"Language and Racism"

I was actually searching for an SNL skit called Nick Burns: The Company’s computer Guy when I came across this TV show put together by the Salt Lake City Community College. It’s called Up in the Valley, and in this particular episode the host, Nick Burns, and his guest, Dr. Victor Villanueva of Washington State University, discuss how racial inequality today is masked and thus perpetuated through language.

You can view this show in its entirety at the Valley Television website.

The Race Card

There is something I want to bring up due to a conversation I had with someone yesterday. Now when a person, let's say a Korean, brings up a fact in a conversation about race. Let's say, about white privilege. And that white person accuses the Korean person of "Bringing up the 'race card.'" Who, in reality, is actually bringing up the race card?

This is the kind of bullshit the pisses me off. Now if the Korean person brings up a fact about how the way a white person might view race is based on their white privilege (due to the fact that they grew up white) than that person is lifting up a veil and illuminating a situation in a more truthful manner. The white person who denies this and says the that person is using the "race card" is in actuality pulling the sheepskin over all of our eyes and is contributing to the further masking of the racial realities in America.

This white person has no idea what it is like to be a person of color and yet this white person accusses someone of using the "race card."

Now, in reality, who is actually using the race card?

I would argue that it is the white person who is using the race card by saying she or he is "using the race card." The white person is actively using race and putting the other person on the spot bu accusing them of something that they are not doing. What the Korean person was bringing up was racial realities in the United States of America. What the white person was doing was masking and/or ignoring those realities which in turn is using race for her or his benefit. Not bringing up race is actually, in effect, benefiting the white person.

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Buzzle.com

A Concise History of Race Relations in the U.S.

Found this great cartoon over at the blog Why Am I Not Surprised?

Man! That Shit is Racist!...Against...uh...Whites

My girlfriend is doing a story for our school newspaper about institutional racism and how it plays out in our everyday reactions on campus. She opens up with an example of a teacher describing to a class about the controversy between Native American burial grounds and construction projects. Then, one of the students in class (a white female) raises her hand and says, in disbelief. "Really? They bury their own kin? I thought they ate themselves!"

Pretty messed up huh? Especially when the teacher didn't address the issue she brought up and instead just told her she was wrong and left it at that. But why I'm blogging about this is that one of the editors (who's a Chinese and Latino male) who is editing her story said she should get rid of that quote because it's racist...against whites. Huh? Excuse me?

When I first heard this in the news lab and I was pretty flabbergasted and upset. "Are you fucking kidding me?" I asked my girlfriend out loud. "Jesus Christ. That guy's an idiot! Don't listen to that shit."

This brings up a whole lot of issues that I don't really want to talk about now, especially since I'm working on a multimedia piece right now and I have to go through all of the audio and pictures that I collected over the past seven weeks. But I will say this (and I will latter expound this point in an upcoming blog):

It's interesting to note that the editor seemed to focus on the fact that my girlfriend mentioned that it was a white woman who said that comment instead of the actual racist comment it self. He saw racism where it wasn't instead of where it truly was.

Time Wise On Don Imus

There's been much going on considering Don Imus. In fact so much so I figure I don't need to cover it.

Here's what Tim Wise has to say on the Don Imus controversy over at Lip Magazine:

Let us dispense with the easy stuff, shall we?

First, Don Imus's free speech rights have not been even remotely violated as a result of his firing, either by MSNBC or CBS Radio. The First Amendment protects us against state oppression or legal sanction for our words. It does not entitle everyone with an opinion to a talk show, let alone on a particular network. To believe or to demand otherwise would be to say that Imus's free speech rights outweigh the rights of his employers to determine what messages they will send out on their dime.

