South King West

Woman Tells Muhammad Ali That He’s Too Arrogant, His Response Is Absolutely Priceless…

“children don’t see/care about race”

“Color doesn’t matter! It’s about the actor/story!”

“there are bigger issues to talk about than representation”

“they whitewashed because they need to make a profit and attract their target audience”

“historical accuracy”

“It’s a European fairytale/story so of course the characters will be white!“ 

(Because it’s not like the setting could change and adapt to the story)

“whitewashing isn’t real”

“they considered and picked the best actor for the job”

(The best actor? More like the best we can do at this time.)

(It’s not the best actor when you exclude a racially ambiguous role to one race.)

“why do we need minorities in European stories!? they wouldn't do a story about Africa with white actors!”

“Maybe they didn’t cast an actor of color because they didn’t auditioned!”

“why do we need minorities in settings that don’t make sense!? you don’t see white people being placed in stories and setting with a non-white majority!” 

the word “phobic” means “of or relating to a phobia or phobias.” when you look up “phobia” the definition is “persistent, irrational fear of a specific object, activity, or situation that leads to a compelling desire to avoid it.” in medicine, it is defined as “a persistent, abnormal, or irrational fear of a specific thing or situation that compels one to avoid the feared stimulus.”

over at wikipedia, we find the psychological/clinical definition of the word. it states “a phobia is a type of anxiety disorder, usually defined as a persistent fear of an object or situation in which the sufferer commits to great lengths in avoiding, typically disproportional to the actual danger posed, often being recognized as irrational. in the event the phobia cannot be avoided entirely, the sufferer will endure the situation or object with marked distress and significant interference in social or occupational activities.”

the theme in the actual definition of “phobic” and “phobia” is “irrational fear.” i often see people being accused of being “…phobic” who aren’t displaying irrational fear. now they may be displaying dislike, disgust or even hatred but not fear. they may even be displaying that dislike, disgust or even hatred towards ONE person, but it’s still not fear. also just because you don’t understand and/or like their reasoning for their disgust, dislike and even hatred, doesn’t automatically make it “irrational” either.

Suzanne Lipsky

written in the 1980s and yet even truer today.

black culture is not perfect. no culture is. imperfections in our culture have been used as an excuse to perpetuate our violent oppression while imperfections in white culture are hidden off to the side, not talked about and certainly not held against white people as a race.  while i do not play the respectability game (because it’s pure fuckery and a lie), we as black people do have some things to work out. working out these things WILL NOT end racism, WILL NOT get white people to respect and like us more, WILL NOT end institutional racism and oppression. however it’s not about them or that. these things are worth addressing because we are a great people and doing so will only make us better. however we must address them without fear of the white gaze and most certainly without any input from white or other non-black people.

Also people don’t understand just how horrible segregation and Jim Crow was. It was a step up from slavery in the same way 10pm is a step up from 9pm.