America on Fire

Not on CNN or MSNBC front page today, maybe he is considered as another "oreo":

A quick moderation note: This post was reported by one of our readers who questioned the use of "Oreo" given that it can be construed as a slur. I don't think it was intended to be offensive, and the mod team doesn't feel we need to issue a warning.

However, it turns out that "Oreo" does make Wikipedia's list of ethic slurs (see here) so we advise our members to stay away from such language in the future.

No warning needed, this is just for everyone's information. (Including my own; now that I know better I won't use the term "Oreo," but I hadn't realized it was problematic. Of course, I wouldn't use a term like "banana" so perhaps I should have realized that.)
 
A quick moderation note: This post was reported by one of our readers who questioned the use of "Oreo" given that it can be construed as a slur. I don't think it was intended to be offensive, and the mod team doesn't feel we need to issue a warning.

However, it turns out that "Oreo" does make Wikipedia's list of ethic slurs (see here) so we advise our members to stay away from such language in the future.

No warning needed, this is just for everyone's information. (Including my own; now that I know better I won't use the term "Oreo," but I hadn't realized it was problematic. Of course, I wouldn't use a term like "banana" so perhaps I should have realized that.)

Agree, I used it to provoke a discussion, and was not intended to be offensive, but to point out a paradoxical situation. I will not use it the future.
 
We have to make revolution by “smashing the Four Olds” (po si jiu, 破四旧):
Old Thinking, Old Culture, Old Customs, and Old Habits (jiu sixiang, jiu wenhua, jiu fengsu, jiu xiguan 旧思想、旧文化、旧风俗、旧习惯)

Red Guards (Hong Weibing 红卫兵) during Chairman Mao's Chinese Cultural Revolution

 
Thank you for this very stereotypical reaction of an American Christian right winger to this issue. People here needs to know what people of color are dealing with every day. Living right in the middle of them, I’m actually very acquainted with every single point she brings forward. It’s like listening to a broken radio, or Fox news.

It’s a classic example of everything that is wrong with their side.
  • She has never personally wronged any black person, so she refuses any responsibility in this situation in her country. At the same time she has no problem to take pride of her country. It sounds like a German who lived through WWII excusing herself because she was not a Nazi and never got involved in the war or concentration camps.
  • I don’t doubt her statistics, but she uses it only as a ‘whataboutism’. The protest is not about black people protesting white people, it’s about black people protesting police brutality. It’s a matter of race because they, as a race, are generally treated worse by the police. They have to be blind and deaf to not know that poor black people kill each other more than whites, but that’s not the point. They are already in pain because so many blacks are killing blacks, they don’t need the police to make the situation worse by treating anybody with dark skin rougher. It’s not about you, white lady.
  • She repeats Trump propaganda that “the media” is out to manipulate people. The media are mostly professional journalists trying to inform people. They are not perfect and they are certainly not free from bias (as a gun owner I should know), but for the most part they deliver facts. What she doesn’t say is that she prefers to get her news from clearly biased and often plainly lying fringe sites. She only accepts news and facts that fit her world view. If the facts are uncomfortable, then it must be fake, so she has to get the “alternative facts” from her source. All this and she has the gall to call the rest of us being manipulated.
  • Must she bring abortion into this? I know she cares about it, but it’s a non sequitur.
  • She threatens anybody who may come for her, she is clearly under the illusion that she is being oppressed. Nobody is coming for you. Stop making this about you, the world doesn’t revolve around you.

I’m sure I miss at least half a dozen of her silly points, but I’m tired.

Edit:
For people wondering about the flag, it’s a Betsy Ross flag that symbolizes the young American republic. It seems benign, until you realize that the flag is associated with the young republic that predated the 19th century. That was before the civil war, so it was a time when slavery was still legal. I don’t think she actually wants slavery back, but she certainly holds a fundamentalist view about the country. Make America Great Again (like in the 18th century).
 
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A black police officer was fired one year short of retirement because she stopped a white colleague from choking a suspect. Now officials in Buffalo ask the state to probe into the firing.