Secondly, those who are telling black folks to "get over it," when it comes to racial slurs, such as those offered up by Imus, are missing an important point: namely, the slurs are not the real issue. The issue is that these slurs (be they of the "nappy-headed ho" variety, or the semi-psychotic string of vitriol spewed by Michael Richards a few months back) take place against a backdrop of systemic and institutional racism. And that backdrop--of housing and job discrimination, racial profiling, unequal health care access, and a media that regularly presents blacks in the worst possible light (think the persistent and inaccurate reports of murder and rape by African Americans in New Orleans during the Katrina tragedy)--makes verbal slights, even if relatively minor, take on a magnitude well beyond the moment of their issuance.

Those who so easily let slip dismissive cliches, such as, "sticks and stones," have rarely themselves been the ones for whom slurs signaled a pending or extant campaign of oppression. So, for those whites who seek to change the subject to slurs used occasionally against us--like honky or cracker--please note: it is precisely the lack of any potent, institutional force to back up those words, which makes them so much easier to shrug off. But people of color are well aware that the slurs used against them, particularly when verbalized by whites, are often the tip of a much larger and more destructive iceberg, beneath which tip lies an edifice capable of shattering opportunities, of damaging and even destroying lives. In truth, even the words themselves can injure, especially the young, for whom an insistence on the development of thick skin seems especially heartless.

Third, and please make note of it, this is not the first time Imus had done something like this. In the past he's referred to black journalist Gwen Ifill as "the cleaning lady," a Jewish reporter as, a "boner-nosed, beanie-wearing Jewboy," and Arabs as "ragheads." Furthermore, he handpicked a sidekick who called Palestinians "animals" on the air, and suggested that Venus and Serena Williams would make fine centerfold models for National Geographic. Imus is a serial offender, and his contrition now, while perhaps genuine, has been long overdue.

So, a quick review: Imus is a racist, words can wound, and his employers had both the right and responsibility to fire him. But such is hardly the stuff of which meaningful commentary is made. So now, let us consider a few other matters as they relate to the Imus affair: matters that have been largely under-explored amidst the coverage of this story in recent weeks...(Read More)

Also, there has been quite a few links on The Blog and the Bullet on the issue as well:

Corporate Rap and Violence Culture by Kai.

Controversies and Social Change by Shark-fu.

Hip-Hop Made Imus Do It! by Darren Hutchinson.

Kevin Powell on Don Imus posted by Mark Anthony Neal.

Focusing on the Real Issues by Afro-Neitzen.

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Can't Stop the Bleeding

The Affects of White Supremacy on Student Organizers of Color

Last year the Pilipino organization that I had been heavily involved in established a rules committee to oversee and analyze the constitution making sure that everything was up-to-date and inline with our goals and beliefs. Under the current version of the constitution, part of the purpose states, "The organization shall support ...the continued opposition to white supremacy, sexism, and other forms of bigotry." In the past couple of meetings, the current committee had discussed replacing "White Supremacy" with "racism" believing that the mentioning the former was racist to white people. Here is the e-mail I sent to them regarding this issue:

Dear Committee,

I'd been meaning to bring this up sometime at one of the meetings but considering that not everyone can make them, I thought it'd be best to post my opinion here for all to read as I think that this particular subject warrants serious discussion.

I'd been told by some members of the committee that the reason for the replacement of White Supremacy with racism is because "we don't want to sound racist" and "we don't want to point fingers at any one particular group of people." While I completely understand where this point of view is coming from, I vehemently disagree with it for it is grounded upon false assumptions, which suggest that 1) the mere mentioning of White Supremacy = racism; 2) racism is merely an interpersonal issue between individuals and therefore black/brown/yellow/white racism are just all the same; and 3) attacking white supremacy = attacking white people .

First, replacing White Supremacy with simply racism because one believes that that's somehow "reverse racism," which is just such a white reactionary concept meant to safeguard white privilege (I'll get into that in a second), abstracts racism from history. For hundreds of years, since the advent of imperialism and colonialism brought upon the rest of the world by Europeans, being white has afforded one with countless benefits. As anti-racist author and activist Tim Wise states in his essay WHITE PRIVILEGE: Swimming in Racial Preference :

Affirmative action for whites was embodied in the abolition of European indentured servitude, which left black (and occasionally indigenous) slaves as the only unfree labor in the colonies that would become the U.S.

