at least be held a little legally accountable, is sheer madness. 

Yeah, they'd had break-ins. I get it. It sucks, I've had my stuff stolen, been jacked at knifepoint, it ain't fun. But I don't see anyone demonizing white men for being perpetual white collar criminals, who by far and away are almost the only white collar criminals in the U.S., with far greater reaching impacts on human beings than your typical street-level criminal. The real clothing I fear? White shirts and ties. Hoodies don't scare me. So yeah. Race had nothing to do with it.

What say ye? 

The Move Back Home

Aloha, California!

It's been three weeks since I officially moved back to the Golden State (The California Golden Bear has returned). In that time, I have performed a wedding ceremony for two of my favorite people on the planet, have received more support, love, guidance and advice from those I trust than ever before, and got my motorcycle shipped, registered, and I passed the fuck outta the license tests. Also rode Amtrak for the first time ever. Met a couple new folks who I really dig. Have spent time with some of the people who are parts of the overall reasoning why I moved back, and will be spending more in the next week and a half. Agreed to jump into starting a business with another of my favorite people. Was invited back up to Bearskin which set my heart aflame. And that's not all...

Towards the end of my time in Hawaii, my perception of how things happened was pressured, so I've given it all some thought during the whole transitiony thing. I was absolutely disappointed about a lot things, but I don't usually talk about what I don't feel good about. Not typically my style, although I've done enough of that since getting back to last me months. I tried to work my ass off to earn a Ph.D. which didn't work out. Of all the reasons, I think the most important is that the place I was living and working in wasn't the right place for me. People have asked me a number of times, "so you miss Hawaii, don't you?" And I have to say, not so much. I miss many of the people I met, especially the folks with which I built friendships. They, I miss. Hawaii, with its expansive physical beauty, its stunning sunrises and sunsets, and brilliant snorkeling, is a fun place to hang out. All of this was overshadowed, for me, by the sheer nastiness of the cost of living. And why was it so expensive, you might ask? Well, my inquisitive friends, a great majority of the food, transportation junk, and everything else is shipped into the state.

Think about that for a minute. If shipping lines were disrupted, there's approximately enough food for the population living there for a maximum of roughly 3-4 days. This coming from the state gub'mint. I mean, holy grass skirts Batman! So yeah. There's the economic bullshit. Then there's the rent, which is somewhat comparable to San Francisco or Los Angeles, but is complicated by the realities of building shit in a tropical place: wood gets gobbled up by termites relatively quickly, metal gets nom-nom-nom'd by the salty air, and bricks don't make good windows. And the fuckin' Cane Spiders!!1! Those little bastards charge the shit outta humans! Fast! What the fuck?!!? Impressive little buggers, but what the hell, man. What, the, hell.

There were also some goings ons in my professional life that really sucked, but I'll leave out the details. I'm simply grateful that I'm for the most part leaving the larger thing of academia behind me. I'll always enjoy teaching, and I think it's something I want to keep doing in some form or another if possible. As a full-time gig it's brutal. Got mad respek for academics, as for the most part they are brilliant, interesting, and delightful after just enough booze. After teaching six undergrad courses in one bitch of a semester, I can honestly say that I love it, but I can also honestly say: fuck capitalism. Fuck it, right in its ear. That being said, I really loved teaching at HPU, and got over my reservations regarding private universities pretty quickly. I felt very supported in my work by the department administration, and really all of the administration I worked with at some point or another. The other faculty were welcoming and interesting. Also, the students were great! I enjoyed both the in-person and online courses there, and the folks earning grades with me were a lot of fun. My students at UH I will miss greatly, as they were very much my motivation for doing good work.

Also took the LSAT last week. Pretty sure I punched it in its solar plexus, although until my score surfaces from the depths of the LSAC intertubes I won't really know. So yeah, law degree or something. It's been an interest of mine for years, I just never pulled the trigger out of fear, anxiety, uncertainty, misinterpreted advice, yadda yadda. After getting through the professional shit-show that was my life on the island, law school and a startup: that I can and will do. Hell yeah.

My people are spectacular human beings. All of you. And to anyone thinking of moving to Hawaii: if it's really what you want, be prepared to kick some serious ass. Avoid acting like an entitled dickhead; Hawaii has a history, a relatively recent colonial history, and it would behoove you to read up on the actual history of the state we know as Hawaii. I never felt threatened or unwelcome anywhere, but I was challenged occasionally. I welcomed it, and it made me better. I'm a living sign of social privilege, regardless of my own challenges that I face. Be aware of what's been going on, and take it to heart. Avoid thinking you already know everything you need to know about being a good person in a given context.

