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This week we will begin to think like critical media analysts. Issues of race and racism are sometimes buried in mainstream media. Generally, when it does become relevant for media to cover issues of racism it's related to a problematized response to people of color. Below are four examples of our contemporary discourse on race, racism, and how difference is socially constructed. Answer the following questions after you review one of the videos below:
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Judy Chen
10/15/2014 04:47:12 pm
The video I chose to analyze this week was “Racism in America: Small Town 1950s Case Study Documentary”. It was centered on the story of a small African American family called the Meyers moving into a predominantly white town (Levett Town), and interviewing how current white residents reacted to this move. One of the first residents to be interviewed voiced her negative opinion about how a black family moving in would lower the property value of a white town. Housing discrimination is a huge theme discussed in our Tim Wise textbook, and this woman’s attitude towards this issue was an accurate but unfair reality. “Indeed, though he addressed housing bias in his now-famous address on race in March, he did so almost exclusively from the perspective of a backward-looking commentary about how racism in the past had limited the ability of African Americans to accumulate wealth - ” (Tim Wise, 19). The act of the Meyers moving to Levett town itself does not decrease the property value, but it’s the hostile attitudes that white people have towards people of color that causes such a move to lower the property values within an predominantly white town. Another theme that was brought out in this documentary was assimilation when a women expressed how “they should educate and better themselves, not force their way in” they of course, meaning the Meyers and people of color as a whole. Tim Wise also discusses assimilation when he ran through explanation of why Obama was such a popular candidate for president and how widely supported he was by white people. “So long as whites can vote for a black man only to the extent that he doesn’t remind them of other black people, it is fair to say that white people remain mired in a racism quite profound” (Tim Wise, 22). The whole notion that a person of color must be as close to being white as possible to be accepted and supported is an entire new level of absurdity. Tim Wise explains that a huge reason why Obama won over so many white supporters was due to the fact that he fit well enough into the American status quo, and that he “isn’t as black” or as the others, or simply different from other people of color. Another interviewee in the documentary also expressed her concern on how she believes the Meyers are deliberately moving in to disrupt the peace in this white town, and to bring other people of color with them to infiltrate the town. In Chris Crass’ book, he mentions his beliefs about how the United States is socially constructed so that race, gender, and class are all separate into categories of power, privilege, and oppression. These beliefs exemplifies how privileged people do not want to give up their power, and are constantly worried about the threat of other races taking their status away from them, which is why this women in the documentary shows concern over the possibility of more people of color in the future moving into this white neighborhood, and perhaps resulting in a completely integrated community. There were also individuals who specifically kept their children away from talks about the Meyers moving into the neighborhood, because they don’t want and also don’t need their children to know about it, which is both privilege and denial. Choosing not to speak on an issue does not make the problem disappear. Believing that discrimination doesn’t exist because you haven’t witnessed huge problems first hand also doesn’t indicate any truth in that belief.
Alexander Salah
10/16/2014 10:06:00 am
You made some very good points in your blog about “Racism in America, small town 1950s case study”. As I was reading your post towards the top about when the Meyers moved in to a predominantly white neighborhood, I couldn’t believe the reactions people were having. Then I remembered this was in the 1950s where racist people voiced their opinions more confidently even if they sounded completely wrong and verbally abusive. The housing discrimination towards African Americans was a real issue that has not been brought up too much in class. “It’s the hostile attitudes that white people have towards people of color that causes such a move to lower the property values”. It was not black people moving into neighborhoods but was the white people negatively thinking about how blacks were inferior to them and could cause prices to drop. I think this quote is powerful due to the fact that symbolizes the views of whites in the 1950s.
Dakota Bramer
10/16/2014 09:43:37 am
Hate crimes/ discrimination
Alexander Salah
10/16/2014 09:56:33 am
I agree with you as I am Arabic and know how hard of a time people of my descent had after 9/11 because of this false stereotype. My parents would constantly get stopped in airports just for having an Arabic last name. People would get uncomfortable when my family spoke Arabic in certain places after 9/11 so in order to make people feel at ease, we stuck to English. Just because people who caused 9/11 were Arabic, people jumped to conclusions about the rest of us, which kind of sucked. Although I understand that some people act irrationally due to fear and paranoia, I would expect some people to have a degree of knowledge and common sense not to judge every single person who looks different.
