#antiracist baby

[cowboy-heart]

'BUTCH MANIFESTO'

inspired by 'FEMME SHARK MANIFESTO' by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha

(ID under cut)

Ko-Fi (Commissions Open!)

[ID: an original poem titled 'BUTCH MANIFESTO'. the stanzas are all on the left side of the page and lineated, except for the first line, and last stanza. Poem begins:

Listen up! Butches hold it down! We don’t spend hundreds of pounds on designer clothes and black and white tuxes – we shop off the charity shop rack, hand-me-downs from our bois, our men, our women. Butch is not a glamour word - Butch is not for the white collars in their 9-5 and their office parties, Butch is not for the woman in a police uniform with short cropped hair, Butch is not for the masc who looks down on our femmes, Butch is not for the dumbass white people who call themselves stud, like our people haven’t taken enough from black lesbians, Butch is not for the politician or the soldier, it’s for those of us who get shit done and don’t throw anyone under the bus; who stand between our loved ones and the white-knuckled fist; it’s for the people who take a breath of relief when they get home and get to lay their head on the shoulder of their baby and say, it’s hard, and I need you right now; it’s for those of us with hard-soled feet, worn by hours of standing, just so people can buy some useless shit on a Sunday. Butch is for the primary school teachers, the neighbour keeping your package safe, the hairstylist, the barber, the youth worker, the locked up, the sectioned, the evicted, the boy on the dole. Butches hold each other up, Butches stand up for communities, no matter how different we might be.

Butches stand up for Butches, because only we know the shit we face, we don’t argue over what butch looks like for someone - their struggle doesn’t counteract ours. We’re brothers, sisters, siblings, lovers, mentors, we don’t fight over femmes or fight each other. We help up our siblings who can’t hold themselves up and shouldn’t have to.

Butch is recognising our hurt, our pain, and making sure nobody has to go through that, in the very least not alone. Butch is not reproducing that hurt, butch isn’t the transfem exclusion, the toxicity, it’s driving our girls and boys to the abortion clinic, it’s holding your femme’s hair back over the toilet bowl, it’s telling your darlin’ to take a deep breath, before you poke the needle into her thigh, it’s holding back on punching the catcaller because you know it’ll put your lover in more danger, it’s fishing in your closet for an old, dusty dress for your questioning girl, it’s never calling the cops, it’s carrying the Narcan, it’s gathering the funds for bail, it’s tipping the waiter, it’s kissing the bruised chin of a fellow butch who’s built like a brick shithouse.

Butch is not all muscle, able-bodied, white Butch is not all skinny and androgynous Butch is care Butch is NURTURE. Butch is a cane and an unsteady step Butch is putting down the ramp Butch is wheeling up it Butch is addict Butch is straight-edge Butch is diaspora Butch is desi Butch is antiracist Butch is socialist Butch is punk Butch is black Butch is brown Butch is fat Butch is fat-loving Butch is mental illness Butch is antipsych Butch is autism Butch is trans Butch is anger Butch is tears Butch is grief Butch is the old bull Butch is the closeted kid in a dress Butch is the baby dyke wearing a rainbow flag cape Butch is smile lines Butch is crinkled eyes Butch is crying in your friend’s beat-up car Butch is foetal position Butch is pink Butch is motherhood Butch is fatherhood Butch is cat-dad Butch is fucking Butch is getting fucked Butch is stone Butch is bashful Butch is humble Butch is cocky Butch is proud Butch is single Butch is uneducated Butch is poet Butch is poetry Butch is council estate Butch is gentleness Butch is bones and spit and the soft curve of our lower backs the clenched jaw under a double chin the hard-eyes that any femme can see right through the estradiol the testosterone the carabiner clink the thick hands the cellulite the bloody pads the tampon string the mood swings the sagging tits the top surgery scars the swinging cock the hairy pussy the protruding t-dick the leather harness.

Butch is eternity Butch is sewn into the fabric of atoms Butch is love and solidarity Butch is never leaving anyone behind and never selling anyone out.

End poem. In the bottom right corner, the poet is signed as 'Ren H.' End ID].

[weareagitated]

(via Progressive Politics Antiracist Make Racism Wrong Again Cute - Etsy)

[doberbutts]

It’s very refreshing to see your thoughts on the state of feminism and masculinity, particularly men’s position in the movement. Sometimes coming on here makes me feel insane with the takes I see from people who have clearly never done any activist work, read anything by a black activist, or actual gender studies scholarship. I really enjoy reading your takes, they’re very nuanced and thought provoking!