Affirmative action for whites was the essence of the 1790 Naturalization Act, which allowed virtually any European immigrant to become a full citizen, even while blacks, Asians and American Indians could not.

Affirmative action for whites was the guiding principle of segregation, Asian exclusion laws, and the theft of half of Mexico for the fulfillment of Manifest Destiny.

In recent history, affirmative action for whites motivated racially restrictive housing policies that helped 15 million white families procure homes with FHA loans from the 1930s to the '60s, while people of color were mostly excluded from the same programs.

In other words, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that white America is the biggest collective recipient of racial preference in the history of the cosmos. It has skewed our laws, shaped our public policy and helped create the glaring inequalities with which we still live.

For Pilipino/as specifically, can we turn on the T.V. or watch a movie and see people like us portrayed in a variety of roles – assuming that we're even portrayed at all?

Can we work or go to school somewhere that practices Affirmative Action without people thinking that we got in just because of our race?

In a "normal" history class do people typically learn in depth about Pilipino/Pilipino Americans who have made this country or world what it is?

What particular group of people doesn't have to worry about any of these things?

Second, the problem of racism is a problem of power. If racism was merely an interpersonal issue between individuals rather than one that is systematic and institutional then racism wouldn't be a problem. It is the misunderstanding here that allows for people to think that even having an organization for Pilipino/as is racist – Why do you people need an organization for yourselves. All you're doing is causing more separatism. We're all equal.

Lastly, it is a gross misconception that attacking White Supremacy or even talking about it = attacking white people. This is not the case at all as it is an attack on a system and an ideology that benefits a particular group of people while keeping others down. It would be just as ridiculous to associate radical Islam with all Islamic peoples. This is the ideology working at its best when people of color think that the mere mention of it is somehow racist against whites.

You cannot truly grasp racism and how it operates without examining White Supremacy. White Supremacy, being the dominant ideology, is exactly why [Name of Pilipino organization], along with many of the other student organizations, and Ethnic Studies exist.

As people of color - as Pilipino/as - we have to be militant in our struggle against this type of thinking that plagues our community. It is a disease that serves to confuse us and to make us turn our backs on each other and other people of color. It wasn't until a couple of semesters ago (and by accident no less), that I learned about all of this and no doubt it will take a lifetime to undue all of the brainwashing that we've all endured. We owe it to oursevlves and to our community to educate one another and have dialogue (which I believe is severely lacking) about this issue. So let's read up and get everyone talking.

Below, I've provided some links and resources for further reading about this topic.

Take care, everyone and enjoy the rest of our winter break.

-- Carlo

Websites:

WHITE PRIVILEGE SHAPES THE U.S.
by Robert Jenson

More thoughts on why system of white privilege is wrong
by Robert Jenson

White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack
by Peggy McIntosh

Honky Wanna Cracker? A Look at the Myth of Reverse Racism
by Tim Wise

WHITE PRIVILEGE: Swimming in Racial Preference
by Tim Wise

Race: The Power of an Illusion

Books:

Racism without Racists: Color-Blind Racism and the Persistence of Racial Inequality in the United States

Yellow: Race in America Beyond Black and White

Racism and White Supremacy

A lot has been going on with me in the past couple of days pertaining to group work and activist work at San Francisco State University and one issue that has been brought up in a few situations (completely unrelated to each other) is the issue of white privilege and white supremacy in society as supposed to just racism in general.

Essentially, racism is what most people expect it to be. It's thinking that one's own race is superior to others and that other races are either sub-human or not as gifted as one's own race. Defined by the Oxford English Dictionary racism is:

a. The theory that distinctive human characteristics and abilities are determined by race. b. = racialism.

racialism: Belief in the superiority of a particular race leading to prejudice and antagonism towards people of other races, esp. those in close proximity who may be felt as a threat to one's cultural and racial integrity or economic well-being.

racialist: a. n. A partisan of racialism; an advocate of a racial theory. b. adj. Of, pertaining to, or characterized by racialism.