Brandon Morin
10/18/2014 04:12:34 pm
Stereotyping is so easy to do in our every day lives. I'm sure most of us have experienced different degrees of it and I'd be surprised if anyone truly didn't stereotype others as well. It is a flawed and ignorant way to discriminate and judge and in the process people do indeed suffer. The 9/11 example is a very solid example of an extremely unfair case of this and it's a shame the way certain stereo types become socially acceptable and unpopular to defend due to social significance. Its the same way slavery went on as long as it did. It is unpopular to stand up against a look alike of the individuals that hijacked planes and because of that cowards keep their mouths shut and stand by while others take advantage of the easy targets. Fear is why stereotypes are created and fear is why nothing is done about them.
Jason Do
10/19/2014 11:14:57 am
It definitely is a strange thing where 19 people could do something horrible and millions of other people are put under scrutiny. However, with all the white people behind mass shootings and crimes, it's a wonder we don't start suspecting white people of anything. I think it relates to the idea of a default person. Human natures loves to scapegoat other people, especially if they are different. It is easy to put South Asians under the microscope because we attribute them as being "the other" whereas white people are too close to our default person to stereotype.
Dylan SanFilippo
10/19/2014 02:25:53 pm
I agree. Discrimination has been rampant for centuries among many peoples, and more specifically; Americans. Every age seems to have its own racial conflict. It just so happens that the racial conflict of the current age is between Americans and south Asians, especially Muslims. It is the natural reaction of people in power to oppose anything that is new or foreign, but that does not justify the racial discrimination of the masses.
Alexander Salah
10/16/2014 09:45:43 am
For this weeks blog post I decided to watch the RT (Russian television) video, “Is the white race under threat in America?” before getting started, it is important to realize that RT is a very biased, backed propaganda tool for Russia. I can affirm this claim because I have watched RT the past two years. Obviously this is my belief but I share the same opinion with many respected people. Is the white race under threat in America? This is a question that stuck in my head throughout the video not due to accuracy of the claim but how outrageous it sounds. As much as I want to believe that the tides have turned and Minorities (non white) are in charge of this world, this is simply not the situation at hand. In one of the few cases, I agree with the RT analyst, who argues that white people rule this world and said, “Have you looked at the color of the faces in congress?” this is a hysterically true statement. Matthew Hienback who is a student at Towson University, argues that whites are being discriminated against in job hiring practice, acceptance to universities, and the affirmative action policy. Although I try to see both sides to an argument, I have trouble seeing the claims he is making to be true. For those who do not know what affirmative action is, it refers to “equal opportunity employment measures that Federal contractors and subcontractors are legally required to adopt. These measures are intended to prevent discrimination against employees or applicants for employment on the basis of "color, religion, sex, or national origin.”(Wiki) The affirmative action policy in the United States was created so minorities being non-white and other people who are discriminated against would have an equal and fair chance at getting hired from various companies. Although there is an argument for reverse discrimination to be taking place, many people around the world believe that discrimination has been a white, racially backed movement for the past couple of thousands of years. In the video, the analyst brings up white privilege, to which Hienback immediately claims is a Marxist term, which loosely applies to “whites”.
Dominic Allred
10/16/2014 01:16:21 pm
The video I found most intriguing was the video about racism in small town America. The intriguing aspect of this video is how relevant it is to small town America today and how racist tendencies are still prevalent in small town America. Some main themes that were shown in the video were: black families bring property value down, fear that blacks cause violence, economic down turn, integrated marriages, and that there is spit in the community about approval of black family living in a all white town. The first two things are fear based ignorance and racism about black families. The video stated that based on statistics that blacks didn’t want integrated marriages and were only seek the same opportunity to own a house like white Americans. These fears are based on assumptions about African Americans; in correlation to Tim Wise when he evaluates the movie Crash he uncovers assumptions similar to the ones from the video about African Americans being inherently violent in Crash which in turn through the movie perpetuates these assumptions. Another fear the white individuals in the video expressed was economic; that blacks will be the cause of economic turmoil in Levittown. However, a woman in the video refutes that claim and states that property value and economic issues are a white problem and rooted from white people. Something that Wise brings up related to whites understanding and assumptions of blacks; Wise quotes Joe Feagin, “Most whites show an antiblack, pro-white bias on psychological tests” (41). This quote relates to fears and the split of acceptance of a black family in Levittown. The fears are rooted in psyche of white Americans and the split is more for show than actual truth. To further debunk the concept that blacks are a source of violence, Wise in response to an ignorant email says, “The reason it is racist to say that “most blacks are criminals” is because such a position is based on racial stereotypes rather than factual information: It casts aspersions upon an entire group of people, based not on truth, but on the basis of ignorant prejudice” (37). This quote clearly shows that fear of blacks exhibited in the video from white Americans is ignorant, stereotype, prejudice based and in my opinion pathetic. The “issue’s” that arouse in the video were expected in my view because this story is repeated constantly through American history after blacks were freed from slavery. As I stated early these fears are pathetic, but I guess if someone is racist against minorities, the upward movement of those minorities causes fear. I can only hope that facts and statistic can fight these types of ignorance and fears, for we will only repeat this vicious cycle if it does not.