I was talking with a very good friend of mine (a black lesbian) and discussing how we go online and see totally wild assbackwards takes from people claiming to be feminists and antiracists and then when actually confronted with the work, freak out and state that it's antithetical to the cause. Even when it's work written by people who began the cause. How we grew up in fairly similar yet different demographics and we heard all the same early work from our black elders and then we come online and even the most baby kindergarten-ass idea or theory is shredded in favor of some extreme bastardization of the most radical political viewpoints and that's it.

For her, it's why she doesn't engage with tumblr anymore. For me, it's why I refuse to let people try to talk over me about black politics.

[jellybeanium124]

xxx

I'm angry in this one btw. real properly angry. I don't wanna talk about this because I know some of y'all are thiiiiis close to blocking me for not falling in line and being a good little jew and repeating the slogans thoughtlessly, but I'm so mad and scared and nobody cares at all and I wanna shut up about it so I don't lose all my goyische friends but I can't I just can't.

hm maybe people are being arrested because there is some violence and this is terrifying jewish students?? and I think the author of this article is way too kind to these students. they hail hamas as heroes. they don't think the innocent civilian hostages should be released for the crime of being israeli. they champion themselves as being antiracist when ANTISEMITISM IS AN ETHNIC PREJUDICE YOU DUMB FUCKING CHAZERS!!!

jews are terrified.

rabbis are telling us to stay home.

whenever there's an "assembly" on the uni I live by, I'm terrified it'll turn violent. I'm terrified they'll burn down or deface the clearly labelled building where the jewish org lives.

I stopped wearing my magen david because I'm terrified of my peers, my peers who are supposed to be inclusive and love everyone regardless of ethnicity, seeing that I'm jewish and harassing me or worse.

the average college campus is less safe for jews than it has been in decades.

the optics of your movement are shit. you're infested with jew haters, and no one seems to care!! no goy cares, because you all care more about hating israel than not hating jews. and hating israel turns into hating jews so, so quickly. I want palestine to be a free nation. I want this war to end. but none of you understand that as long as hamas exists peace cannot happen. none of you understand that if you hate israelis you're a fucking antisemite lol sorry. if you want every israeli dead, you want half the world's jews dead. if you don't think that makes you an antisemite, lemme give you another example. let's say you want all black americans dead (not all black people are american, in fact, less than half the world's black population are in america). are you racist? YES. same fucking logic here.

saw a video the other day where some dumbfuck was like "have you considered that all hamas knows is oppression and hatred? 🥺" THESE ARE GROWN ADULTS!! YOU RACIST FUCKING INFANTILIZING FUCKING IDIOT!! THEY ARE GROWN ADULT HUMANS AND YOU ARE TREATING THEM LIKE BABIES AND CLAIM TO BE ANTIRACIST??? if you see POC as too innocent to be bad, then you are falling for the noble savage stereotype all over again. has that stereotype historically been attributed to arab people? no. but it definitely fucking is now with the way y'all think rape and terrorism is excusable.

none of you fucking idiots see anyone involved as full humans because none of you have a goddamn piece in it. you see palestinians as innocent babies who could never rape or hurt anyone, and you see israelis as demons to be exterminated. you're racist, you're hateful, you're not helping anything, and I hope you will one day be so, so ashamed of the fear you've instilled in jews worldwide while seeing them as genociding monsters regardless of ties to israel or anything, as well as the myopic infantilizing racist way you view arab people.

and one last thing: "FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA" IS ANTISEMITIC. IT'S A SLOGAN ENDORSED BY HAMAS. IF YOU ARE CHANTING THAT OVER AND OVER AND OVER GUESS WHAT YOU'RE HAVING AN ANTISEMITIC PROTEST, SORRY. you can't reclaim that slogan, it is calling for the destruction of israel, which will lead to jewish genocide, or just a massive jewish refugee crisis if they're lucky and hamas doesn't succeed in their goal of exterminating the jews.

[readingsquotes]

"Elite panic, manifested in crackdowns on dissent, has clarified to growing numbers of people a basic truth: any hope of building a multiracial left strong enough to confront the resurgence of fascism depends on solidarity with the Palestinian liberation struggle. This is because Zionism, the movement for a state for the Jewish people in the eastern Mediterranean, is the cause that happens to most powerfully unite liberals and the right in open expression of racist warmongering.

In its aspiration to racialize Jews worldwide, Zionism has two poles: in Palestine, it is a colonial project of Jewish supremacy. In the United States, the most important center of Jewish life outside of Palestine, Zionism has buttressed a liberal multiracial order in which Jews of European origin are considered both white and an aggrieved minority. This combination explains the outrage cycles over antisemitism that punctuate American public life, in which Zionists can weaponize the language of antiracism against critics of Israel. When directed at actual victims of Euro-American racism and colonialism, however, tendentious accusations of antisemitism have always carried a whiff of desperation — which is also why the multiracial character of the Palestine solidarity movement has threatened  Zionism and must be either downplayed or disrupted.

