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There's a lot of really good stuff in the comments of this post (though I gritted my teeth through the actual post):
http://gratefuladdict.livejournal.com/19551.html

Which leads to a couple of essential essays:
http://mmcisaac.faculty.asu.edu/emc598ge/Unpacking.html
http://blindprivilege.com/white-trash-blues-class-privilege-v-white-privilege/

EDIT: The first entry has been locked. I asked the poster to consider unlocking it; if she ever does I will come back to it, because I'd love to discuss it with you guys.

Date: 2008-10-06 04:56 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] twirlgrrl.livejournal.com
Oh, damn! I should have screencapped--I had that thing up for days!

Date: 2008-10-06 05:32 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] alexisyael.livejournal.com
Ah, no worries... I've read too much on the issue and tend to get really pissy about it -- white people annoy the shit out of me sometimes!

Date: 2008-10-06 07:45 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] twirlgrrl.livejournal.com
Yeah, I hear you... there were some really great comments though, and it was a good subject to discuss in general, because I've heard various perspectives on it from my friends. In particular the idea I want to explore more the feeling among some white folks that people of color are gaining advantages over them because of affirmative action, etc. This is a complex, multifaceted issue that I don't have answers on!

Date: 2008-10-06 07:59 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] alexisyael.livejournal.com
See, my response to that issue is that I think it complete and utter BS. Especially living here, you drive to the ghetto (and we REALLY have multiple ghettos and the REALLY poor ones are places I wouldn't drive in if I had to -- and I know the poorer neighborhoods of SF and the Bay Area and I feel comfortable in most of those, except for an abiding dislike of some of the druggie rich white kids of the Haight/ telegraph) and there is NO WAY IN HELL of getting out of a Black in Alabama ghetto without serious effort and a great deal of luck.

The colorline is a big, awful divide. I grew up poor. But I'm white, I have white privilege. No one looks at me and immediately thinks my parents couldn't afford rent every month. They don't follow me around the store, thinking I'm a shoplifter (or look at me like I might have a gun in my purse). No cop would just shoot me out of the blue b/c I'm sleeping in my car (that event happened in Riverside, CA, actually, about 12 blocks from where I lived when I went to UCR).

Being Black in America is a crime. And that is wrong. I do not have patience for White people who don't get that. Which is why I mostly stay away from those types of posts...

Date: 2008-10-06 09:42 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] peachyc.livejournal.com
I totally agree. I got into a discussion at a party in Delaware one time and this guy said, "Black people have to get over slavery. Things have been fair for a long time now." I think it was the first time my jaw actually hung open, I was so shocked. I told him, "The Civil Rights Act was in 1964!" and he said, "Yeah!" Like that was such a long time ago.

I don't have any patience for it either. People are stilled judged by the color of their skin, there have been plenty of examples of that. Things aren't even or fair, and if there are policies that can help to correct some of those wrongs I think they are essential.

I grew up in Riverside, but wasn't in Riverside when that shooting happened. I remember the controversy though and that nothing happened to the officers. (If it's the same one I'm thinking of (Tyesha Miller?)

Great post.

Date: 2008-10-06 09:46 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] alexisyael.livejournal.com
Yup, Tyesha, may she RIP. It was horrifying.

I can't remember whether I was living there when it happened or whether it happened right after we'd moved.

Living in Riverside was a HUGE eye opener for this Northern CA-ite! But I have to say living in Alabama has been even more eye-opening.

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