Mocking Black Names in Covina: How “Liberal” are Our Youth?
by Guest Contributor Joe R. Feagin, originally published at Racism Review
There seems to be no end to mocking of the language and speech of people of color by whites. A Los Angeles Times article recounts some mocking of the names of black high school students, likely from a white high school student:
Administrators at Charter Oak High School in Covina are investigating how a student on the yearbook staff was able to get fake names for Black Student Union members, including “Tay Tay Shaniqua,” “Crisphy Nanos” and “Laquan White,” into the published yearbook.
Beyond this hateful racist mocking there are deeper issues. Whites and some others do not seem to understand that many working-class and middle-class black parents provide their children with nontraditional first names to provide them with something special and distinctive–and not with the “white” first names that are commonplace in society. (Adia has made this point to me in discussion.) Such naming is often a type of resistance to whiteness and white folkways. Historically, whites have done a lot of mocking of the language and speech of all Americans of color–African Americans, Native Americans, Latinos, Asian Americans, and others—and name mocking in the Covina case seems in this tradition of negative racial framing of Americans of color. Mock Spanish and mock Black English seem to be esp. popular these days, including on the Internet. There are many websites mocking the speech of other Americans of color. Whites often say such mocking is “just joking,” but as we have known since Freud, racist joking is often far more than joking.
In movies, on television, in newspaper and magazine columns, and on the Internet whites, including well-educated whites, are among those who mock or ridicule black language and behavior. In Hollywood films the “good guys” often speak prestige versions of the English language, while those portrayed as “bad guys,” including black Americans and other Americans of color, often speak some negatively stigmatized version of English
Anthropologist Jane Hill has studied mock Spanish, which is common in the US. Otherwise monolingual whites use made-up terms such as “no problemo,” “el cheapo,” and “hasty banana,” and phrases like “hasta la vista, baby.” Mock Spanish is on billboards and in movies, gift shops, and boardrooms. Racialized ridicule of language, speech, and naming reveals an underlying stereotyping of people of color among many whites who might reject more openly racist practices.
The Covina school officials have not yet comprehended fully the damage done to the Black students and have weakly responded in regard to remedies, so far at least:
Calling the incident a “regrettable mistake,” Clint Harwick, superintendent of the Charter Oak Unified School District, said Friday that school officials had spoken to the student believed to be responsible…. The school has made stickers with the correct names available for students wishing to cover over the false names. [Principal] Wiard said the school was also considering replacing the entire page because so many names, not just those of BSU members, were incorrect.
However, black parents see this as far too little too late:
[Toi] Jackson, who said the school was insensitive to her daughter and the other club members, said she expected the school to take “significant” measures to correct the yearbooks and discipline any responsible student. But more than anything, she said, she hoped everyone in the community could learn from this incident. “No one wants their character to be attached to something negative for nothing, for being African American,” she said. “All I know is, at the end of the day, it’s all wrong. It affects us, and it affects my child.”
Ridicule of African American and Latino (or other Americans of color) names and language or accent is usually racist because it has meaning only if one knows the underlying racist stereotypes and images. While it may appear to some relatively harmless, social science research shows that such mocking enables whites to support traditional hierarchies of racial privilege without seeming to be racist in the old-fashioned, blatant sense. Researcher Rosina Lippi-Green has noted, such mocking shows a “general unwillingness to accept the speakers of that language and the social choices they have made as viable and functional…. We are ashamed of them, and because they are part of us, we are ashamed of ourselves.” Language mocking and subordination are not about standards for speaking as much as about determining that some people are not worth listening to and treating as equals.
Texas college student blogger LeftofCollegeStation, who called my attention to this now national story (thanks!), has a good comment on local action that should be taken:
This becomes an example to white students of race relations, and the way in which the school administrators handle the situation will give the students a perception of what is acceptable. This is absolutely giving white students the wrong impression. It is giving the message that if something offensive is done to a person of another race that pacification and appeasement are acceptable. That the only yearbooks that will be changed are the yearbooks of the students that are members of the BSU sends this message. Charter Oak High School like many institutions in America is going to ignore an opportunity to talk about race in a constructive way. This incident will be brushed aside, and called an “isolated incident.” However, as many of the people in the community and in the country know, this was not an isolated incident. Racism happens every day in the hallways of our schools, in the offices where we work, and on television that we watch.
Well said. Dear readers, what do you make of this incident? Have you heard of similar mocking?
Carmen Van Kerckhove is co-founder and president of
Abu Sinan wrote:
You made a key statement here:
“likely from a white high school student”.
That is an assumption on your part, not fact. I dont dispute it is possible, but having seen the same jokes made by black comedians, ever seen the movie “Don’t Be a Menace to South Central While Drinking Your Juice in the Hood” it is by no means impossible that it was done by someone within the African American community itself.
One doesnt need to lay blame to a “likely” suspect to talk about the issue. When you try to lay blame without the facts and do it in a racial manner you divert the topic from what it should be into something it isnt.
Remember the characters depicted in the movie “Dashiki”? This is certainly a made up name portraying a classic stereotype of a ghetto African American woman.
Before you talk about “likely” peoples guilty of this you need to keep in mind that African Americans themselves have a long history of comedic depictions of the very thing you are talking about.
Your entire post is directed at white Americans, but it is clear that the problem just isnt white Americans, as is proved by the comedic history of using these types of names as fodder by African American comedians.
Coming out with a “likely white” suspect here is more than a bit racist, considering the facts, on your part.
You cannot BEAT the racists by BECOMING a racist or by STEALING their methods. Any other person who talked about supposed suspects of a crime with zero proof to support their claim would rightfully be called a racist. It should be the same here.
Your racist blame game ruined what could have been a decent discussion. The fact that you left out PoC actors and comedians, never mind mainstream PoC, who use the same material for their own uses shows you really didnt want to cover the issue completely or fairly.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:43 am ¶
cosmicsistren wrote:
I will be very honest. When I first heard of it I laughed. I am a black woman and I thought it was very funny. I think some action should be done to the student who did it. An apology to the student’s whose names were changed and he should make a public apology to the entire school for all the emotional damage and embarassment that was caused. If I get angry at everthing a white person did to someone of color I would probably be in jail facing a long sentence.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:44 am ¶
kerrita k. wrote:
*i see the mocking and affectations a lot with my students and agree with the comments in the article.
*if there is not an institutional awareness about the ways power hierarchies work, or the ways people of any sort resist that hierarchy these incidents will just continue without notice. a great way to talk about this in a classroom is to talk about the power of naming for any group. why the utility of: gay versus queer? lewand versus lewandowski? chicano versus hispanic? what are the social benefits of being unaccented?
and how do these names signify a place within a socio-political movement or historical continuum? and how are we all as people linked by our choice in names?
*it doesn’t sound like the administration has the skills to direct the student’s or the teacher’s conversations about this issue. or have examined their own racist use of language.
*and. uhm. yeah.
i have a completely made up name. as do my sisters – who have variations on a white theme, too. i love it. it is such a barometer of how people approach me as an african-american women.
‘cuz if they keep calling me theresa – the person really is just taping their poorly fitting schema on me! :0)
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:49 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Abu –
Professional comedians are professional comedians. While they may make observations, they do not speak for the entire community.
And as a black kid with a “ghetto name” I will state definitively – we don’t fuck with each other’s birth names. It could have been some other non-white students, true. But I highly doubt another black kid would have done that. Anytime I’ve been referred to as something like “Tay Tay Shaniqua,” “Bomquisha,” or “LaSharoniqua,” jokingly or no, it’s been a white person on the other end.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:49 am ¶
Mickey wrote:
When I hear stories like this, I’m not sure what to make of some White people. How can someone not understand this is offensive?
What if I went through the yearbook and called every White girl “Becky” (the Southern term for White girl)? Do you think those chicks parents would be satisfied with some crappy stickers?
*crickets*
And I’m so sick of that argument that it’s “just a joke”. My name is who I am. It’s MY identity. To mock it is insulting and hurtful.
And just because Chris Rock, Katt Williams and ‘nem do it, don’t make it right.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:56 am ¶
kerrita k. wrote:
abu sinan – i think the issue of naming really comes down to power. the power to claim a name with pride. to re-name yourself legally (thus re-claiming your identity from your parents). naming to assert an ideation or life path (i have a friend who changed his name legally to reflect who HE thought he was altho the names had the same derivation). even our online choices are about the declaration of our identity (nappy diatribe).
regardless of the race of the perpetrators, these students stole the black students’ power by re-naming them in a public sphere. in the yearbook, this student had the final say and used their power poorly. the creation of a new identity for these bsu students ONLY was an act of privilege and power that should be addressed by the school administration whose JOB is to protect all of the students, regardless of in-house jokes by chris rock about someone with an ‘ethnic’ name…
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:57 am ¶
kim h20s wrote:
the race of the person who put in the wrong names is irrelevant. what if the culprits are black – then would all this talk of hidden racism be moot? what if the culprits are an interracial group of all races?
the most salient fact is that somebody defaced the school yearbook. every effort should be made to find the guilty party and they should pay the reprinting costs so that every student who ordered a yearbook with the correct names gets a yearbook with the correct names.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:03 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Latoya,
I never stated that professional comedians speak for an entire community, but as is the nature of their profession, they tend to focus on subjects that are of interest to that community and subjects that have wide play in that community.
Why would a comedian talk about something to try and get laughs when the subject has zero play in the target community? They dont, they talk and represent issues in a comedic way that have traction in the community.
I, myself, have had this conversation with African Americans. The subject of unusual names seems to be one that makes the rounds.
Out of the three names that were quoted, I have seen two of them personally used by real people. So to a certain extent they were not “made up” by whomever did it, they were added into the year book representing students who didnt exist.
As to messing with people’s birthnames, I have seen that done first hand. My 17 year old step son was born in Saudi Arabia but was raised here in the USA. Most of his wider circle of friends are African Americans. My step son has a rather common Arab name, but I have heard him made fun of because of it on numerous occassions by his African American friends. As a matter of fact, it is a subject of a whole thread of discussion on his Facebook account. Maybe the subject of birthnames is off limits for other African Americans, but it certainly isnt off limits for my Arabic American step son.
Again, laying blame to an event, without facts, to a racial group is prejudice. Using stereotypes, or even personal events in one’s life, to lay blame against a person based on race is wrong.
It is a standard that most be enforced evenly across the board. Either racism is wrong, or it isnt. There is no “in between”.
When someone claims to be fighting or taking a stand against racism, but then uses the race tactics of the racists themselves, it diminishes the argument.
As to unusual names, both of my boys have Arabic names when it is highly unpopular to do so here in the USA today. We did so out of religious reasons as well as out of cultural reasons for my wife. They have my European last name, an Arabic first name for the both of them we felt was a good indicator of their bi-racial background.
One is a not so common Arabic name, unusual in the Middle East “Sinan”. The other is a traditional, old fashioned name “Sayf.”