This dynamic, which leaves antisemitism on the far right to metastasize unchecked, has only intensified since Oct. 7. Many of the flashpoints over Palestine have been sites of ruling-class power purportedly charged with reproducing a multiracial meritocratic elite: electoral politics, government bureaucracy, corporations, nonprofits, the arts, journalism, and above all higher education. And it is predictable that after Palestinians themselves, those punished for speaking out on Palestine in these spaces are often Black.

....

Boomer Zionism’s policing of post–civil rights parameters had its first major test in the summer of 2016, when a policy platform document produced by a major BLM movement organization (and co-authored by Rachel Gilmer, a Black Jewish organizer), the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) crossed a red line of Zionist consensus by accusing Israel of genocide against Palestinians. The blowback was swift and predictable: Zionist groups decried the statement, and a New York City fund-raiser for BLM was canceled. But compared to critics of Israel in the academy and nonprofit sector, BLM was a robust social movement and less vulnerable to Zionist pressures. Instead the move backfired, amplifying intergenerational schisms within Jewish communities. Activists who had been energized by BLM turned against the heavy-handed tactics of boomer Zionists. Some did so out of solidarity with Palestinians, others because they wanted to preserve the possibility of building alliances with Black activists. For these younger Jews, interrogating their whiteness in the United States also pushed them to question their Jewish privilege under Zionism. In modeling an antiracist approach that departed from post–civil rights parameters, BLM helped shift the conditions for critique within Jewish communities as well, influencing groups like Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow.

[textualviolence]

like octavia butler is a black woman writer & she said in interviews she was a feminist and committed to anti racism. So what else could her books possibly be about i mean shes gotta be teaching us how to be even better antiracist feminists, right? Thats why we read her works. to be more woke. become better allies. "gain consciousness" shut the fuck up!!!! xenogenesis has got none of that in it so stop lying!!! just cause the main character is a black woman doesn't mean the book is here to teach you how to not be racist like a stupid little baby. The "Utopian ending" of xenogenesis is one in which fascism has won. And its because the point isn't fascism bad or fascism good but fascism scary and upsetting (& therefore fascism horny). Give up on your sense of self and your ostensible ethics and morality that are all about how "forced eugenic breeding" and "mass sterilization of unfit populations" is something you're "fundamentally opposed to". Just give in, because it feels good. There you go. Good girl. Your morals mean nothing and you're my little doggy now. And you get a Utopia in exchange (a fascist one). Thats what xenogenesis is about. And no one gets it!!! And donna haraway was like "uhhhh its an opening of feminist possibilities" no it isn't!!!! its an opening of possibilities for my pussy but its not saying shit about what we could or should so as feminists shut the fuck uppppppppppp

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Alice Wright

Ibram X. Kendi's Antiracist Research Center at Boston University fires almost HALF its 45 staff, as ex-workers claim he had too much power and brand him EXPLOITATIVE

Woke activist Ibram X. Kendi's Antiracist Research Center at Boston University had laid off up to twenty members off staff

Boston University confirmed the center had made 15 to 20 workers as the center moves towards a fellowship model 

Former and current staff alleged that the center had been poorly managed 

Woke activist Ibram X. Kendi's Antiracist Research Center at Boston University had laid off up to twenty members off staff amidst accusations from former workers that the organization was 'exploitative' and poorly managed. 

Boston University confirmed the center had made 15 to 20 workers redundant from a staff of 45 as it moves towards a fellowship model. 

'The Center is evolving to a fellowship model. Dr. Kendi remains the Director. We can confirm that there were layoffs at the Center' Vice President Rachel Lapal Cavallario told Fox News on Thursday. 

'The University and Center are committed to working with and supporting affected employees as they look for their next opportunities' the statement read. 

But staff who worked there painted a far less diplomatic picture, claiming Kendi was given too much power and that he mistreated those working for him. 

He infamously implied that white people should be discriminated against to tackle the horrific prejudice previously inflicted on black Americans. 

The center opened at BU during the turbulent summer of 2020 when America reckoned with nationwide protests over the police killing of George Floyd. 

Some former and current staff told the Boston Globe that the center had been poorly managed by Kendi. 

'There are a number of ways it got to this point, it started very early on when the university decided to create a center that rested in the hands of one human being, an individual given millions of dollars and so much authority,' Spencer Piston, faculty lead of the center's policy office told the publication.  

