Mimicry is Not Solidarity: Of Allies, Rachel Dolezal and the Creation of Antiracist White Identity

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Monday June 15, 2015 · 4:06 AM PDT

2015/06/15 · 04:06

While many speculate as to the motives behind Rachel Dolezal's pretending to be black--and while some insist that this story isn't news, or is a mere distraction--let me suggest that there is a quite likely reason for her duplicity, mostly overlooked thus far, and which actually matters quite a bit in the antiracist struggle, especially as concerns white allyship and solidarity. If you're curious, or someone for whom antiracist allyship is important, please jump below the squiggle. it's a short piece...

tim wise

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Monday April 13, 2015 · 10:49 AM PDT

2015/04/13 · 10:49

Though the media may be talking about this by later today, it's worth noting that this mornings murder of an employee at Wayne Community College in Goldsboro, NC was apparently carried out by Kenneth (Ken) Stancil. Stancil, who is being described in the media as a white male, 5'11" with a tattoo over his eye, happens to be a Neo-Nazi, as has been reported, to my knowledge, only here:

http://heavy.com/...

Here is his Facebook page, since deleted, but cached:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/...

Two quick thoughts:

1. Why has major media not picked up on this detail, which a small internet outfit managed to uncover?

2. Who expects them to consider this a possible act of terrorism, even if they do end up mentioning the suspect's politics?

Now obviously, regarding the last question, it might not have been a political act (though in my experience, overt white supremacists see everything in life through that filter), and thus, may not actually be terrorism. But I think we all know that if it were a Muslim shooter, even simply taking out a beef with an individual, devoid of larger content, suspicions of it being political and terrorism would surface immediately....

Another day, another killing, and another killer who will get to represent nothing larger in terms of his race or religion...

Just Because Speech is Free Doesn't Mean it Has to be Worthless

tim wise

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Thursday January 08, 2015 · 3:16 PM PST

2015/01/08 · 15:16

Many years ago, when discussing the issue of hate speech and how it should be addressed on college campuses, my friend Paul Gallegos at Evergreen State College offered the line that serves as the title for the think piece that follows. "Just because speech is free,' he explained, 'doesn't mean that it has to be worthless." The notion has stuck with me for years; his deft appropriation of the double-meaning of "free" (both as liberty but also as a statement of non-existent value) was a stroke of genius, and one that has informed my understanding of these issues ever since. I am thinking about it again in the wake of recent events in France.

Following the horrific killings of journalists at Charlie Hebdo in Paris, much has been said by pundits and prolific purveyors of tweet: about fanatical interpretations of Islam, about free speech, about the importance of satire, about religious profiling and the notion of collective blame, etc. Some of this commentary has been helpful and instructive, while other iterations of it have been incendiary and useless. But through it all, one thought has continued to trouble me about the dominant narrative, even among (perhaps especially among) liberals and progressives. If interested, please follow me beneath the squiggle. What follows is something I posted on Facebook and then tweeted out, slightly lengthened for further content. I am genuinely interested in seeing what others think about this.

tim wise

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Wednesday December 10, 2014 · 3:26 PM PST

2014/12/10 · 15:26

Here is my speech in Lexington KY last week, discussing racism and police brutality post-Ferguson. This is from the MOSAIIC conference, sponsored by Bluegrass Community and Technical College. I think folks here might find it helpful to pass around...

https://soundcloud.com/...

We Don't Need Nice, We Need Justice: Racism and the Moral Blindness of White America

tim wise

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Thursday December 04, 2014 · 12:35 PM PST

2014/12/04 · 12:35

This past week, Chris Rock noted in an interview that in his estimation, although racism remains a real and persistent problem, America is producing the nicest white people in its history.

Perhaps. But if so, this only suggests the pitiable limits of niceness and its utter irrelevance for the production of something approaching justice, or for that matter even insight. And if so, it may merely signify how far we had to come out of the pit of whatever one takes the opposite of nice to be: mean, nasty, cruel, selfish, and so on. In short, it's pretty thin gruel in the pantheon of praise, however sincerely Rock may have meant it.