The three years I spent on Oahu were perfect. I learned a shit-ton, possibly a metric shit-ton. Took opportunities as best I could. Worked my ass off both personally and professionally. Learned a lil bit of pidgin. Swam with fish who were literally eating each other alive. It was exactly where I should have been, until it wasn't. And that's a good thing to figure out; how to measure whether a place and space is working for me or not (and the complimentary part: whether or not I'm working for a place/space is just as important a thing to be able to see and internalize).

Alrighty then, time to get back to life. Or something. Holla atcha boy.

-Nick G.
a.k.a. The Golden Bear
a.k.a. Gibbey
a.k.a. Gibbo
a.k.a. Bigbo
a.k.a. Gibbs
a.k.a. Muthafucka
a.k.a. Haole Boy (thanks Shawn)

Generally Speaking...

I have students in a number of my courses submit reading responses as part of their overall course experience. With permission, I'm posting the text of one assignment from my Social Problems course at UH Manoa this semester. If you read through it, I'm sure you'll see why I'm putting it up for all to see; this kind of work should be shared, not hidden away in the deep recesses of my downloads file.

The topic covered by the text was poverty and homelessness. Check it:

"The problem with welfare as we know it, is we’re so full of shit. Not only do we have rich people who fucking complain about being taxed for having millions of dollars, they also have the damn nerve to say that the government is spending too much “their” money on welfare programs. How fucking greedy and envious do you have to be to think of treating people this way. These clowns never had to spend a day in the damn streets working for a piece of bread. They are in their nice warm luxurious offices complaining about how they don‘t have enough. In fact, we barely spend any money on welfare compared on how much of an income the government receives. The poor that do pay their taxes are returned just a bit of what they are asked to give. And of course the media is covering their fuckery up. And even the people that aren’t piss rich are so confused with all the crap that the media shows them that they believe all these lies that makes them think that the poor are a bunch of lazy, sorry, good for nothing people that try to cheat their way to a “perfect” American dream. Oh and to add a bit of truth to these big fucking lies lets blame it on the minorities as well. They are already known for being a bunch of savage people who like violence and drugs, let’s tell everyone that they are also the ones that use up all the welfare money and don’t pay any back. Matter of fact lets go deeper into this lie and point out the single black teen mothers and call their children “mistakes” that everyone has to pay for. Oh and by the way, Diane Sawyer can eat a bag of rusty nails. Who the fuck gives her the right to judge all mothers? No one knows what these girls have gone through in their lives. Show all the blacks in magazines and TV shows all you want. The truth will always be the truth. Media is a bunch of shit put on the television and paper to fuck with people’s minds. Call them myths all you want, they are all lies. And I don’t give a fuck about what the technical difference is between poverty and homelessness. I could honestly give a rat’s ass. They both mean the same thing: human beings that are struggling in life who need help. Ever seen the homeless here in Honolulu? The other day I bought a man a sandwich and a Gatorade. When I went to give it to him, he threw it back at me. Did I get angry and take it from the ungrateful piece of shit? Of course not, this person is a human being. Their prides aren’t asking for anything, especially not a welfare check. I walked away and returned after about an hour. He had the sandwich in his lap and Gatorade next to him. He could barely accept a free sandwich and people honestly give a fuck about the definitional differences between poverty and homelessness. Something is clearly wrong.  God, how many people are there out there that are like Murray Barr. Decent, loving people whose lives are in a black hole. And this can happen to anyone, in any city, town, state, country. No one ever wishes to live that life. It’s a disease for them. And boy does it cost millions of dollars on housing and medical bills. And surprisingly there aren’t that many of them when you really look at it. Life is not perfect by all means but if we all just chipped in a bit then something could really happen. We all own what we came into this world with and will leave with, our human bodies. Everything else is temporary possession and if you think you’re entitled to everything then you are in for a big surprise the day of your funeral."

See? Brilliant. In my courses, while I do want good scholarship more often than not, these assignments ask for students to reflect on the topics and concepts, and explore their own perceptions and beliefs. One assignment like this is appropriate for this course, given what i ask of them. Seems pretty blogworthy, yeah? And worth all the possible points. Good work, anonymous Social Problems student.

From: http://unwinona.tumblr.com/post/30861660109/i-debated-whether-or-not-to-share-this-story

I debated whether or not to share this story.

