[Peace-discuss] Would It Kill Us to Apologize to Iran for the Coup?

[John W.]

On Fri, Feb 6, 2009 at 8:58 AM, Robert Naiman <naiman.uiuc at gmail.com> wrote:

I'm definitely not in favor of refusal to recognize privilege. But I
> presume that in a non-racist society, if everyone woke up one day and
> discovered that by some mysterious process, a chunk of their neighbors
> were disproportionately excluded from the economic benefits that the
> society had to offer, people would move to address the disparity.


You gotta be shitting me, Robert.  Surely you jest?  You have neighbors
right here on this mailing list who are disproportionately excluded from the
economic benefits that society has to offer, and it has nothing to do with
race, and no one on this list is doing a damned thing about it or is GOING
to do a damned thing about it.  Whenever I talk about poverty, lack of
health insurance, etc., from a personal perspective, I get a blank stare
from the limousine liberals.  "Get a life," they say, or "Be warmed and
filled," to quote the Good Book.  I daresay that most of the readers of this
list care more about people in Pakistan than they do about their neighbors,
at least in terms of doing anything pragmatic to help them.

I'll probably live to regret that comment, but there it is.



> So, the fact that such disparities persist in our society, and the
> fact that we don't move successfully to redress them, to me is
> evidence enough of racism; no other story is necessary.


You ain't read enough stories, apparently.  There are many types of
disparities in our society, and many complex causes of such disparities.
Racism is an important one, but it is only one.



> That doesn't
> mean that other stories don't have value, and might not also be
> important to achieving the end of redress, but I see no need to posit
> them as prerequisites, and some reason not to; since it might be the
> case, for example, that some people have a psychological barrier
> against recognizing privilege, but not against redress justified on
> some other basis.


You lost me there.  Not that it matters.




> On Thu, Feb 5, 2009 at 8:46 PM, Marti Wilkinson <martiwilki at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>

> > The problem with refusing to recognize privilege is that it creates a set
> of
> > blinders that perpetuates the status quo. So while I do agree with the
> > sentiments you have expressed - I still think that privilege matters.
> Racism
> > rears its ugly head in various ways such as the attitude that poor and
> > marginalized groups remain that way due to a failure to pull themselves
> up
> > by the bootstraps. This 'blame the victim' approach is one that is used
> to
> > great effect by opponents of reparation, equal rights, and affirmative
> > action.
> >
> > Even worse is the way in which groups can be pitted against one another.
> In
> > 1996 California passed proposition 209 which killed affirmative action in
> > public universities. The sad irony is that it was the vote of white women
> > that played a tremendous role in passing 209.  More recently proposition
> 8
> > had support amongst minorities and, as long as we refuse to look at
> > privilege, situations like this will continue. On an international scale
> > this can manifest in the form of being accused of antisemitism if one
> > supports human rights endeavors in Palestine, or focusing on the hostage
> > situation in Iran instead of the coup instigated by the US.
> >
> > If priviledge didn't matter then our politicians would be sending their
> kids
> > overseas to get killed in Iraq. What would happen if our state
> > representatives and senators where given a link card, then told to feed
> > their families solely on what is available. How many people really
> > understand what it is like to have a medical card and not get medical
> care?
> > At one point in my life I actually did end up on welfare and, while the
> > experience sucked on so many levels, I'm grateful that it gave me the
> > opportunity to really see what happens when you are below the poverty
> line.
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 5, 2009 at 7:01 PM, Robert Naiman <naiman.uiuc at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>
> >> Yeah, although you could be for reparations without being for guilt,
> >> or even acknowledging privilege. It's a blight on us all that the
> >> descendants of slaves have a disproportionately small share of the
> >> national economic pie, even if we got off the boat yesterday. I'm for
> >> shoveling more money their collective way by any means possible. Call
> >> it whatever you want: reparations, affirmative action, full
> >> employment, raising the minimum wage, raising the earned income
> >> credit, making it easier to form unions, shifting the burden of
> >> taxation toward the wealthy, universal health care: I'm for it.
> >>
> >> On Thu, Feb 5, 2009 at 7:32 PM, Marti Wilkinson <martiwilki at gmail.com>
> >> wrote:
> >> > The problem with the United States is that many individuals refuse to
> >> > accept
> >> > ownership of human rights violations and crimes if they don't see
> their
> >> > ancestors as guilty parties. For example: How many people do you know
> >> > who
> >> > object to making reparations to the descendants of slaves and Native
> >> > Americans because their ancestor didn't immigrate to the states until
> >> > after
> >> > 1900?  People often do not understand how privilege benefits them or
> see
> >> > the
> >> > long term damage that is the result of years of prejudice and bigotry.
>
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