Former assistant director of narrative at the center, Saida Grundy, said the center lacked structure and the culture was 'exploitative' as she was asked to work unreasonable hours. 

'It became very clear after I started that this was exploitative and other faculty experienced the same and worse,' she told the outlet. 

Kendi garnered recognition in academic circles with his 2019 book 'How To Be An Antiracist,' which exploded in popularity during the global movement for racial equality in 2020.  

Then-president of BU Robert A. Brown said at the time that Kendi's leadership 'would create a critical emphasis on research and policy to help eliminate racism in our country.'

Kendi's hiring announcement was followed by a flood of donations to BU to support the center and Kendi's work, including a $1.5 million, three-year gift from the biotech company Vertex and a $10 million donation from Twitter founder Jack Dorsey later that summer. 

A few months later, The Rockefeller Foundation donated $1.5 million over two years to help fund the center's COVID-19 Racial Data Tracker.

Kendi's work, especially his children's book 'Antiracist Baby' has gained criticism for teaching children controversial critical race theory. 

Kendi defended his books in June 2022 as a way to teach people, including children, to 'see racism.'

'Well, actually, teaching people to see racism,' Kendi said on 'CBS Mornings.' 'There's a difference. Race is a mirage. Racism is real. And it's – you know who's the most likely to be harmed by racism? Our children. You know who are least likely to engage about it? Our children. That's what's really prevailing me to do this work.'

==

Kendi is a full-blown fraud.

Glenn Loury: I take umbrage at the lionization of lightweight, empty-suited, empty-headed mother-fuckers like Ibram X. Kendi, who couldn't carry my book-bag. Who hasn't read... no, I'm sorry, he hasn't read a fucking thing. If you ask him what Nietzsche said, he would have no idea. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, he's an unserious, superficial, empty-suited lightweight. He's not our equal, not even close. Fuck.

[justsomeguycore]

hairspray was straight up such a big influence on me lmaoooo like baby’s first antiracist anti fatphobia exposure

[moleshow]

i was in a bookstore today and found of a copy of how to be an antiracist by monsieur ibram x kendi. now being familiar with his greatest work, Antiracist Baby, i was curious to know what his non-children’s book writing* was like. and, well.

It’s bad.

[surreyambie]

Random rant about something that's been said frequently and better than I ever could.

Sometimes (as a white person insulated from racism) you forget how blatent and openly evil racists were in not even 70 years ago.

The 1949 Rogers and Hammerstein musical South Pacific was both very popular and controversial. The controversy stems from the two main romances in the show and the plot as a whole deal with racism and interracial marriage. The leading man falls in love with an asian woman while stationed on a south pacific island during WWII, the plot covers the couple's struggles with both external and internal roadblocks caused by racism.

Ultimately the romance fails. The leading man fails to overcome his internalized racism and bitterly sings the most controversial song from the show "You've Got to be Carefully Taught." The song states that racism is not natural, and that it needs to be reinforced by those dear to you.

Now today, the biggest denciation you'd see from politically important racists would be to deride its obviousness and say that the show is just "virtue signalling." Of course, the more blatent, yet platformed, racists nowadays may point to some study that shows babies like people who look like their parents more than others.

At the time the show was almost cancelled because of this song and message. Notably the government of Georgia (the state (obviously)) introduced a bill to ban any entertainment with "...an underlying philosophy inspired by Moscow."

It's at this point where the more naive might say "but surrey why would an anticommunist bill target a show about interracial marriage?" And the answer to that question is made obvious by one lawmaker's statement that "a song justifying interracial marriage was implicitly a threat to the American way of life." You see, communism at the time was used as a boogeyman to smear and ban any sort of antiracist or tolerant movement, MLK Jr. and the civil rights movement were often accused of being communist conspiracies to create division and weaken America. Remember this next time some racists talks about BLM or the like make nearly the exact same accusation.

When you hear the sort of couching lawmakers and pundits use to deflect accusations of racism or other such bigotry, you realize that they really aren't that different to the olden racists. They point to some nebulous idealogy that they're ACTUALLY attacking instead of actual people, like wokeism, transgenderism, communism, globalism, etc. Sure they might not say that race mixing is communism (out loud) anymore, but they'll sure imply it.

They will try to obscure the hate in their heart for their fellow man because it is so obviously ugly, but it is important that we do not let them get away with it.

[mbvvacationbibleschool]

Beyond Good and Evil

It’s come to my attention that I may be evil. 

