#race and gender

[isaacsapphire]

I think the link between conspicuous consumption and femininity is specifically an upper class thing.

The stereotypical feminine trait among lower class is generally taking a caretaking role - being a teacher, a nurse, childcare, (and yes, parent), etc. Interesting to note that blah blah women in STEM stuff succeed in giving all the women who are interested in STEM entry into the field but has not seemed to massively attract more.

[this is not to say that men can't be caring or caretakers, it's just the role still reads as primarily feminine]

Also in china specifically a woman thing is apparently, finances [among the lower class]. There's a persistent stereotype that lower class men will just gamble it all away or spend frivolously so it's better to put your entire paycheck in your wife's account, she will manage the household finances, and give you money as needed. I have no idea where this norm came from (I guess bc women do the food shopping and groceries?)

Hmm, reasonable. I get so caught up in the aesthetic of even lower class femininity being spending (whatever counts to members of this class as) vast amounts of money on stuff like nail salons and purses and outfits to be worn only a few times and that like, pearls and at least bejeweling and designer brands are the definition of femininity that I sometimes forget about other aspects of it, and that at least some of the fancy appearance stuff is a big deal in it's own way for a lot of forms of masculinity.

#gender and class #gender roles #race and gender #fashion #oh geez i can tag asks now

[misespinas]

Recently I’ve begun reading Frantz Fanon and found his theory on gender related to race in Black Skin, White Masks (1952) to be disturbing.

He has two chapters in the book I will focus on, one titled “The Woman of Color and the White Man,” the second “The Man of Color and the White Woman.” It should be noted, he does almost exclusively focus on the relations between the black people of Martinique/Antilles and their French colonizers.

“The Woman of Color and the White Man” is extremely prescriptive and critical of black women for their apparent attraction to white men. His point of reference for this is Mayotte Capécia’s I Am a Martinican Woman (1948). Capécia’s work is rampant with colorism and has been widely criticized for its descriptions of internalized black inferiority.

Fanon would describe that “It is commonplace in Martinique to dream of whitening oneself magically as a way of salvation,” and claims that “a lot of girls from Martinique, students in France, [...] confess in lily-white innocence that they would never marry a black man.” Fanon speaks of black women as though they are children, writing in a patronizing tone, “[black Martinican women] too one day will realize that ‘white men don’t marry black women.’” He writes with a tone which conveys that black women are not capable of being attractive. On top of this, his belief seems to be that black women only have one real job, “to whiten the race.”

Fanon is insecure in his manhood and believes he cannot be a complete man as a white man is capable of.

In “The Man of Color and the White Woman,” the descriptions of the black men are far less judgemental. He writes, “between these white breasts that my wandering hands fondle, white civilization and worthiness become mine.” Even if we focused on less sexual descriptions (there are several within the chapter), Fanon wrote, “By loving me, [a white woman] proves to me that I am worthy of white love. I am loved like a white man.”

It is evident that Fanon views women as tools, but their worth differs depending on their race. He claims this is not unique, later in the chapter explaining that “with Antillean men we learned that their main preoccupation on setting foot in France was to sleep with a white woman. [...] this ritual of initiation into ‘authentic’ manhood.”

Black women have the purpose of procreation according to Fanon, while white women have the purpose of sexual pleasure. A black woman cannot be sexually enjoyed, and a white woman cannot mother his children.

#frantz fanon #race theory #gender theory #race and gender #race and ethnicity #Martinican history #french history #antillean history #sexism #internalized sexism #internalized racism #objectification #stop objectifying women #misogyny #misogynoir #internalized misogyny #misogynistic #cultural misogyny #predjudice #women's liberation #womens studies #womens rights #female exploitation #radfem #radical feminist #radical feminism #libfem #liberal feminism #liberal feminist #intersectionality

[red-erroring]

Am i autistic or just too introverted for a functioning adult?

