I am not suggesting that minorities are equally to blame for white privilege or that oppressed minority groups are responsible for their oppression. Nor did I maintain that minorities benefit from white privilege. The descriptive reality of white supremacy is a function of institutional hierarchies. I believe we are all complicit in reinforcing and maintaining the social distinctions that are often used to lend credence to the institution of white supremacy and to perpetuate discord and disunity. What I simply mean to say is that all races share some responsibility (to various degrees) in maintaining socially entrenched racial stereotypes and ‘racist’ distinctions prefaced on ‘otherness’.

Here is an example. Last weekend I was walking home from dinner in midtown up Broadway. It was late - around 10 pm - and as I was walking up a well-dressed, older black man emerged from a restaurant, bid farewell to his dining companions and started to walk up the street a few feet in front of me. Ahead of us both were two black youths, dressed in baggy jeans and hoodies, hanging out on the side of the street. The man in front of me slowed down a bit, so that he was almost walking beside me, as we reached the boys. After we had passed them he turned to me and said “I just wanted to make sure you were all right – it didn’t look like they were up to anything but you never know”. I said thanks, and we went our separate ways.

I think this just points to how, regardless of the color of our own skin, we all have internalized classist and racist proclivities that manifest themselves both consciously and unconsciously in day to day life. I try hard to acknowledge and stay conscious of my own, so that I can better critique and dismantle them, though I don’t always succeed. My above post was not meant to assign blame. It was just meant to call attention to the fact that we are all, regardless of race, complicit in harboring societal stereotypes, ‘us vs. them’ distinctions and a sense of ‘otherness’ – regardless as to whether we choose to or not – because of how we have been socially conditioned. I simply believe it would be most effective to work together to recognize, call into question and discard these classifications that serve to reinforce disunity and to bolster the institution of white supremacy.

-- MeaganBurrows - 11 Apr 2012