Blaakmaan
Posts: 374
Joined: 5/21/2007
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quote:
ORIGINAL: LaTigresse
quote:
ORIGINAL: Blaakmaan
quote:
ORIGINAL: LaTigresse
In that regard, I hope it takes away the "because I am black" excuse factor.
However, my greatest hope is related to my primary reason for voting for him, improved foreign relations.
[takes a deep breath..., exhales slowly..., counts to 10...]
I sometimes wonder if there are ANY black people on these message boards with the guts to challenge some of the racial and racist BS that passes for commentary on here.
I've done my share. Not my job. It's somebody else's turn...
Life is too short to use it up trying to disabuse white people of their fantasies of superiority.
I would hope that an Obama presidency would take away the "white privilege" factor, but even Dr. King couldn't dream THAT dream!
Blaakman it is apparent that I worded my comment incorrectly. I will use an example from my own life to explain what I meant. I grew up "poor white trash" in a small town in Iowa where image, what you wore, and who your family was, meant everything. My family had no money, my parents were one of"the town tramps" and "one of the town drunks". There was no school activity like sports that gave me an in, I was shy and very reserved. I also got pregnant months after my 16th birthday and my parents final seperation. I dropped out of school married another drunk/drug addict. My son was born just a few days after my 17th birthday and my daughter when I was 18. I was also the oldest of 6 kids whom I helped raise when my mother went off with her boyfriends.
Somewhere along the line, between then and now, I realized that just because I didn't have the ideal life, didn't mean I had to continue on the predicted path. I wasn't going to use the excuse of being born poor white trash, being a dropout teen mother, the wife of an addict/alchoholic, an uneducated welfare recipient.
As my children were growing up and they faced challenges, I was constantly in their face that they had a brain and the ability to be whatever they set their mind to. Regardless of divorced parents, some learning disabilities, whatever the challenge was at the moment. I got in their face and pushed them, never allowing them to use any challenge as an excuse. Not ever. I am not going to use the lame "I have friends that are black" THAT, to me, is racist and condescending. I have friends of all sorts, both genders, gay, straight, mixed heritages, mixed families, abuse of various types, and on and on. They are my friends regardless. The thing is, regardless of life challenges we, all of us, really can be whatever we want if we want it badly enough. Hillary Clinton and Condoleezza Rice are both excellent examples that first come to mind as women, among many other women that pushed at gender descrimination. Barack Obama and Ms Rice are both excellent examples of two people overcoming race descrimination. I am sorry, I would give more examples but race and gender are not the first things I think of when I think of people worthy of respect.
If my admiration of people that overcome personal challenges and provide role models, make examples of themselves, for others with the same challenges, people that take away that "excuse book" I would never allow my children or myself to use, makes me racist, a bigot, or whatever other label you want to slap on me, then there really is something wrong with this world.
I know me, I am definately not racist. No more than I am a man hater just because I identify as a lesbian........even though quite a few men have given me reason to. What I am is a blunt speaking, hard nosed, demanding bitch.....at times. I demand alot of myself, and I demand alot of the people around me. I push them to be their best, regardless of the challenges they face.
So, if you, or anyone else took offense at my poorly worded blunt speaking and took it in a way it was not intended.......my deepest appologies.
I will not however, stop pushing people to overcome their unique life challenges and fight for their dreams nor will I stop pushing them to dream them.
LaTigresse:
I'm all for pushing others--and ourselves--to overcome our unique individual challenges, and I applaud you for doing so in your own life and for encouraging others to do so.
However, the fact that individuals struggle and triumph over their circumstances does not negate the fact that systematic discrimination and disadvantage exists that cannot be overcome by the best efforts of the disadvantaged group.
When one group of people in a society are systematically privileged and advantaged, while other groups are systematically repressed and disadvantaged, no amount of "pushing" will enable the disadvantaged group to overcome that repression so long as the forces of systematic disadvantage remain.
You simply cannot "push" yourself to outrun me if I am running downhill and you are running uphill. The fact that some few exemplary individuals may be able to accomplish the feat (e.g., a Condoleeza Rice or a Colin Powell) does not mean that the rest of the disadvantaged group could also do so if they only "pushed" themselves hard enough.
Repressed groups are disadvantaged primarily because they are repressed, not because they don't try hard enough to overcome their oppression.
Anyway, that's how I see it.
I appreciate your comments, and I was not labeling you anything--just responding to my interpretation of what you wrote.
Blaakmaan
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RE: one of my hopes for an Obama Presidency - 
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