Those who claim to be fighting racism must be above using the tactics of those they claim to be fighting.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:11 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
@Kim h2os,
You are spot on. The erronious claim of the race of the suspect only distracted to the real issue at play here.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:13 am ¶
Sewere wrote:
Abu Sinan,
Interesting response. It’s almost like the “What about White Chicks?” response to the blackface party phenomenon of the past couple of years. The funny thing is both movie employ the same joke because they were made by the same people (The Wayans).
Movies, comedy shows as deplorable as I find many of the race jokes, are employing multiple stereotypes with jokes about white folks at the same time, pitting stereotype against stereotype for cheap laughs (remember the ridiculous corner store scene with the Wayans, the Korean owners and the white dude). It’s sloppy but it is structured in a way that isn’t solely directed at one non-white group which is what I think the point Joe was referencing in the examples he used.
This particular case is not a comedy show, this is not a movie, this involves people’s lives and memories and as hard as it may be for you to understand this is not the kind of prank black kids are likely to instigate. Otherwise, wouldn’t we have heard about blackface parties by black kids?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:24 am ¶
gatamala wrote:
The superintendent called this a “regrettable mistake”.
How does one mistakenly change a name to a mocking stereotype and how does someone else ALLOW this mistake to continue unedited?
This was intentional, cruel and very ugly.
comicsistren~ I disagree.
Any remaining students should be kicked off yearbook and suspended. Perhaps a notation can be added to their sanctified transcript. Graduates should have a letter to the university they will attend that describes the incident and the student’s involvement.
There’s enough humiliation to go around.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:24 am ¶
Katie wrote:
Abu Sinan -
“Those who claim to be fighting racism must be above using the tactics of those they claim to be fighting.”
People fight racism in all sorts of ways. Your words seem mighty condescending.
“You cannot BEAT the racists by BECOMING a racist…”
You know that thing called reverse racism? It doesn’t exist. What you’re seeing as bias is some speaking directly from their lived experience in a way that resonates, I venture to guess, with a hell of a lot of people on this blog. So why don’t you check your privilege?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:28 am ¶
Traveler wrote:
Just to clarify, the student was an Asian-American.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:34 am ¶
Mary wrote:
This incident really hurt to read about. High school is still a delicate age, even without this kind of horrible mockery enshrined in a yearbook. Even if the pages are corrected (in only the BSU students’ yearbooks – are you kidding me?!) the damage is still done, they can’t snatch back every copy that was printed.
Mocking names and speech patterns is a perverse way of turning around responsibility on the victims. Like, “I wouldn’t laugh at you if you didn’t talk so stupidly/give your kids such funny names.”
Language mocking and subordination are not about standards for speaking as much as about determining that some people are not worth listening to and treating as equals.
One thing I will add to this – not as a contradiction of this point, mind you – is that when I was studying in Japan I read about a study of regional accents. One of the general points made was that a thick regional accent was about ACCESS, about weeding out who was a real Nagoya/Aomori/Kansai/etc. guy, and who wasn’t.
Obviously this seems applicable outside of Jpaan as well… it is remarkable how instantaneously language can identify one as in-group or out-group, and how powerfully subconscious some of those determinations are.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:39 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Abu –
The guest poster used the word “likely,” not “obviously” or “of course it is white students” or what have you.
And, as Kim mentioned above, even if the students involved were non-white, it still doesn’t excuse the behavior.
Those who claim to be fighting racism must be above using the tactics of those they claim to be fighting.
This sentence pisses me off. I hate that high minded thought process that minorities are always supposed to take the high road, are never allowed to be upset at a slight to their community, are never allowed to say anything mean to white people because, by God, you’re supposed to be better than that.
(It is also interesting to me that this same phrase makes the round in feminist circles. Again, the patterns of oppression are totally clear.)
Power dynamics are uneven between whites and non whites, and while words have weight and importance, it is not the same situation. So, while Racialicious works to make sure that white people are not unfairly targeted or put upon, or the subject of slurs, a word like “likely” in the context that is is given isn’t really that serious.
However, it concerns me greatly that you are trying to excuse this behavior by saying, in essence “well, black people do it so you shouldn’t judge white people for it.” And the arguments that start with “if you are serious about fighting racism…” tend to smack of the same entitlement as do conversations about minorities being too angry, or needing to adjust their tone, or any of the other Wite-Magick attacks Nezua recorded over in his blog.
We are anti-racist with a realistic focus on how people interact and talk to each other in the real world. And moreover, we’re a PoC space, which is often perceived as hostile to whites. So, I am not sympathetic to a white person trying to instruct PoCs in the proper way to fight racism.
I am hoping that this was not your intention, and you just happened to push one of my buttons. But I do remember your comments about white liability on Macon’s thread, and I am starting to wonder where you are coming from.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:40 am ¶
Mary wrote:
^^Obviously “Jpaan” should read “Japan.” Oops.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:40 am ¶
cosmicsistren wrote:
@Katie – I like your thinking but I would like for him to be singled out and address the students face to face.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:47 am ¶
Ron wrote:
Being a California dude and understanding the dynamics out in Covina – the only way to deal with these issues is by not taking any prisoners.
Anything less than complete bullying by black students will not get them anywhere in Covina.
For example, I know a few people from Covina who compare the black people from the South with black people from California.
Even if the names were provided by a black student – the yearbook staff knew that those names should not have been published.
The yearbook staff is charged with the knowledge of how important a yearbook is to its fellow students.
The black people from California have to be meaner and more belligerent because that is the only way to survive in SoCal. Blacks are outnumbered like 9 to 1.
Black people in the South can afford the luxury of being nice because they represent a significant percentage of the population.
The siege mentality unnecessary in the South.
Those students knew exactly what they were doing. They were taking advantage of their numerical strength and the perceived weakness of the fellow black students.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 9:51 am ¶
coco wrote:
This attack wasn’t about just re-naming black students who had non-Western names.
It was about re-naming members of the Black Student Union, and giving them so-called “black people names.”
That is racist. They took actual black people’s names/identities and bent them into conformity with what they thought was more “appropriately” black.
No one is excusing this behavior, even if the person who did it was black. It’s still racist.
Black people who talk about other black folks names are not talking about all black people. They’re talking about some black people who make naming decisions they disagree with.
But when yearbook members rename all the members of the Black Student Union, they are not distinguishing between individual black folk. They are grouping them together as black people, and renaming them all with “black names.”
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:12 am ¶
Merri Lee wrote:
This reminds me of the Black Girl controversy from a few years back. What kind of a “place holder” are these kids using? If someone didn’t know my name, and the caption slipped by as “Third from left” or”Girl #4,” that would make sense. How is Tykweesha a placeholder?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:13 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Well, it would seem the facts were that the person involved was not “likely white”. It has been stated that he was Asian.
Anyway, the idea that racism, in whatever form, is a valid response to the oppression that one has seen in life is absurd.
Is this what Nelson Mandela taught? Did he teach that racism against whites was a valid response to the racism that he endured? Did Martin Luther King teach that prejudice against your oppressors is the way to go?
I cannot, for the life of me, understand how some will justify racism, on whatever level, as a response to racism.
Latoya,
It isn’t about upsetting people, it is about NOT being a hypocrite. You cannot condemn racism and then engage in it without being a hypocrite. If someone does something they condemn they are a hypocrite.
It is about racism being wrong, point blank. You cannot say it is wrong, you cannot claim to stand against it, then engage in it. It is wrong, and must be condemned, or it isn’t wrong.
Racism cannot be okay for one group and condemned for another. The entire concept of racism is wrong. When you condemn it for one group and “understand” it for another group then you do the whole cause a disservice.
The dynamics are different, but what I am talking about is the concept of racism and prejudice. Just because I am white doesn’t mean that I should to deal with other people’s racism and prejudice.
If you believe that then you are fighting a loosing battle against racism because EVERYONE can come up with a reason as to why their racism or prejudice is justified in one way or another. Hence, ALL racism should be condemned and treated in the same manner.
I didn’t try to excuse anything or anyone. If you can quote where I said this is okay because African Americans did it, I would appreciate it. I don’t mind because I never said anything like that so you cannot post it.
What I DID is to point out that the prejudice comment pointing out that the suspect was “likely white” is NOT grounded in any fact and there is a long history of this in communities besides the white community.
If, as it has been claimed here, that the person who did it was Asian American, it would clearly justify everything I said. When one is prejudice they are almost always bound to make mistakes and be wrong because prejudice just doesn’t hold water, whether it is directed at blacks of whites. Either way it is wrong.
Where am I coming from? I am coming from the direction that ALL racism is wrong. I believe from the bottom of my heart that NO ONE deserves to be the victim of racism and it doesn’t matter who they are or where the racism is coming from.
Again, either racism is wrong or it isn’t. No amount of justifying it from any direction will change that.
I will always stand against those who seek to justify any racism, from any direction, against anyone. All racism is wrong.
Until people accept that ALL people deserve to live a life free from racism it will never change for anyone.
It is a stark choice to make. Either racism is okay, in any form, then one can make their stand with the neo-nazis, or racism is wrong completely and take you stand with the righteous. For me, I make the choice that alll racism is wrong and nothing will change that.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:15 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Katie wrote:
“What you’re seeing as bias is some speaking directly from their lived experience in a way that resonates, I venture to guess, with a hell of a lot of people on this blog. So why don’t you check your privilege?”
I guess you fail to realise that your “lived experience” excuse for racism is one that many members of the KKK and Neo Nazis promote right?
If you have ever heard anyone racist speak most of what they will talk about is “lived experience” as an excuse for their racism.
So, if you start using “lived experience” as an excuse for racism, where does it stop? Who gets to use “lived experience” as an excuse for racism and who doesnt?
The better method is to condemn racism no matter WHO it is directed at and no matter who is doing it.
The is NO excuse for racism. If you think there is an excuse for ill treating people based on nothing more than the colour of their skin, their ethnicity, religion or the language they speak, you then are PART of the problem.
I realise there is a difference in the forms that racism can take. Institutionalised white privledge means that white racism can be more damaging and more pervasive that PoC racism, but it still exists.
Racism is something that everyone can do, from all backgrounds, it is just a question of to what extent they can do it.
Racism can be something as little as insulting someone for their colour or their ethnicity, to as great as the institutional racism commited in America.
Realising that it is clear that EVERYONE has the ability to be racist, just not in the ways to the same extent.
That is why racism, in all forms from all communities, is wrong.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:26 am ¶
lunanoire wrote:
As the descendant of enslaved Africans, I would love to know my REAL last name b/c I am not a likely descendant of a slave owner.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:41 am ¶
Treacle wrote:
Abu,
You keep using the word racism.
I do not believe it means what you think it means.
Racism is defined as privilege + power. While racism can be institutional or individual, it is always unidirectional.