#so many jobs require extroverted people #society does not cater to many people #this is not how the world should work #autism spectrum #race and gender #disabilities #mental health #etc

[gameminds]

one of the hardest long lessons for the greater sociopolitical progressive movement (basically all human-rights struggles against entrenched authority since ~1600) is that the basic things that make someone into a bigot or a fascist or a willing sycophant to the status quo, are actually shared pretty intimately by all human beings.

some of us have a degree of skepticism towards certain forms of disenfranchisement (but not all forms- most people still agree on carceral justice), and it leads us naturally to question the status quo when it causes harm for us or others.

but even that basic questioning instinct is vastly insufficient to address global issues with race, gender, etc. To rely on people's basic skepticism would be, and has been, a huge fallacy that ignores how easy it is to brainwash even (and often especially) morally upstanding, decent people. It's painfully simple to convince your well-meaning, progressive, gay aunt that there is a rising political group that hates her and wants her dead, and the logical next step for that existential fear is to take drastic steps to protect yourself, personally and politically.

It's plainly demonstrable and widely agreed that even people with liberal sentiments can be agitated to unreasoned hate, which places their enemies in the role of Unholy Instigator, and justifies any and all means to defeat them. Joe Rogan, for all his faults, is not a cult leader- not even close. but he serves an intimate purpose FOR cult leaders unintentionally. The first step in comprehensive brainwashing is to convince people that the reality they experience is an illusion.

That's the basis for his entire show.

So, then, fundamentally, the long lesson is that attacking issues of moral standing or righteousness is a losing game against a team whose primary mechanism of action is blurring the lines of justice and lying openly about the righteousness of their cause, the "science" backing it, and the nature of the voting populace as supporters. The larger population is vulnerable to these ruses for precisely the reason that they have been continuously primed by media (and, let's face it, geopolitical events) to believe there are great Cabals running the planet and every major political movement.

While there are, in fact, great Cabals running the planet (you know, governments and corporations), the "Lie All The Time" movement depends on Aunt Geraldine believing that Uncle Bradley is a vested and willing member of their *intentional conspiracy*. this lie serves miraculously as blanket cover for the wrongs of governments and businesses; they can both blame the cabal for their failures and shortcomings, hide behind it as a constant talking point to avoid making real changes to issues that actually affect people, weaponize it to threaten the safety of their enemies, and use it as a cudgel against their opponents rhetorically.

The way you attack these systems of belief in a way that neither compromises your ability to clearly see the difference between subjective "wrong" and objective "incorrect/inefficient", nor allows the kind of leeway in the interpretation of your statements condemning reprehensible actions taken by bad actors, is to attack the fallacy, contradictions, and circular logic that these systems depend on to keep people trapped.

Not attack them rhetorically, we've seen repeatedly that calling a political movement "deplorable" just hardens the worst offenders and tends to serve as a rallying cry for self-victimization. Instead, we need to attack the systems these movements use to A) spread misinformation that serves a hateful purpose, B) trap people in political in-groups with xenophobia and "already apocalyptic" descriptions of out-group societies, and C) confront the basic failures of the state and our culture generally to educate people about the nature of hate, its ability to twist our mind unwittingly, and the ways it is subtly weaponized as a brainwashing tool, even on the left.

the biggest road block remains, of course, that all major political movements of the 21st century depend on 'Big Lie' tactics to drive engagement and voting turnout. Liberals have been feeding The Beast of our Misinformation Culture for 75 years, at the same pace and with the same food as the fascists. The larger political bodies depend on a sizeable chunk of the population having precisely zero critical thoughts about the government. The easiest way to accomplish that is by pointing Aunt Geraldine at Uncle Bradley and telling her that he is, personally, the reason abortion is banned. Our brains are designed around seeing patterns that may or may not be there. Assigning blame to a known individual is easier and more satisfying than assigning it to a greater entity that you would have to spend time and energy thinking about if you were to fight it.

