#mlk also said

[moreaujeans]

moodboard

[terrorbirb]

The hr guy is printing covid denial stuff on the printer and it's annoying if only because all of the rest of the office are engineers who I actually know, due to discussions, are very on board with covid is real and we should get vaccinated.

[chronomally]

I'm attending an official corporate training program and they keep using the word "content" to refer to like. what they're going to be teaching us

[clonekisser]

Okay but these people are obviously trolling. I know this is from 2015 "haha tumblr is sjw cringe" times but even by those standards no human would think this

[iamjustalittlegayman]

being a teacher assistant is all fun and games until you get the most horrendous essay you’ve ever seen

[dedalvs]

Today is my 44th birthday. I was brought to my mother’s arms as Ronald Reagan was being sworn in and then went to the airport to welcome the Iranian hostages home—a meeting we now know was pre-arranged, as Reagan’s team negotiated to keep the hostages in captivity a little bit longer just so it could be Reagan, as opposed to Carter, who got the credit for releasing them.

Every four years my birthday falls on a US presidential inauguration. Some of those days are good; some are bad; some are terrible. Today is certainly one of the worst.

My birthday also sometimes falls on the day the US honors Martin Luther King, Jr.—or, when it doesn’t, always on a day very close to it. I always spend some time on my birthday thinking of him, too. Like all of us, he wasn’t perfect, but more and more what I think about regarding his legacy is how some of the things he said have been cherry-picked and stored like prize possessions in jeweled boxes for admiring every so often while the rest has been buried. MLK was an outspoken opponent of the Vietnam War, of income inequality, and of capitalism. Of all things I remember the first time I heard anything by him about that was in college when I happened into a record store in San Francisco and heard one of his speeches (not the “I have a dream” speech) remixed in a song.

Often you will hear that you should focus on what you can control. This is true, when it comes to your own personal well being—your state of mind. I feel like there should be a balance, though. Sometimes your well being is well enough that you can spare the anguish that comes with worrying about the state of the world—the many injustices you can’t fix, either by yourself or right away. We need that to push us to actually fix these things, either in small individual ways or collectively, through both direct and indirect action.

Each of us at different times in or lives—or on a micro level, at different times of the week or year—goes in and out of phases where we must focus on self-care and phases where we can look outward. Today I hope we can treat ourselves and each other with a little kindness when it comes to recognizing where it is we need to be in a given moment. Looking around on social media, it may seem that some are always on—always fighting, always pushing for change—and some are always off—cat memes, shipping, fandom. But that’s nothing but a small window into a person. First, that’s simply how that person interacts with one social media platform; it’s not their entire life. Second, it may be that this is the place they come to unwind—or, alternatively, this is the only place in their life where they can share the rage inside of them. Whoever they are, however they are, let them be, and offer them kindness. It’s going to take all of us to fight back.

[dailyrothko]

News!

From the Rothko Chapel

We are pleased to announce that the Rothko Chapel, which has been closed since hurricane Beryl hit Houston last July, will reopen to the public on December 17. The Chapel will be open during the following holiday hours: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Tuesday through Sunday, December 17-22, and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. December 24-January 5 (except on December 25 and January 1, when hours will be 12 p.m. to 5 p.m.).

Hurricane Beryl brought exceptionally heavy rain and gale-force winds that resulted in leakage through the Chapel's roof. Part of the ceiling and several walls sustained water damage, and four of Mark Rothko's panels were also affected to varying degrees.

Immediately after the storm, the Chapel engaged Whitten & Proctor Fine Art Conservation, one of the country's premier art-conservation firms, to lead the conservation analysis and assessment. The affected panels are now undergoing careful restoration at an off-site facility and will be returned to the Chapel once the work is complete, with additional information on them forthcoming. The water-streaked walls and ceiling have also been repaired and repainted.

