72 – AmeriKKKan Rebellion (Patreon)

I’m not trying to change anyone’s minds about anything. Because internalized beliefs don’t happen overnight, they are deeply embedded and it ain’t going to change because of any post via corporate-owned entity. So this post is for the ones who are already on the side of the oppressed and don’t know how to analyze or defend their stance.

Because of the nature of how these protests started, for a lot of people, protester and person of color, especially black person of color are interchangeable. And so they think about it the same way they do with minorities, they see them as one uniform blob — a monolith, a stereotype. So everything that happens, it’s “them” doing it. So from marching, protesting, to vandalism, to looting, it all falls on the shoulders of organizers: “The protesters are doing it.” It’s their responsibility to stop it because somehow they are orchestrating it. So it’s, “why are ‘they’ doing it.” But who is this “They”? But these critics don’t think of white people as a monolith and make it a point to separate the so-called “good cops” from the “bad ones” — but for protesters AKA minorities, it’s always “why do you people do this?” Because it’s about in-group and the Other, and that is the heart of racism.

And the truth is, organizers aren’t telling anyone to do this. It’s happening, and a lot of it is out of the control of the organizers. The reasons are varied, from agent provocateurs, white supremacist agitators, undercover cops, to just poor people who have already been failed by the system, who are dying disproportionately from COVID-19 and have nothing to lose at this point. You can’t talk about race without talking about poverty and the economic injustice of this country.

Why didn’t these provocateurs and undercover cops do this during the lockdown protests? Why would they do it to their own? And don’t get it twisted, much of the protests have been peaceful (which is being underreported because it’s not sexy) and even still the peaceful ones are met with force. The contrast between the lockdown protests and the anti-racism protests are obvious for anyone paying attention. And in these anti-racist protests, much of the escalation has been caused by the police themselves.

Trevor Noah recently said:

“It’s never the right way to protest because that is what protest is. It cannot be right because you are protesting against the thing that is stopping you.”

So it is what it is. The fact it offends your pearl-clutching sensibilities has nothing to do with the organizers of these protests or the ones who are not vandalizing or looting. To put it on them is the definition of racism, where you take anecdotes to broad stroke negatively stereotype everyone in a group.

The media itself is not just complicit, it is at fault as it spends way more energy on the sensationalism and chaos than focusing on the injustice. Do we have more looting than in other countries when these things happen? Maybe because we are THE MOST capitalist country in the world. But we have no real way of knowing because our media spends all its energy on the side of property than it does on the side of people. So it’s overly biased to one side.

In other countries, when this happens, it’s called a rebellion. Any time this happens in this country, it’s called a riot. How come we only somehow have riots in this country and never rebellions? How come black and brown people can only riot when they have legitimate cause to rebel? And they are rebelling. But American exceptionalism won’t allow us to call it that because if we did, we would have to admit we are what we accuse other nations of being, a shithole nation. Even before these protests, in the lockdown, all the failures we criticized other countries for, we had here in spades. We had literal bread lines.

We also saw armed white people take state buildings without any resistance from the police. But police killing black men and women, and people taking to the streets to march instantly becomes a riot. Even “liberal media” won’t call it a rebellion because that would mean it’s a rebellion against the WHOLE system, not just the conservative part. And they invested too many years calling anyone criticizing the “establishment” a conspiracy theorist. So they can’t back down now. We just need to go back to normal, to the American dream, and owning property.

That’s another American problem, to automatically assume property is more valuable than people. People get appalled when you ask why they believe this because their whole life they went on believing this was just a given. And no one has any good answer, just deflection.

Then if looting and vandalism is something out of our control in a racist/capitalist system, then the energy of having this message or the protest go to waste or not is on us. Because a message doesn’t exist without a receiver. If we choose to take this as a sign of how bad this country is, then the message is not lost. If you insist on hating the protesters because, well… you probably were hating on them from the jump and never said one word about the police killings, so you were never going to be a receiver of the message anyway. But arguing with someone over their feelings about the protests doesn’t change anything because the people who we argue with are not the ones doing it. So then we are just arguing over how to receive the message and people are telling you, gaslighting you, to believe the looting and vandalism makes the case for racism in this country moot. “Oh you all protested wrong, sorry. No racism anymore. You blew it.” Isn’t that what they are trying to convince you? They know you aren’t one of the ones actively looting or vandalizing, so what are they trying to change your mind about? That this is a lost cause, right? That the protesters are wrong and that the racist system is fine just the way it is? Tell me that’s not the case.

The message or the lesson of the protests is based on our choice in how we take this moment or not. White privilege means not having to know racism, but you can still CHOOSE to learn about it. Just as non-black PoC, especially Asian Americans, have to educate themselves as well. Derek Chauvin having an Asian wife and an Asian friend/partner is an example of how this is not meaningful in showing someone’s anti-racism. This is actually a common pattern. We too often turn our backs on our black and brown siblings and ally with racists.