Auntie G won't ever question her political leaders if the only reason they fail is the Great Conspiracy.

beeg thots on a sundae

#sunday #politics #race and gender

[eileenleahy]

very very weird when people act like only trans & nb people have complicated relationships with gender and are the True Understanders of the violence of our deeply gendered world. beyond the fact of how troubled cis girls and women grow as they experience gender in a misogynistic world, are we supposed to act like every poc doesnt become aware at some point of just how eurocentric gender expectations are, and how dysphoric that makes you? how alienated from your own body and sex? this is just me talking from the experience of being forcibly held down and waxed at 8yrs old for being a hairy latina and constantly getting called manly at school for having a mustache and body hair. sighh i really just need white trans people to stop pretending they intrinsically have an understanding of gender so far above everyone else's

#im not saying cis oppression or whatever the fuck im just saying Understand experiences beyond yourself #and it's telling how often i see trans poc discuss how complicated their communities' relationship with gender is and how distinct it is #from the cis white world. and there's consequently a distinct lack of aggrandizing of their personal understanding of gender #because everyone they know has a fucked up relationship w gender by virtue of their race

[cadmium-free]

I don’t know, the thing that really bothers me about Greta Gerwig’s films is that there is just this gaping hole where gay women should be. Like, when you’re making these movies about the trap of heterosexual marriage, breaking free of that, and the only concrete answer is to be a single woman over and over and over again, it feels like an intentional absence. You can watch the movie with a queer lens, but it is egregious that you may only consider homosexuality in her movies in this way. It ought to be in them. There is no reason for it not to be there. Women don’t fuck women in Greta Gerwig’s feminist liberations. Often, they don’t have sex at all.

#text #i don’t know I’m just never excited about her movies they feel dated wrt to gender sexuality race #notifications are muted <3 #terfs stfu

[em0-opossum]

"can I be [x gender] if I..." "can I still call myself [x term] if..." yes. yes. if you like the term then use it. do whatever you want forever. labels are just little words we use to categorize our infinitely complex existential experiences on this floating rock !! no two people who use the same label are going to experience it the same way and that's the beauty of it !! use "contradictory" labels, use labels that don't make sense to anyone, change your label every day or not at all, explore anything and everything, use no labels at all or every label under the sun, confuse people or correct them or let them assume things rather than explaining, I promise nothing other people think about your identity is worth your happiness !!

#ofc there are some situations where this does not apply (ex: terms connected to a specific culture or race such as 2 spirit) #but in general people need to be more chill about labels #lesbian #nonbinary #bigender #lgbtq+ #gay #trans #multigender #trans joy #asexual #aromantic #bisexual #queer #demiboy #demigirl #2 spirit #pansexual #demisexual #too tired to tag all the genders and sexualities and other things i can think of but yeah

[kitsune-oji]

I just read what it'd be like to be Dia's spouse, could you do something similar for Mammon please?🥺👉👈

Married to Mammon

With pleasure, my friend! ♡ though tbh some of these also apply to when you're just in a relationship with him too, without being married

Mammon x gn! Mc (you/yours)

What would your life look like as Mammon's spouse?

You're literally married to your best friend, but in the best way possible

Mammon is awed every day when he realises that he's married to you, like he's actually your husband!!! The fact you love him is so miraculous to him, it's amazing

Wealth finds you in abundance, though not all of it is money. Your wealthy in love and happiness too and you're not doubting for one second that it's because of Mammon('s influence)

The places he frequents to gamble at all know you by name and point you towards him the second you walk through the door. He will ask you every time if you'll blow on his dice for good luck... It's on you if you indulge him or not

So you still live in the House of Lamentation with him and all his brothers? Most likely, because it's just much easier and cheaper and as dysfunctional as their relationships are, Mammon would miss them all way too much... At least after a while

On more than one occasion you catch Mammon bragging about being married to you and proudly showing off his ring. No, it's not that one or the other, it's on his Ring Finger, you dingus (cue him hitting the other demon upside the head)

Whenever Mammon gets his paycheck from his modeling job, he's always trying to do smth with you or get a present for you, just anything to make you happy and show you how much he loves you because he does and he can't believe that you reciprocate his feelings but he definitely doesn't want that to change, ever! So he's gotta keep you happy!

Talking of his modeling job, Mammon invited you to come watch him a few times and (if you went) after a while the whole set knew you, even if maybe they hadn't seen you yet. Hell, Mammon talks about you so much that they feel like they actually know you already before ever seeing you, let alone talking to you.