 
A quick moderation note: This post was reported by one of our readers who questioned the use of "Oreo" given that it can be construed as a slur. I don't think it was intended to be offensive, and the mod team doesn't feel we need to issue a warning.

However, it turns out that "Oreo" does make Wikipedia's list of ethic slurs (see here) so we advise our members to stay away from such language in the future.

No warning needed, this is just for everyone's information. (Including my own; now that I know better I won't use the term "Oreo," but I hadn't realized it was problematic. Of course, I wouldn't use a term like "banana" so perhaps I should have realized that.)
Oreo, Banana, and Coconut are definitely not terms used in polite company, but I feel that they’re more of a joke than a full-blown insult, unlike the N word. If somebody calls me a coconut I’d laugh rather than be offended. Just my opinion.
 
Statistically black Americans and indigenous Australians are more likely to spend time in gaol than a comparable number of white people. Statistically, morbidity studies show that in both America and Australia life expectancy is that white people live longer.

Many financial institutions make business decision based on these kind of studies which means that black applicants for loans or insurance in America and Australia are seen as a greater risk than white applicants. Within these structures there is no analysis is to why these statistics represent the reality of life for blacks or whites. Such decisions are not thought to be racist but based on simple business risk analysis.

Those harsh realities are at the heart of "natural prejudice. More blacks in prison proves that blacks are dangerous and are therefore are not wanted as neighbours, seated next to whites or in close contact.

A just society has to allow that any one individual may not conform to negative statisical analysis. A civilised society allows that every individual is entitled to the same rights and opportunities as any other individual irrespective of skin colour, ethnicity or religion.

Around the word inherent racism and hostility prevail but ultimately we strive for a better world and this is the fundamental basis for this worldwide explosion of black lives matter demonstrations.

Racial prejudice does not just demean the victims it demeans all of us.

The cultural dynamics are not unlike those of late 19th century England where the upper class knew that the lower class were all likely to be criminals and had to be taught how to behave appropriately with harsh imprisonment, floggings, the hangman's noose and of course deportation to Australia.
 
Sometimes it depends what tone of voice a word is said in, or what written context. In certain contexts I can find the word Bule very offensive indeed, but in other contexts it is perfectly fine as it clarifies who one is talking about and is just quicker than using an explanatory phrase (white person who is in Indonesia for some reason).
 
Sometimes it depends what tone of voice a word is said in, or what written context. In certain contexts I can find the word Bule very offensive indeed, but in other contexts it is perfectly fine as it clarifies who one is talking about and is just quicker than using an explanatory phrase (white person who is in Indonesia for some reason).
The word Bule does depend on tone and context.

Another word in Indonesian that relies heavily on context is Cina. It is the formal and academic name for China, but in everyday use most Indonesians prefer China (the English word). This is because old Javanese folks have a habit of cursing out Cina’ (with a glottal stop at the end). Since Cina and Cina’ are very close, at some point people decided to skirt it by using the English spelling and pronunciation. Back in the 60’s up to maybe the 90’s the preferred terms were Hokkien words Tiongkok for the country and Tionghoa for the people, equivalent to Zhongguo and Zhonghua in Mandarin. They became dated, so the English version came into play.

In Mexico and other Latin American countries, I believe Gringo/Gringa is also contextual. It can be neutral or offensive, depending on intent.
 
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Thank you for this very stereotypical reaction of an American Christian right winger to this issue. People here needs to know what people of color are dealing with every day. Living right in the middle of them, I’m actually very acquainted with every single point she brings forward. It’s like listening to a broken radio, or Fox news.

