We can’t handle the big stuff — income inequality and a low-wage economy, failing urban schools with an achievement gap compared to other post-industrialized nations, and an inadequate system of health insurance. So we wage guerrilla warfare over the small stuff, whether it’s one whacked-out PR executive’s racist tweet or the half-wit and un-wisdom of the patriarch of TV’s most popular reality show. But the funny thing is that the “Duck Dynasty” flap and the war on Obamacare all stem from the same impulses.
Welcome to America — a nation so exceptional that we have two, still separate and, now, way more unequal than ever. And until we come to grips to that — and with our original sins that can’t be papered over with happy talk about the great American melting pot — our future is condemned to keep repeating the past.
Every woman who appears wrestles with the forces that would have her disappear. She struggles with the forces that would tell her story for her, or write her out of the story..The ability to tell your own story, in words or images, is already a victory, already a revolt.Rebecca Solnit, Men Explain Things to Me (via iwriteaboutfeminism)
Artist:Jaxon Northon
Hattie McDaniel (June 10, 1895 – October 26, 1952) was an African American actress, singer-songwriter, and comedian. She is best known for her role as Mammy in Gone with the Wind (1939), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, the first Academy Award won by an African American.
Samsung India has launched a nationwide television and digital campaign showcasing its initiative to take customer service to the doorsteps of consumers in the hinterlands. Conceptualised by Cheil, the campaign film #SamsungCares went viral within few days of its launch and has already been viewed over 75 million times and shared over 64000 times on YouTube.
On Holocaust Remembrance Day, this twitter account is posting the names and photos (when available) of refugees turned away from America who became victims of Naziism. #NoBanNoWall #RefugeesWelcome
The bill would require all utilities serving Wyoming by 2019 to obtain
their electricity from sources other than commercial-scale wind or solar
operations.
A Minnesota House committee has approved a bill to charge protesters for police costs associated with disruptive demonstrations.
Protests erupted immediately after the measure was passed 6-3 by the House Civil law Committee.
“Shame on you,” CBS Minnesota reported John Thompson, who said he was a friend of Philando Castile, a black man shot and killed by a St Anthony police officer last summer, as shouting.
“You should leave, because those seats you’re sitting in will be replaced by somebody who represents us,“ Mr Thompson added.
Other reports added his shouts of: “Being black is a crime in Minnesota. We are coming for your seats.”
Shouts of “shame, shame!” prompted lawmakers to walk out without taking up a second measure.
State representative Nick Zerwas, who proposed the measure, said police agencies in the state had spent $2.5m in the past 18 months dealing with protests.
“Taxpayers are holding the bag,” Mr Zerwas said. “That’s not right.”
The bill will go on to the House Public Safety Committee.
Republican lawmakers in several states have proposed bills which could potentially criminalise peaceful protest over the last few weeks.
In Washington, senator Doug Ericksen proposed a law to make protests a felony if they are deemed “economic terrorism”.
A Republican lawmaker in Iowa pledged to introduce legislation establishing criminal penalties for protesters who shut down highways.
Here’s a MLK quote I’d love to see white people share.
“Whites, it must frankly be said, are not putting in a similar mass effort to reeducate themselves out of their racial ignorance. It is an aspect of their sense of superiority that the white people of America believe they have so little to learn.”
Take a facet of crime, and then look at television shows/movies that feature those criminals as protagonists.
White mobs.
White pirates.
White serial killers.
White political corruption
White drug dealers
I mostly want to talk about this as a TV phenomenon, but pick a crime, any crime, and Western media has probably made a movie/TV series/play/etc. with a white person that romanticizes the criminal activity. No matter what, a white person can do whatever terrible crimes and still have a TV/movie fanbase that loves them.
When you see black or brown people committing crimes on screen, you are to see them thugs and criminal masterminds and people to be beat down.
When you see white people committing crimes on screen, you see a three-dimensional portrait of why someone might commit that crime, how criminals are people too, and how you should even love them for the crimes that they commit because they’re just providing for their families or they’ve wronged or they’re just people and not perfect. This is particularly a luxury given to white male characters, since there few white female criminals as protagonists.
If and of the above shows were about black or brown folks, there would be a backlash of (white) people claiming that TV and movies are romanticizing criminals and are treating them too much like heroes and that it will affect viewers and encourage violence and “thuggish” behavior. And yet fictional white criminals get to have a deep fanbase who loves these white criminals, receive accolades and awards, get called amazing television that portray the complexities of human nature. Viewers of these characters see past the atrocious crimes and into their humanity, a luxury that white characters always have while characters of color rarely do. The closest that mainstream TV has come to showing black criminals as main characters is probably The Wire, and even then, the criminals share equal screen time and equal status as main characters as the police trying to stop them.
The idea that crime can be so heavily romanticized and glorified to such a degree is undoubtedly a privilege given to white characters. The next time you hear someone talk about Dexter Morgan or Walter White in a positive way, it may be an opportunity to rethink how white people can always able to be seen as people no matter what they do, while everyone else can be boiled down to nothing but a criminal.
If you don’t believe this is true then look at the reaction America had to Rock and Rap music. When Rock was being produced by black people it was the sign of the coming apocalypse. Or at least it was until white men appropriated the music and then it became the best thing ever invented. The subjects remained the same, sex and criminal activity. Only the races of the performaers changed. So much so that almost no one remembers that black people invented rock n roll.
When rap music started its rise to in popularity in the 80s, it was performed almost exclusively by black people. It and the performers were vilified by the media, people tried to ban it and place restrictions on it. The same reaction they had when Jazz (also invented by black people) rose in popularity, when rock music got popular and now rap music. Notice that these musical styles only go mainstream once they’ve been adopted by white performers.
This humanization of white pathology happens in all forms of media.
