Racism and Impunity

[asakiyume]

barry_king has a scorching assessment of what racism is in here. This is at the heart:

Racism is when you let impunity create a system where
[a group] is denied justice
permanently. Institutionally. Because
"that's the stuff we did/do/will do.
We do this. Because we can,
because nobody will punish us for doing so."

He links to a 2011 Daily Kos article by Hamden Rice, "Most of You Have No Idea What Martin Luther King Did." He says it wasn't about speeches or marches, but about standing up to white people--who, as he points out, were liable to engage in "random, terroristic, berserk behavior" with impunity.

And that brings us Ferguson and last night's protests and what they're all about--not letting random, terroristic, berserk behavior happen with impunity. The behavior still happens. You know this either because you've experienced it yourself, or because your friends have, or because you've been told. Part of the struggle to end it is to make sure, when it does happen, it doesn't happen with impunity.

Comments

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

-ism is when you let impunity create a system where [a group] is denied justice permanently. Institutionally. Because "that's the stuff we did/do/will do. We do this. Because we can,because nobody will punish us for doing so."

Am I familiar with this? Why, I do believe I am!

The mystery to me as an outsider is that US central government allows a member of the federation to behave in this self centred imperialist fashion and does precisely nothing visible to prevent it.

The puzzle is not that the barbarians are at the gate, but that they're inside, running the damn place!

Fall of the Roman Empire anyone?

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

It's good to have a higher authority to turn to when the lower authorities themselves are criminal--in this case, I believe it's the body politic, rising up, that have driven the authorities to act. And while I wish there was no racism and no police brutality, I must say I'm glad at least that when people rise up, as now, their cries can be answered.

[cmcmck.livejournal.com]

My way of dealing back in the days of Apartheid was to join and support the ANC but I really don't know what I can do in this case other than to utterly condemn it.

I don't understand racism- never have- it nauseates me!

There's a huge police corruption scandal breaking here just now.

[yamamanama.livejournal.com]

It's fucking horrifying how many people out there have a "problem with race."

I just want to send them all to a barren moon somewhere.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

It permeates everything, and you just have to fight it. The first step for the privileged is to become aware. It's ongoing. Everything is always ongoing. None of us can ever rest on any laurels. But that's okay--ongoingness is what it means to be alive, or part of it, anyway.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

It's fucking horrifying how many people out there have a "problem with race."

Whole mobs of them were rioting in the streets not too long ago, attacking white people. Or black people who got in their way. Or anyone who had something they wanted, really.

I just want to send them all to a barren moon somewhere.

Yes. Dealing with dissent by rounding up dissenters and exiling them to the wilderness is the way to go.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

Hey though. I think both you and yamamanama are opposed to racism, so why provoke him? He's not saying "Go rioters!" As hyperbolic overstatement goes, saying you want to banish someone to the moon is better than, say, saying you want people to die in a fire or whatnot, right? It's just a statement of frustration and anger.

[cucumberseed.livejournal.com]

This.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I'm taking to heart what plasticsturgeon said here (http://amaebi.livejournal.com/974956.html?thread=4965228) about the importance of even just *saying* something. Just speaking up.

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

*nods, weeping*

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

((hugs))

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

How is wrecking local businesses going to teach "the Man" a lesson? And how is attacking random white people who had nothing to do with the shooting doing anything save piling racism atop racism?

[barry-king.livejournal.com]

Oo! Oo! Pick me, Pick me. I want to answer that one.

It ain't.

It's bullshit. It's what happens when people without hope express their anger. It gets expressed directly to the nearest target. Because that's what people do.

It's like Hamas rockets into the void, or the zebra murders (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zebra_murders) one of which happened to a friend of my parents, and they never quite recovered from it.

It's totally evil, and there is no excuse for it.

The way evil works, see, is that people start to target people not because of the crimes they did, but because they are perceived to be part of the society that doesn't punish those crimes. It's a kind of reverse racism, sure. And it's equally unjust. And it's married, ideologically, to the racism that sparked the problem in the first place.