And then I debated whether or not to put it on Tumblr…but I decided it was important.  Because in my own way, I can (unfortunately) point out exactly what is wrong with men when they don’t realize how hard it is to be a woman.  How we do not have equal opportunities and freedoms in everyday life.  How most men, even good caring men, have no clue what we go through on a daily basis just trying to live our lives.
So here goes.
I often ride the Metro when I commute from North Hollywood to Long Beach in order to save money.  I bring a book, pointedly wear a ring on my ring finger to imply I’m married (I’m not) and keep to myself.
Without fail, I am aggressively approached by men on at least half of these commutes.  The most common approach is to walk up to where I am sitting with body language that practically screams LEAVE ME ALONE and sit down next to me or as close to me as possible, when the train is not crowded and there are many empty rows.  Sometimes an overly friendly arm is draped over the railing behind me, or they attempt to lean in close to talk to me as if we are old friends.  Without fail, the man or boy in question will lean to close and ask me
What are you reading?
Is that a good book?
What’s that book about?

This serves the double purpose of getting my attention and trapping me in a conversation.  If I stop reading the book I enjoy to talk to you, random stranger, you hit on me or just stay way too close to me.  If I tell you to leave me alone, you get mad at me.  Because I somehow, as a woman, owe you conversation.
Tonight when I boarded the train in Long Beach at 10:30pm, it started up right away.  I was not on the train more than three minutes before three boys who looked eighteen sat in the row behind me and leaned over the seats into my personal space, close enough to breathe on me.  The one with his arm draped over onto the back of my seat asked me—surprise— “what are you reading?”  I went through my usual routine.  I told them loudly and firmly that I wanted to be left alone to read my book.  They got angry.  I was told “Why are you going to be like that?  I just wanted to talk!”  His friends start laughing at me and they don’t move, telling me come on! and why are you gonna be like that? until I tell them to leave me the fuck alone, stand up, and move to the front of the car near the three other people on the train, a couple and a business man in a suit.  They spend the next two stops shouting at me from the back of the car, alternating between trying to sound flirtatious and making fun of me, shouting “I bet she’s reading Stephanie Meyer!  I bet she’s reading Twilight or some shit!  You reading Twilight or some shit?”
They exit the train at the next stop, and I’m relieved.  The train is going out of service at the next station, so we all exit to board a new train to Los Angeles.  As we board, the business man steps aside to let me go through the door first and asks me if those guys were bothering me.  I say yes, that it happens all the time, and he tells he’ll beat them up for me if they come back.  He is a nice person who talks to me like I’m a human being instead of a walking pair of tits, and I make a mental note:  This is how a real man talks to a woman on a train.
The business man and the couple exit our new Blue Line train an exit or so later, and I think my night is ending on a good note.  A seemingly normal man enters the train with his bicycle.  At this point I am three rows from the front of the car, another man was sitting near the back of the car, and the rest of the car is empty.  Bicycle Man walks halfway down the row, and settles into the seat directly opposite me.  Perfect, I think.  Twice in one night.
It’s not the first time I’ve been bothered multiple times.  As such, I’m still amped from the teenagers on the first train.  So when this man leans across the aisle into my personal space and asks me, yes, what are you reading, I assertively but calmly tell him to please leave me alone, I am reading.  The man stands up, moving to the front and muttering angrily over his shoulder that it isn’t his fault I’m pretty.
Yes.  Exactly that.  I am the bad person in this situation because somehow this is all my fault.  I started this by being attractive.  I am making a mental note to bitch about this to my friends later.  I go so far as to write it down so I know I’m remembering it properly.
It is at this exact moment I realize Bicycle Man is not taking it well.  The seemingly annoying but normal man a moment before is now talking to himself, becoming agitated.  In my years of being bothered by total strangers, I have learned how to hold a book and seem to be reading while taking in everything around me.  He is glaring at me, and says out loud in an angry baby talk voice “PLEASELEAVEMEALONEI’MREADING.  PLEASE LEAVE ME ALOOOONE.”
Then he’s up out of his seat and things go from bad to worse.  He begins pacing back and forth in front of his bike, alternating between screaming something about his mother being dead and calling me a slut, a hoe, a bitch.  I am frozen in place.  There is one other person in the car, and I’m not sure if trying to change seats will draw more attention to me or less. I trust my instincts and show no fear, doing my best to appear to be calmly reading my book, never once looking up to acknowledge the abuse he’s hurling at me.  There are four stops left until we reach the main downtown station where there are lights and security officers.  Those four stops are virtually abandoned, and I have no guarantee that leaving to wait for another train won’t motivate him to leave the train as well, leaving us potentially alone at a metro station platform just outside of Compton.  I’m frozen in place, trying to plan what I’m going to do if he decides to take all this rage directly to me.  I’m ready to kick him, scream, make enough noise that he panics and flees.
At this point he’s punching the walls and doors of the train, screaming at me.  He stares me full in the face and screams
SUCK MY DICK, BITCH
YOU BITCH
YOU STUPID BITCH
YOU GODDAMN HO
IF I HAD A GUN I’D SHOOT YOU
I WOULD FUCKING KILL YOU BITCH
This went on for two stops.  No one came to see what was happening.  The man in the last row was as frozen as I was.  I’m not angry he didn’t come to my defense.  He was smaller, older, and frailer-looking than I was.  Again, I was worried if I got up, I would be turning my back on him to walk down the aisle.  In the state he was in, I had no guarantee it wouldn’t get physical, and I had more physical strength with my back to the window and feet in kicking position where I was.  If he had chosen to assault me, I would only be making it easier for him by standing up and putting myself directly in his path.  On and on, over and over, he screamed at me, screamed at his dead mother, screamed at me again.
The moment we reached the downtown station, I was out the door and down the stairs.  I still had to catch a connecting train to North Hollywood, and made sure there was no sign of Bicycle Man before I entered the car.  That’s when I finally starting shaking, and almost threw up.  By the time I exited the Red Line and reached my car I could barely breathe and my heart was pounding out of my chest.  Even now, in my own home, my hands are still shaking and for some reason the stress has made my back muscles feel cold and numb.  From all the tension, I can only assume.  I can’t eat anything, I still feel like I’m going to vomit, and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t cried so much, so hard I still have the headache.
So when people (men) want to talk about “legitimate” forms of assault, tell girls they should be nice to strangers and give men the benefit of a doubt, tell them to consider it a compliment, tell them to ignore the bad behavior of men, I want them to be forced to feel, for even one minute, what it feels like to have so much verbal hatred and physical intimidation thrown at them for nothing more than being female and not wanting to share.
I just wanted to read my book.
It’s not my fault I’m pretty.