They let you in to watch his gigs if you want to stop by and watching your chemistry, the photographer asks you to join him in a few pictures and if you're up for it and like it, you may find yourself on and in some magazines in the future...

Since he doesn't have a last name, Mammon will take on yours....and he beams whenever someone calls him Mr. (___)

The crows know you and the demons know you too

The crows see you as a very important person they have to protect and they wanna make you happy too, so they bring you things you may like. With time they also learn what makes you the happiest and frequently get that instead of other things

The demons on the other hand know you as Mammon's Partner, as part of his family and even the dumbest demon who would otherwise look down on Mammon because he's too soft, won't mess with you. Because if they did, everyone knows that Mammon ruin not only their career, but their face (or body depending on the severity of the offence) and their life as well ♡

#mine #obey me shall we date #om! swd #obey me headcanons #Hc #Hcs #obey me mammon #gender neutral reader #Gn mc #race neutral mc #Fluff #obey me fluff

[coffeelovinggayidiot]

Like all of tumblr, aparently: we 💜 love ✡️jews✡️ and we would 👊 punch nazis and we reblog five 5️⃣ different haukkah 🕎 posts a year we are like so progresive 💁✨️

Also all of tumblr, aparently: death to all jews 🚫✡️ if you're a jewish person who lives in IsNotRaEl then you're an evil 👺 bad jew and you deserve to be raped and murdered ☠️☠️ what? You fled to israel because we were murdering you by the millions??? Well you should have all died lol ☠️☠️ happy hanukkah btw 🕎

#jewblr #op is pissed off #ישראבלר #jewish #antisemitism #i/p #i/p conflict #antisemitism is so real both on this app and in general leftist communities #and I used to side with these people #if there was an attack on people based on their sexuality; gender; race; religion ect I like to believe I would have cared #that I would have shows campation to your loss and understand your pain #instead of actively be part of the bigotry againsts you #i don't trust so many of my mutuals right now because I now know that if there was a nazi uprising they wouldn't hide me #they would cheer at my death #THIS is why jewish people can't trust you guys #YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT JEWISH LIVES #there was a really good article that explained this really well and how so many people have and will lose jewish friends #because we now know that you aren't there for use. and that you were never there for us #'punch a nazi' and 'never forget' are just cute little slogens to you but they actually mean something to us #it used to mean safety; used to mean that we could trust you; now it's empty wprds ringing with betrayel #never forget #jewish lives matter #hamas #palestine #israel #bring on your hate I don't care y'all are a bunch of privliged fucks anyways who would have rallied behind hitler like a bunch of pigs #noa's jewish talk

[zivazivc]

For those of you wondering about Les's mysterious younger sibling. It's Hed, he's the little brother.

They share a mom who was a rock troll. Les's dad is funk, and Hed's dad is rock, but he lived in Vibe City since very young so he's also basically mixed genre like his bro.

In the second pic he's singing/rapping Tastes Just Like Chicken by Scatterbrain. I feel like this is the kind of music he would make when younger.

and bonus: meet the nominees for the worst parents award

#trolls #dreamworks trolls #ex bandmates #my art #I feel like trolls' music genres are based in their genes (race) #but are also an amalgamation of their upbringing. culture. and perhaps even gender (🤔) #like it's an integral part of their self expression that they can't live happily without #and like all those things many have a clear relationship with it while with some it's not so cut-and-dried #and they need a while to figure it all out #I chose the parents genres solely based on what the brothers' genres derive from irl because I'm a little obsessed with the little details #they are also whatever is the troll equivalent of potheads and crackheads. also drunks... #also just awful trolls all around #the brothers really hit a jackpot with them #trolls oc #les #hed

[grison-in-space]

Troy and Abed were so fucking groundbreaking, man. I don't think I can articulate enough how amazing it felt, and still feels, to have two characters who are characterized so strongly by their neurodivergence featured in the same story. (There is literally an entire subplot of an episode devoted to the concept of Abed being an alien observing humanity from afar.) And neither one of them is a math or science expert! Or white! And they're best friends. And they're both hilarious!

And they're incredibly different people.

I can't think of many pieces of media that achieve that, before or since.