One can be perfectly nice, after all, and still fail to see that which is right before you, staring at you from the computer screen as you watch Eric Garner killed on the streets of Staten Island with an illegal chokehold. The officer who applied that pressure to Garner's neck might himself be "nice" in the sense that he is kind to old people, babies and animals. Likewise, the grand jury that decided yesterday not to indict him for any crime might well have been filled with nice people, who send get-well cards to sick friends and relatives, participate in Secret Santa at work and volunteer at the local food bank. And what of it? Their niceness did not, clearly, provide them with the gift of comprehension, as they managed to watch an officer kill a man who posed no threat to him whatsoever---no reaching for his gun, even in some paranoid fever dream, no charging him like a bull, or as Darren Wilson put it to justify his killing of Mike Brown, like "a demon." Their niceness came laced with nothing so helpful as empathy as they watched a man choked to death, gasping for air, all because he had been selling loose cigarettes on the street and dared to tell the officers to leave him alone when they decided to harass him for that most serious of crimes.

(more below the break)

tim wise

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Monday November 24, 2014 · 6:38 PM PST

2014/11/24 · 18:38

I suppose there is no longer much point in debating the facts surrounding the shooting of Michael Brown. First, because Officer Darren Wilson has been cleared by a grand jury, and even the collective brilliance of a thousand bloggers pointing out the glaring inconsistencies in his version of events that August day won’t result in a different outcome. And second, because Wilson's guilt or innocence was always somewhat secondary to the larger issue: namely, the issue of this gigantic national inkblot staring us in the face, and what we see when we look at it---and more to the point, why?

Because it is a kind of racial Rorschach (is it not?) into which each of these cases---not just Brown but all the others, from Trayvon Martin to Sean Bell to Patrick Dorismond to Aswan Watson and beyond---inevitably and without fail morph. That we see such different things when we look upon them must mean something. That so much of white America cannot see the shapes made out so clearly by most of black America cannot be a mere coincidence, nor is it likely an inherent defect in our vision. Rather, it is a socially-constructed astigmatism that blinds so many to the way in which black folks often experience law enforcement.

(More below...)

tim wise

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Sunday November 02, 2014 · 6:33 AM PST

2014/11/02 · 06:33

The following is an excerpt from my forthcoming book, The Culture of Cruelty: How America's Elite Demonize the Poor, Valorize the Rich and Jeopardize the Future (San Francisco: City Lights, 2015) This section explores the way that many (especially on the right) downplay or dismiss the problem of poverty and the hardship faced by the poor and unemployed. In coming weeks I will post a few more excerpts from the book, which is in the editing process currently. Note, there may be slight changes to the final text when it is released in book form.

Join me below the break for the text...

tim wise

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Thursday October 30, 2014 · 5:53 PM PDT

2014/10/30 · 17:53

I know that for most on this site, this won't necessarily be especially revelatory or needed. After all, most on here are progressive Democrats, whereas I'm a far more grizzled leftist than most. That said, I figure we might still know folks to whom this piece applies, and therefore, perhaps it might prove helpful or thought-provoking. Basically, it's an all-purpose critique of the convenient and sophomoric radical conceit that says voting doesn't matter, or voting for compromised Democrats is evil, or there's no difference between parties, or (fill in the blank with your favorite radical bumper sticker here)...It's so tiring, so pedantic, but nonetheless appears persuasive to some. So join me below the squiggle to see why it's dysfunctional...

tim wise

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Friday August 15, 2014 · 10:53 AM PDT

2014/08/15 · 10:53

My newest piece on Ferguson and beyond...trying to make the connections clear between apartheid-like policing, the attack on voting rights and the general assault on black America...lots and lots of links/citation...please send it around if ya like.

Join me below the break...

tim wise

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Wednesday July 23, 2014 · 7:25 AM PDT

2014/07/23 · 07:25

It's because they hate. There is no other logical explanation.

After all, it's one thing to oppose a piece of legislation and fight to keep it from being passed because you honestly disagree with it as a matter of principle. Decent people can disagree on policy.

But it's quite another to celebrate like frat boys at a keg party upon hearing the news that millions of people may now lose their health care, or that their care may become so financially prohibitive as to bankrupt them.