This is me again, y'all. I think it's safe to say that everything we say, think, and maintain as 'normal' matters. To everyone, not just someone. The more we (people who both identify and are identified as male) allow for our gender to be categorized as consistently aggressive out of 'necessity', the more we lose out on the opportunities to be good allies. F**k yeah.

An interesting discussion on feminist activism and push-back from the privileged

Hugo Schwyzer discusses the Good Man Project's decision to not publish a column he wrote in response to a post by the project's founder, which inspired a Twitter back-and-forth. The links to the Twitter conversation are available on Schwyzer's blog linked above and some background story which I'll post here: Serious Discussion is not wrath, The Wrath of Feminists, and As Equals and as Friends. The discussion surrounding male privilege and dominance is one we must continue having, especially if the founder of a project aimed at contributing to this discussion is terrified of facing backlash for being an asshole.

I commented on Schwyzer's blog, but here's my take and let me know yours.

This issue, as with other vital social issues like it (racial privilege and anti-racism, gender privilege and gendered understanding, sexuality and human rights) are all centered on choosing to take responsibility. Guilt is only helpful if one feels guilty about things they have specifically done. Responsibility is about taking a stand and taking ownership of something that harms many and privileges others. As a straight white male, I enjoy so much unearned privilege, and at times I do feel guilty for not doing more.

I decide, each day, to take responsibility for making a more equitable and equal society for my community, for my important people, and for myself. This inevitably involves accepting criticism, and I choose to accept it as someone with privilege and social power that I have not explicitly earned through meritorious work. Criticism for me is always helpful, even if it comes with barbs aimed at my ego; especially with barbs aimed at my ego. I appreciate the humility that criticism of my social location provides, and I do not see disagreement with my current viewpoint as an attack. It is an opportunity to become more aware and more responsible.

Fear is powerful, and as a male in a western society, I feel the fear of losing privileges that I have enjoyed; however, that fear is wholly set aside when I envision a future of understanding and true integration of every person, whether previously privileged or not. If I’m not willing to talk about my own life, and if I am not willing to tell my own ego to take a hike, I am not taking responsibility for making equity a goal, and that is unacceptable to me. Talking about how men are victimized is important, but the central concept here is that feminism allows for a critical look at social and societal inequalities of all kinds, and my social location gives me the ability to choose to pay attention, which in itself describes social privilege perfectly.

Not running this piece smells bad. If it doesn’t fit with a brand, that’s capitalism at its finest and completely within the rights of a publisher to decide. Given that, if the mission of a movement is to allow for a ‘lifting up of the rug’ on what we can do to make our communities and society more just, marketing should be the last thing on a publisher’s mind, as should the ego of a man unwilling to accept criticism for his privileged social location.

