Teachable Moments and Tokenism.
I just wrote this bit of correspondence to a neighbor of mine in response to her musing about how racism, both overt and covert, can rear their (not ugly but everyday) heads in our otherwise chummy public house down the street. An out of towner went on a tirade about the NAACP meeting a friend of mine (non-black) attended and was gushing about. And suddenly this was an endorsement of "the Niggers" and how he wasn't "for equality with Niggers". He directed his indignation, his scorn at my girlfriend, furious that this pretty, smart woman would present such an argument and when asked say: "If you mean that all human beings are equal, then yes, I am 'for it'". He opened to the audience at the Pub and asked if anyone else was "for it". To which not a single other man in the room, including one of the owners, whom my friend was speaking with at the time, responded. She called me directly after and I went down to discuss it with her. My thoughts in part are below...
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Hm. Thanks for the musings, Noel. I'm of several minds on the topic, and this helps sort things to a degree. First, its quite true that there aren't a ton of venues to skip out on here. And to be honest, I feel like I've invested a lot (of capital both social and monitary) in the place. There are points, when events like this happen that take me out of those moments and make me feel disconnected from that investment. I find myself wondering if my "belonging" is more a biproduct of me just inserting myself into a venue that otherwise doesnot have any genuine connection with me, or any real interest in my presence one way or another. If I wasn't present, of course there'd be less friction. Less waves. And the passives and bubble boys would be free to go about their lives as though there really were no such thing as human suffering and social inequality.
There are points though that reinforce that my sense of "ownership" and "belonging" are tenuous at best. I'm reminded of an occasion last summer when random texts made the typical pubgoer of an older, fist shaking set very suspicious of "kids in baggy jeans and blue shirts". Which I was quick to point out was every other kid in the Ward. The dialouges they had about possible gang activity quickly deviated into "those people" and "thems" which I had to interject a few times to remind them about. They'd go about talking about their handguns and looking suspiciously over their shoulders at the neighborhood kids who the week before barely registered to them, and I found myself shaking my head at the arbitrary nature of it all.
The situation I attempted to explain to you before the meeting on Friday seemed similar that way. The specter of "crime" is always black or hispanic others that conveniently slip into rasists assumptions and vitriolic slurs. I'm quite confident that the disheveled biker regular (who's name I've purposely never gone out of my way to get. I'm not so foolish to miss how his eyes narrow when he looks in my direction) forgot himself when he launched into a "Thats what THEY do. These NIGGERS" And thats about all he needed to say before I stepped in and shouted him down in ways I'm reluctant to expound upon. Just know I could have moonlit as a sailor, but the effect was the desired one. He looked at me with his eyes daggers, and finally Scotty piped in about "not using that word" and having us move to our respective corners. The comparison to the other incident is what I find troubling here though. If I had been there, without question I would have confronted the jerky hillbilly in question. And perhaps someone would have found the stones to back my play. Perhaps, but not likely as I'm not accustomed to anyone doing things like this for the right reasons. What it does inform me of, is that these people, who I may have foolislhy imbued with more character than I'd thought, may not be may not be genuine enough for my liking. If the only time racism matters is when I happen to be present to object, then there's something quite wrong with this picture. Thinking on this, I initially felt fine, if somewhat cynically ambivalent about it, but the more I think on it, the more frustrated I become. I don't want to quit the place but -and I feel similarly about a lot of ties I've forged of late- I've put a lot of energy into environments I never really belonged in anyway, and this may be the most glaring example. Being a token minority is full of teachable moments, but I find myself losing patience in having to be the one being vigilant and offering perpetual lessons
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Hm. Thanks for the musings, Noel. I'm of several minds on the topic, and this helps sort things to a degree. First, its quite true that there aren't a ton of venues to skip out on here. And to be honest, I feel like I've invested a lot (of capital both social and monitary) in the place. There are points, when events like this happen that take me out of those moments and make me feel disconnected from that investment. I find myself wondering if my "belonging" is more a biproduct of me just inserting myself into a venue that otherwise doesnot have any genuine connection with me, or any real interest in my presence one way or another. If I wasn't present, of course there'd be less friction. Less waves. And the passives and bubble boys would be free to go about their lives as though there really were no such thing as human suffering and social inequality.
There are points though that reinforce that my sense of "ownership" and "belonging" are tenuous at best. I'm reminded of an occasion last summer when random texts made the typical pubgoer of an older, fist shaking set very suspicious of "kids in baggy jeans and blue shirts". Which I was quick to point out was every other kid in the Ward. The dialouges they had about possible gang activity quickly deviated into "those people" and "thems" which I had to interject a few times to remind them about. They'd go about talking about their handguns and looking suspiciously over their shoulders at the neighborhood kids who the week before barely registered to them, and I found myself shaking my head at the arbitrary nature of it all.
The situation I attempted to explain to you before the meeting on Friday seemed similar that way. The specter of "crime" is always black or hispanic others that conveniently slip into rasists assumptions and vitriolic slurs. I'm quite confident that the disheveled biker regular (who's name I've purposely never gone out of my way to get. I'm not so foolish to miss how his eyes narrow when he looks in my direction) forgot himself when he launched into a "Thats what THEY do. These NIGGERS" And thats about all he needed to say before I stepped in and shouted him down in ways I'm reluctant to expound upon. Just know I could have moonlit as a sailor, but the effect was the desired one. He looked at me with his eyes daggers, and finally Scotty piped in about "not using that word" and having us move to our respective corners. The comparison to the other incident is what I find troubling here though. If I had been there, without question I would have confronted the jerky hillbilly in question. And perhaps someone would have found the stones to back my play. Perhaps, but not likely as I'm not accustomed to anyone doing things like this for the right reasons. What it does inform me of, is that these people, who I may have foolislhy imbued with more character than I'd thought, may not be may not be genuine enough for my liking. If the only time racism matters is when I happen to be present to object, then there's something quite wrong with this picture. Thinking on this, I initially felt fine, if somewhat cynically ambivalent about it, but the more I think on it, the more frustrated I become. I don't want to quit the place but -and I feel similarly about a lot of ties I've forged of late- I've put a lot of energy into environments I never really belonged in anyway, and this may be the most glaring example. Being a token minority is full of teachable moments, but I find myself losing patience in having to be the one being vigilant and offering perpetual lessons