"Since the storm, our focus has been on the complete repair of the building, the restoration of the damaged panels, and on the reopening of the building so the public once again has access to this beloved space for contemplation and meditation; said Executive Director David Leslie. "Getting to this point has been a true community effort involving an amazing team of art conservators, scientists, art handlers, volunteers, community partners, and Chapel staff, and we are very excited to reopen in time for the holidays.

The Chapel resumed its program season this fall at off-site locations and will host its first program in the Chapel - its annual MLK Observance, "Sick of War: Discussing Health Impacts of US Militarism" - on January 15, 2025. The Suzanne Deal Booth Welcome House, located at 1410 Sul Ross Street, remains open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday to provide information and hospitality to those who visit.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

WIBTA for writing a story where someone from 1944 is the main character, with all that entails?

I (M, white) had an idea for a story as of late. I have not written it yet but I plan to.

Basically, the plot (very summarized) is that a French soldier, J, falls through a weak point in time and space. This weak point connects a WWII battlefield in 1944 and a random meadow in Georgia in 2024, outside of Atlanta. He gets found by the other main character, M, and the story is about him teaching J about what life is like 80 yrs later.

In the story, J is a white cis man, and M is a Black/Korean trans man. Throughout the story, J unlearns biases that were put upon him by ignorance, and that includes racist, homophobic, and transphobic beliefs, among others. The point of this was to show that even a person brought directly from a very uneducated time even WITHOUT all the social movements of the 20th century can make the decision to change their ways. He and M even end up together by the end of it, as J realizes that so much of his self loathing came from internalized homophobia.

Anyway, that's the gist of it. Now for the actual conflict.

I have a friend (F, also white) whom I described the story to to get her thoughts on it. She said she was concerned that I was making my transgender character of color get with a racist, transphobic guy by the end. I tried to explain that it was BECAUSE of M that J gets put on the path to change, and that the man at the end is not the same man from the beginning. It got more heated as I tried harder and harder to explain the nuances of the story. I eventually asked her what ending SHE'D prefer, and she said she "would like it better if M beat the shit out of him, or if J got sent back to his own time and got shot."

I replied that that was a terrible idea, that there was nothing wrong with showing a character growing, and that she sounded super twitterbrained. She called me a nazi apologist and blocked me, and now she's lying to mutual friends and saying that I said that MLK deserved it (????????????). Fortunately none of them believe her after talking to me, so...

I know she's acting insane about the other shit, but it's starting to weigh on me. Should I change J's character so he's from sometime else? Or just scrap the story altogether? WIBTA for continuing it as planned?

[lizardsfromspace]

A key piece of the Jones puzzle is that, once upon a time, being a burnt out conspiracy weirdo was a significantly more bipartisan pastime. The right-wing conspiracy weirdos were way more dangerous - they made up the entirety of the militia movement in the 90s - and the more political, as they focused on fears of government takeovers, but it was once extremely common to find someone on the left - or who wasn't political at all - who couldn't stop talking about how UFOs were real and one was the Grassy Knoll.

This is exemplified by Behold a Pale Horse, a big tent conspiracy book that was meant for militia types, but also had chapters on UFOs, and also had chapters about how AIDS was bio-engineered to wipe out African-Americans, which garnered it an audience broad enough to include white supremacists and black nationalists and general UFO kooks, but also one of the chapters was literally just the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. People picked and chose what was relevant to them and ignored the rest

The last gasp of this was 9/11 trutherism, which is often inaccurately reported as primarily or exclusively left-wing, but there were a lot of left-wing believers, and it was the last conspiracy theory of its kind to gain currency on the left. One reason the protest art of the Bush years was so often, uh, bad was that too much of it flirted with trutherism, like, not directly but in a "we should ask Questions" way. If I had a nickle for every prominent political rap song of the era that paused for a verse about how Bush brought down the towers, I'd have two nickles etc. The first and only time I listened to Air America was some show where someone said we had to hear truthers out and. No.

