From: jj@alice.att.com (jj, curmudgeonly clueless old white boy)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.asian.american
Subject: Re: Perceptions, Realities, Perceptions
Date: 26 Aug 92 16:26:53 GMT
Reply-To: jj@alice.UUCP (jj, curmudgeonly clueless old white boy)
Organization: NJ State Home for Bewildered Terminals

In article <1992Aug25.165049.7810@nynexst.com> clare@nynexst.com (Clare Chu) writes:
>In article <23541@alice.att.com> jj@alice.UUCP (jj, irritated old clueless white boy) writes:

>  But you seem to be such a "wanna-be".
I do?  Only in your dreams.
I like me.

>  This question has been taken up by social scientists.
>  One did an experiment where he coloured himself, did his
>  hair and walked through the South as a Black man, and wrote
>  down his experiences.  
Yeah, it was, it turns out, quite a sacrifice in more ways than
one.  First, he found out just how bad it was in the south at
that time, and how it remains in some places today.   Second, 
I understand that the poor fellow died from the results of the
way he was "colored" eventually.   This book "black like me"
sat on my grandmother's bookshelf for many years (it's an
OLD book), and I read it several times.  It was rather
enlightening in a surprising way, it described the way
I was treated where I grew up so well.  The things missing
were the "go to the back of the bus" laws.  I just got beat
up if I didn't, no law needed, thank you kindly.

Still, yes, as I've said, YES, IT IS DIFFERENT.  DIFFERENT
in that I got beat up for breaking out of a class, ergo,
except when I was in the wrong store, or the wrong bar
(and people knew where I "belonged", sigh, the joys of a smaller
town), I didn't get beat up randomly.  Yes, that IS a difference.
Of course, I did get beat up randomly (well, rather I beat
feet, and fortunately my pf's were faster than theirs, I took
some damage, but they didn't get hands on me to keep me
around) for being white on Market Street, but then again,
that's only a white boy's experiences, and as you are making
so very, very clear, they don't count.  I'm not a person.
I'm just an object to hate.

>  This situation is also set up in classes on racism where
>  different groups are arbitrarily assigned different color
>  armbands that they must wear around the clock.  Members
>  of the class are told how to treat each other according
>  to the color on the armbands.  This exercise is so that
>  people who do not ordinarily suffer from racism are exposed
>  to how it feels, even if in a pretend environment.
Yes, I've seen it.  I've seen it break up an entire department
when the people in it weren't smart enough to just tell the
"moderator" to "shove off and go away". 

This armband is
a whole lot like being the kid from the mill taking the
SAT with all the management kids, even in another town. 
The clothing is all it takes.  They steal your seat,
your pencils, try to distract you, and in general harass
you, simply because YOU shouldn't be going to college,
you're trying to take THEIR place.

Yeah, I recognize it, alright.  THEN, when the scores
come back, the Guidance Councillor sends yours back
because "he couldn't have done that good".  Yeah,
sure.  Never happens to a white person. THEN, when
they come back saying "well, he's the only one who
answered x, y, and z right in the whole room. 
Of course, when this gets out (confidential, hah!)
four nice doctor and lawyer's boys show up to pound the
daylights out of you for doing that.  Nope, never happen
to a white person.  Just couldn't.

>  Just walking
>  a mile in someone else's shoes, before denying what
>  they experienced as a child. 
I haven't denied it, except in your mind, where you must
insist that "MY EXPERIENCE IS WORSE THAN YOURS".
Perhaps it is.  I see no reason to accept either
happening.  Nothing that happened to me justifies anything
that happens to you, and vice versa.  I won't accept
either, but you seem quite willing to permit one
to happen because "it's not as bad".

>  We all know what happened
>  to you as a child and we know that white people can be
>  just as oppressive to each other as they are to minorities.
No, you don't know what happened, and you accept exactly
none of it, as your article makes so perfectly clear.
Like most others who are strongly verbal on this newsgroup
I recall little enough of it myself until somebody
reminds me of yet another little bit of nastiness.
Like most others, given time and some effort, I could
probably write a nasty "expose" book, but why bother.

>  an identical incident that happened to some poor white
>  kid from the wrong side of the track.
Why don't you want to hear about some of the coping
strategies?  Last time I posed a few, as suggestions,
nothing more, it started a thread that is living to this
day as "arrogant white boys".  You don't want constructive
suggestions, then, I guess?  What do you want?

>  and death (as that Vietnamese American 19 year old found out).
And I claim nothing else.  EXCEPT to point out to you
that life isn't so very secure from where I used to sit,
or where I sit when I got back to visit, either.  

Yeah, life sucks a lot of places, now why can't we do something
about it, rather than argue about it?  This thread started
when  somebody tried to discuss 'what to do', and separatism,
which is very much NOT what to do.

Clare, were you born in the upper middle class?  It may sound
rude, but I recognize a whole set of behaviors and denials 
here that have nothing to do with race, and that are
most startlingly familiar.
-- 
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