Update 10/30/13:
Yes, I'm well aware of Schwyzer's meltdown, and subsequent obvious lack of integrity, honesty, and full-hearted bullshittedness. He's a jackass, I'm aware. His work was fairly good; his self-absorbed crap was tough to watch happen, and really lacked much of what many of us yearn for in good faith male feminist leadership. That said, while I do hope he tends to his shitshow in fucking public silence as decency dictates, I hope that those of us who are really working to act as positive forces continue to do so. Fuck his bullshit; I'm still going to advocate for us guys with shit-tons of privilege using that privilege as leverage against the, "we don't need feminism anymore." And those of you saying crap like, "feminism is a mistake, let the good times roll," up yours. You're full of it, and you know it.

Aime Cesaire's Discourse on Colonialism

Sorry it's been a little while, if anyone was thinking, "ya know, that Street Philosopher dude hasn't posted anything in a while. Wonder if he's alive?" The answer would be alive-ish. Loving the life here in Hawaii, although I'm still workin' out some of my time management. I did get to do dinner last night with my dad, cousin, her hubbs and their friends which was a great relief from the everyday.

Here's a shorty I wrote on the above titled work for Social Stratification. Hope it actually makes some sense...I wasn't sleeping and was hopped up on caffeine. Enjoy if you will.

SOC 754, Social Stratification

Due: 11/4/10

Critical Evaluation for: Discourse on Colonialism

            Cesaire pulls no symbolic punches in Discourse, and weaves a compelling narrative of what it means to colonize. Not necessarily a narrative in the simple sense of a story from beginning to end, but in a context-heavy and consequence focused description. The main concepts derive from an anti-colonial viewpoint, and seem simple enough:

• The act of colonizing[1] dehumanizes the colonizers just as much if not more so than the colonized, and;
• Colonialism holds within itself the destruction of the colonized world at both the point of colonization and the origination.

            Here we have a wonderful opportunity to examine the effects of colonialism on the institution of governance and social control. To visit the first concept, as colonial powers institute rule over peoples that were previously free of colonial rule, there is always a backlash against the colonialism in some way. More often than not, this backlash is necessarily violent and easily understood by the colonizing power as the actions of uncivilized lunacy. This easy categorization of non-European peoples[2] as uncivilized, which includes undeveloped both technologically and politically from the colonizing point of view, allows for a forceful ‘civilizing’ to be undertaken. Languages are un-taught and the colonizing language is substituted in the example of the Native Americans’ ‘re-education’ otherwise known as the ‘save the native’ campaign in early United States history. Familial organization is reorganized to resemble the colonizing ideology of family and community as we can see within the Christianized Samoa and familial values undergoing a massive shift to unquestionable male domination. Land and the means of personal and cultural subsistence are appropriated to assume the appearance, or more subtly the feel, of the original socio-physical place of the colonizing force as we might observe in the constructed forts and surrounding townships in Africa and the Europeanization of the social and political landscape there.[3] Because such serious steps to ‘civilize’ the peoples of colonized places were deemed necessary, it is not a far logical jump to then assume that the resistance whether violent or otherwise is obviously lacking in foresight and proper temperament. Ethnocentricity and blatant racism aside, to forcibly adapt someone to another culture would seem unconscionable if perpetrated against the colonizing force; however, the colonizers excuse their lack of compassion and self-respect, and overabundance of violent oppression as necessary steps in what they might describe as the objectively right direction. An inference to our current militaristic occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan is easily bridged.[4] The colonized will fight, and simple answers to the deep philosophical questions of what liberation and progress mean are inadequate when accounting for the social realities of other peoples.

            So, we can see that relatively contemporary documentation to support the theory of the brutality and dehumanization of colonialism is well within reach, as are historical parallels. Cesaire draws upon the history of the Roman Empire and its downfall from both external forces of attack and rebellion from within. The symbiotic relationships of neighboring peoples is described deftly, as are the repercussions of enveloping others in order to assume control of a people different from the crusading colonizing force. As the colonial empire grows; as the people who are colonized are forcibly removed from their own culture and communal spirit; as biting hunger for further expansion escalates within the colonial force; so too does the danger of revolt from within the colony and without. Protecting interests not yet appropriated for the use of the colonizers would hold as much validity as reclaiming a colonized home. If there are only those within and without, instead of a cacophony of cultures, civilizations and peoples, we are left with the idea of ‘us’ and ‘them’ instantly creating the divisive and fear-inspiring totality within the binary language of colonial rights and responsibilities.[5] Cesaire is also adept at pointing out the inherent dangers of nationalism substituting for collective organization and identity as a colonized population. While the colonized peoples may break free of the direct control of colonial rule, he argues that care must be taken to avoid settling in within the institutional structures left behind by a defeated colonial occupation. This is not only an interesting philosophical point, it is also practical if we think of the effects of living within a rigid system of right and wrong, or proper and improper for an indefinite amount of time and awakening to find that some form of social cohesion and direction must be found.