This basically sums up what "racism" is. Yet there is racism and then there is white supremacy, which comes from white privilege, and comes from a society that has favored (and given rewards to) white people over people of color. Essentially, anyone can be a "racist." A Korean American father and mother could get upset at their son or daughter for a dating a Black person because they think Black people are "lazy" and "dumb" and a Black person could hate white people because they think that white people are inherently "inferior" and that the Black race is the superior race and the white race is the inferior devil race. Yet there is a marked difference between a Black person being racist and a white person being racist and enacting certain policies that affect many people of color around this country (and the world).

With the term racism, there is no power structure being implied in its use. With the term white supremacy there is a power structure being implied in its use. While a person of color can be racist it's not the same as a white person being racist and/or using his or her white privilege to gain an upper hand in society. A person of color may have racist thoughts but those thoughts are rarely enacted through the power structures of our society to effect mass change and to affect other people. The power structure in our society has been built up over time on white privilege and white supremacy and the people that have been exploited to make this country "great" were people of color. This structure is still in place and people of color are still in worse off situations than whites are (see "Living on the Other Side of the Color Line") and whites continue to benefit from a society that views white as the "norm" (white heroes in history books, whites in TV shows, whites in congress, whites as CEOs, etc.) and continue to benefit from past racist policies and from current racist and contemporary racist thought (see "Black Dolls/White Dolls," "Anti-Gang Injunctions," "Boxer Recalls Award," among other posts) as well as intentional or unintentional racist policies from the government that harm people of color but tend to not harm the white population. A person of color can be a racist, of course, but a person of color (due to the cited references above) cannot act on her or his racist views and in no way can harm whites at a mass level.

Someone who is a white supremacist (not in the classical KKK sense but in the more contemporary sense) in contrast can act on her or his racist impulses more often than not and still receives benefits from society despite being racist. Someone who is white and who holds the views that most welfare cases are "lazy Black mothers" (which actually isn't the case, from what I've been told) holds more sway (through lobbyists) than do people of color arguing that welfare shouldn't be changed since it will adversely effect people of color. This was the case under Clinton who changed the welfare laws during the 1990s. Also, white privilege holds sway over vast swaths of American life and affects people of all ethnic groups. Whites, most of the time, do not see their own privilege and enact policies, or lobby for policies, that would benefit them while in turn disenfranchising many people of color (all though they would do this under the guise of being "color blind" or that they believe all races should be "treated equally"). We see in the power structures of America that most of the people at the top (except for a few token exceptions) are white males, from the executive, to the judicial, to the congress, to the CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, to many mid-level and high-level bureaucrats in major cities. These white people at top tend to hold many views that mainstream white Americans hold and in turn these views effect the way they govern and interact with other whites and other people of color. And this doesn't just include those in bureaucratic power put in everyday life as well and in everyday interactions that white people have and that people of color have. A white person would be hard pressed to remember the last time he or she had security follow them around a department store or having a cop asking them if they were lost because they were in such a "nice neighborhood" while a Black person could probably draw upon experiences from just the past month.

Another point on power structures and the difference between racism and white supremacy (which is not the same as Black or Brown power, etc.) is that racism also tends to imply that all races are "equal" and that all races can be "equally racist." Yet the reality of America is that not all races are equal. One could argue under a multicultural guise that whites need their own "European History Month," or day, etc. yet this ignores the fact that not all races are equal. The white race was essentially built up on privilege and didn't come from an ethnic group. There is no such thing as the white ethnicity (as suppose to the Han ethnicity or the Mein ethnicity or the Lgbo Nigerian ethnicity), "whiteness" was defined over the generations and was solely defined from privilege and exploitation. Not all racism is equal because not all racism affects people on a wide scale, but other types of racism do affect people on a wide scale. This is where the term white privilege and white supremacy come in. It's not enough to use the term racism, especially against people of color, since it is white supremacy that is prevalent in American society and it is white supremacy that effects the most changes in society and gives whites the most benefits and people of color the least benefits. Racism implies all types of racial bigotry are equal when in reality there is one type of racism that is above all else, that is white racism against people of color, white supremacy; and therefore using the term racism as a blanket statement for all racism in general, whether it be Black racism, white racism, Asian racism, etc. is not adequate enough and not accurate enough.

