Comment by _DeadFred_

You might consider some things.

First of all, I don't know you personally. What I wrote about were historical facts.

I understand that often white-bodied folks become very triggered when folks point out that they might have a point of view informed by white supremecy culture. I have no idea what kind of body you have, but you are clearly very upset. I don't say that as a "gotcha, hah triggered ya", I say that as a person who has been often and deeply upset by this culture, and who can recognize similar patterns of hurt and harm in other folks writing. So while I have no actual idea about you or your actual state of mind or body, you read to me like a person who is very upset for reasons that have very little to do with postings on a message board.

On one hand, it's easy for me to say:

a - if you don't like being called out, don't call folks out. If you want to be hypercritical of folks, as you were doing up thread, you're gonna need a thicker skin

b - I believe that when you say "mainstream interpretation" you can pretty easily interpret that as "white", which is what I mean when I write that you specifically are operating from a position of white supremacy. You might not have noticed that in response to references to Frederick Douglass and WEB DuBois you counterpoised a couple of white "leaders", but I certainly did.

Secondly, even if I didn't just do what you're doing to other folks on this board and dismiss your writings out of hand as both based in whatever deep traumas you have around whiteness and general ignorance of the world, your political position is still quite bad.

Your position is what a lot of folks describe as "Blue MAGA", centered on the idea that the US used to be pretty dang good (if flawed) and that we need to work back towards that greatness.

To hold that position you need to ignore a whole lot of real and obvious history, and the way folks in the US have done that is to ignore the actual writings and words of non-white folks.

I am certain that you don't experience that ignorance you are maintaining as a process of de-humanizing those other people (at least until someone points that out, which can be very activating to read).

I don't expect you to be rational about these things, because being made to feel white is very traumatic to folks in white bodies.

I don't expect you to have the capacity to deconstruct your thoughts around race, either.

But if you ever are able to do that work, consider that what I'm describing is a very specific dismissal that you're doing, of a very specific historical selectiveness, and all you have to do to not do that is to read and listen.

That's not a personal attack. This isn't about your personal "character"; that's just the world, and your ignorant and (frankly) dehumanizing political position.

I'm sorry that it feels upsetting and personal to you.

Getting to a position where you can do that work of examining these things may be impossible, and you might find that it makes all the other white-bodied folks around seem quite menacing, but it's certainly work that will liberate you from the need to defend the indefensible.