In other words, while anyone can have prejudices or behave in a discriminatory manner, only members of the dominant racial group possess both the privilege and the power to be racist. In America, this group is white people.
Racial minority groups lack both privilege and power, therefore they cannot be racist. Reverse racism is a myth.
I find it laughable that you, a white person, would presume to educate people of color on what racism is. Not only do you lack the individual experience necessary to do that kind of “teaching,” but you also obviously lack the education for it.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:41 am ¶
Big Man wrote:
The culprit was a young white boy. At least that’s what I read in another story. Just wanted to clear that up since it became a topic of discussion.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:43 am ¶
coco wrote:
abu:
are you going to ignore the racism in the news story and focus on why the racialicious post said “likely white”?
this is an incident of American racism, and that is largely rooted in theories of white supremacy. the historical and present-day source of much of the racist discourse in the US is belief in white political, economic, cultural, etc. hegemony.
that’s all that “likely” means.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:43 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
Abu, racism is not applied evenly. It did not impact all races in the same manner. It does not manifest itself in the same ways.
So I do not understand how you think a blanket solution will solve this issue.
Do you think that all minorities are seeking to reconcile with whites in the US?
Do you think that minorities do not have their own issues with internalized racism to deal with, without having a white person come and lecture about the ONE TRUE WAY to end racism. There are many ways to be racist, from neo-nazis burning crosses to kind hearted saviors and everything in between. We have the issues we do now because some people refuse to see that. Racism manifests differently and needs to be dealt with differently, depending on the situation.
Glossing over centuries of mistreatment and abuse, without first understanding where that pain comes from and how it manifests is disingenious and does not help with honest discussions of anti-racism.
Kai writes (emphasis mine):
What you are doing is reframing this conversation from the action itself to a perceived slight toward whites. I am asking you to stop.
(And by the way, yes you did say that – there is no reason to bring up the fact that black comedians make fun of black names unless you are attempting to justify the behavior. No, you did not say that the behavior was right. But by introducing the discussion what commedians say as a reason why we should not assume that the perpetrators were white plays into established racist patterns of thinking – if one black person does it, so do they all. If it is okay for a black person to do it, then it should be ok for a white person to do it. And so on.)
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:43 am ¶
Yvette wrote:
Just a small note: *All* names are “made up.”
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:47 am ¶
Paul wrote:
I have to wonder where the Yearbook Advisor was during all of this “joking”? As a teacher, I know that schools usually have a teacher/administrator serve as a Yearbook Advisor. This adult is responsible for making sure inappropriate commets, gestures, clothing, etc. does not find its way into the yearbook text or pictures.
Where was this person in Covina? Kids often want to do stupid, racist things. It’s up to adults to stop these things from doing them.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:51 am ¶
juju wrote:
@Abu Sinan
How is the author’s use of the term “likely” an example of racism? Based on his experiences, he presumed the perpetrator of this very specific type of act to be a white person. Also, I’m not seeing how the fact that the person is actually Asian supports your case. Because, unless I missed something here, the author did not say that “it must be a white person, as only a white person could ever possibly do such a thing”. As I’m sure you know, POC do sometimes adopt forms of racism that is more commonly practiced by white people. Is your issue that you believe him to be overly focused on the racism of white people?
The evocation of King, Mandela, and sometimes Gandhi, to police the behavior of black people specifically, and other POC and white activists in general, is pet peeve of mine. Because black people do something that you interpret to be outside of King/Mandela/Gandhi’s teachings, doesn’t make them wrong.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:55 am ¶
VELMA SABINA!!! wrote:
Just awful, so racist and ignorant.
I don’t find any of this funny at all.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:56 am ¶
Joseph wrote:
I was on the subway coming home last week, crumpled over a magazine when a couple of pretty teenage white girls came on the train and took the only available seats–one next to me and one directly across. They began to giggle and I slowly realized that the one next to me was making faces at the one across, apparently at my expense. They were sleek little things, raking their fingers through their long shiny hair and continually re-arranging themselves in their seats. Despite the fact that I am, as my friend Crystal puts it, a “grown-ass man” I suddenly felt fourteen, all curly and wrong. I immediately began to wonder what was wrong with me. Is it my hair? My clothes? Are they wrong somehow? Is there food on my shirt? Am I too ugly to ride along with pretty teenage girls? And if so, when did that happen? Or have I always been ugly and just didn’t know it? I felt completely lost for a moment…and I am an adult. I have known real pain and real joy. I have been loved. But for a hot minute I still got pulled along in the current of casual cruelty that comes so easily to some teenagers. I know very well that I was completely incidental to their evening: they were probably a little high (or at least high on the power that comes from being a pretty young white girl) and I was just in their way for a moment. Just something to laugh over until the next thing. But that’s just it: some thing. For a few seconds they made me feel like less than a person. I am a grown up and a week later I can still remember that feeling. And I don’t have a book to commemorate the moment.
I think it is entirely possible that this prank wasn’t “personal”–or even intended to be racist (the way, say, a person who burns a cross intends to be racist). But it doesn’t matter how it was intended–the effect was racist and dehumanizing. And the adult response has–so far–been underwhelming. School boards are more noted for their moral agility than intellectual vigor but, seriously? Stickers? No.
I hope they get their asses handed to them in court.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:58 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Latoya writes:
“Abu, racism is not applied evenly. It did not impact all races in the same manner. It does not manifest itself in the same ways.”
EXACTLY! Which is why ALL racism is wrong. ALL RACISM is wrong. Wow, I never thougt I’d be ahving this argument with anyone who wasnt white. I guess I learn something every day.
My 16 year old Arab step daughter came to me this year after hearing some non-whites go off on a racist rant about “ragheads” and “camel jockies”.
She asked me why people who had suffered so much themselves could have such hatred in their hearts and be so racist.
So what should have I have answered her, “that these people’s lived experiences after 9/11 give them the right to be racist towards your ethnicitiy”?
You honestly think people should be in the business of trying to explain and justify the hatred of others? With this attitude we will be ahving the same conversations we are today, but 300 years from now.
Latoya,
You still dont get it. I didnt point out the African American comedians to try and say if “one black does it they all do it” rather to point out the FACT that anyone could have done it, including the people who were the target of the incident.
You assume I gloss over anything, I dont. I just refuse to accept that racism, in ANY FORM, is the solution for anything.
It isnt.
Either racism is wrong, or it isnt. Yes or no.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 10:58 am ¶
TierList E wrote:
@Abu
LaToya pretty much said all that I tried to bumble out, so I’ll just shut my trap and second her.
I wish I can use another word but, your arrogance is blurring your vision on what all this is supposed to say. Stop trying to poke reverse racism holes where there shouldn’t be and read what the post is saying, not what You think it’s saying.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:01 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
Oh, and some random facts, just for fun:
The Covina School district breaks down in this way:
District Ethnic breakdown (2005-2006)
47.3% Hispanic
35.8% White
4.3% African American
4.0% Asian
3.1% Filipino
0.4% Pacific Islander
0.3% Native American and Alaska Native
4.8% Multiple or no response
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charter_Oak_Unified_School_District
Racial Breakdown of the HS:
“• Of the 2,000 students who attend Charter Oak High School about 45 percent are Latino; 30 percent white and 4.5 percent black, according to school officials.”
http://www.eurweb.com/story/eur44864.cfm
“Probst said the student responsible for the names will be a senior next year. He did not know the student’s race or gender but said that “appropriate actions will be taken.”
http://www.wtopnews.com/?nid=104&sid=1430194
Comment from one of the students:
But BSU member Paisley Moore said a sticker is not enough.
“I kind of laughed at it,” she told the Tribune. “Show that you are sincerely apologetic. I don’t think they realize what happened here.”
Past editions of the yearbook have won awards from the University of Columbia Scholastic Press with gold and silver medals in 2006 and 2007, respectively, school staff told the newspaper.
Of the 2,000 students at Charter Oak High School, about 45 percent are Latino, 30 percent white and 4.5 percent black, school officials told the newspaper.
Moore said she was not surprised that something like this happened.
“People of color — Latinos and African-Americans — are viewed at the school as a joke,” she told the Tribune.
Probst told The Times that officials believe one student was responsible and that they were still trying to decide on an appropriate response.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/25441562/
If anyone has more information, please add it with a cited source.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:05 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@ Paul -
The administration has apparently chosen to focus more on the student who created the names. I am not sure how the supervisor of the yearbook staff does not help in the proofreading, but to each their own, I suppose.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:10 am ¶
Mickey wrote:
@ LaToya
Each one, teach one.
You’re doing an awesome job.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:19 am ¶
coco wrote:
Abu:
as much analysis as you have about whether the racialicious post was racist, and whether your children are bearing the brunt of racism from other poc, and whether black comedians should talk about the black community, you have very little to add to the conversation at hand, which is about the Covina yearbook incident.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:21 am ¶
Ailurophile wrote:
What? Nobody remembers Praise-God Barebone?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praise-God_Barebone
And the girl mentioned in the book “Albion’s Seed,” by the name of “Flie-Fornication,” who was hauled into court for…allegedly fornicating.
And the Mayflower passenger who named his kids “Fear” (girl) and “Wrestling” (boy).
My point being that once upon a time, “white” English people gave kids unique names too, for the same reason African-Americans sometimes give their kids unique names – as a mark of distinction and separation from the mainstream.
And yes, whoever did it ought to be called to account. This is not acceptable. As Mary said, it’s not like these names were placeholders like “Purple Shirt,” “Boy at Far Right” or “Girl #1.” It was a deliberate attempt to be nasty and racist.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:22 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
JuJu,
You write:
” Based on his experiences, he presumed the perpetrator of this very specific type of act to be a white person. Also, I’m not seeing how the fact that the person is actually Asian supports your case. Because, unless I missed something here, the author did not say that “it must be a white person, as only a white person could ever possibly do such a thing”. ”
Amazing. What if a racist were to say, based on his experience that all non whites were rapists, drug dealers and welfare recepients?
Dont you see how this EXCUSE leads to racism in itself? The assumption that one person’s experiences can indeed label an entire race? Besides which, if it can be done against one group of people it must be equally valid for all groups.
This “lived experience” excuse for racism is indeed one of the major one white racists use to justify their hate, and as I am seeing now, it seems to be the major one for ALL racists.
The reason that the Asian suspect makes my point for me is that the original writer said the suspect was likely to be white with no proof of any sort to support the claim.
As Latoya has shown, the population at the school is LESS than 50% white, therefor empirical evidence says that it is unlikely for it to have been a white. Empiracal evidence being something that can be proven.
The fact that one person would point to the suspect as being “likely white” without any proof to support this is racism.
All racism is wrong. Instead of arguing who has a right to be racist we should just all get aboard with the idea that it is wrong no matter who is doing it, no matter the reasoning.
No head way can, or ever will be, made in our society against racism if some are trying to put out the idea that some racism, some hatred, is justified.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:24 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Abu –
Last comment from me on this one.