#Community #Rewatch #It's got its flaws I won't lie #It was something I remember really pushing the limits on being progressive for race and neurodivergence at the time #While at the same time it was like B- on gender politics at BEST #But it pushed its strengths HARD

[abstractvanity32]

Season 2

Changing Those Bad Habits

Sandy was content with her life. She enjoyed lounging on the couch, watching TV and eating all sorts of junk food without any concern for her weight. She was an overweight girl who had accepted her fate, not bothered by the constant teasing and mocking from her peers. But little did she know, her lazy habits would attract the attention of a warlock.

The warlock, disgusted by Sandy's unhealthy lifestyle, decided to teach her a lesson. He cast a spell on her, one that would transform her completely. At first, Sandy didn't notice anything different. But as she went about her day, she started to feel strange. Her clothes were suddenly too big for her, and she could feel her body changing.

She rushed to the mirror, not prepared for what she saw. Her fat was slowly melting away, replaced by lean muscle. She grew taller and more masculine with each passing minute. Her skin darkened, and her hair receded, turning into a short, black buzz cut. Her face became more chiseled, and her chest formed bulging pecs.

Sandy was panicking, not understanding what was happening to her. But it wasn't until she looked down and saw her hands, her new large, muscular hands, that she realized the full extent of the transformation. She screamed, but her voice was now deeper and rougher, not at all like her own.

In just a matter of moments, Sandy had been transformed into Ernie, a 6'2 black bodybuilder. She could feel her mind changing as well, her thoughts becoming more confident and focused. She no longer remembered her old life as Sandy, her mind rewritten by the warlock.

Ernie stood in front of the mirror, admiring his new body. He felt powerful and in control. In a way, he felt like he had been reborn.

#gender transformation #female to male transformation #ftm tf #f2m tf #tf caption #tg transformation #male transformation #tftg caption #male tf #reality change #male shapeshift #transformation story #race change tf #race tf #racial tf #racial transformation #jockification #jock tf #jock transformation #himboification #himbo tf #himbo transformation #gender tf #gender change #female to male tf #f2m transformation #female tf #gender swap #gender bender #tf tg

[spookyjarchivist]

while i do have a soft spot for “hobbits age slower than humans so 33 for them is our physical 18” i rlly dont think that’s how it is bc they get to about the same age as humans before death by old age, i also really dont think we appreciate enough a few things about what this means narratively and thematically

tolkien really said no child soldiers, no 20-something year old soldiers, they’re not really adults yet, they barely know anything of the world we’re sending them to die for it and that’s not okay, not when there are other options

he also addresses this with the hobbits specifically, frodo and bilbo are 50 when they go on their journeys, FIFTY, and we can see that they handle them differently than the others. while bilbo changes afterwards, it’s not in a coming of age like we would see if 50 really was the equivalent of ~27, he just accepts a part of himself he’s been suppressing for years, for him it’s accepting that getting older and being an adult doesn’t restrict you from the excitement and opportunities of youth. similarly frodo doesn’t change much either outside of his ptsd, all of his change is trauma, not maturity

now sam and merry are both past the age of majority, but they still grow into themselves in a way bilbo and frodo do not, they mature

but pippin, sweet beautiful pippin grows the most out of all of them. he’s the most childish, always running after his cousins and you can tell he’s not even 30, this is HIS coming of age story, before this journey he’s known nothing of true responsibilities, but by the end he’s ready for when he eventually has to take over as thain of the shire

and i think that this is a really beautiful way of saying something that has started to get really popular in the last few years

instead of being terrified of that big 30, we should be excited for it, we should embrace it wholeheartedly, because it’s the time when we’ve finally started ironing out the last of the kinks in being an adult, we’re growing into our responsibilities and and we can start learning how to cultivate that balance of responsibility and excitement and FUN that makes life living instead of surviving

#tolkien #lord of the rings #lotr #hobbits #the hobbit #god i love these books so much #tolkien was so far ahead of his time #like obviously he had some issues #the race issues have had some really good talking points lately thanks to rop and people being more receptive to these discussions #but like everything else aged pretty well #his themes on gender are rarely paralleled even today by shit that passes the bechdel test #which is insane #*noodlespeaks

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Stellantis wants to make scabbing woke

I'm coming to Minneapolis! Oct 15: Presenting The Internet Con at Moon Palace Books. Oct 16: Keynoting the 26th ACM Conference On Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing.