But that was the era conspiracy theories not only gravitated towards the right, but also became far more current. People stopped talking about UFOs (even the UAP stories couldn't get people talking about them again) and they stopped talking about ancient events like JFK and MLK, once Obama was elected it was all about how he was going to throw all Christians into prisons inside Wal-Marts next Tuesday (a real thing they believed for a hot minute, it was called Jade Helm). We paved the burnt out stoner cousins talking about UFO abductions and put up a Joe Rogan. What a loss...?

[conceptofjoy]

yay the post i said id make about the blood aspect and why every vantas exudes blackness. is this a vantas only thing, or a blood bound thing? let me start by saying, you can make white or white coded characters blood bound, that's not what i'm trying to get across. it's just that blood as an aspect, when put through the lens of race specifically in america is just so fucking black.

redirecting you to the karkat specific, "why do i think he's black" thing :)

i get that the extended zodiac is kinda horoscopey, but like just a refresher on blood as a thematic element. you know how the majority of the exposition about the ancestors hinges around the signless and his civil rights movement? the fact that he tried to change alternia sets up the web of characters and reasons for them meeting in the first place.

you literally only need a rudimentary understanding of american history to know about the civil war and the civil rights movement. its not a secret that people who are oppressed form groups to protest their second class status. its also not a secret that major movement leaders get assassinated by people in power to keep that status quo, and their deaths never mark the end of their message. was hussie trying to do an mlk and malcom x parallel with the signless and summoner? LMFAO PROBABLY. that kinda just cements how inescapable race is when you're making an american centric comic.

i can end the post there lol, but here comes the question about where KANKRI fits into all of this... its tough explaining this really, if i call him one of those talented tenth believers to a black person they would just nod and be like ohh yeah... hm.

ok you know how there r some gay cis men who get away with some crazy misogyny but thinks it cancels out because they're gay? there is still something at the end of the day to be gained because they are men. it doesnt matter if they are seen as lesser than, as long as they can "pass" then they can get a spot at the leopards eating people faces party. FOR NOW. nothing that kankri says does he really mean fully. there's something to be gained by telling a woman why are you raising your voice?? when you mow them down with bullshit and they realistically get upset. he's a hardcore lib with conservative leanings.

actually speaking of, the commodification of unity. alternia's a capitalist and colonialist wheel, every instance of comradery comes in the form of quadrants, or how you serve the queen. karkat wants to be a threshecutioner and form bonds that way because he cannot think of anything different. kankri commodifies his own identity so he can be misogynistic and ablest. the signless breaks free from those preconceived boundaries, and tries to instill change to the system.

i dont rlly have a structure for all this or a note to end this on, here are some prev posts from a few days ago where i was thinking about the subject. 1 2 3

[beardedmrbean]

A trove of long-classified government documents concerning some of the most politically charged killings in modern American history — including the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy — could finally be made available to the public.

But that's just the start of the latest saga surrounding the killings, which have sparked fascination, conspiracy theories, and history-changing debate for decades.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday aimed at declassifying government documents related to the assassinations of former President John F. Kennedy, his brother and presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, and civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr. The order essentially requires the nation's security organizations to create plans to release the records.

The full findings of the government investigations into the three killings have been hidden for decades, sparking wide-ranging speculation and preventing a sense of closure for many Americans. All three men were national and international icons whose assassinations — and the theories swirling around them — became the stuff of books, movies, controversy, and the pages of history itself.

“A lot of people were waiting for this . . . for years, for decades," said Trump in signing the release of the documents. “Everything will be revealed.”

Tragedy in Dallas: JFK assassination on Nov. 22, 1963

The shock of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination in 1963 still echoes more than half a century later.

John F. Kennedy, known for both his glamour and steering the country through the closest it ever came to nuclear war, was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. He was shot and killed as his presidential motorcade brought him along a downtown city street and as he waved to adoring bystanders from the open-roofed car.

Police arrested Lee Harvey Oswald less than an hour later. But Oswald himself was killed on live TV just two days later as police were transferring him to a county jail.