But the point, and I want to make it very clear that there is a point....

Is that it never would have happened without the atmosphere of injustice.

But when you point out the injustice of the oppressed in the face of injustice, you are not pointing out an equality. You are perfectly right in saying "this is wrong, and it shouldn't happen". But you're wrong when you say that "to be fair, all evil is equal."

Because some evil has a head start. And works from a position of power. You can't hold the powerful to the same rules as the powerless without sanctifying the injustice that keeps the powerful powerful over the powerless.

The fact is, the whole situation is tainted, and power and "doing the right thing" are now impossible. All we can hope for is that people back off from the situation and not take part in it anymore.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

The fact is, the whole situation is tainted, and power and "doing the right thing" are now impossible.

Of course it's possible. People can not riot, pillage, and assault passerby. People can, if rioting occurs, fight to defeat the rioters and turn them in to the authorities. Police can choose to be brutal or professional. The authorities can hand down harsh and deterrent sentences to felonious rioters and brutal police officers. People do not lose their power of autonomous agency because other people are behaving badly.]

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

People do not lose their power of autonomous agency because other people are behaving badly.This is true. Tonight, for instance, my Twitter feed showed protestors protecting a liquor store from being looted.

[barry-king.livejournal.com]

You mean they could have, or might have. It's too late now. But riots don't spontaneously occur, either. Nobody says "I think I'll riot today". Like fungi, their roots run deep and it takes just the right conditions and suddenly they're everywhere.

To be honest, I'm not a great fan of believing in the autonomy of agency. We are not as rational or as in control of our selves as we would like to believe we are.

[yamamanama.livejournal.com]

They should go after the people and organizations responsible for propagating racist ideology.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

(*nods*) Only by starting a terroristic war of raid and counter-raid wtih gun and firebomb to replace free and open elections can America cast off the false guide of sanity and descend shrieking with joy into the eternal night of the Great Old Ones.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

(By last night's protests, I actually meant the National Moments of Silence held in various cities around the country, not the riots)

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

That makes a considerable difference. I have nothing against memorial moments, a lot against rioting.

I've heard reports about the original shooting and am not even sure why it happened. It seemed to me as if one cop was being unnecessarily and unprofessionally hostile to the teenaged guy, shoving a gun at him; he (naturally) responded by pushing the gun barrel out of line with his own body, and the cops then panicked by shooting him dead.

This is bad police procedure from beginning to end. There was no reason to draw a loaded weapon on the suspect; having drawn a weapon the closest cop should never have gotten so close to the suspect that he could simply shove the gun aside (had he really been resisting arrest that could have resulted in the police officer losing control of his service weapon), and this was insufficient reason to shoot him even once, let alone repeatedly.

Having said this, the rioting was pointless and stupid. None of this leaves me with a high opinion of St. Louis -- neither its police force nor its population. Then, this is a city with a long reputation for corruption and vice, dating back to the days when it was a major port for riverboats, in the mid 19th century.

[wuweibaby.livejournal.com]

It was laid open this time

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

For sure.

[desmond coutinho (from livejournal.com)]

Irom Sharmila the Manipuri political prisoner wrote a long over five thousand word article about the problems of Manipur her own struggle. Nobody wanted to publish because it told the truth if you want I can send you the original hand written pages which she had translated from meiteilon and signed off on each one with corrections by hand.

One of the relevant things here is she is campaigning against a law that grants absolute immunity from any accountablity to visiting paramilitaries for any action undertaken while in Manipur. They have a tough job to do I agree and they get absolute immunity for anything they do while they are there.