I know, I know, it's weird when the worst people you know are right, even when they're right for the wrong reasons: like, the "Intelligence Community" is genuinely terrible, pharma companies are murderous crooks, and Big Tech really does have a dangerous grip on public debate. The swivel-eyed loons have a point, is what I'm saying:

https://locusmag.com/2023/05/commentary-cory-doctorow-the-swivel-eyed-loons-have-a-point/

When conspiratorialists and reactionaries holler about how the FBI are dirty-tricking creeps who are framing Trump, it's tempting to say, "well, if Trumpists hate the FBI, then I will love the FBI. Who cares about COINTELPRO and what they did to Martin Luther King?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI%E2%80%93King_suicide_letter

It's a process called "schizmogenesis": forming new group identity beliefs based on saying the opposite of what your enemies say, and as tempting as that is, it's extraordinarily foolish and dangerous:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/12/18/schizmogenesis/

It means that canny reactionaries like Steve Bannon can trick you into taking any position merely by taking the opposite one. Bannon's followers are even more easily led, so it's easy for him to convince them that we have always been at war with Oceania. The right has created an entire mirror world of "I know you are but what am I?" politics.

Anti-vax co-opts "bodily autonomy." Climate denial becomes environmentalism ("wind turbines kill birds"). Transphobia becomes feminism ("keep women-only spaces for real women"). Support for strongmen becomes anti-imperialism ("don't feed the war machine in Ukraine"). These are the doppelgangers Naomi Klein warns us against:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

The far right has even managed to co-opt anti-corporate rhetoric. Culture warriors rail against "woke capitalism," insisting that when big businesses take socially progressive positions, it's just empty "virtue signalling." And you know what? They've got a point. Partially.

As with all mirror-world politics, the anti-woke-capitalism shuck is designed to convince low-information right-wing pismires into buying "anti-woke pillows" and demanding the right to pay junk fees to "own the libs":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/04/owning-the-libs/#swiper-no-swiping

But woke capitalism is bullshit. Corporations – profit-maximizing immortal transhuman colony organisms that view workers and customers as inconvenient gut-flora – do not care about social justice. They don't care about anything, except for minimizing compensation for workers while maximizing the risk those workers bear; and locking in and gouging customers for products that are as low-quality as can be profitably sold.

Take DEI, a favored target of the right. It's undoubtably true that diversity, inclusion and equity initiatives have made some inroads on correcting bias in hiring decisions, with the result that companies get better employees who would have been excluded without this explicit corrective.

However, corporations don't value DEI because they abhor their history of hiring bias. Instead, DEI is how corporate management demonstrates to workers that their grievances are best addressed by trusting corporate leadership to correct their error of their ways – and not by forming a union.

Before the passage of the National Labor Relations Act in 1935, corporations would create fake "Company Unions" whose leadership were beholden to the company executives. These were decoy unions: they looked and sounded like unions, but when they negotiated with management, they were actually working for the bosses, not the workers.

This is more mirror-world tactics. They're the labor equivalent of the "crisis pregnancy centers" that masquerade as abortion clinics in order to fool pregnant people and trap them with endless delays until it's too late to terminate their pregnancies. Company unions get workers to trust in negotiators who are secretly working for the bosses, who emerge from the bargaining table with one-sided, abusive contracts and insist that this is the best deal workers can hope for.

Company unions were outlawed 90 years ago, and for decades, labor had a seat at the table, with wages tracking productivity gains and workers getting protection for discrimination, unsafe labor conditions, and wage-theft. Then came the neoliberal turn, and 40 years of wage stagnation, increased inequality, and corporate rule.