It’s a classic example of everything that is wrong with their side.
  • She has never personally wronged any black person, so she refuses any responsibility in this situation in her country. At the same time she has no problem to take pride of her country. It sounds like a German who lived through WWII excusing herself because she was not a Nazi and never got involved in the war or concentration camps.
  • I don’t doubt her statistics, but she uses it only as a ‘whataboutism’. The protest is not about black people protesting white people, it’s about black people protesting police brutality. It’s a matter of race because they, as a race, are generally treated worse by the police. They have to be blind and deaf to not know that poor black people kill each other more than whites, but that’s not the point. They are already in pain because so many blacks are killing blacks, they don’t need the police to make the situation worse by treating anybody with dark skin rougher. It’s not about you, white lady.
  • She repeats Trump propaganda that “the media” is out to manipulate people. The media are mostly professional journalists trying to inform people. They are not perfect and they are certainly not free from bias (as a gun owner I should know), but for the most part they deliver facts. What she doesn’t say is that she prefers to get her news from clearly biased and often plainly lying fringe sites. She only accepts news and facts that fit her world view. If the facts are uncomfortable, then it must be fake, so she has to get the “alternative facts” from her source. All this and she has the gall to call the rest of us being manipulated.
  • Must she bring abortion into this? I know she cares about it, but it’s a non sequitur.
  • She threatens anybody who may come for her, she is clearly under the illusion that she is being oppressed. Nobody is coming for you. Stop making this about you, the world doesn’t revolve around you.

I’m sure I miss at least half a dozen of her silly points, but I’m tired.

Edit:
For people wondering about the flag, it’s a Betsy Ross flag that symbolizes the young American republic. It seems benign, until you realize that the flag is associated with the young republic that predated the 19th century. That was before the civil war, so it was a time when slavery was still legal. I don’t think she actually wants slavery back, but she certainly holds a fundamentalist view about the country. Make America Great Again (like in the 18th century).

I couldn't agree more with you on this one.

Her rant on looting is funny. The detractors of the BLM protests are so obsessed with looting in the solidarity protests for George Floyd and ignore the fact that majority of marches are peaceful. If those right wings are so concerned about the looting, perhaps they should protest against museums in Europe. How the hell did historical artefacts from African countries end up in a British Museum? For years, people buy tickets to see stolen goods in European museums? Where is the outrage? These museums should be a harsh reminder of systemic violence in European colonial history not a place where you can instil a sense of pride because one dominant race conquered and 'civilise' other races.

Amongst the right wings 'mainstream media' becomes synonymous with lies and fabricated facts and therefore they advise their followers to find alternative truth. The truth is that many media tycoons don't share the same view with the left. For instance, Rupert Murdoch's News Corps control the debate on climate change in Australia and gave a platform to deniers. Conservatives have more and bigger media platform than the progressive ones and yet they keep preaching about the peril of 'mainstream media'.

BLM movement never asks white people to apologise for being white. The movement is an opportunity to have a fair discussion on white privilege and what it means for others. The fact that many white people all over the world join the movement and stand with POC shows that systemic racism isn't a myth and 'white privilege' is a real issue.
 
I couldn't agree more with you on this one.

Her rant on looting is funny. The detractors of the BLM protests are so obsessed with looting in the solidarity protests for George Floyd and ignore the fact that majority of marches are peaceful. If those right wings are so concerned about the looting, perhaps they should protest against museums in Europe. How the hell did historical artefacts from African countries end up in a British Museum? For years, people buy tickets to see stolen goods in European museums? Where is the outrage? These museums should be a harsh reminder of systemic violence in European colonial history not a place where you can instil a sense of pride because one dominant race conquered and 'civilise' other races.

Amongst the right wings 'mainstream media' becomes synonymous with lies and fabricated facts and therefore they advise their followers to find alternative truth. The truth is that many media tycoons don't share the same view with the left. For instance, Rupert Murdoch's News Corps control the debate on climate change in Australia and gave a platform to deniers. Conservatives have more and bigger media platform than the progressive ones and yet they keep preaching about the peril of 'mainstream media'.

BLM movement never asks white people to apologise for being white. The movement is an opportunity to have a fair discussion on white privilege and what it means for others. The fact that many white people all over the world join the movement and stand with POC shows that systemic racism isn't a myth and 'white privilege' is a real issue.

I never condone looting, because the moment I excuse it the movement loses the moral high ground. Many of the looted stores are small businesses owned by minorities themselves, so the action is never justifiable. Having said that, it is the height of prejudice to consider all BLM protesters as looters. The vast majority of protests are peaceful, and there were many instances when they actually prevented looting.

