#not to say she isn't a privileged old white american lady of course

[anghraine]

Sometimes I still think about that weird German article about how the EU made a mistake in thinking of Greek people as the heirs to ancient Greeks, when modern Greeks are the mixed offspring of Albanians, Slavs, and “Byzantines” (and shouldn’t be in the EU for that reason, somehow?). 

Like, it was in a conservative magazine, but I’ve definitely seen people doing all kinds of gymnastics to sever actual Greek people from the legacy of the past to ... idk, turbo-charge the fetishization of it. It’s weird because my personal experience of Greek heritage is mostly “people being vaguely xenophobic about Grandma even though she was born in the USA” and yet people are so into Greek stuff when they can divorce it from living human beings.

#idk grandma is very sick rn and the shit she's dealt with is on my mind #not to say she isn't a privileged old white american lady of course #or even that she's a good person #but there are parts of the extended family who won't associate w/ her or her descendants and just call her 'that greek woman' #so having that (and some other things) on the one hand and then people being The Way They Are about greek stuff on the other is... #kind of a weird experience #and how they make their dismissal of living greeks square with their fetishization of ancient ones is doubly weird #not everyone is actively gross per the article but... yeah #anghraine babbles #ellinoamerikana blogging #bastard byzantine hybrids unite!

[mainecoon76]

I think what many of us privileged folks don't realize is that achieving equal rights is a two-step process. Often enough we go only half the way, and then feel (not only act, but genuinely feel) offended when someone calls us out in it. But only taking the first step is actively harmful.

I just witnessed a conversation between a very old white lady whose values got stuck at some point in the 1950s, and my ten-year-old son. She claimed that "some black people are nice enough" and she might have fallen in love with one, but would never have married them because they're "a different race". (Please let's not discuss that worldview here.) My son got upset and argued that skin colour doesn't matter at all.

It was, of course, the right thing to say. But it occurred to me that many of us stop there. It just doesn't matter. Skin colour doesn't matter. Gender doesn't matter. Disability doesn't matter. We're all equal.

But that's only step one.

Step two is to acknowledge that all these things shouldn't matter but they do.

And that's the thing about color-blindness. I suppose it's usually well-intentioned but still harmful, because it shoves systemic disadvantages under the carpet. But because it's well-intentioned, the privileged person ist genuinely offended at being accused of racism. Because hey! They believe in equality!

I saw a particularly unpleasant example of this, not concerning skin colour but disability. (Though in that case I'm 100% sure the good intentions were fake.) The neurotypical, able-bodied person in question argued that because disabled people have the right to equal treatment, it is a sign of respect to hold them to the same standards, demand the same of them, and, if they are unable to fulfil those demands, inform them "fairly and truthfully" about their lack of suitability.

What the everloving fuck?

That's not what equality means. It is only step one: we're all equal. If we stop there, we give everyone the same treatment and leave people to deal with their disadvantages on their own, which results in inequality.

So step two is to acknowledge that we have all equal rights, which means that disadvantages must be dealt with before we can talk about equal treatment.

This is why it's "black lives matter", not "all lives matter". This is why inclusion is hard work, why we need laws to protect disabled people. It applies to women's rights and, more broadly, all kind of discriminantion because of gender and sexual orientation.

Those who have been fighting those issues for all their lives will probably roll their eyes and say "got there already, have you?", but that's not the point. The point is that I believe it's a common misconception - equality done half-way. And I think we have to tackle that in a different way than the various -isms at step zero.

(Caveat: I'm speaking from my own experience and from the background of my own culture, which isn't American. Not claiming that this can be generalized.)

#cw: racism #cw: ableism #privilege #blm #I'm saying this as a privileged person... #... as the result of observing other privileged persons #also step one was what my parents taught me as a kid #step two was what I learned alo the way #rl #recent events #racism #ableism