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. Finally, finally, we have reached a turning point in labor, with public approval for unions at levels not seen since the Carter administration and thousands of strikes and protests breaking out across the country:

https://striketracker.ilr.cornell.edu/

It's not just the Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA, either. For the first time in history, the UAW is striking against all the major automakers, and they are winning:

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/10/striking-uaw-workers-win-key-battery-plant-concession-from-general-motors/

The automakers are getting desperate. Stellantis – Chrysler's latest alias, reflecting the company's absorbtion into corporate-human-centipede of global carmakers – has mobilized its DEI programs, trying to get marginalized people to believe that scabbing is a liberatory activity:

https://theintercept.com/2023/10/10/uaw-auto-strike-stellantis/

Stellantis calls each of its DEI silos a "Business Resource Group" (BRG): there's a "Working Parents Network," an "African Ancestry Network," "Asians Connected Together," a "DiverseAbilities Network," a "Gay & Lesbian Alliance" and more:

https://blog.stellantisnorthamerica.com/2021/07/20/business-resource-groups-drive-inclusion-and-diversity/

The corporate managers who lead these BRGs have established a scab rotation for each subgroup, calling on members to cross a UAW picket-line at a Michigan Parts Distribution Center run by Stellantis subsidiary Mopar:

Each BRG will pick a specific day of the week/weekend to volunteer as a team. Help continue to be the RESOURCE the BUSINESS can count on! Stellantis needs your help in running the Parts Distribution Centers (PDC) to ensure a steady supply of parts to our customers while negotiations continue. Working Parents Network has identified Friday, October 13 as WPN’s BRG Day at the PDCs!"

Now, these BRGs weren't invented by marginalized workers facing discrimination in the workplace. They come from literal union-busting playbooks produced by giant "union avoidance" firms that charge bosses millions for advice on skirting – or breaking – the law to keep workplace democracy at bay. All the biggest anti-union consultancies love BRGs, from Littler Mendelson to Jackson Lewis. IRI Strategies touts BRGs as a way to "union-proof" a business by absorbing workers' grievances in a decoy committee that will let them feel listened to.

BRGs, in other words, are the Crisis Pregnancy Centers of workplace discrimination. They're a Big Store Con, a company union dressed up as corporate social responsibility.

Now, let's not pretend that unions have a sterling record on race and gender issues. Giant labor organizations like the AFL had to be dragged into racial integration, and trade unions have sometimes been on the wrong side of anti-immigration panics:

https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1997/summer/american-labor-movement.html

But unions have also been the most reliable way for people of color and women to win better workplace treatment. The struggle for racial and gender justice was fought through labor organizing. Remember that MLK's "I've Been To the Mountaintop" speech was given in support of striking sanitation workers in Memphis:

https://www.afscme.org/about/history/mlk/mountaintop

Black organizers have always been militant labor organizers. Labor Day commemorates the victory of the long, hard-fought Pullman strike, where Black workers brought one of the most powerful companies in America to its knees:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Strike

And women have always fought for gender justice through the labor movement: the New York shirtwaist strike is the Ur-example, when women-led unions fought thugs and scabs on icy New York streets:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_shirtwaist_strike_of_1909

It's no surprise that labor activism, anti-racism and feminism go together. Since the earliest days, the labor justice struggle was also a social justice struggle. To learn more check out Kim Kelly's Fight Like Hell: The Untold History of American Labor:

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Fight-Like-Hell/Kim-Kelly/9781982171063

The most exploited, underpaid, and abused workers in America are also the most marginalized (duh).

From nurses:

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/kaiser-healthcare-union-says-week-long-strike-possible-early-next-month-2023-10-09/

To teachers:

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-04-18/l-a-teachers-win-21-wage-increase-in-new-lausd-contract

To Amazon warehouse workers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Labor_Union

To publishing assistants:

https://apnews.com/article/harpercollins-union-strike-ends-0a94238718879066d9b21af6266be526

To baristas:

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/29/business/starbucks-union-wages/index.html

To fast-food workers:

https://www.ufcw.org/about/

The vanguard of today's labor surge is Black, brown, female and queer. Without a union, workers who face discrimination are on their own, hoping that their bosses will voluntarily do something about it. Black workers in Tesla's rabidly anti-union shops face vicious racism, from slurs to threats to violence. Without a union, they have to rely on the shifting whims of an Apartheid emerald mine space-Karen for relief, or hope for help from the NLRB or a class-action lawyer:

https://apnews.com/article/tesla-racism-black-lawsuit-class-action-21c88bddf60eca702560be58429495de

The far right isn't wrong when they holler that woke capitalism is bullshit. As with so many of their mirror-world causes, they've got a point, but only a limited one. The problem with woke capitalism is that it's no substitute for a union. The problem with relying on Business Resource Groups to fight racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia is that these struggles are all class struggles, and a BRG is never going to fight against the company that created it.