I am truly sorry for what happens to your daughters at the hands of other non-whites. When I wrote my 4th Generation Racist piece, I used the term specifically because I think often about the interplay between other people of color and how racist actions can come from all sides.
But that is not what we are discussing here.
You took offense with a very innocuous term, used lightly, by a white writer. Was it an assumption? Yes. But your reaction is was trigged my liberal quoting of both Kai and Nezua because all your remarks fit into the same pattern that I see all the time.
Trying to hold people of color accountable for their anger at a majority white system is a fool’s game. And as I have said before, we take great pains to create a PoC space here that does not bash white people – or anyone really – and we don’t condone violence or threats. But your complaint doesn’t wash.
So, I am going to remind you of this section of the comment policy:
10. If all of your comments are variations on the same theme, we reserve the right to ban you. If every time you post a comment it is a variation of “that’s because white people hate black people” or “you need to stop generalizing white people,” it is generally not conducive to our discussion and only serves to stir up animosity.
You seem to continually present yourself as the one true authority, either on being white or being anti-racist, or being Muslim.
And I am asking you formally to stop.
Consider this your first and last warning.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:27 am ¶
Renee wrote:
I think that just focusing in on the one student, or the one faculty member that is guilty of this action is a mistake. It creates this incident as a singularity, when we know in fact that daily bodies of color must confront racism. There needs to be a conversation about the ways in which color is perceived as less than in our society. Attitudes will not change if we continue to treat each incident individually, as though it is not related to the wider concept of racial value in our society.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:34 am ¶
Kochanie wrote:
Unfortunately, yes. A similar incident occurred at the prestigious Horace Mann School in New York and was the subject of an article in the March 30, 2008 edition of New York Magazine, which is the source of the excerpts I quote below.
In mockery of a student organization called the Women’s Issue’s Club, Horace Mann students created a Web page for a Facebook group named the “Men’s Issues Club.” Forty-four of Horace Mann’s students were members of the group, included children of prominent families and trustees on Horace Mann’s board. The online conversations included insults of teachers such as “crazy ass bitch” and puerile boasts from boys of “banging a teacher in the music dept. bathroom” and “beating up women when drunk.” According to the members of Men’s Issues Club, the answer to the question where women belong was, “IN THE KITCHEN!! IN THE KITCHEN!!” The club’s mission statement:
One of the slandered teachers, Danielle McGuire, logged into the H.M. Facebook group using her married name. McGuire found that her liberal politics had earned her the title “Official Minority Rights Officer and Head of Protection for Feminist Society” and “Representation of Oppressed ‘Indians’ of America.” But the worst was
While the administration of Horace Mann announced that the punishments for students in the group would be severe, the teachers who had viewed the Facebook group pages were told that their employment contracts were under review. One trustee, who was also the parent of a member of the Facebook group, confronted McGuire in public about viewing the site under a false name. When McGuire claimed that she had the right to protect herself against defamation, the trustee countered that the illustrations and insults were nothing more than students “just blowing off steam…[t]hey’re very stressed; it’s not unusual for them to say racist and sexist things.”[Emphasis added by commenter]
Some have criticized the article which appeared in New York Magazine as staging the conflict between the teachers and the privileged students and their influential parents. Horace Mann will accumulate a debt of $339 million for new construction and other improvements and, as a result, the composition of its board has changed to include lawyers, investment bankers and real estate developers rather than academics. However, the bigger issue here is the ease with which the parents and trustees could overlook the misogyny and racism displayed by their children.
The incidents at Horace Mann and Covina are not isolated in time. When the parents or administration do not condemn racist mockery, they create a moral precedent that makes such mockery acceptable. In November 2007, Science Daily reported that Thomas E. Ford, a psychology professor at Western Carolina University, and his graduate student co-authors published an article detailing the results of two projects designed to determine the effects of sexist humor. IMO, the conclusion of the study can be applied to both sexist and racist humor. According to Ford,
Since the Covina school officials did not denounce the mockery of the black and Latino students, they should not be surprised when, perhaps ten years later, they read a newspaper article quoting one of their former students who will justify her racist reference to a coworker as joke: “Unfortunately, I was under a loss of stress at the time.” Or perhaps there will not even be a newspaper article, because the coworker who will be the target of the racist insult will not file a complaint because, “It happens everyday. Supposedly, I’m too sensitive and I would end up losing my job.”
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:36 am ¶
Joseph wrote:
Wow. While I was writing my post this thread has taken kind of a disturbing turn. Why all the Abu-hate? Latoya, I hear you–but can we step back a minute?
I didn’t hear Abu defending the behavior of these kids. I understood his comment about the comedians as offering an additional context for the prank–which is an interesting point: Racial stereotypes are employed in pop culture as a matter of course now and kids are exposed to them as neutrals–not as historical constructions. As in suburban white kids who grow up listening to hip hop who learn to mime Black street culture with no first hand experience of it. It is entirely possible that such kids use offensive language and mannerisms in a different way than their parents did. As I said in my post the effect is the same–and my heart breaks for the kids on the receiving end of this prank. But acknowledging that teenagers today have a different relationship with racial stereotypes because of pop culture doesn’t equal excusing their behavior. I think you are making a leap and attributing it to Abu Sinan.
As far as Abu questioning a single line of the original post–what’s the big deal? Would the argument of the OP been crippled if it had been restated? Or omitted completely? Or–my preference–owned. As in: “I THINK it was likely…” I don’t see any reverse racism, fallacious flip gymnastics happening here. I think this prank is so hurtful that it has everyones nerves up under the skin (I know mine are–I’d like to introduce the kids responsible to the back of my hand). But I don’t think turning on each other (Treacle #24…really?) is productive.
I have told you before–more than once–I think you are a fantastic moderator. The reason this community works as well as it does is because of your hard work. But you are a person, not a computer program. If something doesn’t ping on your radar but it does for one of us, is that so terrible?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:39 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Latoya,
“Trying to hold people of color accountable for their anger at a majority white system is a fool’s game.”
Anger and racism are two different things. PoC have a right to be angry. I know I would be.
NO ONE has a right to be racist.
I think I have made my point here. If others want to continue to justify and explain racism, that is their choice.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 11:41 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Thanks Joseph. I didnt see the big deal when I made the first comment next thing I know I am David Duke.
Room must be made for different opinions, unless one wants nothing more than a peanut gallery with an Amen corner.
It is very hard being in the middle, because both sides see you are public enemy #1.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:00 pm ¶
holls wrote:
The entire incident is rude, vulgar, tasteless and ultimately as demeaning to the perpetrator as it was to those who were attacked.
BUT,
I don’t really see this as about race so much as it is about class.
M’Kayla is a trashy and uneducated name for a WHITE baby girl. That child isn’t going to be a bonds trader or a property developer or a physicist.
There are plenty of uncommon and yet legitimate names the world over:
Kwame, Sita, Tariq, Skadi,
but come on; there is no difference whatsoever between the parody name ‘Tay Tay’ and the cited ‘real’ name ‘Toi’.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:00 pm ¶
wendi muse wrote:
i don’t really think it matters who did it. it’s wrong. i think some people may have assumed it was done by white students mainly because it’s the names of the black student union that were altered…which could be a reaction to their attempting to unify black students. however, i have heard many blacks make fun of non-traditional black american names, and not just comedians.
the name issue is really one of assimilation. many asian americans whom i know have parents who decided to give them first names in english and traditional asian names (depending on their native country and/or language) as middle names, possibly in hopes of allowing for a bit of an easier life for their children. i wonder if blacks will have to resort to this or if people will grow up and stop discriminating based on names. i have a feeling the only realistic approach will be the first one.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:05 pm ¶
coco wrote:
i think it’s also an affront to the other yearbook staff who put in hard work.
will this year’s book be eligible for yearbook awards, with this kind of racist foolishness in it?
that’s why the advisory staff should be accountable.
they’re supposed to use their oversight to prevent people from ruining everyone’s work.
and it messed up the yearbook for the whole school. how are any of the students going to be able to be proud of, and show their yearbook off to other people in years to come?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:06 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Joseph –
Now, we’ve talked, and you know I have nothing but love for you. But on this one, you’re going to have to trust the mod.
Abu’s initial comment was a slight annoyance and slightly derailing. I dealt with it that way, and pointed out some of the problems in his subsequent statements. That’s what escalated the thread. And from the reactions of Carmen and other commenters, my initial assumption was correct. And as I brought up, this becoming a consistent pattern – unlike y’all, I read almost every comment made by every person who choses to do so. So, I tend to notice patterns in conversation that repeat over time. And that line of thinking, specifically, disturbs me.
After discussing with Carmen (what, y’all think I just ban people because I feel like it?) we came to an agreement on action in this situation. In most cases, if I feel like strongly chastising/banning someone, I put the question/my response up to Carmen or one of the other contribs. It provides a nice language check and cool down minute. After all, mods have bad days too. And while I had to apologize to MoeHailstone, I would prefer not to make that a habit.
Generally, if we disagree on the action to take, commenter gets benefit of the doubt. If we agree, we move forward.
At any rate, we are making an addition to the comment policy. I am going to publish the post in a minute.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:06 pm ¶
Slush wrote:
“How is the author’s use of the term “likely” an example of racism? Based on his experiences, he presumed the perpetrator of this very specific type of act to be a white person.”
Exactly. That’s what prejudice is. Prejudging an association of certain acts with a particular race, or associating a particular race with certain acts. You just defined it and exemplified it yourself right there.
Whether ‘racism’ is the same as racial prejudice or necessarily involves a one-way power dynamic is up for grabs. I personally agree with Treacle that the quintessential character of racism is about the power differential, but I don’t agree that that’s the definitive interpretation and there are no other legitimate ones.
Also, the power differential idea of defining racism tends to make things POC do okay, but not okay if the same things are done by whites. As I said, I do think that’s legitimate, but not always, across the board, without examination or analysis. It doesn’t excuse everything.
So I think Abu raises a legitimate question as to the assumption that the perpetrator was white, because there’s equal evidence that he or she might not be. Maybe most of us will determine that this assumption is a reaction borne of victimization and is reasonable, but I don’t see how you can claim that it’s not worth some serious self-questioning.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:10 pm ¶
CVT wrote:
I’m coming in pretty late in the game here, but I’ll echo a couple other posters:
I agree with Paul that – although the kid who did it needs to have some sort of real consequences – it’s the TEACHER for that class that needs to be smacked around some. I teach middle school, and I do a large variety of different classes that have students writing or creating their own expression of some sort. I know that kids do stupid things. They say them, and they write them. Knowing that, it is my responsibility to do everything in my power to prevent a kid’s stupid “joke” to end up affecting other students. In this case, there is NO WAY a teacher of quality could let this go without, a) “not noticing” because of their own entrenched racist notions, or b) because they DIDN’T DO THEIR JOB and never edited. Either way, it’s worth some heavy consequences for the teacher.