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BBC News

Rangel is the Black Michael Richards: Issues of Black Power and "Double Standards"

This morning at around 3:00 a.m. or so the TV was on and it was tuned into the Fox News show Fox & Friends where they were talking about New York Representative Charles Rangel's "comedy routine...where he made a joke about President Bush and white supremacy." The anchor than went on to say, "So was New York Representative Charles Rangel wrong, or was he just razzing?" The anchor (a white female) than went on to a panel of two (white male) news analysts where she asked. "Is there a double-standard when it comes to who is allowed to poke fun and make jokes and who isn't and I don't see this going over as well with a white congressman making fun of and poking fun of Black power or something along those lines."

As soon as I heard this my ears perked up and I decided to watch to see what these two panelists had to say. Many whites tend to make an argument that all racism is the same and that all racism is, essentially, is thinking that one's race is superior to anther's and that other races are inferior. Yet many fail to realize that while racism does involve this much of racism (especially today) has to do with power and where those streams of power flow and whom holds power of whom. This especially comes in handy when looking at institutional racism and contemporary racism, especially in everyday life and how it effects people of color in everyday situations. We've especially seen this in previous posts with issues of the pervasiveness of "white beauty,", being singled out for higher scrutiny due to one's religious preference, and being singled out by law enforcement due to one's skin color.

Rich Galen, a GOP strategist, answered the question by stating that "Charlie Rangel is the Michael Richards of the Democratic Black Caucus and he can get away with it because, as you say, there is a double standard which everybody knows and you can either wring your hands...or work your way around it."

With that the other panelist, Ellis Henekin (I believe that is both their names because I don't have a transcript in front of me, I'm transcribing this while listening to audio), lets out a gasp of exasperation and stated that "when your approval ratings are at thirty and falling, people are gonna make some jokes about ya."

With that the other anchor (a Black male) states that they should go over what Rangel said, which was. "More than any other President that I can think of, you have really, truly shattered the myth of white supremacy."

Henekin states. "I can't believe that anybody could even be offended by this."

With this the anchor woman quipped back. "You can't believe it, really?"

"Are you shocked by this?" Henekin asks.

She than answers back. "I just think there seems to be a double standard both politically and racially because...didn't Trent Lott have to step down."

Henekin than blurted out, in disgust it seemed. "This is so far from Trent Lott." And he than goes onto say that it like if he was to make fun of his cousins and that it's OK for him to make fun of his own cousins but not anyone else. Which really didn't address the issue at hand.

Many whites seem to bring up the "double standard" argument when talking about race, whether it be the use of honky and nigger or affirmative action. Yet in a society where white privilege is built up upon the backs of people of color using the term double standard is very disingenuous, especially uttered from the mouths of white people, such as that anchor on Fox & Friends. For more on this you should read "Honky Want a Cracker?" by Tim Wise on our blog, which talks about this very issue of whites bringing up arguments such as "double standard" and "reverse racism." I'm only really going to touch on this issue very briefly since it will be touched on, no doubt, in more detail in latter blogs.