When I rallied against Suharto in 1998, there were a lot of lootings during the riot. Student protesters never encouraged destruction of property, yet it didn’t prevent certain generals from accusing us of instigating the problem. It’s a very typical authoritarian ploy.

Many white people in America don’t see their privilege, or worse, they see it and consider it justified. What’s also common is them confusing ‘privilege’ with ‘guilt’, whether through ignorance or on purpose. People of color don’t consider every white person responsible for police brutality, but they know simply being white saves you from a lot of hassle by the police.

White privilege is like beauty; people give you a lot of undeserved leeway and benefit of the doubt because of it. Nobody blames you for being pretty, but it is offensive when you say there must be something wrong with a person if nobody ever buys her free drinks at the bar. It is offensive to say that if the police stops your car randomly in a nice neighborhood, then it must be nothing but your fault.
 
Many white people in America don’t see their privilege, or worse, they see it and consider it justified. What’s also common is them confusing ‘privilege’ with ‘guilt’, whether through ignorance or on purpose. People of color don’t consider every white person responsible for police brutality, but they know simply being white saves you from a lot of hassle by the police.

White privilege is like beauty; people give you a lot of undeserved leeway and benefit of the doubt because of it. Nobody blames you for being pretty, but it is offensive when you say there must be something wrong with a person if nobody ever buys her free drinks at the bar. It is offensive to say that if the police stops your car randomly in a nice neighborhood, then it must be nothing but your fault.

Whiteness is a sinking ship. Most white people have picked up on this, and a fair number of us are desperate to distance ourselves from whiteness. Others advocate for the language of critical race theory as a means of self-defense. We're excoriated for our perceived privilege yet powerless to express our agency and self-worth as white people. Attempts to do so are discarded as white fragility, or worse, as frank racism.

Part of the cachet that Donald Trump has for white voters of a certain age, those roughly 50 and older, is that he doesn't vilify them. His victory was in no small part thanks to his ability to tap into them as a disaffected people largely dismissed as fly over country. Traditional forms of privilege, of classism, are seen as an acceptable means to discount the white hoi polloi.

And that's a problem. White privilege doesn't take into account the circumstances of white people as individuals. We neglect to examine the privilege of say, being born in a developed country, and are instead fixated on how whiteness is a manifestation of oppression. And that's really what there is to know about critical race theory. It assigns all malaise, all fault, all wickedness into whiteness as the identity of the oppressor.

If self-respecting white people seem "defensive" about being vilified, it's with good reason.

Pick and choose your sides as you see fit. You live in the United States, and you can sense the way the wind is blowing. Demography is destiny, and whiteness as the de facto identity of the United States is no longer our present, much less our future. That's the way that it should be, too.
 
Condensed numbers about police violence are hard to get. Even the databases do not give a clear picture, depending on which side you look. If you look raw numbers black people are in disproportion.


The only breakdown by race, reason, who shots whom, why, etc I have found in a police magazine(it could be that the police magazine is biased, suggest for everybody to do own research). They claim 40% of all cop killers are black, killing cops of all races:

The Real Numbers Of “Police Brutality” in America That You Need To See

On the contrary, the police magazine, and others, ignore that numbers have been falling in general and the progress that has been made. I.e, the number of incarcerated black people has been falling steadily and strongly.

@Dan
I think that the situation in the US and partially in the UK is a consequence of the rise of woke culture in the last 30 years. 2 parallel processes are ongoing: the protest against violence and the woke cultural revolution.
 
@Dan
I think that the situation in the US and partially in the UK is a consequence of the rise of woke culture in the last 30 years. 2 parallel processes are ongoing: the protest against violence and the woke cultural revolution.

Critical race theory has its origins in academia. Its advocates have succeeded in suppressing criticism through mob rule on college campuses. Opposing viewpoints have been stifled. Now, it has extended its reach to all other cultural institutions. Those with a voice in the media or academe who criticize it, those who even act as a gatekeeper to have any conversation on its merits and flaws at all, find themselves unemployable and threatened. A select few can openly criticize it in popular right wing media, and typically for all the wrong reasons.

