SHARING TIME!

[glockgal]

It seems like every single post I make about Avatar: The Last Airbender casting ends up in people needing to share their experiences growing up as a social outcast and/or a survivor of abuse and/or victim of visual judgement. I've also seen a lot of demonstrations of subverted self-loathing and (the more amusing) claims from multiple people that

Comments

C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

I don't know, I feel I have to share parts of my life which relate to this in like, general pissed-off-ness

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

Nope, eugenics.

According to Wikipedia, and I'm pretty sure it's true, "Sweden sterilized more people than any other European state except Nazi Germany." The sterelizations where more targeted at the mentally ill and criminals, though, and didn't really deal with race... I guess after Nazi germany, that sort of lost it's charm...

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[melisus]

Well, I know that it had its BASIS in anthropology where anthropologists thought there should be sub species of homo sapiens. But then they tried to attribute personality traits to the sub species and it then became an excuse to put down the minorities for those that needed the excuse.

[anne_jumps]

The British tried to cast them as being subhuman so it wouldn't look so bad for them to mistreat them, more or less, right? I remember seeing some old editorial cartoons (and illustrations, which looked enough like cartoons!) basically positing that the Irish were apes, like the Africans.

Good times.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

If white is anglo-saxon, does that mean that the scandianvian part of my family isn't white? Or are scandinavians anglo-saxons? I'm asking because I don't know, not to be sarcastic.

But this points exactly to my problem with understanding "white" as a defnition, it's either too broad or too specific, depending on which point on view one has.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[melisus]

I'm pretty sure Scandanavian would count. Traditionally, with the exception of the Irish, it would just be Mediterranean and Eastern Europeans who wouldn't be white.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

Ah! Well, that does make sense with the traditional Swedish way of seeing it, only Swedes wouldn't talk about it as being white, but as something else.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[bossymarmalade]

"white" is whatever kind of white they want it to mean

Yes, exactly. Definitions of "white" are very fluid and shift depending on who's making the judgement and what their reasons are.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

Yeah, that's how it seems to me. But that's what makes it so hard for me to use "white" from the perspective of someone who doesn't want to sort of... point at people and go "THAT'S WHITE, you guys!" and be meet by "bwu? I'm this-and-that, I'm totally not white!" because I don't have the same understanding of "white" as they do...

GOD WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE SO COMPLEX :P

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[bossymarmalade]

ahahhahah! SERIOUSLY. It gets even more complex on the internet, because there's an assumption of whiteness that people work from! I've had discussions about race with people who got ANGRY and refused to talk anymore when I eventually told them I'm not white. *g*

[anne_jumps]

I think the whole point in any race-discussion is that in the end, "white" is whatever kind of white they want it to mean

Bingo. Italians weren't "white" until recently, either. If a group was "good" enough, they "became white," apparently.

[glockgal]

If a group was "good" enough, they "became white," apparently.

Oooh, man. I never really thought of it that way, but yeah. Yet another example of systemic racist mindset in our culture.

[reallyreally]

Yeah, totally, that's how I understand it, too. Ugh.

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[glockgal]

I think 'white' falls into the same category as 'invandrare' in Swedish - as in, it's a malleable sense of mind that can be shared by both white and non-white poeple regardless of what country they're from or how many generations back their families go.

Some people in Canada I've met are 14th gen white Canadians and they're like "I respect racial diversity!"

Others are 1st gen white Canadians, and they're like "Go back home, Chinaman!"

LOL my friend and I, to differentiate between the two, use 'white' and 'whitey-white'. White, to mean well. That's the colour of your skin. 'Whitey-white' to mean that your mindset is privileged. It's silly, but since the two of us have our understanding (and aren't intending to Spread the Word or anything), we can support each other when racial issues come up. ;D

Re: C&P from previous post: what is "white" in a North American context?

[reallyreally]

A canadian teacher at the school where I work usually refers to herself as "invandrare" and it always takes me one moment of "huuh?" before my brain (and not just the ideas that come with my culture) kicks in and I remember that yeah, as a person from a different country living in Sweden, she IS an invandrare. Because that's what the word means.

Haha, that's pretty smart, actually, even if it is a between-the-two-of-us thing, because it makes more more sense to me to differentiate between the two!