The other relevant thing she said which often Americans don't get let alone the rest of the world. When President Obama was elected the Norwegians gave him that year's Peace Prize. I think it was one of the most just awards the Nobel Committee had ever made. About 30 years ago while I was reading Classics at UCL we had an American on some kind of one year exchange programme from Cornel University I think he is now a History Professor at an Ivy League University. At the time Jesse Jackson was standing for the Democratic Nomination it would have been 86 or 87 as I recall. He let me into the discussion he and his liberal parents had about which way to vote. And they ended after furious anger as all political discussions have agreeing that a vote for Jesse Jackson was a vote for the Republicans. I presume I won't have to explain to Americans that Jesse Jackson was a black politician and what he was saying was even though none of them were racist if they put forward a black candidate for the Presidency then the all sane rational voters would vote for the opposition.

What Sharmila wrote to inspire her people was I'd have to fish it out from my archives but something like. And today in America a descendant of slaves, a black man whom previous generations had bought and sold like cattle today has become President of the United States. Let us not believe that we are nothing that we can do nothing. There has been no greater sign of hope for change than the election of President Obama. I am more than happy for Americans to continue to demand improvements in their own country. Even your enemies those who despise seem to want to live there. Because you are free. It's not just that you feel free to debate demand change criticize your leaders re-write your history. Even if the President of the United States turned up on your doorstep the more well mannered might start the conversation with Mr President but the attitude would still be. I pay my goddamn taxes you ain't better than me this is what I demand that you do. I don't want to live in America. I think it's obsessed with money and shallow illusions like money. But what you keep reminding Europeans and you have every right to is that previous generations sent their sons, whole regiments of black men you didn't end segregation till after WWII to die that government of the people by the people for the perish not from this earth.

If ever I see the siege of Helm's Deep in LOTR2 when all hope is fading and 150 elf archers turn up I think the Marines have landed yeehaw and you know they are gonna say. Retreat hell we just got here. Then I'd follow up pointy eared green skinned freaks overpaid oversexed overhere. But that's not racism not when you need help and you're too proud to beg.

Pity time has moved on no way would another democratic president order the invasion of a land locked small regime in south east asia just because they need help.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

What Sharmila wrote to inspire her people was I'd have to fish it out from my archives but something like. And today in America a descendant of slaves, a black man whom previous generations had bought and sold like cattle today has become President of the United States.

Along which line of descent do you imagine Barack Obama was descended from slaves? His father was Kenyan -- I don't believe that any of the Kenyan tribes were caught up in the slave trade, and to the extent that they were it would have been the Arab slave trade. He's also descended from the Kenyan upper classes.

His mother, of course, was white.

So if Barack Obama's ancestors had anything to do with the slave trade, it would more likely have been as buyers, sellers or traders than of slaves.

The most you can really say is that Barack Obama kind of looks a little bit like some Black Americans who were slaves.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

As it happens, Desmond isn't American and may not have known about Obama's parentage.

ETA: And whoops, he's quoting what Irom Sharmila said, and she's a Manipuri citizen of India who probably had even less reason to know.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

True. It's not as if the media likes to point this out, either -- they like the idea of him being the first "Black American" to become President -- which is technically true, but he is not of Black American descent.

FWIW, his daughters would be because I'm assuming that Michelle is of normal Black American descent.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

The other relevant thing she said which often Americans don't get let alone the rest of the world. When President Obama was elected the Norwegians gave him that year's Peace Prize. I think it was one of the most just awards the Nobel Committee had ever made.

You do know that Barack Obama, at that time, hadn't actually accomplished anything toward the pursuit of international peace? Since then, he's started several wars, and abandoned US allies resulting in their enemies starting wars against them. The most I can say about his achievements in peace is that he's laid down work for future generations of peacemakers to do.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I think barry_king's quote about impunity absolutely applies in the case of AFSPA.

[superversive.livejournal.com]

Here is the Oxford English Dictionary’s definition of the word:

The belief that all members of each race possess characteristics, abilities, or qualities specific to that race, especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior to another race or races.

Note that this has absolutely nothing in common with the definition you cited, which is politically motivated and tendentious. If you follow the OED’s definition, racism is about what people believe and do, and it can be fought against and changed. If you follow the other definition, it is ‘permanent’ and ‘institutional’ and creates an open-ended system of grievances that can never be sufficiently atoned for — and it only applies one way. Hence the belief, for instance, that it is impossible for anyone but white people to be racist, which is (per the OED definition) a racist belief in itself.