Something needs to be made very clear when discussing this ideology: it is not a subset of liberalism. It may exist on the far left, but I simply prefer to refer to it as illiberalism. The kind of optimism, the conspicuous defense of free speech found in liberalism is completely lacking in its successor.

And with it has come all manner of things that were, at least publicly, frowned upon in the liberal order. Its advocates carry water for manifestations of political violence either by downplaying its frequency (see ponyexpress's belief that "a majority of marches were peaceful") or by saying it has righteous justification in the simmer of racial animus. Whereas a diversity of opinion once flourished on the left, now there is an ever shifting floor of collectively accepted talking points. Failure to show the requisite woke credibility and soon you too can be the victim of reductionist accusations of cryptoracism.

That word I use, cryptoracism, is the last element. People are compelled to make public statements asserting their anti-racist, rather than non-racist, credentials. Why do they do this? I personally believe a large portion of them think they're doing the right thing. An even larger portion are fearful that they will not appear to share the modern zeitgeist, the modern consciousness.

Police violence was the focal point that brought out the anarchists and loons, but it's the larger body of self-identified liberals who have coalesced around this ideology to breathe into it a terrible existence.
 
Whiteness is a sinking ship. Most white people have picked up on this, and a fair number of us are desperate to distance ourselves from whiteness. Others advocate for the language of critical race theory as a means of self-defense. We're excoriated for our perceived privilege yet powerless to express our agency and self-worth as white people. Attempts to do so are discarded as white fragility, or worse, as frank racism.

Part of the cachet that Donald Trump has for white voters of a certain age, those roughly 50 and older, is that he doesn't vilify them. His victory was in no small part thanks to his ability to tap into them as a disaffected people largely dismissed as fly over country. Traditional forms of privilege, of classism, are seen as an acceptable means to discount the white hoi polloi.

And that's a problem. White privilege doesn't take into account the circumstances of white people as individuals. We neglect to examine the privilege of say, being born in a developed country, and are instead fixated on how whiteness is a manifestation of oppression. And that's really what there is to know about critical race theory. It assigns all malaise, all fault, all wickedness into whiteness as the identity of the oppressor.

If self-respecting white people seem "defensive" about being vilified, it's with good reason.

Pick and choose your sides as you see fit. You live in the United States, and you can sense the way the wind is blowing. Demography is destiny, and whiteness as the de facto identity of the United States is no longer our present, much less our future. That's the way that it should be, too.
I can see certain parts of America that used to be virtually lily white (with a smattering of black) becoming more chromatic, and that is disconcerting to a good number of white folks. Ironically I’m quite sensitive about the ethnic composition of my surroundings, having lived in a small town Alabama and metro Atlanta. Regardless of how many Indian-owned gas stations and hotels, Vietnamese nail salons, Chinese restaurants, and Mexican laborers around, Congress is still 78% white, the Supreme Court has 7 white justices out of 9, and the president is 100% white.

The demographics of America is changing (as always), but just because it’s gradually becoming less white, it doesn’t mean that today white people are the underdogs. Not by a long shot. What’s happening is that old conservative white men are beginning to lose solid political control, and they resent having to compromise or share power with liberals and people of color.

As a newcomer I consider compromise as the norm rather than the exception. While my skin tone remains the same, I have essentially remade myself to adapt to the American way of life. Being a brown-skinned guy with a funny name in America, I have to constantly prove myself. I essentially have to work twice as hard and be twice as knowledgeable to earn the same income. As such, it is difficult for me to sympathize with white folks complaining that they have to compromise a little here and there.

I’m not even asking them to meet me halfway. I learned their language, and their culture, and their popular references, and I even adopt many of their values. All I ask in return is to accept me as an equal despite my foreign birth place, and that my views are not going to jive 100% with theirs. Apparently even this is a bridge too far for many of them.

I’m even less sympathetic because many of these same folks love to complain about ‘entitlements’, yet at the same time they expect to maintain a default dominant position in society based on their skin color alone, which they don’t earn. They’re all about merit and the free market until they lose their job to smarter and/or harder working brown people, then it’s about ‘illegal’ immigrants destroying America. They want to “make America great again” like in the 50’s, when blacks knew their place and other colors were either in reservations or across the border. For people who love to tout “personal responsibility”, they sure love to place the blame of their failings on other (non white) persons instead of on themselves.

