Racism

One of the big things I learned during my year at p6 is that racism is real. Thanks to Craig Nulan (cnulan). I can't find the thread, or I'd link it.

It's not a thing of the past.

But what to make of that is far from clear.

To some, establishing that racism is real implies, QED, that blacks need/deserve what we call affirmative action. I didn't follow that.

But the really curious point, which I remain stuck on, is the notion that "white people collectively are racist but individually, personally, there's nothing which can be done".

It's curious because, once cnulan had stimulated my grasp of the issue, I had come to believe that individual white people could make a difference.

So what did I learn during a year at p6?

Distrust

Can an anonymous person be trusted at all?

I had imagined so. I had imagined that by supplying lots of details about the real me, that I could become trustworthy, in the sense that my thoughts would be accepted as my own, and not part of some malevolent effort.

It didn't turn out that way.

One might observe my treatment as simple hostility to a libertarian agenda from die hard liberals, but ultimately I took it to be different than that. P6 was never too upset by a straight out debate. What upset him (and ptcruiser, in the extreme) were my attempts to "be one of the guys". To discuss contentious issues as a friend rather than a sterile debater.

I did that, to be sure. I sought friendship.

Nor do I believe that P6 is incapable of being friends with a libertarian. I suspect he actually is friends with libertarians. And conservatives. He's quite comfortable with cobb, despite important disagreements.

Or maybe it's that I'm a white guy.

But it's not that simple either. P6 is a mature adult who's broadly participated in New York City all his life. He's had plenty of good experiences with white guys.

Being a white guy did have an important part of the distrust.

Several times, it was strongly suggested that I have had experiences which I simply have never experienced. That I would deny such experiences became the basis of a belief that I wasn't being honest, that I must have some hidden agenda.

In some sense, maybe I did. Do I hope to communicate with hard-core-liberal-blacks? Indeed, yes. Does it help to have your arguments tested in the fire? Of course. Was P6 such a fire? You bet. I was quickly convinced that some of my initial beliefs were simply wrong, and some other ones lacked sophistication.

In return, I offered myself as a "typical" white guy. Willing to explain white behavior, willing to work with P6 and his posters on enhancing their ability to communictate to white people. Maybe it was a bad bargain for them, but on a human level it felt fair.

In the end, I was not trusted.

And since one cannot communicate with people who one doesn't trust, it was broken.

dwshelf's initial posting

Hi
I'm dwshelf.
I've posted on other people's blogs before, most notably http://www.prometheus6.org, but this is my blog. Feel free to add comments .

dwshelf