Vanessa Fernandez
10/19/2014 12:45:34 pm
Just like you I hope people inform themselves of the realities and truth that statistics show. Maybe then we we will be closer to eliminating false stereotypes that the media and society has created. This ignorance and these fears we are witnessing by white people in denial are only a product of what is publicized on a daily basis and the way minorities are being portrayed needs to change.
Dylan SanFilippo
10/19/2014 02:24:47 pm
If you want the “vicious cycle” (Allred) to stop, then you have to attack the problem at the root; that being the psyche. Unfortunately the psyche is such a deeply integrated part of a human self that it is not easily changed. Racism has to stop, that is a given, but stopping it is like trying to stop a runaway train car with your bare hands. It can be done (assuming the car is on a level grade), but it takes a lot of time and effort.
Arnulfo Gembe
10/19/2014 03:38:13 pm
You made a point on how racism has become rooted to our psyche and it is unfortunate. Take for instance Wise’s own grandmother, her entire life she fought racism but because she was exposed to racism as a child racism had become embedded within herself. This makes me wonder what we as a society can come up as solutions so as to not expose the youth to racism. Any Ideas? I remember in my home sometimes my parents or brothers would make remarks about certain races that lived in our neighborhood that negatively influenced my perspective upon that race. Someday I’ll be a parent and I’ll try my best to not negatively influence my children that way.
Hakwoo Kim
10/23/2014 05:15:22 pm
I really agree with you that many fears that privileged ones have are many times just illusion. Like the video says, I think it is more like a test on our democracy. I also think what you pointed out about fighting ignorance is important. Many times, our stereotypical or racists thoughts and tendencies seem to come from our lacking openness. If we could be open to each other and pay attention to their stories and actual facts, I think we will find ways to really understand each other and be more united.
Tiffany Le
10/16/2014 02:10:11 pm
Three themes in the video “Is the white race under threat in America?” include white denial, paranoia from the dominant group, and the lack of opportunity for people of color/myths about policies to aid the “underprivileged.” First of all, white denial and white privilege go hand in hand. Matthew Heimbach, the person who founded the White Student Union, believes that whites do not run this country. He also discounts the argument about Southern states trying to secede from the North over reasons of slavery because Ulysses S. Grant had slaves. Rich white people have always ruled this country. The dominant groups, beginning with the founders of the United States of America, have written laws to their advantage. In this case, Heimbach mentions that skin color shouldn’t matter (except for white skin); Wise also mentions that whites love to chant “race doesn’t matter, race doesn’t matter” (Wise 18). The idea that color doesn’t matter feeds into the mentality of white denial, and white privilege causes the paranoia that results in people like Heimbach, who do not want to recognize that this nation was built on systematic oppression, forming modern white supremacist groups. As Wise has mentioned, paranoia forces the privileged group of people to take “preventative” measures in order to keep their power. Heimbach explicitly states that he doesn’t mind stores having “whites only” signs or black stores having “blacks only” signs, which would return our nation back to the openly, racially segregated days. Lastly, the host on this talk show rebuts Heimbach’s argument that whites need more representation and support from other white people because laws like affirmative action are working against them by mentioning how people of color have less opportunity in this country, as well as less wealth inherited from generation to generation, which iterates Wise’s notion that whites have more accumulated wealth that people of color do, AND people of color earn less than their white counterparts with the same credentials (Wise 58). Also, we've discussed in class how white women benefit most from affirmative action and are the people who receive a majority of welfare. After watching this video, I think Tim Wise should visit this school and speak to the White Student Union (haha free copies of Speaking Treason Fluently for all!).