Oswald’s killer, Jack Ruby, acted alone on an impulse, the President's Commission on the Assassination of President Kennedy, known as the Warren Commission, concluded. The commission ruled that Oswald also acted alone.

The JFK assassination sent the nation into mourning and shook it to its core, as Americans searched for answers. Hundreds of books have been written and documentaries produced, with bits and pieces of information emerging to this day.

Many regard the commission’s work as a government-orchestrated coverup and doubts have been raised over who killed John F. Kennedy have persisted. Conspiracy theorists lay the blame on everyone from Cuba — at the heart of the nuclear missile crisis — to the CIA itself.

The wide-ranging theories over Kennedy’s death - how many shooters were involved, how many bullets - became so ingrained in popular culture that they made it onto the comedy series Seinfeld.

MLK assassinated in Memphis, April 4, 1968

King, whose work furthering the Civil Rights Movement is honored with a federal holiday, was killed on the balcony outside his motel room in Memphis, Tennessee.

The Atlanta preacher was visiting the city to march alongside striking workers. On the evening of the assassination, he was preparing to leave for dinner at the home of a local minister.

He stepped outside to speak with colleagues in the parking lot below and was shot in the face by an assassin. James Earl Ray, a 40-year-old escaped fugitive, later confessed to the crime and was sentenced to a 99-year prison term.

But Ray later tried to withdraw his confession and said he was set up by a man named Raoul. He maintained until his death in 1998 that he did not kill King.

A Memphis tavern owner and a former FBI agent both also claimed a figure named Raoul was behind the killing, according to the Department of Justice.

Loyd Jowers, a former Memphis tavern owner, claimed 25 years after the murder that he participated in a mafia-linked conspiracy to kill King. Jowers also linked Memphis police and Raoul to the assassination, the Justice Department said.

Donald Wilson, a former FBI agent, also claimed in 1998 that after King’s assassination he found some papers in Ray’s car that mentioned Raoul as well as figures linked to the Kennedy assassination. Wilson said the papers were stolen from him by someone who later worked in the White House, according to the Justice Department.

RFK killed in Los Angeles on June 5, 1968

Robert F. Kennedy never achieved the political heights of his older brother. But he was no less a beloved figure for his championing of civil rights.

He served as his brother’s attorney general and as a senator. He was killed in Los Angeles where he had gone for the California Democratic primary, just months after declaring his presidential candidacy.

The younger Kennedy spent the evening of the election at a suite at the Ambassador Hotel awaiting election results. He eventually went down to a hotel ballroom to thank supporters, then went through the hotel kitchen after being told it was a shortcut to a press room.

An assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, killed him as he shook hands with a hotel busboy. Sirhan remains in prison.

But some believe the same elements behind the older Kennedy’s assassination also killed the former senator.

The presidential candidate’s son Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s pick to run the Department of Health and Human Services, has long maintained that Sirhan didn’t even shoot his father. The Trump cabinet pick believes Sirhan missed and that instead his dad was shot by a man linked to the CIA.

[council-of-beetroot]

As we see an increase in antisemitism I have reflected on my experiences how many years ago being the token Jew in my eighth grade English class and I have found some aspects about it which lead me to believe are the parts that Holocaust Education in the U.S. goes wrong

Being taught in English Classes

Often such as in my state, the Holocaust is taught as part of English curriculum. English teachers aren't history teachers and they may be lacking in the skills or knowledge required to teach in the necessary depth to discuss the Holocaust.

My mother used to teach English but she had a history degree as well. She would lecture in class about everything leading up to and during WWII. I remember reading handouts she had in her classroom while I was waiting after school about the history of antisemitism. I didn't have any of this in my English class unit, because to put it simply most English teachers aren't my mother who also has the prior knowledge of how to teach history.

Additionally, as it is part of English, there is often more focus on Holocaust literature rather than the topic itself

This is where I think it gets extremely flawed if a person's primary knowledge of a historical period is Anne Frank or the incredibly inaccurate boy in the striped pajamas. A single account or work of complete fiction shouldn't be your main lens to view any topic whether it's the Holocaust, Slavery, Civil Rights movement etc.