One can't equate Rangel to Richards and one can't equate his comment to Lott's because of many factors, including factors of white privilege and power. First off, Trent Lott was making a comment that if Senator Strom Thurman had been elected we wouldn't have had all of these problems in our country. What problems was Lott talking about? Well, to understand one has to look at Thurman, because when Thurman was running for president back in 1948 he was running on a platform of white supramacy and segregation. Secondly when Rangel was making a comment he was stating that, essentially, Bush was so dumb it undermines the argument by white supremacists (that is classic racist neo-Nazi types) that the white race is superior. In one Lott was arguing that if Blacks were segregating and had been "kept in check" there would have been no problems of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X and civil rights, etc. In another one Rangel was taking a jib at an unpopular president. Thirdly, to use the argument that white supremacy is the same as Black power is not only wrong but also racist. White supremacy is something that pervades our society to this day and privileges one group over another group through institutional racism and that was built off of the death and subjugation of people of color. Black power is in reaction to white supremacy (or white power) and is the complete opposite of white power. Black power is reclaiming one's humanity and identity as a Black woman or man in the face of a never ending onslaught of whiteness surrounding our society. Black power is making one feel proud of being a person of color instead of being ashamed. Lastly, white supremacy is propped up not only by ideology but also by the power structures of our society, corporate and government power, as well as in the media and everyday interactions with others.

The fact that Henekin didn't state this fact is quite disappointing. So while he was defending Rangel (in some parts strongly, in others weakly) he wasn't bringing up the real issues of why this was even being brought up in the first place and why that anchorwoman was even using the term "double standard" when in reality there is no such thing. Part of this had to do with time constraints, the whole conversation lasted no more than five minutes. Another part of this has to do with the fact that Henekin is white and a male and it would be safe to say he remains blind to his own white privilege and to white privilege in society. Again, I am not going into too much detail but there will be posts, especially an upcoming one by Carlo Montemayor on the differences between Pilipino pride and "white" pride (among others), in the future that will touch on this issue in more detail.

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Street Cow

Honky Want A Cracker?: A Look at the Myth of Reverse Racism

By Tim Wise

This was an article that Carlo Montemayor brought to my attention about a week ago when we were discussing the differences between white racism and "racism" by people of color. This essay originally appeared on ZNet June 24, 2002.

Tim Wise is a white anti-racist activist who has spoken in 48 states and over 400 colleges and is the director for the newly-formed Association for White Anti-Racist Education (AWARE).

Recently, when speaking to a group of high school students, I was asked why I only seemed to be concerned about white racism towards people of color. We had been discussing racial slurs, and a number of white students wondered why I didn’t get as upset about blacks using terms like “honky” or “cracker,” as I did about whites using words like “nigger.”

Although such an issue may seem trivial in the larger scheme of things—especially given the more significant discussions about racism in the educational system that I had hoped to engage in that day—the challenge posed by the students was actually an important one. In fact, it allowed a discussion about the very essence of what racism is and how it operates.

On the one hand, of course, such slurs are quite obviously inappropriate and offensive, and ought not to be used. That said, I pointed out that even the mention of the words “honky” and “cracker” had elicited laughter; and not only from the black students in attendance, but also from other whites.

The words are so silly, so juvenile, so utterly pathetic that they hardly qualify as racial slurs at all, let alone slurs on a par with those that have been historically deployed against people of color.

The lack of symmetry between a word like honky and a slur such as “nigger” was made apparent in an old Saturday Night Live skit, with Chevy Chase and guest, Richard Pryor.

In the skit, Chase and Pryor face one another and trade off racial epithets during a segment of Weekend Update. Chase calls Pryor a “porch monkey.” Pryor responds with “honky.” Chase ups the ante with “jungle bunny.” Pryor, unable to counter with a more vicious slur against whites, responds with “honky, honky.” Chase then trumps all previous slurs with “nigger,” to which Pryor responds: “dead honky.”

The line elicits laughs all around, but also makes clear, at least implicitly that when it comes to racial antilocution, people of color are limited in the repertoire of slurs they can use against whites, and even the ones of which they can avail themselves sound more comic than hateful. The impact of hearing the antiblack slurs in the skit was of a magnitude unparalleled by hearing Pryor say “honky” over and over again.

As a white person I always saw terms like honky or cracker as evidence of how much more potent white racism was than any variation on the theme practiced by the black or brown.

When a group of people has little or no power over you institutionally, they don’t get to define the terms of your existence, they can’t limit your opportunities, and you needn’t worry much about the use of a slur to describe you and yours, since, in all likelihood, the slur is as far as it’s going to go. What are they going to do next: deny you a bank loan? Yeah, right.

