Ruminations on Racism and Racist Speech

I found out about Blog Against Racism Day via Monica Jackson (her contribution can be found here, but I’m not going to touch THAT particular topic with a ten-foot pole). Anyway, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about racism and racist speech and racist intent, none of these thoughts being particularly organized, but you regulars are used to me kind of rambling ‘round and ‘round the point instead of addressing it directly, right? I hope so, because this entry is really rambly.

So here’s my first thought about racism:

Not all racists are evil people, though racist acts are always evil. I also think one does not have to perpetrate racist acts to be a racist; racism is an attitude.

Racism has become a very charged word—accuse somebody of it and images of flaming crosses and lynchings come to mind. Those images aren’t unwarranted, but I think a lot of nuance is also lost. There are racists, and there are racists. It’d be nice if race weren’t an issue, but then it’d also be nice if gender, sexual orientation, social and economic class and religious beliefs (or non-beliefs, as the case may be) weren’t targets for discrimination, either. People are people, and people, for whatever reason, seem to enjoy pissing on others who are different from them in whatever way. I have observed, though, that people who identify themselves as, say, feminist and queer-friendly are also much less likely to be racist, while racists tend to be anti-feminist and homophobic.

My parents are racist. They’re not bad people. Some of my siblings are racist, which they undoubtedly picked up in part from my parents, and some of them aren’t. I like to think I’m not racist, but I also know I’m not the best judge of myself. (I do freely acknowledge that I harbor prejudices, but near as I can tell, none of them have anything to do with race—my bigotry tends to be belief-based, e.g., if you believe Intelligent Design is scientific or that gay people should never be allowed to marry, I’m going to think you’re a moron and/or an asshole, no matter what else you say or do. This goes double if you like Celine Dion or Richard Marx, because I refuse to believe anybody who loves Richard Marx has a soul. Je refuse.)

My parents said racist things and were deeply, deeply uncomfortable when my best friend in middle school was a Malay girl. However, they only ever expressed their displeasure to me and never in any way indicated to my friend that they were less than pleased that we were close. Similarly, they blew a gasket when my sister dated a Kenyan guy in college, but they were courteous when they met him—in fact, my mom was kind of pissed when they broke up because HE WAS GOING TO BE A LAWYER, DAMMIT, and bless her practical Chinese soul, the status and salary more than made up for everything else, up to and including his coal-black skin.

Oops, did I just make a racist comment about my mom? I guess so, but a lot of Chinese people, especially those who live in South-East Asia will tell you: a lot of those jokes about kiasu, mercenary Chinese people hold true. I know it does for a lot of members of my family, and I have to actively repress some of my own kiasu tendencies because I was brought up to be insanely competitive.

Maybe I’m culturalist, not racist? Because I don’t think race determines these attitudes or attributes. I don’t think us chinkies are inherently better at math and the sciences than other races, for example—but I do think that the high value our culture places on education, especially education with high perceived status and extensive practical applications like engineering and medicine, encourages kids to excel in these fields. My mom never got a fair shot at an education—it’s tough to be born a girl in a shitty-poor Chinese ghetto in the late 1930s in Malaysia—and it really burned her ass, which is why she ragged on all of us kids to do well in school.

And oooh, look, I used the word “chink”! I must be racist. And so was a friend of mine when I was telling him about a racist incident at work and he replied with “Goddamn you brown people! You’re taking over America! We need to kick your asses out and make it ours again. It’s time for the round-eye to rule supreme!”

People. It’s known as irony. It’s supposed to poke fun at racist people by caricaturizing them. It takes away some of their power if we’re able to look at them square in the eye and say “You’re ridiculous, the words you use are ridiculous, and we’re going to laugh at you and refuse to let you hurt us. Oh, and the Jews DO run the mass media and the banks, and they ARE out to get you.”

On the other hand, east Asians have had an easier time with assimilation than black people here in the States, plus our history here in the US isn’t quite as traumatic or long-lived, which is probably why the n-word still has the ability to make me flinch.

Two questions:

1. Is it racist if it’s true?

2. Is it racist if it’s employed for the sake of comedy and/or irony?

Shameless relativist that I am, I say: it all depends. Context is important. Racist speech can be used without racist intent—in fact, quite the opposite.

I have to admit that item 1 stymies me, though. You can make claims that are scientific and empirical (e.g. that a certain race tends to score higher or lower in certain areas of study) and then draw racist conclusions that aren’t necessarily supported by the data (that this proves a certain race somehow has superior or inferior reasoning abilities, etc.) which then go on to support racist actions (denying somebody a job, for example, just because you’re convinced that on average, somebody of a certain race is going to do poorly at a certain kind of task). So the latter two are most definitely racist, but is the first racist, too? Hell if I know. What do you think?