            Cesaire’s only weakness that I perceived was his dual recognition of the bourgeoisie as both negligent controlling class and potential saving grace of the proletariat. I would agree that if a shift in bourgeois consciousness regarding the malformation of colonial intent were to occur, the bourgeois could in fact play a vital role in the art of reorganizing a more equitable societal foundation and structure. Conversely, I would argue that it might seem impractical for a class of people, who benefit both directly and indirectly from the social and cultural enslavement of a perceived lower class of people, to do anything to change the fundamental nature of the system supporting their comfort. To say that it might or should be the underlying foundation of a truly civilized society to never accept such audacious colonial abuses I think would be appropriate. Thinking that it might one day be more than likely I would posit is a stretch. This would require an awakening from comfort such that has not really been seen in contemporary history, and I think it is safe to say neither is there evidence of such an awakening occurring in a significant historical context. That said, there is no reason not to fight for such a monumental call for equity, sustainability, and from what I can see, global survival.

---

[1] And the subsequent acts of barbarism as described by Cesaire.

[2] In this case, European colonialism is the current colonizing power under literary scrutiny, and in contemporary effect.

[3] Including masterfully organized and socially reinforced apartheid and racially motivated brutality.

[4] Invade country, enable corporate development projects and force a specific style of governmental rule on the people of the country, continue to eradicate dissenting voices; this sounds like colonization to me. Couldn’t we have done with a black-book operation to remove an oppressive regime instead of resorting to poorly excused slaughter?

[5] I recognize that I wrote this in a style similar to Cesaire, however I must say that it seems quite effective. I promise my work is still my own.

The Demonization of Women for the sake of Capitalism

I posted the first draft of a paper for my social stratification course a few days ago, and here's the final product pre-submission. Over the last couple of weeks we read Silvia Federici's Caliban and the Witch: Women the Body and Primitive Accumulation. I'm posting it in the hopes that maybe I'll get some feedback or start a conversation or few. Here goes:

SOC 754, Social Stratification

Due: 9/30/10

Critical Evaluation for: Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation

            Silvia Federici paints a very clear picture of the intimate connections between capitalism, imperialist expansion and the witch hunts. What seems to stand out is her focus on what we have discussed as an accumulation of differences. This accumulation stems from a systematic devaluation and demonization of women, and a simultaneous twisting of female sexuality, access to community through healing and social organization, as well as a merging of religious ideology and centralized state control. This process, which could seem overly complicated to protectors of capitalism, is thoroughly explained and organized in Caliban. Class warfare was eventually won using gender genocide and political control of sexuality and social understanding of what it means to be human.[1] The historical timeline investigated in both Caliban and The Origin of Capitalism is the same, yet I felt more compelled to sink into Federici’s exploration of the devaluation and subsequent demonization of women as a gender.[2]

            At a time when feudal communities were transitioning into state-sanctioned privatized business opportunities for landowners, the working and farming classes were organizing grassroots struggles against the expropriation of workers, and fighting the loss of their previously natural rights of land ownership. This wasn’t just a political move; this was taking the right to survive under one’s own power away from an entire population of people in one broad, long-term swipe. Women organized these rebellious movements extremely effectively, and did so many times over. However, as privatization of access to the ownership of the means of production occurred, so did the understanding of what people were worth. Community was slowly becoming less of a lifestyle and more of a place. The physical body, as it could be understood, was transitioning from just a part of existence to an existential thing to be understood and examined. Popular philosophers of the time began to draw conclusions based on the needs of the bourgeois and the ruling classes to control what was becoming the proletariat.

This proletarianization was accompanied by Federici’s accumulation of differences between the sexes, as women were being devalued for the work they did as healers, mothers, community organizers, and protectors of knowledge, and were turned into naturally evil beings. Primarily, the idea of work was becoming more and more associated with a wage-earning place within the market system, and what became known as “women’s work” was not involved in the creation of a market-demanded labor product.[3] This goes against all humanity and logic along with it, but control was necessary if the upper classes and landowners were to cement their place at the top of the social food chain. While this did coincide with the ruling classes’ need to control the production of a work force, it also coincided with a dehumanization of all women, no matter their class. The loss of the midwife as a social norm and their replacement by male doctors resulted in male control of reproduction, thus the vilification of midwives and healers. Healing was one of the first roles that women played in their community that was propagandized as witchcraft. Two main themes here are state institutionalization of religious rhetoric regarding morality (i.e. the devil), and philosophical dissemination of the idea that the body is just a physical tool with impulses; the mind should ‘refine’ the body’s ‘ill nature’. During this social and institutional process, any and all women could be suspect of communing with the devil in order to batter, de-masculinize and undermine the male society.[4]