To understand how bankrupt woke capitalism is, conside this: Stellantis is calling on its "Working Parents Network" to scab this Friday. Stellantis is also being sanctioned by the Department Of Labor for discriminating against nursing mothers – the same "working parents" that the BRG is meant to protect:

https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/local/2023/02/08/investigation-finds-stellantis-violated-rights-of-nursing-mothers-at-sterling-heights-plant/

Woke capitalism is just another kind of "predatory inclusion," like Intuit's campaign defending its "Free File" tax-prep scam, where they're claiming that ending this ripoff is racist because it denies Black families the right to be tricked into paying for something they are entitled to get for free:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/27/predatory-inclusion/#equal-opportunity-scammers

When I learned about Intuit's wokewashing, I thought I'd found woke capitalism's rock bottom, but I was wrong. Stellantis's call for woke scabbing is a new low.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/11/equal-opportunity-class-war/#inclusive-scabbing

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

#pluralistic #race #gender #uaw #stellantis #gm #general motors #woke capitalism #wokewashing #strikes #labor #liberalism #company unions

[svankmajerbaby]

she's her own means of production!!! she's the mother and the child! she's the woman and the infant! shes the teacher and the student! she's innocence and experience all in one! shes a monster and is also infinitely human!!!!!!

#bella baxter #poor things 2023 #its my favorite movie now #it was just as amazing as i thought it would be #the ending is a bit sour and there's a whole discussion to be made #on how it treats deformities in godwins case and neurodivergence with bella and felicity #and also something about race probably.... how toinette and harry are in the end means in bellas journey #(just like the two older woman are) #and theres also a whole class and gender analysis to be done of course..... #but this movie has so many layers. its challenging and at the same time candid and striaghtforward #it has no ill intent only a desire to push everything and see what tips over and falls #i loved it i loved it i loved it i loved it

[quartermera]

Photo Book with Law

Day 7 of Fluffvember 2023 Gender & race neutral reader Requested by @strawheart-pirate

“Which one do you think would fit best?” you asked.

Law examined the two pictures you were presenting to him. He thought for a moment then replied:

“The left one.”

It was a photograph of Bepo hugging the captain, who could not conceal his smile. Meanwhile the other picture, showcasing the bear triumphantly carried by the crew, was placed on the next page.

You had been unsure when suggesting to make a photo album as a present for Bepo’s birthday, but Law had been adamant. He loved the idea and insisted that his second in command would enjoy the gift. Thus, you planned a few afternoons of collecting photographs and memories, and gluing them in a beautiful, orange, cloth-bound book.

Law was very meticulous in selecting which photographs and quotes would go into the present. He was also very clear, when he invited the crew to write a few sentences each on the last few pages, that no idiocy would be tolerated. This was a special gift, for a special someone, and he wanted to keep it that way.

With the last photographs glued, you let Law carefully wrap the book in craft paper. Then, adding a bow and a card, you were done with the finishing touches.

“Happy?” you wondered.

The smile on Law’s face was enough of a response, yet he replied:

“Very.”

Standing up, he tucked the present away in his nightstand to hide until the due date, a few days ahead. The subtle bounce in Law’s walk was sufficient to tell how excited he was.

A week later, a white bear would involuntarily recreate one of the pictures from the photo book he had just been gifted by his best friend, as he hugged his captain tightly.

#fluffvember 2023 #one piece #trafalgar law #one piece x reader #one piece imagine #one piece scenario #one piece fluff #trafalgar law x reader #trafalgar law imagine #trafalgar law scenario #trafalgar law fluff #gender neutral reader #race neutral reader #nille writes