You're in short blurring fact and fiction when discussing these things in the context of literature.

Sense of Finality

I feel like in my classes at least there was this idea that was kind of implied that hatred of Jews began and ended with Hitler and the Holocaust. I think this leads to misconceptions about antisemitism.

I feel this is a problem as I remember mistakenly getting that takeaway in school regarding civil rights in America. It was taught that Slavery was a problem, emancipation proclamation, MLK said I have a dream, and the civil rights act was passed and bam no inequality or racism. Later on, I fortunately learned this was flawed for many reasons. But not everyone does.

Not teaching about how the Holocaust happened

If you aren't given the knowledge of how centuries of hatred lead up to the Holocaust, I feel the main takeaway becomes that it was almost a random occurrence.

Many learn the Holocaust is bad without learning the signs of thinking that can lead neighbors to kill neighbors.

So many people don't have the basic facts such as Hitler being elected rather than assuming power.

I think when you learn of an atrocity of such scale without learning the human beliefs that brought about it, you have learned nothing.

I had a girl in my college uni class who was shocked when I said that antisemitism didn't begin and end with Hitler. I can see where she would get this idea if I at ten figured that racism ended with MLK.

Using Simulation

Slavery and the Holocaust should probably not be taught using roleplay. It usually goes poorly and you can find dozens of examples of how this goes wrong.

Sanitizing History

Exactly what it sounds like. But it's a major problem in general with history education in the US. I think we downplay westward expansion, and slavery in the us. When we downplay those it's easy to see how some begin to downplay the Holocaust.

We had a kid faint on the trip to the Holocaust memorial at some of the images. I think it was because they were inadequately prepared to see the horrors in image, my teacher didn't show any pictures in class.

Final notes

I don't blame teachers. Teacher's jobs fucking suck from what I've seen and many don't have the skills or resources or experience. I guess for now I think it's good to recognize those holes in our education and fill them ourselves through self education and life long learning

With the current political atmosphere of education of the unpleasant or difficult to discuss parts of history, i can only see things getting worse if we don't change anything. But like I said in the absence of a solid education which discusses these topics, it's important to educate ourselves and confront our lack of knowledge.

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

by Tamar Sternthal

In another stroke of ludicrousness, Palestinian-American Rima Rafidi-Kern is quoted without challenge: “We’re the original Christians.” That’s a bald-faced lie. The original Christians were converted Jews. Jesus himself was a Jew, an inconvenient reality of ancient Jewish indigeneity belying the “settler-colonialist” canard.

GOSHAY, A reporter of local Midwestern affairs, loses her way in Mideast coverage, flailing even with basic nomenclature. “Palestine – also known as Israel,” she confounds the no-longer existent Palestine Mandate with Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip.

She bungles the 1947 United Nations plan as “partitioning the territory between the new State of Israel, the kingdom of Jordan and Egypt, and the exclusively Palestinian Gaza Strip.” In fact, the Partition Plan had nothing to do with Jordan or Egypt. As the UN explained: “The plan envisages the division of Palestine into three parts: a Jewish state, an Arab State, and the city of Jerusalem, to be placed under an international trusteeship system.”

The proposed Arab state included not only the Gaza Strip but also the West Bank and a huge chunk of what is now central and even southern Israel (including the city of Beersheba), along with a significant patch of land in the north, encompassing Acre and Nahariya.

But in a colossal misjudgment that sealed their people’s unfortunate fate for generations, the Palestinian Arab leadership rejected the seminal Partition Plan and the surrounding Arab countries attacked the nascent Jewish state. Arab leadership in Haifa, Jerusalem, Tiberias, and other locations encouraged residents to flee, resulting in the Palestinian refugee crisis.

Goshay neglects to mention these key historical events, choosing not to intrude on her interviewees’ uninterrupted soliloquy of singular Israeli culpability for Palestinian displacement.