Racism is bipartisan. Let me repeat that, RACISM IS BIPARTISAN, just as whiteness is bipartisan. Just as whiteness doesn’t care about gender or sexual orientation, neither does racism. Remember the Alt-Right stands for Alternative Right. It was meant to be an inclusive white nationalism for alternative lifestyles. Because they rightly understood white supremacy is ultimately about whiteness.

The clearest way I can explain that is to have you all close your eyes and think about this. Do you know a parent? Are you a parent? Have you ever heard a parent say they would do the most violent things if anything happened to their child? Okay. Now have you heard someone say the same about any member of their family? Okay. Now keep all that in mind. So we all know people who feel this way and even say it with pride to show their love for their kind. That their protective love is that great. Then why aren’t black people allowed to feel this way? Why can’t you empathize with black mothers and fathers? Or black people? Why is everything you said about how you’d feel, what you’d do, disallowed for black people? You’d do anything for your child, people don’t understand a parent’s love you say, but why don’t you empathize then with other parents with a different complexion? Oh, you’ll say this cop is someone’s father or someone’s son, but why doesn’t that apply for black people? Are they not people? Imagine if white children were locked in cages or wrongfully imprisoned, what would this country do? We’ve seen it when rich white tourists get in trouble in other countries. The country mobilizes.

My mother-in-law from Korea has been staying with us, trapped because of the lockdown. And because she is Korean and used to Korean healthcare, she’s been thinking about and shocked by our US healthcare system. When she saw the news reports about George Floyd and the protests after, she asked me “So do you not have universal healthcare in this country because they don’t want black people to have it?” She understood in a few months what many never understand. And it’s only because she had something to compare it to.

If this country was white, or there really was no bipartisan racism, it would have been EVERY Democratic nominee wanting immediate universal healthcare, not just one. If you didn’t believe that before, look at the recent reactions of people you thought of as allies within your party, and think about it again and tell me racism had no part in that. White countries all got it. You’re telling me those candidates are completely racism-free? Have you heard the shit the Democratic nominee says? And that’s the Democratic nominee, not Trump.

From Amy Cooper to reactions you’ve been seeing, this racist energy has been laid bare. And these are the people asking protesters and upset black moms and dads to apologize for upsetting decorum, for upsetting their suburban sensibilities. They have the nerve to tell a black protester who is mourning the killing of black people and systematic racism, “You’re helping Trump.” That is some next-level evil shit.

I hate Donald Trump, I hate fascists and the Right. But white supremacy isn’t just about the KKK, it is about putting whiteness supreme, it’s about putting those feelings first, it’s about making that the default. And for too long, if you had a “D” in front of your name, people believed this didn’t apply to you.

Van Jones from CNN recently stated:

“It’s not the racist white person who is in the Ku Klux Klan that we have to worry about. It’s the white, liberal Hillary Clinton supporter walking her dog in Central Park who would tell you right now, ‘Oh I don’t see race, race is no big deal to me, I see all people the same, I give to charities,’ but the minute she sees a black man who she does not respect, or who she has a slight thought against, she weaponized race like she had been trained by the Aryan Nation. A Klansmember could not have been better trained to pick up her phone and tell the police it’s a black man. What you’re seeing now is a curtain falling away. Those of us who have been burdened by this every minute, every second of our entire lives are fragile right now. We are tired.”

Lots of folks are much too tired to sugarcoat and save the feelings of white liberals who they needed on their side. But they aren’t showing up, or they show up too late, or they are too often on the other side. So folks are tired. So here we are now.

Laid bare. What will happen to this energy then? If people come to some conversion, that’s a transformation they’ll have to proactively induce in themselves. Right now we need solidarity and the protesters need to know who is with them.

Donald Trump is calling the protesters “thugs” and “terrorists.” He did this intentionally not just for his own base, but he knows there are a lot of white Democrats who also feel this way, and he’s dog whistling to them. But what he’s also done is made it very easy for many of us to decide who’s side we’re on. A lot of folks who talked a big game about hating Trump sound a lot like him right now.

To say racism is only a conservative problem, not an American problem makes you a racism denier. To say this is only because of Trump, and we just need to go back to the way it was is denying the racist history of this country. You’ve been trained in KKK talking points, and you don’t even know it.

This will be one of many posts you’ll see on this subject. This is still raw, and others will have more insight and observation as time goes on. Uncomfortable things many people have felt for a long time but didn’t know how to express it until now. Maybe still not saying it right. But it needs to be said. Because we are no longer afraid to make our white friends uncomfortable because they are making many of us feel even worse right now. So how everyone receives this message is up to them. It’s their choice. The organizers and the protesters aren’t ruining shit.

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