For the record, the John McPherson cartoon that got Chris Clarke’s panties in a twist and Sarah Silverman’s chink joke? I don’t think either are racist. The McPherson cartoon is painfully unfunny and depends on inaccurate depictions of cannibals and cannibalism for its joke, but hell, Hagar the Horrible is still running and I don’t hear people boo-hooing about what a travesty to Scandinavian culture that strip is. Dude. It’s a COMIC STRIP. Clarke’s objection seems to be that the cannibals are brown people. My question is: if you want to make fun of cannibals, would making them white make ANY kind of sense? Because really, how many white cultures engaged in ritual cannibalism up until the 20th century? I can’t think of any.

Or is Clarke especially sensitive to misrepresentations of cannibals in comic strips? I admit: I don’t get it. I really don’t. The strip is unfunny, but I don’t get the racist component.

And I thought Silverman’s chink joke was awesomely funny. In my opinion, it pokes fun at people who are desperate to get out of jury duty, if anything, and it strikes me that the people who’d cry “Racist!” at that joke would also be the kind who whine about the use of “niggardly.” But I have to say, the messenger matters just as much as the message. If the joke had been made by, say, the mother of the Gaede twins, that would’ve given the joke a truly unsavory spin.

Man, this was even more unfocused and rambly than usual. My apologies. But these thoughts have been percolating in my head for a few days, and I’m glad to get them out. Hopefully discussing this with you guys in the comments will help me solidify some positions while discarding others as untenable.

I have some other thoughts about non-white protagonists in genre fiction in general and romance novels in particular that also has some bearing to racism, but they’re far too amorphous for me to express at the moment.

So everybody: Happy Blogging Against Racism Day!

Categorized:

Random Musings

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  1. Monica says:

    After Blog for Racism day, I put up a blog,

    for white people who have considered homicide when the rainbow (racism talk) is enuf.
    http://monicajackson.com/2005/12/03/for-white-people-who-have-considered-homicide-when-the-rainbow-racism-talk-is-enuf/

    I figured y’all might need an intervention or something.

  2. Really interesting discussion going on here. Also really enjoyed looking at some of the other links that people have put up. Anyhow, a few thoughts have been nibbling away at my mind while reading.

    It’s been noted here that if (for example) someone tells a joke based on a racial stereotype and it’s done with the intention of demeaning people of that race, this is a problem, but if it’s done with humorous or good intentions, it may be crass, but it’s not such a problem.

    I do agree with this in principle. It is important to give people the benefit of a doubt. Often knee-jerk accusations of racism (or any other -ism you might find) are less-than-helpful at resolving problems. But I’m also wary of globally excusing attitudes or statements on the grounds of good intentions and leaving it at that. Good intentions need to be coupled with reflection.

    Since the comments in this forum have all shown this kind of reflection, this seems to be taken as a given requirement here. Therefore this is in no way intended to be a criticism of any of the comments or attitudes expressed so far. But I think the need for analysis is worth stressing. To make the point, I’m going to use examples that are extreme. Please note that I am in no way comparing someone who makes or laughs at what might called racist joke to a card-carrying member of the KKK. Of course, all this kind of behaviour falls into a continuum and many other considerations must be taken into account, but this kind of reaction is exactly the reason why people on all sides of the argument need to take a step back and examine things on a case-by-case basis.

    From what I’ve read of the Gaedes’ ideology and the BNP’s manifesto, contemporary white racist ideology is often justified as being “for the best for everyone.” Similarly, from a historical point of view, good intentions have been used justify ignoble practices.

    Take the example of the most notorious example of institutionalised racism: plantation slavery in the Americas. Its supporters generated a wealth of theoretical rationalisation for the institution, often centred around the notion that it was ultimately for the benefit of all.* This sort of evidence is tricky to evaluate. Even if Mr. Whyte-Planter upon waking did immediately think, “Another beautiful day. Must do my bit for the glory of the triangle trade and cynically convince a few more folk today that black people are sub-human and the target of God’s righteous wrath,” he was unlikely to write this explicitly in his diary or other correspondance.

    It is possible to argue that all of these arguments are conscious cynical justification. However, I’d note that although this might have been the case at times, many people don’t reflect too deeply on social practices and customs which support the status quo. This is particularly true when “higher” rationalisations (religious or ideological) are factored in. Of course, this blindness is usually in their own self-interest, but it’s hard to evaluate just how cynical and willful this blindess is.

    Both then and (less so) now, people were raised and lived their whole lives without deeply examining their own assumptions about many cultural practices including ideas about race and society. These days, there are far more opportunities to examine our preconceptions and we should take advantage of any opportunity to do so. Not doing so is the real problem.

