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White College Students in Dire Need of Education
Posted by: | CommentsA white college student at Brigham Young University (BYU) in Utah recently dressed in ‘black face’ and then interviewed some of his classmates about some basic questions, like “when does black history month happen?” (h/t Jenni Mueller).This short clip (4:14) reveals that white college students are in dire need of education:
It’s tempting to suggest that there is something uniquely ignorant about BYU students, but I think that the college students featured here are pretty typical of other college students attending historically white institutions.
Stuff White Girls Say to Black Girls
Posted by: | CommentsThis short (2:02) video is what Raven Brooks at Netroots Nation calls a “meme done right.” To me, it’s a quirky, fun exploration of what white privilege looks and sounds like, created by Franchecsa Ramsey (@chescaleigh), a NYC-based comedian and video blogger. Enjoy!
Cuéntame: Award Winner for Most Racist Ad 2010
Posted by: | CommentsThe 2010 midterm elections have distinguished themselves for the torrent of racist ads produced by political candidates and their campaign staff. In order to counter this, the Cuéntame the ¡Latino Instigators! are highlighting this ad as the ‘most racist’ ad for 2010:
Cuéntame has done some expert work around combatting racism in the media. They were part of the effort to remove Lou Dobbs from CNN for his immigrant-bashing rhetoric. And, in April of this year, launched the “Do I look illegal campaign?” in protest against Arizona’s anti-immigration law. If you’d like to support the work of Cuéntame , you can connect with them on Facebook.
Frontiers of Racism: Anti-Immigrant Bigotry
Posted by: | CommentsMany times, those who defend the anti-immigrant movement do so by denying any connection to racism. This short (6:48) video from The Center for New Community explores the connections between anti-immigrant bigotry, immigration, and African Americans in the United States:
This video (h/t @NativismWatch) makes a connection between contemporary anti-immigration bigotry particularly against Mexicans and Mexican Americans, which seems to be growing, and historical, institutional racism against African Americans.
T-Shirts for Sale at July 4th Festival: “Yup, I’m a Racist”
Posted by: | CommentsSome people at the Lexington, Kentucky July 4th Festival yesterday were selling t-shirts with a giant “Yup, I’m a Racist” logo across the front (h/t: ChrisBoese via Twitter). Reporter Greg Skilling of the Louisville Examiner, headed over there with a video camera to investigate (video is 7:44):
There’s not much to say here except that this is yet another installment in the ongoing series “White People, Behaving Badly.” And, of course, to point out the obvious, we’re so not post-racial. I fear that H.L. Mencken was right when he said, “Nobody ever went broke underestimating the taste of the American public.”
Programming Alert: “Disturbing the Universe” on PBS
Posted by: | CommentsBack in December, I noted the new documentary “William Kunstler: Disturbing the Universe.” about the famous (or, infamous) civil rights lawyer. Now, the film is airing on PBS in most areas of the U.S. on Tuesday (6/22/10). I’m glad to see this film getting a wider audience through its distribution on PBS because I think that it’s a good introduction to thinking about race and institutional racism more critically.
Woven into the narrative about Kunstler’s life and transformation into a civil rights rabblerouser, the film tells a number of other stories. The film provides a compelling history of the uprising at Attica, where Kunstler negotiated on behalf of the (predominantly black) prisoners. And, the film also chronicles Kunstler’s involvement in the seige at Wounded Knee where he served as a negotiator for Native Americans in AIM who were staging a protest there, demanding that the U.S. Government honor centuries of broken treaties. Kunstler was able to help avoid a massacre there and successfully defended Russell Banks and Dennis Banks, two of the leaders of the protest, at their subsequent trial in federal court. Later, Kunstler defends Yusef Salaam, one of the so-called “Central Park Joggers,” who was exonerated, after being incarcerated for many years.