A weaponized and naive notion of propaganda, mixed with moral absolutism has caused many people to throw huge swaths of humanity and the strawman versions of their morality or ideology into the camp of absolute evil. It’s always us vs them, isn’t it? I got into some kind of argument where I ended up being treated as some kind of charicaturized version of the idiot yuppie naive swindled evil soft godless leftist environazi that I may represent in the minds of others. To some, I am the posterchild of evil, especially because I am not shy about speaking my mind- spreading the devil’s seeds of deception.  I am the deluded one who has been bathing in propaganda.

It was very telling to me in that I had been painting these foolish stubborn backwards ecocidal fundamentalist assholes with an oddly similar brush.  I even let myself feel afraid of the alt-left anarchistic anti-natal “antiracist” misanthropics that are willing to throw every baby out with the bathwater. Or of course the truly deplorable “neo-nazis” that are allegedly everywhere, rioting, killing, pillaging. For the radical, even you are a brainwashed bootlicker. Truly these people are evil, right? 

First radicalized with the perception of environmental degradation, I found solidarity with the environmental movement, then the psychedelic movement, the posthumanists, moral relativistic deconstructionist and nihlistic philosophers of the current age. I’m all for a free expression of consciousness that is dignifying for people and the planet. You say you want a revolution? Well if what you’re talking about is violence, you’re going to have to count me out.

Most people are starting to see the cracks forming in our society’s foundation as growing problems rear their ugly head in droves with solutions constantly blocked by the bogieman of your choosing - is it the brainwashed left or the brainwashed right? Is it the rich or is it the politicians? Is it your neighbor? Anyone but me, once radicalized, of course. It’s easy to end up in perpetual exasperation with the dizzying paradox of everything changing and nothing changing fast enough.

You want to take down the Borguouse?  Don’t chase red herrings. Divide and conquer, as the old saying goes. A binary view of evil and defining outgroups through tribalism is the most effective way to stunt change or to ensure unintended or civillian casualties (figuratively or literally). Even Liberals are guilty of tribalism and redifining outgroups. I do believe that a binary view of morality will cause hatred and division by default- at best, it will convey easy answers to hard questions that really ought to be wrestled with for one’s own sake. As Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

Yin and Yang is about how everything has aspects of good and evil in it, and that any ideology brought to its logical extreme has severe negative consequences. As Marcus Aurelius said; “Men were born to be in service to one another.” If we are part of the same body (as it also says in the Bible) then why would one hand strike the other?” We are trying to push a leaning tower of a society, and it seems like taking a balanced or weak stance will mean the tower will topple right onto our heads.  

It’s easy for me to say that what we consider as right and wrong is mostly convention, as someone with a very laissez-faire and impersonal view of the divine influence on our human development. My ideas are a hodgepodge of Charlie Darwin and the Dada artists, Nietzsche, and of course the most controversial and brilliant pieces of post-modernist cinema such as Rick and Morty. We came from monkeys and our society has been left to figure it out on our own. The beliefs we hold dear are some sort of hodgepodge of whatever worked and whatever other people were saying - as the old sayings go -  “Might makes right,” and “Truth is whatever your friends let you get away with saying.” The irony here is that deconstructionism, moral relativism and absolute skepticism are the kinds of hip-and-trendy platitudes of the self-described intellectuals of the 21st century. Contrarianism is another common way to come to firmly held beliefs. Do we come to our beliefs naturally, or was Calvinism right after all?

So I want to try and redefine propaganda, as redefining is a post-modern deconstructionist thing to do- propaganda is often a logically consistent simplification of an issue that relies on omission or downplaying of certain truths and exaggeration of other truths to create a desired outcome in the induvials exposed to that message. Sometimes these messages are spread by so called grassroots organizations or well meaning individuals. Sometimes the messages or the desired outcomes could be for your good or the common good, sometimes it is for some stupid distraction or a culture war.  To reiterate  - often there is perception of real problems in so called propaganda or deluded and radicalized groups. A lack of mutual trust and putting up divisions between groups is where the real problem lies. It may help to consider both sides of an issue. It may help to ask if you may be vilifying other groups - even that particular group that you may think deserves to be vilified. EVEN THEM. The challenge is humanizing the people who have been dehumanized, putting a face behind the person that is the posterchild of your outrage.

We all love a good villain because it makes a confusing world so much simpler. Some people bemoan the rising popularity of the anti-hero or the humanizing of villains in television such as Disney’s (tm) Maleficent, or even villainless films such as Encanto, but I really think it’s time for a hard think. We generally only have enemies if they think we are their enemy and vice versa. Learn to communicate before you escalate.  Mutual trust and cooperation is preferable to mutual distrust. See the prisoner’s dilemma or Friend Or Foe. I don’t really believe that there are evil people or evil nations. Only through ignorance and lack of trust or respect do injustices occur, most people think they are acting out of their own self interest. I recommend vigilence against easy answers to tough moral questions, and avoiding vilifying your neighbor. Who really is evil?

