Just because you can see a trend doesn't give you the right to stereotype an entire ethnicity because you can see a "trend".
Finding a trend is not a proof that there are not lots of people who defy the stereotype. You can find a trend in anything you want to. Everything is a hammer once you're the nail. I don't buy the logic here that a trend is a proof of something true within all people. I think it's dangerous to give that sort of leeway to your own morale compass. Your brain is wired to find connections and patterns, and that is why we all should be vigil about being lazy and falling into stereotypes.
The worst part of it is that it seems to take very few bad anecdotal personal experiences for someones biased perception to be formed.
To stereotype someone based on the pigmentation of their skin is to be unable to see that person as a individual, but only as part of a threatening whole.
If a person cannot be a person before being this or that due to the way they look, then that person is reduced. This is exactly the sort of plight that has plauged (and continue to) minorities in the western world.
In Europe we have intense racism aganst a minority group refered to as Gypsies- A indo-european wandering group of people who exist in most european nation states (since the 12th century). These people to this day, are prosecuted and surpressed like cattle, as they are perceived to be thiefs, beggars and criminals.
Even though they are white, they don't share the spoils of how you categorize being white in America. In western and northern europe we have a lot of racism towards people of slavic descent- That would be our equivelant of "mexicans taking our jobs". Bulgarians, Polish, Romanians and Ukrainians in particularly are unwelcome and met with hostility and racism many places- These people are not seen as white people.
Something which also extends to many europeans hostile appropriation of kurds, turks, persians, greeks and jews (on both the left and the right, and among radical european people of middle eastern descent).
In my mind, the categorization is insane and doesn't make sense. We all agree that its a made up construct that is made to keep darker-skinned people from sharing the benefits, but the mantle just doesn't add up on a considerable amount of people. Not even getting into mixed race people, who don't know if they are a white or a POC.
In majority held white nations, whites benefit- But I'd argue that whites benefiting is not so much a cause of "white privilege" but if tribal favorism. Because if you look anywhere on earth, you see the same thing. It sucks being a minority in Japan, China, Myanmar, Turkey- It doesn't matter where you are. The majority has the power, and they use that power to continue keeping power and hold minorities back. This has been true as long as we have had nation states, and it's one of the core principles of anarchism that tries to undo these power structures, so all wealth and power can redistributed freely between all people.
But you're wording this like this is a white problem that predominately exist in a white vacuum. It's indeed true that many things are easier for white people in the western world, but things are easier for the native population anywhere on earth.
At the end of the day, if the african nations had been the ones to have superior military might and power, it would have been white people who would have been enslaved for centuries, and to this day would live in the aftermath.
An aftermath you also benefit from. By paying your taxes and being a consumer, you inadvertently oppress and take part in exploitation of millions of people around the world who live in countries that have been utterly fucked, destroyed and sabotaged by US and EU interests. These are the people who make our electronics and clothes, and who've we still, to this day, exploit for cheap labor and resources.
All these people also live their faiths at the end of our boots because their ancestors got trumped by EU and US powers. Every powerful country today is standing on top of a burial ground of defeated people. It's kill or be killed, and every powerful nation on earth can thank its power and wealth to the oppression of others. There is no exception, virtually anywhere.
The only thing we can conclude from history is that people are all the same all over.
Thats the thing though, the concept of whiteness is nebulous at best. It's complete nonsense that is born out of having a lack of identity. It's born out of a need to explain how special the colonists with their white mans burden bullshit operating selves sought to change the world.
Nowadays we have articles like this as a result
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/12/are-jews-white/509453/
Whiteness is a desperate attempt to hold on to power. A social power that only exists if all things black are held in contempt. It's an attempt to justify a complete lack of history.
"The concept of the "n-word" was invented as a way of projecting onto the black man what the "white man" hated.
In America, Blackness and Whiteness are two halves of a culture that didnt exist. A culture formed for forgoing all sense of identity from their motherlands. Thus American culture is effectively a hybrid culture.
The idea of whiteness is at its best, a weak justification for the identity crisis of those with no nation.
That's why in popular culture we have the phenomenon of "wanting to be black" but not actually really wanting to experience it.
The irony is white supremacy is a double edged sword. It hoards prosperity for those who fight in its name, but those very same people are not allowed to know what love looks like. Only hate, and eventually that hate becomes the only thing they can see in the mirror.
That and the fear they created.
you don't think saying that all white people are racially violent and that their entire existence is drenched in racism qualifies?
I absolutely agree with her post firing statement but the comments made that got her fired are whats been driving this thread.
You really don't want to or know how to engage in a discussion, do you?
Did you read the OP? That's the reason L'Oreal parted ways with her:
"Honestly I don't have energy to talk about the racial violence of white people any more. Yes ALL white people"
Either way, just going by this thread alone she has done a huge disservice to her very valid cause with her initial statement. If you want to fight systematic discrimination, you would want to get as many people behind that cause as possible, not alienate people by making wild accusations. Through her position at L'Oreal she could've even had a larger audience to direct attention to these issues, but instead this happened now.
I'm sorry but you ARE aware that "racial violence" doesnt just refer to hate crimes, lynchings, KKK riots and threatening people... right?
Socioeconomic warfare also falls under racial violence. Which frankly she is right, society loves its class warfare. In a fundamentally racist society her making a hyperbolic statement when a large part of the institutions are created to not only segregate and impoverish people who frankly dont look like you is sickening. Please dont be ignorant of how people you are related to are either complicit or directly involved here.
Ever had a racist teacher? They'll go lengths to screw with people.
Speaking of "screwing with people"
The US Government literally bombed a city of wealthy black citizens(Tulsa), burned down a village of black people and turned it into Central Park(new York), propagated race riots all over the place, sicced the FBI on half of the people involved in the civil rights movement ( and demolished The Black Panther) .Chicago is so segregated even today because bankers decided they'd make a bit of cash over fucking over people who look like me. That happened all over this country in the US. The US is barely 250 years old.
You can try and act like the US is some special snowflake when it comes to how blatantly racist people are here...
But this ideology started in Europe.
Once you accept that, perhaps we can move forward.
Colonialism did indeed drench the world in racism.
You can no longer afford to maintain some guise of innocence here.
I'm gonna keep posting this until y'all actually read it. It's a very good article
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/aug/08/unlearning-the-myth-of-american-innocence