In other news, stickers!? That makes me want to throw up.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:20 pm ¶
CVT wrote:
@Abu – you’re killing me here. People of color are perfectly capable of being prejudiced against all sorts of other people. Nobody is saying that isn’t the case (even the article itself talks about people’s personal shame about names). But please read Treacle’s response before you just keep typing “ALL RACISM IS WRONG” over and over.
And I just love how you tell the story of black kids making fun of your kids’ names – because it’s relevant, right? Latoya told you, from her own, PERSONAL experience, that other black folks would NOT joke around about black names in this way. So you respond with an anecdote about black kids making fun of other people’s names? How is that relevant – in the SLIGHTEST – to Latoya’s perspective? Do you not see how awful it is that not only did you ignore her sharing personal experience and insight with you, but you FLIPPED IT to say something bad about black people? You did exactly as you are claiming to be against in your repetitive comments – trying to refute somebody’s personal experience with an anecdote of something that happened to SOMEBODY ELSE.
Please. You are white. Being in an interracial relationship does not mean you know ANYTHING about race. My father would make some of the same claims as you (you see, I’m bi-racial), and I don’t accept it from him, either. Conceiving a child with a person of color does not give you a free pass. It doesn’t mean you “understand” anything at all. Please, for your children’s sake, read this post I did over at my blog (in it is sort of an appeal to white parents of bi-racial kids): http://choptensils.blogspot.com/2008/07/on-interracial-relationships-part-ii.html
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:21 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@CVT – stickers upon request only; and according to the administration, not many students have requested the stickers. Hmm…wonder if that’s because they were made available after graduation?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:23 pm ¶
coco wrote:
@holls
regardless of whether you think M’Kayla is a trashy name, (i think it’s kind of pretty), it wasn’t used to label any white girls in this yearbook. The names were only used to modify the identities of black students.
@wendi
Regarding assimilation, the students in the BSU didn’t necessarily have non-assimilated names. Since their real names were blotted out, we don’t know. They were, renamed with “black names” because they belonged to the Black Student Union.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:44 pm ¶
Philly Phil wrote:
wow. just… wow.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:47 pm ¶
Lydia wrote:
Otherwise monolingual whites use made-up terms such as “no problemo,” “el cheapo,” and “hasty banana,” and phrases like “hasta la vista, baby.”
Wow- I had never heard of research and study about this phenomena before. And honestly, as a white girl, I’ve never questioned it before. Just- wow. I just learned a lot.
Racialized ridicule of language, speech, and naming reveals an underlying stereotyping of people of color among many whites who might reject more openly racist practices.
I think the most important thing that this language use does is teach the normalization of racisim and bias. So sneaky. This, especially in light of the Covina event, is really really worrisome.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 12:57 pm ¶
CVT wrote:
@holls – you stating that there is “no difference whatsoever between the parody name ‘Tay Tay’ and the cited ‘real’ name ‘Toi’” -
please tell me you’re being sarcastic. Please.
You just fed the kid who did it. You fed the teacher who let it happen. You’re feeding the administration that is largely ignoring it. And you’re KILLING the people this happened to.
That comment treads on “they all look the same,” and I just pray I’m mis-reading it.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:00 pm ¶
Ailurophile wrote:
Looking back, I’m agreeing with the commentors who said that the TEACHER(s) or other adults involved should be the ones punished. The kid or kids ought to get a talking-to, yes – they need to understand that this isn’t right. However, kids will be kids and they learn from adults. That’s why there are minimum ages for driving, drinking, and voting – you can’t expect people at that age to have a fully developed, adult perspective on the world. If the kids involved are ignorant, they need to LEARN.
If all of us were punished for stupid or bigoted or racist or ignorant things we did as kids, none of us (including me – OH YES!) would escape.
But the adult(s) ought to know better and THEY are the ones needing a call-out or punishment.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:08 pm ¶
Jo wrote:
I find it so sad that Abu has very consistently ignored the purpose of the article and has somehow directed the discussion to two particular words. In school we were taught to be able to dissect a sentence, paragraph or whatever and discern what is the point. Abu deary, you’ve totally missed the point. As a member of the majority race we don’t expect you to get said point. Being condescending is literally causing every hair on my body to stand on edge. I think most understood what Latoya and the article were trying to convey because we have had similar first-hand experiences. I understand persons who are not PoC sympathizing but you will never know or fully understand. I never post comments but after the extremely trying day I’ve had your comments seemed like salt on a fresh wound.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:11 pm ¶
J wrote:
http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/news/ci_9696123
from the school district’s superintendent. at one point, he said the incident was atrocious, but he also says:
“What else can you do?” asked Probst. “It would be nice to snap a magic finger, but I think it was incredibly well done.”
incredibly well done? what’s that supposed to mean?
note that the student interviewed for the article was a member of the BSU, and her name is jordan smith, not “tay tay shaniqua” or any variation thereof.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:11 pm ¶
holls wrote:
NO people of any race ‘all look the same’,
but no, there is not a difference between those two names.
If I am missing something and there actually is a demonstable difference, tell me about it.
Sure they aren’t the identical, but picture an irate white girl saying:
“It’s not ‘Becky’ it’s ‘Becca’!” Seriously, who wouldn’t snicker at that?
Mod Note - Actually, the only person who would snicker at that would be an asshole. People’s names are an extension of who they are, and it is a show of RESPECT to get someone’s name right. “Toi” is not the same as “Tay Tay;” “Becca” is not the same as “Becky,” “Nevaeh” is not the same as “Nyeemah” or “Nivea.” Aside from spelling and pronunciation, there are very big differences (like origin) and your comments are bordering on racist. First/final warning. -LDP
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:12 pm ¶
holls wrote:
Full disclosure: I have a very ‘non-standard’ name.
But my point isn’t just to be a jerk and offend people, so I will let it drop.
This IS a great site.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:20 pm ¶
wendi muse wrote:
hey coc-
i understand that. i am saying i think someone purposefully changed just their names BECAUSE they are on BSU
re: assimilation, that was just a side note. i think people have the right to name their kids whatever they want, but in a racist society, they must be prepare their children to deal with the consequences. and that sucks, but that’s our reality.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:28 pm ¶
juju wrote:
@Abu Sinan
The problem with your analogy is that none of those things are actually true, you didn’t have that experience as those are just racist stereotypes. And again, the word was “likely”. In my experience, some people are indeed more “likely” to do certain things than others.
@Slush
Prejudgments are not inherently bad. They are not always true, but some do prove accurate and can be useful. Many young black and Latino men living in NYC, for example, keep in mind past negative experiences with NYPD when approached by an officer. Are all police officers brutalizers, no of course not, but enough are for you to keep that in mind. As a WOC, it would be stupid for me to attempt to function in this world ignoring my knowledge of certain patterns in behavior of white people in particular.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:42 pm ¶
Heather wrote:
Ailurophile wrote:
“And the Mayflower passenger who named his kids “Fear” (girl) and “Wrestling” (boy).
My point being that once upon a time, “white” English people gave kids unique names too, for the same reason African-Americans sometimes give their kids unique names – as a mark of distinction and separation from the mainstream.”
That isn’t quite accurate. It’s true that Puritans sometimes gave their children names which we today find strange. But the reason for those names was *not* as a mark of distinction or to set them apart from the mainstream.
Most Puritans used biblical names–and they used the same ones over and over again. However, some felt using any name from the Bible blasphemous and used phrases such as “Fly-From-Sin”, “Flee-Fornication” and the like. Or virtue names such as Honesty, Comfort, Faithful etc.
The intent was emphasis on the values they held. “Fear” was named so from the phrase “Fear of the Lord.” “Wrestling with Sin” is where the other name comes from. Fear of the Lord, fighting against sin–these were concepts central to the Puritan world view.
Actually, trying to be distinctive or set themselves apart would be just about the last thing they would do. These were not people who prized individuality or creativity in the way we do now.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:47 pm ¶
CVT wrote:
@holly -
Okay, you were serious. I am assuming “Toi” is pronounced like the object, “Toy.” “Tay Tay,” of course, doesn’t sound like, or even rhyme with, “Toi.” “Tay Tay” is not a commonly-known derivative or nickname for “Toi.” “Becky” and “Becca” are derivatives of the same name, “Rebecca,” and thus are not comparable.
Where you’re going is more similar to saying “Holly” and “Hell Hell” have absolutely no distinguishing differences between them. Thus, I change your yearbook name (it seems “Holly” is not your real name, but you get the point) to “Hell Hell,” and you are not in a position to complain. Add in racist overtones (and the fact that it was not one isolated name, but multiple racist names that have no similarity to the students’ true names), and we have ourselves a problem when you say there is no difference and imply that taking offense is over-reacting.
I hope that was clearer.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 1:57 pm ¶
Philly Phil wrote:
@juju
you wrote–
” In my experience, some people are indeed more “likely” to do certain things than others.”
“… it would be stupid for me to attempt to function in this world ignoring my knowledge of certain patterns in behavior of white people in particular.”
not trying to be divisive or incur the wrath of anyone but i’ve heard many police officers and politicians use the same rationale for racial profiling. almost the exact same wording, to be truthful.
when is that line of thinking acceptable?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:00 pm ¶
SAH wrote:
This is a pretty interesting discussion. While I agree that in a traditionally racist society names can hinder, and even cause problems in a child’s assimilation to a culture outside of his parents, I have to consider the names of some influential people of color in today’s society. Consider Condoleezza, Barack, Oprah, Tyra; none of the above have traditional English names, but are still extremely powerful and influential throughout ALL of America, and not just “black” America. Or even you, Latoya, who referenced your name as being “ghetto”. I don’t expect anything but good writing when I see your name in the credits, and don’t think that your literary talent or voice was anything you had to prove despite what your parents put on your birth certificate.
The yearbook incident was racist; there is no refuting that. The intent behind giving the names was fueled by racist stereotypes, and even disrespect (to echo holls). It’s just a shame that now the Laquans and Shaniquas out there may feel insecure and even pressured to change their names, just because all of America now know and may label their names as “ghetto”.
I think we have to get out of the habit of seeing ourselves through the eyes of others, or judging ourselves based on standards of uniformity and normalcy.
Who wants to bet that by the year 2018, everyone will know at least 3 Baracks?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:02 pm ¶
SAH wrote:
“The intent behind giving the names was fueled by racist stereotypes, and even disrespect (to echo holls).”…. My mistake. Def not echoing holls. Echoing LDP.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:08 pm ¶
juju wrote:
@ Philly Phil
“not trying to be divisive or incur the wrath of anyone but i’ve heard many police officers and politicians use the same rationale for racial profiling. almost the exact same wording, to be truthful.
when is that line of thinking acceptable?”