[150-907-multic-america-mmolina]

Multimedia Journal Entry 3: Internet/Social Media

Instagram account of Ibram Xolani Kendi, American author, professor, anti-racist activist. https://www.instagram.com/ibramxk/?hl=en

Kendi’s framework of "anti-racism" versus "racism" helps us understand how, even in the "Land of Hope," African Americans, Latinos, Asians, and all ethnic groups continue to face racial inequality.

Kendi is an American author, professor, anti-racist activist, and historian of race and discriminatory policies in the United States. He uses social media platforms, including Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, to disseminate his thoughts on race, systemic racism, and anti-racism.

Kendi has also been recognized for his books, including Stamped from the Beginning, How to Be an Antiracist, and Antiracist Baby.

We can connect Kendi’s analysis with that of Ronald Takaki (April 12, 1939 – May 26, 2009), an American academic and author of the famous book A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America, in which Takaki addresses history issues of race and stereotypes in America. Kendi’s analysis in Stamped from the Beginning underscores how current systems of racial oppression are not limited to the South but are woven throughout American society, from the North to the South. Takaki describes in A Different Mirror what African Americans experienced during the Great Migration, when they left the South to escape Jim Crow laws, segregation, lynching, and police brutality, seeking refuge in the North. However, they encountered a different form of racism, deeply ingrained in Northern institutions. African Americans, migrating to the so-called "Land of Hope," were later discriminated against by white Americans who claimed their neighborhoods had been ruined by the migration of people from the South. African Americans faced discrimination in employment, housing, and education. Kendi’s work shows how these structures were justified by racist ideas and how they still exist in today’s society.

His posts often question race in America, encourage critical thinking, and promote activism. Kendi’s writings discuss how race intersects with other systems of power, such as class, gender, and sexuality. As a woman and a Latina in this country, I am able to connect Takaki’s narratives with Kendi’s messages about empowerment for minority groups. I have personally experienced racism at various points in my life, whether when applying for a job or traveling outside of the country, so I can relate to Takaki’s narratives and Kendi’s critical thinking.

Now more than ever, I strongly believe in the importance of embracing diversity. Now that I understand American history through Takaki’s narrative, I can unite with and support Kendi’s efforts to eliminate racism in America.

Reference

Kendi, I. X. (2016). Stamped from the beginning: The definitive history of racist ideas in America. Nation Books.

Kendi, I. X. (2019). How to be an antiracist. One World.

Kendi, I. X. (2020). Antiracist baby. Kokila.

Kendi, I. X. (n.d.). Ibram X. Kendi. Wikipedia. Retrieved December 11, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibram_X._Kendi

Kendi, I. X. [@ibramxk]. (n.d.). Instagram profile. Instagram. Retrieved December 11, 2024, from https://www.instagram.com/ibramxk/?hl=en

Takaki, R. (1993). A different mirror: A history of multicultural America.

Takaki Ronald. (n.d.). Ronald Takaki. Wikipedia. Retrieved December 11, 2024, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Takaki

[clowngames]

How are those nonfiction novels going?

Thanks for asking!

I finished Trust the Plan by Will Sommer. It's a fairly satisfactory account of the history of Qanon, though I don't think it explains the why of Qanon well enough. I think Sommer is a traditional journalist who probably believes in minimal spin or speculation, so I can't fault him for this too much. Did you know there was a Baby Q? The conspiracy theory had its own Babies spin-off! (short story: a young man claimed that he will eventually grow into being Q, and travel back in time to send messages as Q. People... believed him.)

I'm a little less than halfway through How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X Kendi, I'm unsure if I'm going to continue it. I think it's an excellent foundational text (and in fact I've nearly written essays about what's rhetorically effective about it), but that's just it - it's foundational. I think there are lots of people - leftists even - who would benefit from this book, but it hasn't said anything I'm not already well-acquainted with.

I'm early on in How Fascism Works by Jason Stanley, and in contrast with How to Be an Antiracist, this book has several starting assumptions about its readers which make it rhetorically much less effective. I'm too early in to give it well-formed thoughts beyond that critique, and in fairness if I'm reading a book about fascism it's a safe bet that I'm already on the left (the book casually asserts that Trump is a fascist which I feel may leave a sour taste in the mouths of liberals).

