i really thought the point of "being lgbt+ doesn't absolve you of racism as a white person" was that white people arent absolved of racism by being marginalized but it really seems like people think other marginalizations make it okay. no being disabled doesn't do it. no being poor doesnt do it. we need to fight against racism actively no matter what.
I want to pull this post open a little while agreeing with it.
I disagree with the word 'absolved;' no one comes into this world with a mark of sin that needs absolution, including white people. After all, I didn't ask to be born. Neither did y'all. We didn't do anything wrong.
However.
Existing in a world where the structure of society, as well as the racist disgust of a subset of individuals, favors one group unfairly over another I think simply cannot be alleviated without confronting it.
If a white person wants an excuse to not confront racism, they can find one. Their excuse might be that they already confront so much prejudice along another axis of their life that their bandwidth is full up. But, realistically, the thing about being white, specifically, is that you can ignore racism. Just like the thing about being straight is that you can ignore homophobia. The thing about being male is that you can ignore misogyny. Black & brown people, queer people, women, cannot ignore these things.
There's no get-out-of-jail-free card on this one. You only get credit for fighting racism if you fight racism. You only make progress in fighting racism if you fight racism. You only overcome what our culture has ingrained into you by overcoming it.
There is no virtue in being born to an oppressed class; there is no virtue in being born into a class of oppressors. There is virtue in continuing the fight to erase that distinction.