I get it, I actually do. As a Javanese I belong to the dominant ethnic group in Indonesia. But, unlike Trump supporters I never expect to maintain an advantage in society due to my ethnicity alone.
 
I’m even less sympathetic because many of these same folks love to complain about ‘entitlements’, yet at the same time they expect to maintain a default dominant position in society based on their skin color alone, which they don’t earn. They’re all about merit and the free market until they lose their job to smarter and/or harder working brown people, then it’s about ‘illegal’ immigrants destroying America. They want to “make America great again” like in the 50’s, when blacks knew their place and other colors were either in reservations or across the border. For people who love to tout “personal responsibility”, they sure love to place the blame of their failings on other (non white) persons instead of on themselves.

I get it, I actually do. As a Javanese I belong to the dominant ethnic group in Indonesia. But, unlike Trump supporters I never expect to maintain an advantage in society due to my ethnicity alone.

I very consciously chose to reference the privilege of birth in a country like the United States because we've discussed this before. It's something that Americans who receive their citizenship from their parents are inured to. They don't spend time navel gazing on the impact of globalization, they don't comprehend how so much of their advantage is due to whose crotch they slunk out of. And yes, it's privilege, perfectly summed up by you as being "unearned."

Much of the world toils to subsidize the standard of living enjoyed by the citizens of developed economies. Americans will speak of their pro-social credentials on race relations or gender or gay rights, they'll talk exhaustively about the legacy of slavery and how it is felt today. And all the while, we are the beneficiaries of slavery's modern successor in globalization. Some of my relatives work as sharecroppers in 2020, not 1820.

That isn't uniquely a feature of whiteness exclusively, though white people by and large are beneficiaries. What is different about white people, or at least the nation-states founded by our forebears, is that there is a vision for someone who is non-white to become a citizen, to become a countryman.

You could become German. You could become French. You could become British. You have become American.

It is highly unlikely I could become an Indonesian if I weren't married to WNI. It's even more unlikely I could become Japanese or South Korean, or Chinese.

White people are chided for resistance to immigration when we're largely the only people who advocate for it. I don't blame developed economies, save Singapore, in Asia that are reluctant to share in the wealth of diversity. It's a pain, it's a real burden to shoulder that ever growing lack of cohesion. They can easily point to the crises facing the United States, Canada, EU, and Australia as all the more reason to be cautious of calls to diversify their populace.

MAGA is indeed as you say it is. Its adherents seek a return to whiteness as the default identity of the United States. What is to be its successor identity? With the rise of apparent monocultures outside of white-majority nations, how will we differentiate ourselves?
 
I think it's bad idea to mix BLM and LGBTQ rights into one, imagine you joined the BLM march, does it mean you also support LGBTQ? No kid should be brought into a LGBTQ rally, obscenity is everywhere.

 
The demographics of America are changing (as always), but just because it’s gradually becoming less white, it doesn’t mean that today white people are the underdogs. Not by a long shot. What’s happening is that old conservative white men are beginning to lose solid political control, and they resent having to compromise or share power with liberals and people of colour.
Just a quick note,
I think this is overstated a little bit. The USA is 73% "white". Even most of "people of colour" are Latin non-white Americans, effectively similar "Christian-Catholic" culture, descendants of Portuguese and Spanish conquistadores(another oppressors-irony). California was Mexican until taken by war from these descendants of the Spanish colonialists.

Number of WASPs went down, but the US is white almost as it was. 2017 had 73% whites comparing to 2010 when it was 72%. In 2014 almost 76% of newborn kids were by white mothers.

The black population is steady on 13%, or slightly above 14% when self-identifying mixed kids are included.
 
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I think one big minority that deserves attention even more than BLM or LGBTQ is disabled people. I would suggest that the discrimination they face and the general difficulty of their lives is much greater than the first two groups. For obvious reasons arranging big marches could present practical difficulties, but at the very least they deserve their own hashtag.
 

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