Yet that is what they are doing, and by they I mean pretty much the entirety of conservative America. Check out their Twitter spew, where you can see their nearly orgasmic delight at yesterday's 2-1 decision by an appellate court panel to the effect that only persons enrolled in state level insurance exchanges can receive federal subsidies for coverage under the Affordable Care Act. Since most states -- especially those with conservative political leadership -- have refused to establish exchanges, thereby forcing residents to turn to the federal version, the ruling (were it to stand) would mean that millions of Americans may no longer be able to access care under the law.

Decent human beings, irrespective of their take on a matter of policy, do not celebrate at the news that millions of peoples' lives could now be made harder. Decent human beings do not cheer and gloat at the news that millions of children could now go without care, or that millions of people may once again be forced to choose between health insurance they really can't afford, or paying a light bill, or buying groceries, or paying rent. Decent human beings don't put such a premium on political victories that they would purposely seek to harm people, deliberately make them worse off, intentionally leave them adrift with no real recourse to obtain care, possibly causing them, in many cases, to quite literally die. But conservatives in America do all of these things.

Because they hate. There is no other logical explanation.

(Having said that, follow below for more of an explanation...)

tim wise

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Friday March 21, 2014 · 7:49 AM PDT

2014/03/21 · 07:49

My thoughts on the passing of Fred Phelps -- including my recollections of my own encounter with him 19 years ago -- beneath the wonderfully homoerotic squiggly. (Not sure if it's ever been described that way, but in Fred's honor, what the hell...) Originally published on my own site but re-posted here because I thought folks might find it interesting or worth sending around.

tim wise

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Monday February 17, 2014 · 9:27 AM PST

2014/02/17 · 09:27

And so a despairing ritual has once again played out, and once again in a Florida courtroom, where apparently some number of jurors find it difficult to accept that a young black male might not be to blame for his own murder; that his killing might actually have been completely and entirely unjustified. Then again, perhaps it’s premature to say it this way. Until the jury or some member of it speaks, we won’t know for sure why they were unable to agree as to the murder charge against Michael Dunn.

Yes, it could be that some among them believed the utterly preposterous self-defense claim put forth by Dunn and his attorney.

This, despite the fact that the gun Dunn claimed to see pointed at him did not exist.

This, despite the fact that he claimed to hear Jordan Davis threaten his life, even over music that was so loud, Dunn said he couldn’t hear himself think (and even though Dunn had by then rolled his window up, suffers from partial hearing loss, and had consumed, by his own admission 3-4 rum and Cokes that night).

This, despite the fact that he then fled the scene and didn’t call police to tell them what had happened.

This, despite the fact that he didn’t mention Davis having a gun to his fiancee, who was with him at the time, until several weeks later.

This, despite the fact that he kept shooting at the SUV which held Davis and his friends, even as that SUV tried to get away from the gunfire.

Sure, despite all of this, some jurors might have believed that Dunn acted out of a genuine concern that his life was in danger. Some people, after all, cling stubbornly to their belief in unicorns, and the idea that the Earth is only 6000 years old, and that God fabricated and then planted all those fossils (which are, shall we say, quite a bit older than that), solely as a way to test our faith. And a full 1 in 4 believe that the sun revolves around the Earth. Some people, in short, are so painfully imbecilic as to suggest that they should never be allowed anywhere near a jury room, whether in Florida or anywhere else.

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Mimicry is Not Solidarity: Of Allies, Rachel Dolezal and the Creation of Antiracist White Identity

NC Community College Shooter a Neo-Nazi, Media Ignores This Small Detail

Just Because Speech is Free Doesn't Mean it Has to be Worthless

Tim Wise Speech - "Racism & Criminal Justice: Ferguson & Beyond," 12/5/14, Lexington, KY

We Don't Need Nice, We Need Justice: Racism and the Moral Blindness of White America

Repetitive Motion Disorder: Black Reality and White Denial in America

Poverty Denialism in a Culture of Cruelty: Bashing the Poor as Right-Wing Amusement

Your Bumper Sticker is Not a Philosophy: Reflections on Voting and the Limits of Radical Purity

Resurrecting Apartheid: White Police and Politicians are Waging War on Black America

Because They Hate: Health Care Obstructionism and the Conservative Mind

Hate Swallows: Reflections on the Passing of Fred Phelps

Choosing Whiteness or Humanity: Jordan Davis and the Minimizing of Black Pain