Sorry to miss yesterday’s IBARW post. I was thinking, definitely, about it, but didn’t have anything that seemed worthy. I do think I will plan, soon, to come up with a flowchart (or possibly more than one) in the style of the “using blackface on your blog” flowchart, that has to do with how to have privilege and avoid being racist, though I fear that scope is too wide for practicality.
Though I sometimes disagree with where Kate Harding and her posse go, I have to give her respect for this self-revealing post about her own privilege and her own processing about privilege.
It’s a subtlety that a lot of folks don’t talk about that if you have privilege, it can be really tricky to figure out how to deal with accusations that you’ve used it inappropriately. (And even so, I have to say that I’m pleased that we’re getting this far in my lifetime – that underprivileged folks at least on the Internet can have enough of a voice to say so and make it stick, and that some white folks are able to take it pretty well.)
I’m not going to claim that all accusations are fair. Indeed, many commentators say so. When anti-racist activists are all het up, a few poor shots go awry, a few folks go to far. Let’s just say instead that I don’t think that that balances out the injustice that sits on the white folks’ side anyhow.
And to finish up this short discussion, I give you one of the things Kate linked to: How Not To Be Insane When Accused Of Racism (A Guide For White People). It’s old but still (sadly) relevant.
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