So whereas “nigger” was and is a term used by whites to dehumanize blacks, to imply their inferiority, to “put them in their place” if you will, the same cannot be said of honky: after all, you can’t put white people in their place when they own the place to begin with.

Power is like body armor. And while not all white folks have the same degree of power, there is a very real extent to which all of us have more than we need vis-à-vis people of color: at least when it comes to racial position, privilege and perceptions.

Consider poor whites. To be sure, they are less financially powerful than wealthy people of color. But that misses the point of how racial privilege operates within a class system.

Within a class system, people tend to compete for “stuff” against others of their same basic economic status. In other words, rich and poor are not competing for the same homes, bank loans, jobs, or even educations to a large extent. Rich competes against rich, working class against working class and poor against poor. And in those competitions racial privilege most certainly attaches.

Poor whites are rarely typified as pathological, dangerous, lazy or shiftless the way poor blacks are, for example. Nor are they demonized the way poor Latino/a immigrants tend to be.

When politicians want to scapegoat welfare recipients they don’t pick Bubba and Crystal from some Appalachian trailer park; they choose Shawonda Jefferson from the Robert Taylor Homes, with her seven children.

And according to reports from a number of states, ever since so-called welfare reform, white recipients have been treated far better by caseworkers, are less likely to be bumped off the rolls for presumed failure to comply with new regulations, and have been given far more assistance at finding new jobs than their black or brown counterparts.

Poor whites are more likely to have a job, tend to earn more than poor people of color, and are even more likely to own their own home. Indeed, whites with incomes under $13,000 annually are more likely to own their own home than blacks with incomes that are three times higher due to having inherited property.

None of this is to say that poor whites aren’t being screwed eight ways to Sunday by an economic system that relies on their immiseration: they are. But they nonetheless retain a certain “one-up” on equally poor or even somewhat better off people of color thanks to racism.

It is that one-up that renders the potency of certain prejudices less threatening than others. It is what makes cracker or honky less problematic than any of the slurs used so commonly against the black and brown.

In response to all this, skeptics might say that people of color can indeed exercise power over whites, at least by way of racially-motivated violence. Such was the case, for example, this week in New York City where a black man shot two whites and one Asian-Pacific Islander before being overpowered. Apparently he announced that he wanted to kill white people, and had hoped to set a wine bar on fire to bring such a goal to fruition.

There is no doubt his act was one of racial bigotry, and that to those he was attempting to murder his power must have seemed quite real. Yet there are problems with claiming that this “power” proves racism from people of color is just as bad as the reverse.

First, racial violence is also a power whites have, so the power that might obtain in such a situation is hardly unique to non-whites, unlike the power to deny a bank loan for racial reasons, to "steer" certain homebuyers away from living in “nicer" neighborhoods, or to racially profile in terms of policing. Those are powers that can only be exercised by the more dominant group as a practical and systemic matter.

Additionally, the "power" of violence is not really power at all, since to exercise it, one has to break the law and subject themselves to probable legal sanction.

Power is much more potent when it can be deployed without having to break the law to do it, or when doing it would only risk a small civil penalty at worst. So discrimination in lending, though illegal is not going to result in the perp going to jail; so too with employment discrimination or racial profiling.

There are plenty of ways that more powerful groups can deploy racism against less powerful groups without having to break the law: by moving away when too many of "them" move in (which one can only do if one has the option of moving without having to worry about discrimination in housing.)

Or one can discriminate in employment but not be subjected to penalty, so long as one makes the claim that the applicant of color was "less qualified," even though that determination is wholly subjective and rarely scrutinized to see if it was determined accurately, as opposed to being a mere proxy for racial bias. In short, it is institutional power that matters most.

Likewise, it’s the difference in power and position that has made recent attempts by American Indian activists in Colorado to turn the tables on white racists so utterly ineffective.