Moreover, Goshay piles on in her own voice: “Palestinians argue that Israel’s Zionist government has trampled on” Balfour Declaration concerns for protection of Palestinian-owned land and religious rights. “They point to the more than 700,000 Palestinians who were displaced in 1948, with many ending up in refugee camps.”

The journalist’s exoneration of Palestinians for any responsibility reaches the reductio ad absurdum in her depiction of Hamas as thwarted peace activists forced into violence by Israel. Rami Hamdan said, “Hamas began with peaceful demonstrations,” intones the credulous reporter about an organization whose antisemitic founding charter calls “to fight the Jews and kill them.”

“The Palestinian people tried the Martin Luther King way, the way of no violence; they tried it,” Goshay quotes Hamdan of Canton. Apparently, the untold early MLK chapter of Palestinian history has mysteriously been erased from all historical memory and archives, wrongly replaced instead with a bloody trail of hijackings, bombings, and terror at the Olympics.

In this alternate reality, “Benjamin Netanyahu encouraged Hamas to begin because he did not want the PLO.” So talented was the young Netanyahu that he apparently pulled off this feat from New York where he served as ambassador to the United Nations during the time of the Hamas terror organization’s founding.

Goshay’s grasp of present-day reality is equally tenuous. Apparently unaware that more than 90% of West Bank Palestinians live under their own Palestinian Authority government, Goshay broadcasts her ignorance: “Palestinians cannot purchase property in the West Bank. Palestinian vehicles are required to display special license plates, and drivers are restricted to certain roads.”

[freakenomenon]

and if i said despite the fact that ellen is my favorite in both canons her psychodrama is confusing with its tone, tone DEAF with its topics and genuinely a little hard to enjoy as a victim of sexual assault myself. it comes of as more SHOCK VALUE slop than it does an actual tasteful representation of assault victims. they treat her trigger more like a FEAR as if her confronting the EXACT EVENT would not.. make it much much worse? and the "panic attacks" seem. tacked on at best. don't even get me started on the elevator scene in general. listen the acting was great but i just don't think ALLAT was necessary at all.

it HURTS me physically to say this but even teds representation of assault is more digestible. because they don't slap you in the face with it every 5 fucking seconds. not to mention that it is implied that ellen was a prideful and somewhat ARROGANT person about her accomplishments. and even someone who is emotionally neglectful towards others AND herself. choosing to retreat and isolate herself or distract herself rather than to face a problem. having more experience with "algorithms" than with "social grace" ( again, tacked on at best as well. ) it seems like a much more interesting route to see how her outlook on her work as well as well as other people affected her relationships even OUTSIDE of romance. showing that ellen is in fact a FLAWED person just as everyone else is and did hurt people, but her actions are still not as heinous when compared to some of the others. she just wasn't an emotionally healthy person.

also im NOT saying that she CANT be a victim because it's "too heavy!" it's just that they also could've tried just a LITTLE bit to make her more of. a character. outside of her being a victim of sexual assault. like they did with TED. also hey coming from a black person ellen being called "privileged and self indulgent" because she didn't go to any MLK marches and didn't ride the bus REEKS and STINKS of racism and nobody ever wants to talk about that.

but that's genuinely all that i think i have to say, this has been the #1 ellen fan. im gonna go do my laundry now.

[wilwheaton]

”Why do racists always invoke MLK…?”

This is a comment from Reddit. I swear to god, it’s like the redditor who wrote this transcribed all the shit my racist, entitled, privileged, Boomer parents said my entire childhood. Like, word for word.

”Why do racists always invoke MLK…?”

First, you gotta understand their position, which is “Racism doesn’t exist anymore”.  Because black people aren’t lynched, because there are wealthy rappers and basketball players, and because there was a black president, racism doesn’t exist in the US anymore.  And this is especially important; when black people get upset about their lot in life, it is because they are lazy and want a handout rather than earning their way like white people do.  When a black guy is killed by cops, he was a criminal and deserved his fate.  When a black woman loses her access to food stamps, it is because she was taking advantage of the system.  When black people get into college, it is because they are given special privilege they didn’t earn.  And when black folks talk about reparations, it is because they want to punish innocent people so they can be handed their success rather than earn it.  