The difference here is that black people are not more likely to commit crimes, but they are more likely to be subject to policing. Study after study has shown this to be true. If where was actually some reality that justified racial profiling, well that would be a completely different situation.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:27 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@SAH –
Well, my name is kind of weird. When I was younger it was uncommon and perceived as ghetto. Now that I am older, my name was kind of part of that first wave of non-African/French names and more in the “made up realm” so it’s actually kind of normalized. I know four other Latoyas personally. They even have one of those “This is what your name means” plaques for Latoya. It allegedly means victory – which I call bullshit on – but it’s a really nice gesture.
My name is still a liability in terms of job hunting and other kinds of queries. If my reputation is first, or they are looking for certain qualities, I’m fine. If they need to make rush judgments, I’m screwed. It depends.
@Philly Phil –
This would be a really long, really involved post. In the *context* above, I do not see likely as an evil slight against whites. Is it an assumption? Oh yes, and when I dug up some more information, the stats are in favor of it being a latino student more than a white one. (There are theories on ethnicity of the student responsible, but nothing confirmed.) But that wasn’t what I took offense to, specifically.
I also believe there is a big difference between a line of thinking that informs an action and a line of thinking on its own. So, to go back to the police profiling example – if a cop is investigating a crime in a predominantely black area, it is logical to think “the perp may likely be black as well.” It is not logical to harass young black men with no description or cause for questioning. Also not so logical to think in a predominantly white area “the perp must be black.” It also goes back to the power dynamic and who has the ability to act on these kinds of thoughts, but that’s a discussion for another time.
One of the parts of being logical is to know that your assumptions can be challenged and proven wrong. I am not sure if the original author of the piece knows the racial breakdowns of the school and if he would have made the same assumptions if he had. But there is a difference between a conjecture, like the one the writer posed, and the school administrators going “all white students must report for a mandatory assembly on diversity.” One is an idea, malleable and challengeable, expressed in a weak statement, and another is enforcing an action behind it.
Personally, I liken it a lot to catcalling and aggressive street behavior. As I said before, I profile for my own basic safety. But this does not mean I premptively go find the police before passing a group of black men, nor does it mean I scream at groups of men minding their own business to leave me alone. I’m on alert, looking at a large group of men, but I have not taken any set actions there. No evidence of wrong doing, no gut feeling, no action from me. I continue about my business.
Speaking generally now, I know this gets complicated when we talk about issues of race and prejudice and bigotry. It would be a lot easier for people to have no negative, pre-existing thoughts informed by stereotypes or life experience about anyone at all. But we do. And to some extent, not being racist is about managing and challenging these thoughts. Not the absence of those thoughts at all, or minimizing why certain people feel the need to hang on to these thoughts when the evidence is overwhelmingly against the stereotype. But to actively engage and challenge.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:38 pm ¶
JD/ formerly J wrote:
Some of these ‘made up’ names that African Americans use may also be an effort to ‘own’ one’s name. To hear your name and have a history attached to it. My first name- a European one- is traced to Scotland. I am African, what does that say about me. But when I hear my middle name it says a lot about my family’s history, my birth position, my day of birth etc. If that was taken away from me by no choice of my own wouldn’t I want the right to re-invent myself away from the names that were beaten into me?
I hate that African American names can’t be what they are without judgement. What makes Ryder anymore respectable than Sheniqua? Can’t I just have the name my parents gave me and be allowed to make my own identity without pre-conceptions? What if every single girls name had been Toi, then what?
Sorry for the rant I am just really annoyed by this nonesense
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:43 pm ¶
coco wrote:
on the African-American “Other”
it’s okay for black people to expect everyone else to be able to spell their names and learn to pronounce them.
the same expectation in reverse is why I know “Sean” rhymes with “prawn” not “scene”.
it’s okay for black people to expect German dollmakers to craft an Obama doll that looks more like Barak Obama than Ving Rhames.
enough of fencing off parts of American culture for “traditional” folkways. it’s arbitrary.
black people have been “American” as long as this country has been named America, and as long as every other immigrant group. don’t we get to add any names to the “official” baby name book?
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 2:50 pm ¶
aviator wrote:
I was on the yearbook staff in high school, and now I work for a company that does yearbook photography. This stuff goes through so many different proofreaders it’s not even funny. Letting something like this get published is horribly unprofessional, and I really hope they investigate why everyone missed such a blatant problem.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 3:14 pm ¶
Maati wrote:
I ask the Mods indulgence because I just read the thread & my reply is a bit long & 2 fold.
Like some, my birth name sounds made up but isn’t. Being an African-American with a dual name of Native American & West African origins, I’ve had all kind of other persons of race & culture try to ‘remake’ my name, Black, White or other.
The schools is handling of the situation is wrong & I hope the offended parents do take some kind of court action. It more than racist, it’s insensitive, cruel & harms the character of the young Black students. The ‘What can you do’ statement of the principal or whoever in the forefront is the same ‘boys will be boys’ comment from the Jena 6 incident: wrong, insane & defeatist. It is the job; yes JOB, of those in education to teach children better. Teachers & school officials have a lot of jobs in the teaching of our youth, but as of race relations, just like school shootings, this type of foolishness needs to be rooted out of the system, period. Situations like this allow others of differing cultures/races a privilege of degrading others. If I had a nickel for every Hindu, Pakistan, Israeli, etc(I work in a hospital on the East coast with a lot of foreign born doctors) who treats born African American & American Latinos like 2nd class citizens, I’d be rich.
To Abu: I understand the point that you’re trying to make is the any form of racism in this country or any where is wrong. People of any & all cultures should be tolerant of the others. Cultural differences shouldn’t separate us. And to a point I agree.
But I believe you’re being overly simplistic because in the world I’ve lived in for the last 35 years all people are some kind of ist. I’ve read a lot of your comments to this post & as well worded & intelligent as they are, and good points all together, you are, in my personal opinion, showing a naivety that’s a bit unnerving. It plays to the ‘because we’re people of color, we can raise above’mantra that reeks of a inequitable personality. We all know non people of color have some kind of peculiar mentality…why can’t we also? It is not fair & right to be biased? Seems this country has thrived for hundreds of years on the concept. This type of disorder seems has been plaguing people of color for sometime in response to racial/cultural issues. It’s sad to see another fall under the influence.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 3:58 pm ¶
Bob Simpson wrote:
I have to follow up on what aviator said. People are very sensitive about what goes into yearbooks. Switch a name or mess up a spelling and that is Trouble with a capital T.
I once taught at an all-black high school where the administration decided to cheap out on the yearbook. They hired a photography company that had no idea how to light black people properly and a yearbook printer who did not provide proper proofs.
Not only did peoples’ pictures look terrible, but the yearbook company mixed up peoples’ names on numerous pages.
I don’t know exactly how it happened, but the common explanation around the school was that it must have been white folks who think all black people look alike and don’t even care how much effort people put into looking good for yearbook picture day.
It was not only hurtful and demeaning to people as individuals but as black people. To make matters worse, the school was located in a low income area of the city where people expect to be treated badly by the powers that be. It would have been nice for the school yearbook to have been an exception to the rule.
Oh I forgot, it gets still worse, the school closed at the end of the year and that yearbook was the last one ever produced. What a legacy.
I don’t know how the high school at Covina fell down on the job, but it would be all too easy to pin the entire responsibility on one lone little racist fool.
My guess is that a lot of adults are running for cover and pointing fingers to escape responsibility.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 4:18 pm ¶
Yvette wrote:
I disagree with the idea that other African Americans would not do this sort of thing. I find there is a definite class thing going on in some circles where “ghetto names,” “hot ghetto mess,” “ghetto weddings” and other such things are discussed–often disparagingly–amongst Blacks with greater education and/or more wealth.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 4:35 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Latoya
Understood. And I do trust you. It just seemed like this thread got hot awful fast and I was trying to say “whoa.” Whether or not you agree with Abu Sinan’s original point some of the stuff that has come up in its wake–about racial stereotypes in pop culture, racial profiling, class implications in names etc.–is really interesting. I guess that is the test for me: does a post (or a comment) open up a conversation or shut one down? There are comments on this thread I agree with politically that are nevertheless designed to shut down the conversation (and I’m not counting the Mod posts here). And then there are people who are just acting out and showing their ass… Not for nothing but, given all the “white folks, de-lurk” love over on the “Why Do We Come Here” thread people are awful quick to shut a white person down up in here with a “Dude, you’re white.” Weak.
I’m not trying to advocate for Abu Sinan (who can speak for himself), but the whole silencing him with accusations about his privilege thing is tiresome: dude is a Muslim with an Arab name and wife, raising two Arab kids. He could walk around in liederhosen all day and not get back the “white privilege” that costs him. But whatever. My ear is tuned to the orientalism that haunts some of these comments and that is not the point here so I will just leave it at that.
As far as the prank goes I was (and am) hurt by it because, like a lot of people on this thread, I have taken a ton of crap about my name over the years. It is a terrible and dehumanizing thing to do to a person. LDP–I was interested to hear you talk about your name in relation to job seeking because I have dealt with that in spades: they always wait until we are face to face and things are going well before they ask “What kind of name is that”? This is a test–the question is illegal and they want to see if I’m going to be “sensitive” about it. There is no way for me to win once they go there. Either I make a stink or I laugh and we have an awkward “but you don’t look like an Arab” conversation. Either way, no job for Joe. Honestly, in my darkest days with my dissertation this is what gets me through. Me saying “Actually, that’s Dr. (Arab name)…”
Oh and, I got nothing but love for you too.
::Adjusts tinfoil hat to a rakish angle::
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 4:43 pm ¶
Philly Phil wrote:
@Latoya
“…to some extent, not being racist is about managing and challenging these thoughts. Not the absence of those thoughts at all, or minimizing why certain people feel the need to hang on to these thoughts when the evidence is overwhelmingly against the stereotype”
That was so perfect. Thanks!
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 4:49 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Yvette – Its never happened to me. Maybe I just hang with the wrong kind of people
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 5:06 pm ¶
Big Man wrote:
I loved post #72 by Latoya. That was the perfect response to Phil’s comment, which I actually found myself nodding long with because it made sense. However, Latoya’s response made me rethink my position and see the difference. Good job.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 5:16 pm ¶
miwome wrote:
This is a recent opinion piece from Steven Levitt’s NYT blog, Freakonomics: http://freakonomics.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/07/how-much-does-it-cost-you-in-wages-if-you-sound-black/
It’s about the effect of “sounding black” (not looking black) on one’s wages. Toward the end, Levitt (predictably) devolves into a lovely clusterfuck of pprivilege, ignorance, and ends with this line:
“My response: ‘Tru dat.’”