I still haven't registered for Hoopla so The Joy of x by Steven Strougatz is still in my TBR. I'm unsure how much more to dedicate to How to Be an Antiracist before replacing it. Hoopla also has way more audiobooks by bell hooks than Libby does, so it's a matter of time before I make the switch. Not sure what the best hooks books are so so far I'm picking at random!

[8-evil-annoying-catboys]

im very glad you’re sharing your experience, but i’m also frustrated because poc have been saying this for years, and nobody wants to listen to us. even when we admit that we are also not immune to this, people don’t want to listen to us. but you are right—everyone, in western and colonised societies, has racism ingrained in them from a very young age, and taking up “not racist” as a self-identifier in itself, can easily lead you to actually be more racist, and usually white people do that. nobody born and raised in western society is not ever racist, even if they keep their thoughts to themselves and are never outwardly racist, it’s normal to have your first reaction to something be totally fucking racist when you’ve been raised in a society that has taught you to be racist. what matters is your reaction to those thoughts. do you recognise them, say “wait, i’m being racist by thinking that way” and deconstruct them so that you can actually teach your brain that the racist first reactions you have are not founded in fact and make no logical sense when you examine them? or do you just bury them and ignore them and pretend that that’s good enough to be an antiracist? your first thought is what you were taught to think, and your reaction to that first thought is how you actually are. if you’re humble enough to criticise your own internal racism, that’s far more helpful to poc than just allowing it to go unchecked because you don’t want to think about it. and at the same time, you’re teaching yourself that it’s okay to be wrong and have your learned racist reactions to things, but you have to accept that it’s wrong and be open to correction, which, in turn, will make you a WAY better listener when poc call you out on being outwardly racist.

i will never forget when i was around 17, and i had this white boyfriend who was a writer, and when i was reading some of his work, i pointed out to him that describing a character’s skin color by comparing him to food was exotifying and fetishising, and would certainly offend people if it was a habit he continued and ended up putting into a published work. instead of being humble and recognising that i was right, he threw a bitch fit telling me how insecure he was about being a white boy raised in the midwest and how he was sooo scared of being called racist and how he was trying his best—and ultimately, i ended up having to be the one to apologise to and comfort him, even though he was FULLY in the wrong and he was the one who blew it out of proportion (i had approached it very casually and clarified that i personally wasn’t offended, as a lightskin, but i was bringing it up because i knew he wouldn’t be as aware of it as me because he was white). you can probably imagine how angry i am about this in retrospect. and this is exactly what being TERRIFIED of being perceived or labeled as racist, as a white person, will lead to—you shutting down and refusing to listen to poc when you interact with us, and choosing to avoid us rather than just listening and not taking shit so personally. and it’s not personal. with the example here, it’s not REMOTELY uncommon for white writers to describe characters of color as having “skin the color of coffee with a little bit of cream in it,” so there’s no need to take it as a personal affront when a poc tells you that that’s messed up, because you are far from the only person doing it. all you need to do is recognise, “hey, maybe that IS racist, lemme listen to what my friend/partner/editor has to say about it so i can learn something.” insecurity and fear of being racist will only isolate you from poc. if you’re white, then baby, you just have to own it, and recognise that sometimes you’re gonna think and say dumb, racist shit, but that doesn’t make you evil and it doesn’t make you a violent bigot, IF you’re self-aware enough to know when to challenge yourself internally, and especially if you know when to sit down, shut up, and learn something from poc. otherwise, you end up either only associating with other white people because that’s your comfort zone where you’ll never feel challenged—and never have to hear the perspectives of people who are actually affected by racism, so you can keep your own little idea of what racism is and what it’s like—OR you’ll end up making it so that your insecurities become the responsibility of poc in your life, and force us to walk on eggshells every time you say something racist, leaving it up to us to decide whether we should let it go unchallenged, or if it’s worth it to point it out if we’re going to have to deal with all your feelings and white fragility about it.