Sexuality was identified by the great philosophers of the time as a bodily urge that was unclean in both spirit and practice. Women had already been assigned a worth as lesser yet more evil beings at the mercy of the devil, and were now thought to lack the intrinsic ability to reach the bourgeois mind/body equilibrium. The bourgeois ‘lady’[5] came to symbolize womanhood. In other words, strong femininity was sinful, and against the ‘natural order’ of things.[6] By criminalizing witchcraft,[7] the physical and social bodies of women were illegalized.

Federici’s theory highlights the impact of the accumulation of differences between men and women at a societal level. This interpretation of primitive accumulation begs a discussion of the process of elite classes exerting influence over social relations and social structure.  Widely disseminated propagandized ideologies and ground-level genocidal efforts can be ultimately effective in the implementation of capitalist social stratification. Differences included: inherent trustworthiness or the opposite, sanity, righteousness, clean or manipulative sexuality, knowledge collection and production, ability to reason; these all contributed to the transition of women from community leaders to slave class. In today’s world, I see the effects of witch-hunting everywhere that capitalism has reached. Namely, the implicit assumptions still surrounding the concept of ‘women’s work’, the still lurking idea of natural feminine insanity[8], the mainstream assumption that women deserve to be raped, the list goes on. The capitalistic notion of ownership of the means of (re)production[9] has relegated women to a position of defense, and it is the perpetual defense of the self on an institutional level that masculinity has never had to endure in the same way.

---

[1] The physical body was now becoming just a tool of production, for a wage and usually for someone else’s profit.

[2] Unlike Wood, which was a fairly good snapshot of the rise of Capitalism on a global scale from the hills of England and France, I felt like Federici made this text engaging in a very different way.

[3] I have to say that this is really outrageous, given that women were literally giving birth to the workforce.

[4] That the church placed man at the head of all social institutions is telling, in that religious idols were historically feminine and rarely masculine in vision. Witchcraft’s mother goddess was very challenging to the church and the state as complicit conspirators in the social upheaval of the ‘transition’ to capitalism.

[5] Meaning quiet, housebound, mannered and subservient to male authority.

[6] So, following Descartes’ logic, the natural order of things is dirty and to be controlled, yet we should ‘naturally’ assume that women are supposed to be subservient to men…the more I read about how this happened the more I want to call it collective insanity.

[7] The practices of witchcraft equalized men and women intrinsically, and didn’t need a separation of social power to begin with.

[8] I would argue that we’re all nuts.

[9] An infuriating political battle in play now.

What if the Tea Partiers Were Black...

Tim Wise is among the most prominent anti-racist writers and activists in the U.S. Wise has spoken in 48 states, on over 400 college campuses, and to community groups around the nation. Wise has provided anti-racism training to teachers nationwide, and has trained physicians and medical industry professionals on how to combat racial inequities in health care. His latest book is called Between Barack and a Hard Place.

"Imagine if the Tea Party Was Black" - Tim Wise

Let’s play a game, shall we? The name of the game is called “Imagine.” The way it’s played is simple: we’ll envision recent happenings in the news, but then change them up a bit. Instead of envisioning white people as the main actors in the scenes we’ll conjure - the ones who are driving the action - we’ll envision black folks or other people of color instead. The object of the game is to imagine the public reaction to the events or incidents, if the main actors were of color, rather than white. Whoever gains the most insight into the workings of race in America, at the end of the game, wins.

So let’s begin.

Imagine that hundreds of black protesters were to descend upon Washington DC and Northern Virginia, just a few miles from the Capitol and White House, armed with AK-47s, assorted handguns, and ammunition. And imagine that some of these protesters —the black protesters — spoke of the need for political revolution, and possibly even armed conflict in the event that laws they didn’t like were enforced by the government? Would these protester — these black protesters with guns — be seen as brave defenders of the Second Amendment, or would they be viewed by most whites as a danger to the republic? What if they were Arab-Americans? Because, after all, that’s what happened recently when white gun enthusiasts descended upon the nation’s capital, arms in hand, and verbally announced their readiness to make war on the country’s political leaders if the need arose.