The filmmakers are Kunstler’s two daughters – Sarah Kunstler and Emily Kunstler – and they do a good job of providing a thoughtful portrait of their father as a passionate but flawed man. Their film also offers a much needed reminder of what it looks like to do battle against institutionalized racism.
To find the film on your tv-machine, check your local PBS listing and set the DVR.
How to Tell People They Sound Racist
Posted by: | CommentsThe other day I noted the difference between the juvenile debate regarding when it’s okay to call someone racist and the important work of ‘calling out’ racism. Thanks to regular reader Carlos M. Camacho (SUNY-Buffalo) for suggesting this video (3:00) as a response to that post.
Rand Paul: Resetting the Civil Rights Clock Back 120 Years
Posted by: | CommentsIn case you missed it, Rand Paul, the Republican candidate for the United States Senate from Kentucky, son of Texas Rep. Ron Paul, has been getting a lot of press in the last day or so for his views on civil rights. The junior Paul, like his father, is a committed libertarian in his views of the government, and his comments recently on the Rachel Maddow show illustrate just how problematic such a stance is for civil rights. In this clip, Rand Paul effectively resets the clock on discussion about civil rights back about 120 years (video is on the long side, 19:35, but worth watching):
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As you might imagine, Rand Paul’s comments have ignited discussion in the blogosphere and Twitterverse. One of the most cogent observers is Prof. Blair L.M. Kelley (@profblmkelley), a scholar who has studied the Civil Rights Movement. Prof. Kelley offers a thorough analysis of Rand Paul’s nonsense in this piece at Salon.
Coming soon, Prof. Adia Harvey-Wingfield, professor of sociology at Georgia State University, will offer her own analysis here at Racism Review of Rand Pauls’ recent comments. Check back soon.
“Guess I’m a Racist” : Anti-Health Care Ad
Posted by: | CommentsIn the last day or two, an “unknown political group” has created a video (and loaded YouTube), called “I’m a Racist,” and it’s been getting a lot of attention. The short description posted with the video states ‘We believe the health care system needs to be fixed. However, government intervention is not the answer, nor should we be called racist for not agreeing with Obama’s health plan!’ Fortunately, Rachel Maddow and Melissa Harris-Lacewell, provide a thorough critique in this clip (8:01):
Harris-Lacewell makes an excellent point here when she points out the way the ad reinforces an individualized notion of racism, as a personal trait, rather than an understanding that racism is systemic.
This “Guess I’m a Racist” meme jumped to Twitter and people began updating using the hashtag #youmightbearacist. (Using hashtags (#) on Twitter is just a way for people to have a conversation around a theme, so on an evening when the BET Awards are on, people might use #BET as a hashtag to talk about the awards. But the racism prompted by that hashtag is another story.)
Some of the updates to Twitter with the #youmightbearacist hashtag were meant to be funny and skewer racism, some were not so funny deeply racist. Almost all reinforced the point that Harris-Lacewell makes about the anti-health care ad, which is that they assume that racism resides in an individual rather than operates systematically.
There are a couple of things that are interesting about all this for me. First, the video opposing health care is a fairly slick politlcal ad yet it’s created by an “unknown” political ad. In this way, it’s similar to the cloaked sites that I’ve written about here (and in my recent book, Cyber Racism) in which people disguise authorship of websites in order to conceal a political agenda. This ad is slightly different because it’s being pretty overt about part of their political agenda (opposing health care reform), but because the identity of the group that created the ad is hidden, we don’t know how their stance on this one issue may (or may not) be part of a larger political agenda.
What intrigues me further about this is the convergence and overlap of media. So, the unknown political group releases a video on YouTube exclusively, and the video quickly goes viral and becomes one of the most viewed videos on YouTube. They do not buy air time on television to get their message out, but they don’t have to, because the video gets picked up by Maddow’s show and she airs the video. Then, the meme travels to Twitter, where people both reinforce and resist (sort of) the notion of what it means to be “a racist.” The political battle over race, and the meaning of racism, has moved into the digital era.