My response to the response: fuck you.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 5:28 pm ¶
AC wrote:
Shameful, just shameful. Having been on yearbook staff myself in HS I don’t beleive this was a simple or unintentional “prank”. It was deliberate four- part cruelty and here is why: First off a staffer deliberately replaced the names of actual students in the caption for the Black Student Union picture with made up names. That switch had to go past a senior editor (most likely a literal senior – and Abu don’t chase me down on the use of “likely” lol!), it had to go past the faculty advisor, it had to go past a proofreader at the printing company and it had to go past all of the above, and possibly the entire yearbook staff, a second time for the final proofing. And that’s just assuming they went with the standard two proof. It may have bounced back and forth through several proofings depending on their yearbook budget.
Back in my day (mid 80s) once the book was turned in to the printer it was typeset and a proof printed and sent back to the yearbook staff for edits. The entire staff would read an overlapping handful of pages, serving as a sort of multiple proof reading wave to each page. Corrections were made and sent back to the printer. Each correction then required the typeset to be reset and thus was a big deal in time and labor to the printers. Nowadays it’s probably all digitized but that just means the yearbook staff has more power and control – so where is the faculty advisor in all this?
And how does Covina’s award winning yearbook staff handle their editing such that one lone student can change the names of several of his classmates and no one catches it? The faculty advisor didn’t do a final proof read? The senior editor?
The end effect is incredibly demeaning and memorialized for all eternity. I don’t know about you but I have all my yearbooks and a I treasure them. I know my school has each years yearbook in the library, and that extras are kept for distribution to those who lose their yearbooks to fire, theft, etc. The yearbook also serves as a source of information for the reunion committees. So are all those yearbooks going to be stickered?
These students just had all of that stolen from them and the school’s so-called solution does nothing to address the hurt and pain so deliberately caused – shameful.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 6:24 pm ¶
J.J. wrote:
To Abu:
According to the pop. statistics of that school, it’s more than likely the culprit was possibly for simple reason they outnumber the black students there by 31%, and also about because white people have a known history of not only making fun of black people/non-white people in general, but also making them hate/ feel like there’s something wrong with them because they don’t measure up to the white standard of things. That’s what you don’t seem to understand. Plus you seemed more distaught over the suggestion that the perpetrator was white almost to the exclusion of the main subject. You really don’t get where any of the posters, including Peterson, are coming from on this matter. I think you mean well, but you just need some more educating on this subject.
This incident was a deliberate targeting of the black students designed to disrepect and denigrate them, plain and simple. And like Latoya said, I could give less than a damn what black comedians have to say on the subject because frankly, I don’t find a lot of what half of them say to be that funny to begin with, and their opinions aren’t the last word on anything in the black community anyway–they’re just commentators.
Speaking of racist acts, last week me and my significant other went to a small town in southeastern Michigan with an activist group we work with to spread leaflets about a foreclosure law we’re trying to get grassroots support for. We were going to this particular community because a politician who could prevent the law from going through lives there, so we came there specifically to raise people’s awareness of it.
Anyway, to make a long story short, there were six of us (3 blacks, 3 whites) the main person behind this venture, who’s a cool old white dude, suggestion we split up into man/woman pairs. My sig nif went with this cool white woman who’s very much into activism, and while they were both going around on this public beach (this was a mostly white community,BTW) trying to tell people about the foreclosure law, my sig nif (who is a black man) noticed that they were getting weird reactions from the white folks they tried to talk to. He said that some of them acted like they were actually scared of him, despite the fact that he wasn’t carrying anything but a clipboard with petition sheets on it. One woman actually pulled her daughter closer to her as he and the white lady walked up. While we were talking and joking about it later, he said that some of them actually stopped eating in mid-air to stare at him. Basically he was getting this whole negative vibe from all these white folks, not only because he was a brother, but because he was a brother with a white woman. He decided to not say anything and let her do all the talking. Needless to say, they didn’t make much headway in getting the info out.
Sooner or later, a cop came up and told him (my sig nif) he couldn’t leaflet on the beach/he had to leave. The cool white dude noticed what was going on and started making a big show of leafleting just to see what the cop was going to say to him about it. He later said that the cop finally showed up after 15 min. and told him to get to stepping. I was leafleting with a young white boy (who is one geeked-up Socialist) and we didn’t have any problems, probably because he’s white and I’n a black woman. ( I’m absolutely sure of that.)
Anyway, that exp. was quite an eye-opener for my sig nif, having grown up in all-black Detroit—we discussed, joked, laughed like hell about and cursed the prejudiced attitudes of those small-town white folks. We both figured they must have gotten their ideas about black folks from gangster rap videos or something, because my sig nif was virtually the only black man walking around out there (with a white woman, which is also why they got mad shade thrown at them) and he said later, “What the hell did they think I was going to do, when they outnumbered me 100 to 1?” Now, as we were pulling up to the beach, the cool white chich warned us that this was a Klan country, and to be careful. Unfortunately she forgot to tell my sig nif, because he would’ve been better prepared for what happened when they went out there. The whole situation really tripped me out,though.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 7:24 pm ¶
NancyP wrote:
I have to say, when I hear “hasta la vista, baby”, I hear it spoken by a heavily accented German (Austrian) voice belonging to a guy who used to pump iron. I don’t connect it with actual Hispanics, or for that matter, humans not resembling comicbook characters’ physiques.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 7:52 pm ¶
NancyP wrote:
#69 -”Barak” (most common transliteration) is a Semitic-language name, found in the Bible’s ancient Hebrew and no doubt in an Arabic usage as well. It means “Lightning”, and in the Bible, refers to ruler Deborah’s general in the book of Judges, the victor over Sisera (Sisera himself done in by Jael).
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:00 pm ¶
Miss Lisa S wrote:
“Not for nothing but, given all the “white folks, de-lurk” love over on the “Why Do We Come Here” thread people are awful quick to shut a white person down up in here with a “Dude, you’re white.” Weak.”
My thoughts exactly.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:04 pm ¶
Treacle wrote:
To Joseph:
Being in an interracial relationship does not negate your white privilege.
White privilege operates based on how people look, and involves a number of a priori assumptions often made before you even get to the level of learning the individuals name.
I’m sure his being married to an Arab woman and having multiethnic children does affect his relationship with society, but I’m reluctant to say it completely obliterates the positive effects of his skin color in day to day life.
Posted 08 Jul 2008 at 8:27 pm ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Treacle
Your refusal to acknowledge the ongoing, brutal persecution of Arabs and Muslims in this country (and throughout the west) is extremely disturbing to me. Bleating about “white privilege” is meaningless in this context. Google the Abu Ghraib photos–those people are “white.” It is not exactly the same get-out-of-jail-free card for everyone these days. Or have you been living in a box for the last few years?
You know who else did some some quality time in a box? Maher Arar, a fair skinned Canadian Arab who was rendered to Syria, held in a 3×6 ft “grave” and tortured for a year before his release with no charge. (Arar is an IT guy–like the nerd who comes to fix your computer–not a terrorist). His white skin didn’t help him out of that hole. Tell you what, try following Abu Sinan and his family through an airport sometime and then come back here and we can have a chat about privilege, mmkay?
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 1:19 am ¶
rengeko wrote:
i’ve been reading this WHOLE thread, and i have to say that i have a few things to add. first-one thing i want to start with is that if *I* had ever done anything remotely like that, my PARENTS would have been all over me. sure, the school can’t do anything-but why would the parents not do something? i am white, but have lived in largely black areas much of my life, so there was a very serious awareness in my family about what is not ok to say or even think. i certainly had this talk with my stepson at some point, since my husband is from redneck stock, but i can assure you that the first time i heard him say the n-word, he understood that he would not ever say it in my presence again. i guess i can’t control what he thinks, but by not normalising prejudice, parents can drive home their values. on the subject of abu sinan, i do want to be charitable, but i think he has made overemphasis of his “arab” stepchildren-makes me wonder if that’s the way he thinks of them? latoya, i really like this blog-and hope you stay for a long time.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 5:17 am ¶
Ron wrote:
Abu Sinan -
Not to get off target here but Arabs have privilege in the Muslim world based upon their Arab lineage (closely related to Muhammad thus closely realated to Allah).
But white privilege will never go away without the person recognizing that privilege.
Racism is an emotional response. Most people who look at black people the first thought is the process of dehumanization (liken to an animal namely gorilla or monkey) which many blacks themselves do as well. After dehumanization a choice is made to either deal with this emotional response or to ignore and bury it emotionally.
For example, during segregation years dogs where treated better than blacks in public establishments.
Most people bury that feeling emotionally and that is where the lack of recognition of one’s racism starts.
Afterwards, a process to rationalize one’s privilege comes into play. The privilege is maintained institutionally by force of a state or militia. However, other means such economic and social forces will be the first tools used to maintain that privilege.
So on an unconscious and emotional intelligence level is where the dangerous racism has to be challenged.
The caste systems throughout the world rely on these unwritten rules or cultural norms.
Salaam
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 7:18 am ¶
Slush wrote:
@Joseph – cosign #90 (and all of them)
To choose to change your name to Abu Sinan is to knowingly sacrifice your white privilege and experience exactly the the difference. Not all forms of racism will affect Abu – the kind that arises from the first sight of someone as non-white, for example – but no one experiences ‘all’ forms of racism. In the case of Arabs or Muslims, the next thing people learn after seeing you is usually your name, and then you’re suspicious, unhirable, untrustable, threatening, and believe in a despised religion.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 9:04 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Joseph,
You hit the nail on the head. Thanks for understanding. It would seem that with all of the calls here for tolerance, some groups just are not really considered or are left out in the fray.
As to traveling with Abu Sinan and family, I just had to laugh. I have two kids with my wife and two step children 100% Saudi. Try traveling in the USA/International with Saudi passports………..not a fun experience.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 9:14 am ¶
Eva wrote:
What bothers me about this action was it’s cruelty. That’s what is so sad about it. I’m all for joking around but some things aren’t funny, especially denying someone their personhood, which is what this action was in my opinion.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 9:26 am ¶
coco wrote:
abu sinan:
1. it’s rude to derail a thread.
2. the use of the word “likely” was explained repeatedly as being:
a. grounded in US history
b. used by a white author
3. You haven’t responded to any of these contextual factors, you continue to push the idea that this site is intolerant despite the fact that:
a. No commenter bit on the “likely white” comment, and used it as a chance to degrade or speculate about white people being inherently racist. In response to your questions, commenters connected the “likely” conclusion to the history of white supremacist rhetoric being used againt black people.
4. Muslim contributors to Racialicious have already discussed being an oppressed religious group but not necessarily a racial minority.
a. this post is not the forum for that discussion
b. balancing white privilege and Muslim identity depends on signifiers (like name, clothing, etc.) otherwise you can continue to earn white privilege by “passing.”
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 10:27 am ¶
Abu Sinan wrote:
Coco,
I have already refuted the idea that one’s perceived experiences should be able to be used as an excuse for racism. No one group should be judged on the basis of one person’s experiences, it doesnt matter what the race of the person is. White supremists themselves use this method for justifying their own racism. It should NOT be used as a tool to justify anyone’s racism. To understand anger, sure, to justify racism and prejudice, no way.