Because there is no racism, and anytime some white person is called a racist it is likely because they don’t support simply handing success and money over to people who haven’t earned it, and not at all because they act racist in any way.  And the term “racist” has become toxic in the US lately; people lose their jobs after being called racists unfairly.  Heck, one could suggest minorities call white folks “racist” in retaliation, knowing there will be social consequences which are completely unearned.  So to combat this unfair and, in their view inaccurate, narrative they employ a couple tactics;

1) “I’m not racist, you are for even suggesting it”.  Since racism is defacto non-existent, playing the race-card is introducing a factor that doesn’t belong.  When a black person calls a white person racist, they are not only lying, but specifically targeting someone based on their race and falsely labeling them something socially toxic with intent to cause harm.  And the white person is defacto innocent because they would see anyone as insert accusation here, not just black/brown/gay/muslim/female/handicapped/immigrant people.

2) “Black people don’t know how good they have it”.  Classic myopic delusion that assumes the complete lack of racism in the US also means any ongoing hurdles faced by black/brown/gay/women/etc people are their own fault.  The fears behind CRT are great examples of the struggle to maintain this delusion, and not have people delve too deeply into history and see how cause/effect resulted in the current socio-economic imbalance.  And since there are successes in the black community, that is proof that racism is over.  Black folks had a black president, now shut up and stop making waves.  There is an attempt to show that any calls of racism are not only unfounded, but examples of success in the black community disprove systemic racism; wouldn’t MLK be proud?  And not only proud of the success, but would side with the white folks who are now experiencing reverse-racism as the lazy black folks ask for more.  Racism, they think, is simply targeting another race purposefully, and has nothing to do with power imbalance.

3) “I earned my success, so black folks need to earn theirs”.  And this is the crux of it all; white folks today don’t believe they are in a position of privilege because they work hard and their success was difficult.  Many of them come from poor families, struggled to pay for college, don’t have a family history of slaver ownership.  They see any minorities complaining as trying to get privilege unearned.  They assume that, because there is no more racism, there is balance and parity among the races.  Illegal immigrants are trying to circumvent the law, reparations and affirmative-action programs are unearned handouts, and special months/parades celebrating a particular group/race is promoting racism by giving them special attention they don’t deserve.  Many white people see themselves as victims because they don’t receive any overt benefits from being white, meanwhile minorities are showered with unearned benefits all the time.  The Great Replacement Theory is constantly being reenforced for them as they watch society take the side of minorities anytime someone attempts to call out this apparent imbalance in their favor.

But underneath all of this is the undeniable knowledge that they are, indeed, racist.  Whether it is a jealousy, or a fear of socio-economic parity, or ethnocentricity, they know that society isn’t accepting overt racism anymore.  And because of this, they have to hold back, watch what they say, watch how they treat people.  “Make America Great Again” was a call to return to a time when casual racism was fun, and didn’t mean anything, and people weren’t so thin-skinned.  Being “Woke” is forcing people to take difficult looks at the fact racism still exists, which is uncomfortable and threatens to challenge the current socio-economic stability, so terms like “woke” are being dismantled, misused, redirected into something that seems illegitimate.  There is an active, desperate avoidance of acknowledging racism still exists, because admitting otherwise means admitting their world-view is wrong.   invoking MLK isn’t done out of malicious intent, but out of desperate denial of a world that doesn’t fit their assumptions.  Many, perhaps most, white folks in the US have no consciously ill will towards minorities, and would recoil in distaste at the notion of being considered racist.  And they will spend all day explaining why they are perfectly justified in accepting a racist position on a topic and how that doesn’t make them racist because the minorities in question are to blame.  Deflection.  Denial.  Dismissal.  And then vote to prevent change.

(Source)