Indian students at Northern Colorado University, fed up by the unwillingness of white school district administrators in Greeley to change the name and grotesque Indian caricature of the Eaton High School “Reds,” recently set out to flip the script on the common practice of mascot-oriented racism.

Thinking they would show white folks what it’s like to “be in their shoes” and experience the objectification of being a team icon, indigenous members of an intramural basketball team renamed themselves the “Fightin’ Whiteys,” and donned t-shirts with the team mascot: a 1950’s-style caricature of a suburban, middle class white guy, next to the phrase “every thang’s gonna be all white.”

Funny though the effort was, it has not only failed to make the point intended, but indeed has been met with laughter and even outright support by white folks. Rush Limbaugh actually advertised for the team’s t-shirts on his radio program, and whites from coast to coast have been requesting team gear, thinking it funny to be turned into a mascot, as opposed to demeaning.

Of course the difference is that it’s tough to negatively objectify a group whose power and position allows them to define the meaning of another group’s attempts at humor: in this case the attempt by Indians to teach them a lesson. It’s tough to school the headmaster, in other words.

Objectification works against the disempowered because they are disempowered. The process doesn’t work in reverse, or at least, making it work is a lot tougher than one might think.

Turning Indians into mascots has been offensive precisely because it is a continuation of the dehumanization of such persons over many centuries; the perpetuation of the mentality of colonization and conquest.

It is not as if one group—whites—merely chose to turn another group—Indians—into mascots. Rather, it is that one group, whites, have consistently viewed Indians as less than fully human, as savage, as “wild,” and have been able to not merely portray such imagery on athletic banners and uniforms, but in history books and literature more crucially.

In the case of the students at Northern, they would need to be a lot more acerbic in their appraisal of whites, in order for their attempts at “reverse racism” to make the point intended. After all, “fightin” is not a negative trait in the eyes of most white folks, and the 1950’s iconography chosen for the uniforms was unlikely to be seen as that big a deal.

Perhaps if they had settled on “slave-owning whiteys,” or “murdering whiteys,” or “land-stealing whiteys,” or “smallpox-giving-on-purpose whiteys,” or “Native-people-butchering whiteys,” or “mass raping whiteys,” the point would have been made.

And instead of a smiling “company man” logo, perhaps a Klansman, or skinhead as representative of the white race: now that would have been a nice functional equivalent of the screaming Indian warrior. But see, you gotta go strong to turn the tables on the man, and ironic sarcasm just ain’t gonna get it nine times out of ten.

Without the power to define another group’s reality, Indian activists are simply incapable of turning the tables by way of well-placed humor.

Simply put, what separates white racism from any other form, and what makes anti-black, anti-brown, anti-yellow, or anti-red humor more biting and more dangerous than its anti-white equivalent is the ability of the former to become lodged in the minds of and perceptions of the citizenry.

White perceptions are what end up counting in a white-dominated society. If whites say Indians are savages (be they of the “noble” or vicious type), then by God, they’ll be seen as savages. If Indians say whites are mayonnaise-eating Amway salespeople, who the hell is going to care? If anything, whites will simply turn it into a marketing opportunity. When you have the power, you can afford to be self-deprecating, after all.

The day that someone produces a newspaper ad that reads: “Twenty honkies for sale today: good condition, best offer accepted,” or “Cracker to be lynched tonight: whistled at black woman,” then perhaps I’ll see the equivalence of these slurs with the more common type to which we’ve grown accustomed.

When white churches start getting burned down by militant blacks who spray paint “kill the honkies” on the sidewalks outside, then maybe I’ll take seriously these concerns over “reverse racism.”

Until then, I guess I’ll find myself laughing at the thought of another old Saturday Night Live skit: this time with Garrett Morris as a convict in the prison talent show who sings:

Gonna get me a shotgun and kill all the whiteys I see. Gonna get me a shotgun and kill all the whiteys I see. And once I kill all the whiteys I see Then whitey he won’t bother me Gonna get me a shotgun and kill all the whiteys I see.

Sorry, but it just isn’t the same.