Imagine that white members of Congress, while walking to work, were surrounded by thousands of angry black people, one of whom proceeded to spit on one of those congressmen for not voting the way the black demonstrators desired. Would the protesters be seen as merely patriotic Americans voicing their opinions, or as an angry, potentially violent, and even insurrectionary mob? After all, this is what white Tea Party protesters did recently in Washington.

Imagine that a rap artist were to say, in reference to a white president: “He’s a piece of shit and I told him to suck on my machine gun.” Because that’s what rocker Ted Nugent said recently about President Obama.

Imagine that a prominent mainstream black political commentator had long employed an overt bigot as Executive Director of his organization, and that this bigot regularly participated in black separatist conferences, and once assaulted a white person while calling them by a racial slur. When that prominent black commentator and his sister — who also works for the organization — defended the bigot as a good guy who was misunderstood and “going through a tough time in his life” would anyone accept their excuse-making? Would that commentator still have a place on a mainstream network? Because that’s what happened in the real world, when Pat Buchanan employed as Executive Director of his group, America’s Cause, a blatant racist who did all these things, or at least their white equivalents: attending white separatist conferences and attacking a black woman while calling her the n-word.

Imagine that a black radio host were to suggest that the only way to get promoted in the administration of a white president is by “hating black people,” or that a prominent white person had only endorsed a white presidential candidate as an act of racial bonding, or blamed a white president for a fight on a school bus in which a black kid was jumped by two white kids, or said that he wouldn’t want to kill all conservatives, but rather, would like to leave just enough—“living fossils” as he called them—“so we will never forget what these people stood for.” After all, these are things that Rush Limbaugh has said, about Barack Obama’s administration, Colin Powell’s endorsement of Barack Obama, a fight on a school bus in Belleville, Illinois in which two black kids beat up a white kid, and about liberals, generally.

Imagine that a black pastor, formerly a member of the U.S. military, were to declare, as part of his opposition to a white president’s policies, that he was ready to “suit up, get my gun, go to Washington, and do what they trained me to do.” This is, after all, what Pastor Stan Craig said recently at a Tea Party rally in Greenville, South Carolina.

Imagine a black radio talk show host gleefully predicting a revolution by people of color if the government continues to be dominated by the rich white men who have been “destroying” the country, or if said radio personality were to call Christians or Jews non-humans, or say that when it came to conservatives, the best solution would be to “hang ‘em high.” And what would happen to any congressional representative who praised that commentator for “speaking common sense” and likened his hate talk to “American values?” After all, those are among the things said by radio host and best-selling author Michael Savage, predicting white revolution in the face of multiculturalism, or said by Savage about Muslims and liberals, respectively. And it was Congressman Culbertson, from Texas, who praised Savage in that way, despite his hateful rhetoric.

Imagine a black political commentator suggesting that the only thing the guy who flew his plane into the Austin, Texas IRS building did wrong was not blowing up Fox News instead. This is, after all, what Anne Coulter said about Tim McVeigh, when she noted that his only mistake was not blowing up the New York Times.

Imagine that a popular black liberal website posted comments about the daughter of a white president, calling her “typical redneck trash,” or a “whore” whose mother entertains her by “making monkey sounds.” After all that’s comparable to what conservatives posted about Malia Obama on freerepublic.com last year, when they referred to her as “ghetto trash.”

Imagine that black protesters at a large political rally were walking around with signs calling for the lynching of their congressional enemies. Because that’s what white conservatives did last year, in reference to Democratic party leaders in Congress.

In other words, imagine that even one-third of the anger and vitriol currently being hurled at President Obama, by folks who are almost exclusively white, were being aimed, instead, at a white president, by people of color. How many whites viewing the anger, the hatred, the contempt for that white president would then wax eloquent about free speech, and the glories of democracy? And how many would be calling for further crackdowns on thuggish behavior, and investigations into the radical agendas of those same people of color?

To ask any of these questions is to answer them. Protest is only seen as fundamentally American when those who have long had the luxury of seeing themselves as prototypically American engage in it. When the dangerous and dark “other” does so, however, it isn’t viewed as normal or natural, let alone patriotic. Which is why Rush Limbaugh could say, this past week, that the Tea Parties are the first time since the Civil War that ordinary, common Americans stood up for their rights: a statement that erases the normalcy and “American-ness” of blacks in the civil rights struggle, not to mention women in the fight for suffrage and equality, working people in the fight for better working conditions, and LGBT folks as they struggle to be treated as full and equal human beings.

And this, my friends, is what white privilege is all about. The ability to threaten others, to engage in violent and incendiary rhetoric without consequence, to be viewed as patriotic and normal no matter what you do, and never to be feared and despised as people of color would be, if they tried to get away with half the shit we do, on a daily basis.

Game Over.