From: thf2@ellis.uchicago.edu (Ted Frank)
Subject: Re: A bushel of raspberries for Kolodney
Reply-To: thf2@midway.uchicago.edu
Organization: University of Chicago
Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 04:31:53 GMT

In article <1jnhq7INN4ro@morrow.stanford.edu> HF.GTD@forsythe.stanford.edu (Gabrielle Daniels) writes:
>Europeans and their descendants made a virtual cosmology--with
>themselves at the center--for their claims for hegemony over most of
>the world.  White skin privilege was a big part of it.  This makes
>Europeans all the more persons of distinction, and I use the term
>loosely.  Despite your post of bell hooks article, despite Jews
>insistence (at least, conscious Jews) that they are not white,
>Jews are not immune to _acting white_ and exercising white skin
>privilege over dark-skinned people of color, as if they had
>something in common with the goyim.  And, begging your pardon, the
>darkest looking Jew (barring intermarriage with the brothers and
>sisters) is still WHITE LOOKING to me!  I think this is what black
>people on the whole object to in regards to Jews.  Claiming to be
>people of color, and claiming privileges, too!  I mean, whenever I
>read for example, Walkers _Meridian_, or recently, _How I Became
>Hettie Jones_, which is the really interesting autobiography of
>Amiri Barakas white and Jewish first wife, I hear/see the Jewish
>parents freaking out over the marriage partners or someone doing
>_kaddish_ over them.  I do not believe that this is just because
>they picked non-Jews as husbands or wives either.  

I know of plenty of Jews who married white non-Jews who had kaddish
said for them.  Your paranoia is showing.

>There is
>something about our blackness, as well as by extension, the
>_blackness_ of Palestinians who are nothing if not ethnic brothers
>to the Jews, that bug the hell out of certain Jews.  

It's that Palestinian leaders want to kill Jews that makes life a bit more
troubling for us.  

>Getting back to the main issue.  My feeling is that if folks had the
>technology but didnt wanna jump some other country, like the Aztecs
>against the French, for example, if they knew they existed before
>Fernando Cortes, they didnt hafta.

Can you name a single instance in human history when a culture of
any sort achieved technological superiority over its neighbors and
didn't exploit it to some extent?  Certainly the Indians did amongst
themselves before they got wiped out by disease. 

>As far as the Aztecs and their conquering ways, they probably had
>access to the same weaponry as their neighbors.  They probably had
>more numbers.  Thats technology?  

It's superiority in resources.  Same difference.

>Whats in a certain culture that
>would allow them to be warlike and by extension, imperialist?
>Because some people of color were not, and never got into that
>number in the first place.  

And some whites were not, and never got into that number in the first
place.  Eastern European Jewish shtetl culture was peaceful during its
entire existence.  I don't recall Gypsies as ever being warlike, though
I imagine someone can correct me on that.

>Whats the beef?  Were they just dying to
>conquered?  Were the oppressors looking for raw materials?  Markets?
>Get a grip.  What was the modus operandi behind their expansionism
>and tribute system with other Indian tribes?

Greed.  False notions of religious superiority.

>Look at the Chinese.  Im not saying that they werent casting
>covetous glances at the Vietnamese and the Cambodians.  There was
>the Mongol Empire, too.  But when it came time to check out the
>great unknown of the Pacific, or even to consider stretching out to
>the Levant and Eastern Europe, they probably just said, wait a
>minute.  Whats the limit?  Are we stepping into something we hadnt
>oughta?  Do we have everything we need?  Maybe we need to look into
>ourselves and develop our inner selves.  Maybe controlling others
>doesnt get the same result in the long run as controlling ourselves
>and depending on our own initiative.

I'm sure the Tibetans and Koreans will be happy to learn this surprising
fact.

>People dont have to be racist because of technology, too.  They can
>be racist without it as well.

Noone's denied that.
-- 
ted frank                     | thf2@ellis.uchicago.edu 
standard disclaimers          | void where prohibited
the university of chicago law school, chicago, illinois 60637
Newsgroups: soc.culture.african.american,talk.politics.misc