    Finally, on the subject of humour making the point better than any essay: http://www.blackpeopleloveus.com/

    *Big bit about these arguments edited out to stop Candy from killing me for hogging the comments space. But it is interesting. Really. So was the stuff about the phenomenon of racism throughout history. Genius, of course, but again, lost in the mists of cyberspace.

  3. Chris Clarke says:

    A very interesting post!

    For the record, as the person who you describe as “getting his panties in a wad” over the cartoon, well, let me put it this way. I’ve done enough anthropological study to know that most of the descriptions of cannibalism in the old literature are very suspect. Historicallly, cannibalism was exactly as prevalent among light-skinned peoples (Caucasians and Northern Asians) as dark-skinned, which is to say, extremely rare.

    That’s certainly not to say that there were no dark-skinned cannibals. The Fore, in New Guinea, are a handy example of people with darkish skin who ate human flesh. But it’s the stereotype that’s the problem. The joke would have been just as funny – which is to say, not very – if he’d used the Donner Party or Jeffrey Dahmer or a fictional character like Hannibal Lecter to make his point.

    But going with the dark-skinned people – especially with the bone in the nose thing, which is a classic racist stereotype – was just clumsy and wrong.

  4. Candy says:

    Hey Chris,

    Thanks for posting. Here’s the thing: I got the impression that McPherson was referring to people who practice ritual cannibalism (which is not what most people thin it is, either), not people who cannibalize out of starvation or psychopathy. In which case, can you think of any light-skinned cultures that practiced as much?

    And yes, the bone through the nose was silly—and very likely inaccurate. I would like to know if you feel an equal degree of ire for Hagar the Horrible, which presents historical Vikings as being dirty, stupid and wearing horned helmets (which, near as I can understand it, is something they’ve never done) AND A DUCK NAMED KVACK, for all that’s holy. Would you argue that Hagar is racist as well?

  5. Chris Clarke says:

    In which case, can you think of any light-skinned cultures that practiced as much?

    Well, both the Scythians and the Mongols have been so described. (I recognize that not everyone would describe Central Asians such as the Mongols as light-skinned, but I tend to.)

    Would you argue that Hagar is racist as well?

    Well, not so much racist as culturally insensitive. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were Norwegians who hated the comic, and I wouldn’t blame them a bit.

    Similarly, many Irish folks of my acquaintance loathe cartoon portrayals of leprechauns and such. I have been corrected rather tartly in my past for referring to police awagons as “paddy wagons” by people of irish descent who object to the stereootype of cops as Irish, even though it’s about a century out of date.

    But here’s the thing: in present-day North America, people of Norwegian or Irish extraction are not systematically kept down because of their ancestry, and so such stereotypes – while perhaps equally offensive in the abstract – do less damage on a day to day basis. Meanwhile, there are people actively promulgating the “bone-in-the-nose savage” stereotype to describe my fellow Americans in a pejorative way: just look at some of what the right blogosphere said about the victims of Katrina! So that’s where I spend my energy, because that’s where it’ll do the most good.

  6. Candy says:

    I’d disagree about Mongols being light-skinned, but then I had no idea they’d engaged in ritual cannibalism. The Internet: It teaches me something new every day!

    I do agree about the relative harm done by negative stereotypes of black people vs. the stereotypes of white people. I’m not sure I’ve seen too many nasty comments made likening black victims of Katrina to pejorative tribal stereotypes; the ones I saw mostly dealt with more modern takes involving welfare queens, Those Evil Looting Black People, etc. But I am willing to admit that a) my blog rounds are hardly comprehensive, and b) people say a lot of stupid, nasty shit, and I wouldn’t be too surprised to learn about a whole other layer of hate on top of the existing fucktardery that surrounds the Katrina situation.

    I’m interested in hearing your opinion on the difference between racism and cultural insensitivity, since in my opinion, what was depicted in the McPherson cartoon is no better and no worse than what’s presented day in and day out on Hagar the Horrible.

    I do think the portrayal of the cartoon is a lot more nuanced than you seem to view it, because as Saraswathi pointed out, that’s a pretty sophisticated toy for supposed primitives to be playing with.

  7. Murphy says:

    Ah, to have such reasoned, intelligent comments on my blog! (“Partially True Tales of High Adventure” featuring “Saving Sarah Silverman” that you link to here.)

    For some odd reason, everyone who found my site via yours uses the most painful, non-ironic (is that a word?), hatful forms of racist speech I’ve ever heard. It seems that the central complaint with Sarah’s joke isn’t that it’s racist… it’s that she chose the wrong race as the punchline.

    Lovely blog! Continued goodness!

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