I happen to think that racism as defined by the OED is a very great evil and ought to be fought against; and that we have a particular obligation to fight it when we discover it in ourselves. But subscribing to the other definition is racist by the first definition, because it identifies one particular racial group permanently and incurably as the Evil Oppressor, regardless of anyone’s actual behaviour. This is no different in substance from, for instance, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion blaming all evil in the world on the Jews. That, too, was racist; and no person of good will should have any part of it.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I don't want to speak for barry_king, and I'm not sure he'll come back to address your comment, but, speaking for myself, I took his words not as an attempt to actually define racism so much as to point to the results and talk about causes, kind of like in Princess Mononoke, where Ashitaka holds up his arm, with the demon curse swirling around it, and says, "This is what hatred looks like; this is what it does when it catches hold of you." Though maybe I'm wrong, and he does mean it as something like a dictionary definition.

I like the OED's definition; I find it perfectly accurate (which is presumptuous of me; it's not like the OED needs my approval).

I think we're united--all of us here on this page--in finding racism as defined by the OED abhorrent. And that's a great thing, and something we should celebrate: that we *don't* think that members of any race have inherent characteristics specific to that race, and especially so as to distinguish it as inferior or superior. In the past, there were people who gladly embraced that notion. None of us here do. That's a wonderful thing.

There's a lot in political and social discourse that rightly makes people angry, and angry in different directions, depending on their political bent, but let's take a moment to honor this solidarity we feel.

[superversive.livejournal.com]

I don’t want to speak for him either, because I do not know the context of what he was saying. But I have personally known people who used the same definition of racism that he offers, and used it as if it were a dictionary definition; and they used it to prove that all white people are racist purely because of their race, and that it is impossible for any non-white person to be racist, purely because of their race. When I pointed out that they were judging people purely because of their race, and that this is the very definition of a racist act, they merely got angry and said that judging people by race has nothing to do with racism by their definition. (And they simply refused to accept that they do not have the right to decree that their definition overrides the general usage of the word. In effect, they were claiming a position of absolute linguistic privilege – this while denouncing privilege in others.)

Likely we need a word to describe the kind of institutional phenomenon that these people are referring to; and we need a separate word for it. Everybody agrees that racism is bad, because nearly everybody has the OED definition (or something like it) in mind. When a few people try to redefine the term to mean something else entirely, they are stealing the emotional impact of the word ‘racism’ to mobilize people for their own political agenda. I object to that; and I object much more strongly to the fact that if you use the word in its proposed new meaning, you make it impossible to talk about the old meaning at all.

[jordan179.livejournal.com]

It also lets whites who "acknowledge their privilege" get extra special brownie points forever denied blacks or other non-whites. This concept of "privilege" and "racism" is really just one ideological mutation away from naked white supremacy.

[barry-king.livejournal.com]

Well, you're perfectly right to call me out on bastardizing the word "racism"; I agree as well that we need a new word for this thing I'm talking about, but I'd say that we actually need a new word for that which the OED defines. "Racialism" maybe. The -ism of racism implies a political, active component, not some passive misconstrued belief about genes or heritage. But this could all be semantic twaddle I'm spewing, which rests on just how active the word "belief" is.

I think my aim here (and I'll be frank and say that I'm not entirely clear about my scope, because I was speaking from my own background as a Southerner, with family history stretching back to slavery and Jim Crow, but which I see as a repeated pattern elsewhere and in other contexts), is that racist thought and belief in and of itself, "in a bottle" as it were, if such a thing can be separated from the physical, is not the pernicious stuff that racism enshrined in habit and custom, though it can be said to be generative to it, as an instigator of unjust action.

But you're on a slippery slope with the privilege side of things. Impunity is not privilege, though privilege can be said to engender impunity. My point isn't about privilege, it's about how impunity is the mechanism by which the specific crimes that may be racially motivated become institutional norms.