to close off my addition, i think it’d be a little dumb of me if i neglected to hammer in this point: poc also have to do this. we are ALSO taught to be racist by the dominant culture, and racism against other ethnicities runs rampant in communities of color. a lot of my extended family is SO racist to Black and Asian people and even other Indigenous people, sometimes they’re even racist to Latines and specifically even Mexicans, and we ARE Mexican. i’ve both experienced firsthand and witnessed my family experiencing racism from Black people, Asian people, other Latines, you name it. honestly, intracommunity racism is extremely rampant in the Latine diaspora, too—my boyfriend is Peruvian and Venezuelan, and when he moved from florida to california, his Peruvian mother told him not to fall in love with a Mexican because “they’re dirty”—and as far as a white person is concerned, a Peruvian immigrant and a Mexican immigrant might as well be exactly the damn same, at most they might differentiate because a lot of Peruvian have monolids or other Asian features due to migration patterns in the past, but then they’d likely assume the Peruvian is Mexican and Chinese mixed—and, according to my bf, Peruvians specifically are super racist to other Latines, although… it’s not really an exclusive thing, the same thing is true of people from argentina from my experience, and there’s no way that peru and argentina are the only two countries in latin america where this is prevalent. poc are generally more likely to deconstruct this than white people, all else being equal, because we have to recognise our own humanity and thus we learn to stop being racist to our own damn selves, and that can lead to us learning to stop being racist in general, but this is far from universal, and tbh a lot of older poc are even more racist than white people because they were raised to believe they need to be racist to be accepted by white society and make it in life. so, like… white people, when poc say that all white people are at least a little racist, we’re not saying that poc aren’t. if anything, we’re just saying that white people never have to challenge their own racism in order to love themselves, and therefore are less likely to recognise and challenge their own racism—plus, y’all don’t grow up surrounded by poc by virtue of your family being poc, unless you’re adopted, so you’re less likely to also have your family challenge the dominant racist culture when you grow up, and the effect that racist culture going unchallenged in your formative years has on you will show. and it may feel bad to know that. you still need to recognise that, though. don’t turn a blind eye. don’t take it personally when a poc calls you out on being racist, and don’t shut them down. recognise the likelihood that they’re right, and think critically about what they’re challenging in you. when you think something racist, don’t shy away from it and bury it: analyse it. figure out WHY you thought that, and remind yourself why it’s not true, and why, in many cases, it’s just plain dumb.

sharing this in the hopes that people can learn from it, I think the biggest thing I've done to be an ally for people of color is to stop being scared of being racist. not that I stopped thinking racism is bad, but I learned that society puts a racist tint on everything that goes so deep I can't expect myself to be free from it. and at some point it starts to feel silly to be afraid of having any spec of racism inside of you, because it's so deep in the roots of everything that how can it not be there?

and once you let go of that fear you can actually work to start uprooting all this shit. you're not an irredeemable person for being affected by something so deeply rooted in every corner of our society, but being ignorant of it doesn't help anything except the system that keeps racism so prevalent in the first place

I remember a few years ago I was at a gas station, and a guy, I think latino? was in a hoodie next to me just getting a soft drink. I remember feeling nervous then realizing, wait, I feel nervous next to this guy because he's latino and wearing a hoodie. that's racist. and stuff like this still happens, I'll still think or feel something, and then go "wait, that's racist"

and I tell this story so people can learn from it, because if we don't talk about the way racism manifests in our minds it only further isolates us from the truth of how ingrained racism is. it's not good that it's normal, which is why we need to realize that it's normal, so we can all fight it more effectively!

I really do feel that worrying about any little spec of racism inside of me exists held me back from being able to actually challenge that racism because I was too afraid of it existing in any capacity. and I feel lucky to be able to have had this realization that not being racist is a process rather than a personality trait, and it's definitely not something I came up with on my own. I do have countless people of color talking about racism to thank for where I am in trying to uproot it in myself!

I just want other people to also have this realization. I want it to be perfeclty normal and mundane to be able to tell yourself "that's racist". I want the sense that everyone else is simply never ever racist even a little bit and if they are they're irredeemable to be gone, because it keeps people too scared and complacent to actually do the work of trying to not be racist

any additions from people of color are welcomed of course! this is just the perspective I've had of my own growth, I don't want to center myself in the conversation on racism! I just hope that sharing my experience helps someone

[afrotumble]

‘Antiracist Baby’ helps kids and adults learn – Harvard Gazette

This is the #1 New York Times bestselling introduction to racism from award-winning author and academic, Ibram X. Kendi. Take your first steps with Antiracist Baby! Or, rather, follow Antiracist Baby's nine easy steps for building a more equitable world.

With bold illustrations and thoughtful, yet playful, text, Antiracist Baby introduces the youngest readers and the grown ups in their lives to the concept and power of antiracism. Providing the language necessary to begin critical conversations at the earliest age, Antiracist Baby is the perfect gift for readers of all ages dedicated to forming a just society.

This edition includes additional discussion prompts to help readers recognise and reflect on bias in their daily lives.

[afroeditions]

“Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) made a big production on Tuesday about how wrong it is that children’s books promoting anti-racism are being taught at a private school in Washington, D.C., where Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson is a board member.”

A day later, the very same book “Antiracist Baby" is a No. 1 bestseller on Amazon. Ha!✊🏾