I suggest you read different comments than I did. More than one poster commented about how my comments lead to the discussion of such acts in current media.
If you didnt notice I am not the one who brought up anything about being Muslim as way to bypass white privledge, it was someone elese.
It is a bit dishonest to try and tack onto me comments and ideas made by others.
I have tried to refrain from commenting further on this subject, but when you accuse me of making statements that clearly were NOT made by myself I will have to answer.
I agree with Joseph to a certain extent about being a Muslim and it’s exemption of one from “white privledge” but only to a degree.
The colour of my skin still gets me places and entitles me to a certain set of treatment that I would not have if I was a PoC. Some of this dimishes when it becomes clear that I am a member of a religious minority, the only group it is okay to hate today in the USA. It diminishes even more when people find out I that I have changed my name, or even worse married a Saudi Arab woman.
Be that as it may, you should direct your comments to the person who made them and not attack me for things I didnt say.
I have never used my status as a Muslim to try and push my viewpoint(unless the subject is about Islam and Muslims), I think it only rightfully has limited use in such a manner.
One Muslim American writer, Umar Lee, called a white person converting to Islam “apostating from the white race and white privledge”. As I have stated above, this is only slightly true.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 10:53 am ¶
Joseph wrote:
@Abu Sinan
I haven’t wanted to derail this thread by inserting a conversation about orientalism/Islamophobia but
I am struck by what a blind spot it is whenever the concept of white privilege pops up. And I’m also uncomfortable “defending” you since you are obviously capable of speaking for yourself, but since you are the Muslim-white-guy-with-the-Arab-family around here this issue tends to cohere around you so…here we are.
What I wanted to say is: white privilege is real and powerful, but it is also local…and Arabs and/or Muslims no longer have the luxury of a local identity. It is perfectly legal for the United States government to kidnap anyone, regardless of citizenship status, anywhere in the world (including the United States), and imprison them indefinitely, with no access to legal counsel and torture them at their leisure. That is not “24″ people…that is US American law. And Arabs and Muslims are its disproportionate focus.
Given this state of affairs imagining that white skin is a magical surface that no trouble ever sticks to requires a willful ignorance (or indifference to) Arab/Muslim suffering. None of which is to say that white privilege shouldn’t be discussed–it absolutely should–but if a little context is so threatening then perhaps people should examine their premises.
I think I’ve said this as clearly as I can so I’m gonna bow out of this thread now. I think it is important to talk about what happened to those kids in CA and I don’t want to shift this any further away from that.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 11:00 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
Mod Note: Okay, this thread brought up a lot of things out of the woodwork. I am going to close this thread now, but will create a few new posts based on how the comments have gone.
****THREAD IS NOW CLOSED, NO FUTURE COMMENTS WILL BE POSTED****
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 11:39 am ¶
CVT wrote:
I told myself I was done, but I can’t bow out of this fray yet.
@Joseph – I don’t think anybody is trying to ignore the obvious prejudice against Muslims/Arabs in this country. To some extent, it’s probably “allowed” more (officially and otherwise) than other racial prejudices. However, I think what Slush was trying to point out is that Abu CHOSE that distinction (by his wife, children, name-change, etc.). Which makes a difference. Not that it makes him immune to all that will still come down on him, but it does make a difference. And, again, (comment #54) I am in a position to know how dating a person of color does not instantly represent knowledge and lack of prejudice, on a general level.
@Abu – I wasn’t sure if you were still around, but if you are, will you please respond to my comment (#54)? I think it’s important that you see what got people up in arms over your comments, so you understand how good intentions can go wrong when we start “defending” ourselves. I wrote it while heated, so I apologize for the tone, but I think the message is important. And, again, be aware that, in this space, talking about your own personal experiences is something we don’t take lightly – and will be respected (usually). So arguing against somebody’s experience is likely to set some of us off. This goes for you, as well, if you stick to your personal experience – as a white Muslim man in America – I think you’ll see a calmer, more civil response. However, if you keep using your children’s or wife’s experiences to defend your own position, it starts getting a bit murky – when somebody like me starts doubting your intentions. One last time – chosen wife, or kids, of color should not be used as a shield or weapon to prove your understanding or lack of prejudice. Obviously, I would expect you to have understanding as a MUSLIM, but not necessarily get the full Arab experience (trust me, my dad knows little -if anything – about “being Chinese”).
So now that we all have calmer heads about us – I really would love to turn this into an actual dialogue.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 11:52 am ¶
Treacle wrote:
Joseph,
You obviously didn’t read my post. Please do so next time before responding.
I said nothing about persecution against persons of Arabic descent, nor did I once imply, much less state overtly, that Arab peoples have an easy time in America.
However, Abu Sinan is white. He is not Arab. Therefore, he benefits from white privilege. I’ll say it again, in italics, so you catch it this time–
Being in an interracial relationship does not turn off white privilege.
In the future, please address the actual points I make in my post, rather than creating fictional posts out of thin air. I dislike responding to red herrings.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 11:52 am ¶
CVT wrote:
Oops – I’m referring to my comment #53, not 54. My bad.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 11:52 am ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
No, no, no.
Thread is done.
What we have here, as a problem, is people are arguing all different things.
Abu is (was) arguing that all racism is wrong and should be condemned from every corner. I have issues with that, not with the message on its face, but what is often implied with this message. We will discuss this later.
Joseph is arguing that a lot of the criticism aimed toward Abu plays into Orientalism and Islamophobia, and overstates Abu’s white privilege while not taking into consideration his acceptance of Islam and his subsequent, part racial, part ethnic, part religious reclassification, which impacts how he may view the world. Joseph has expressed concern about this dynamic on other threads. We will discuss this at a later date.
Other commenters have discussed how deflecting criticism from one minority group to another is an oft-used tactic to suppress discussions of racism. Others have noticed the issue with power structures and dynamics, and there was a very good question about justifications of profiling.
We will discuss this at another date.
However, from the comments and emails I have received, it is clear to me that the people participating in this thread are all trying to convey different ideas. This is causing a problem.
So once again – this thread is closed.
***THREAD CLOSED TO FUTURE COMMENTS****
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 12:00 pm ¶
alex wrote:
Okay, here’s what I’m wondering – and I’m kind of surprised no one else has mentioned it. Were the only names changed those of BSU members? The news article mentions 9 students, but 5% of 2000 is 100. If only BSU members’ names were changed, doesn’t that raise the whole attack up one notch? Iisn’t that deliberate targetting of students who advocate for their community? It seems to me that this one student (and his many proofreaders – and as a HS teacher I have to really second and underline that the responsibility here ultimately lies with the adult who permitted this to happen) singled out students who are proud of their identities as African Americans, who probably (I know, assumption, sorry) are most vocal about racism with other students and who refuse to assimilate into the student body at large. Am I reading the situation wrong here or missing some information?
Mod Note – Approving this one because it deals with the article. There were other errors in the year book mentioned, but the specific section where the BSU members were pictured were opposite other club photos with the correct names of the students involved. It stands to reason that one couldn’t have possibly proofed and corrected that section of the yearbook without having seen that mistake.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 12:05 pm ¶
Ray wrote:
If you read the article, it says that more than the BSUs` names were changed, which changes things, and also, it has a picture, and, at least to me, it didn`t seem like all of those 7 or 8 students were black.
Posted 09 Jul 2008 at 10:41 pm ¶
queenofsheba wrote:
“Now I know that white folks frequently bemoan the guilt-laden burden of inheriting the racist legacy of their predecessors; to which I can only respond: If white folks disavow and destroy all the systemic advantages and interlocking privileges and perks of whiteness, then they’re off the hook!”
So I’m curious. What does doing this mean, specifically in ways that are action-based as opposed to discourse-related (either internal, i.e. thought, or external, i.e. speech)? –Obviously discourse is one species of action that’s very important, but not what I’m asking about at the moment.
Posted 13 Jul 2008 at 6:04 pm ¶
Latoya Peterson wrote:
@Queen of Sheba –
A full dismantling of the predominant systems in our society. (Or, at least, that is part of Kai’s solution – you may want to contact him at his blog – zuky.net – for more detail.)
Posted 13 Jul 2008 at 6:30 pm ¶
Rosina Lippi wrote:
Somehow I have never come across this weblog before, and now I have a lot of catching up to do. Thank you for this post, which I found very interesting; and thanks for the shout-out as well.
The discussion did seem to devolve fairly quickly, mostly (it seems to me) because things got derailed around the world ‘likely.’ In a group discussion somebody could have called the commenter on that and put aside the question raised (valid as it is) until the core thesis had been discussed. It’s the linear nature of weblog discussions that causes a lot of the problem. If you had a way to thread your comments, the confusion and acrimony might have been avoided.
My quick take on this whole issue: Every human being should have the right to name themselves and to have their choices respected. If you know a Robert who does not want to be called Bob, but you purposefully call him Bob at every opportunity, that’s not a neutral exercise on your part. It’s aggressive and confrontational if you do it face to face. If you do it from behind a screen, as the yearbook staff and/or supervisors did in this case, the effect is even stronger.
There’s a long history of using ethnically marked names as euphemisms for more directly racist terms. Leroy was used that way in the seventies — a cop questioning a black man often referred to him as Leroy, even if the suspect’s name was known to him or her. And the cop was absolutely aware that the use of ‘Leroy’ was demeaning and racist. Just as she or he knew the subject could do nothing about it.
In this case, if the perpetrators are claiming that they didn’t mean harm and/or were joking, then they are almost certainly lying. They might consider this kind of thing truly funny, but they also know that it’s insulting and wrong. Certainly the teachers and staff should have stopped this before it got off the ground.
Posted 22 Jul 2008 at 6:46 pm ¶
None wrote:
I think Latoya has made a very fair and patient effort to moderate the comments here. Applause.
Whomever did this yearbook stunt was mean. Whether or not the perpetrator hates blacks or names he/she associates with blacks, it was a mean thing to do. Kids are mean. I recently read an article about some kid who got shot and killed in Knoxville, TN. He had been the victim of ridicule for his lack of hair due to a condition he’s had all his life.
Kids are mean. They’ll pick anything about someone that they may not perceive as “normal” and make fun of it, often with damaging effects. The racial part is incindiary, for sure. Had I been on the receiving end of this sort of thing, I’d be pissed, too.
Yes, it would bother me just as much as when I’m told I can’t jump high or I’m used as an insult from one black guy to another on the basketball court if I score on the latter. “White boy can’t” this and “white boy don’t” that are everywhere these days. It freaking sucks. And yet I know it’s not as bad as people of other races have it. In many cases, not nearly as bad.
So I feel for the victims here. And with this stuff still going around, I am worried for my younger, adopted black brother…. What difficulties he’ll face when he’s older…
All this disturbs.
Posted 22 Aug 2008 at 1:52 pm ¶