Karla O'Connor
10/17/2014 01:35:01 pm
Tiffany, I enjoyed reading your post. You talked about how because white people have been able to accumulate wealth due to the advantages they have had for generations, people of color can never earn the same as their white counterparts, no matter having the same experiences and education as them. When Wise mentions this, it clicked in my mind that this country has built a system of oppression for centuries, where the privileged will always maintain their power by oppressing those that are disadvantaged. This really put things into perspective for me, and made me angry that people like Heimbach would not mind putting "whites only" signs to stores. This kind of ignorance and victimizing people of color will only get worse if Heimbach and his supporters do not open their eyes to statistics, and to history. He needs a reality check and needs to take classes about Race and Politics in order to think more critically about these issues.
Jason Do
10/19/2014 11:22:07 am
I definitely couldn't take the student very seriously. Though it is true that the host could've shown a little more restraint on his comments, I don't know if I would have been able to even participate in the conversation with my full attention. This is exactly the type of mentality Tim Wise was warning us about in his speech. It boggled my mind to see that people could believe so strongly that not only are people of color a threat to the white race, but that white people don't even run the country. This is an eyeopener into why classes like this one are necessary for everyone.
Brandon Morin
10/19/2014 02:23:25 pm
You definitely wrote your piece well. Its amazing what status and privilege does to a person's way of thinking. Sitting in luxury homes driving a benz and worrying about the threat that affirmative action has brought to your life is pretty humorous. I'm sure that many people that fall into that category get together at their country club and bitch about it while sipping on expensive wine. The system we live in racist and it's interesting to think about the whites only and black only signs. I wonder if that would be a way to bring people back to reality and force them to think about the truth that we live in?
So Chun Kiu Ryan
10/19/2014 04:01:23 pm
I really like your blog! I love how you illustrate the bonding between white denial and white privilege. As you mention, the chant " race doesn't matter" sort of reflects their inability to identify the seriousness of racism in our society. They just deny existence of racism simply because they don't know how dreadful the situation is (white privilege). It explains why most white people still think race doesn't matter while people of color think it still exists. It is shocking and sad for me to see how a white person denies racial inequality in modern era.
Karla O'Connor
10/16/2014 02:43:04 pm
Video: South Asian Americans
Vanessa Fernandez
10/16/2014 05:09:49 pm
You have a lot of good points about how out society has much more sympathy for white terrorists than for Muslims and Arabs. It's human nature for us to want to feel safe, this is why we stereotype and put a label on people we see. Unfortunately a lot of people have chosen the wrong stereotypes for the wrong reasons. These people feeling "threatened" by a turban have a lot to learn about who terrorists really are.
Tiffany Le
10/17/2014 09:59:29 am
Hi Karla and Vanessa! Unfortunately, the media and the government have great influence on the way we think. The media doesn't choose to defame white terrorists that wreak havoc on America; instead, they choose to present people of color as threats to our nation, which is part of the divide and conquer tactic that people in power use to maintain their positions in society. White people, especially rich white people, apparently do no wrong. Even after committing terrible crimes, the punishments that whites receive are not on par with the punishments that POC receive for lesser crimes.
Dakota Bramer
10/19/2014 01:38:05 pm
While I do agree "white terrorists" get overlooked in their own country (US), I think it may have even more to do with the fact that they are Americans rather than because they are white. The word "terrorist" seems to have a foreign connotation to it with "external(to the US)" groups or people trying to attack. In my opinion, it's how the word "terrorist" is defined by an individual and here in the U.S. I feel many attach it to foreign terrorists.
Arnulfo Gembe
10/19/2014 03:50:12 pm
When professor Crain brought up the student who had brought a gun on campus and how the student was white I thought it was strange that a white male had done that. But then I remembered how in the previous years whenever I would see news headlines about gun shootings at schools or movie theaters gun shootings the responsible was always a white male. This must have had a majority of our nation scratching their heads because the media has made us as a society associate terrorism with any skin pigment except white.
So Chun Kiu Ryan
10/16/2014 03:14:12 pm
In the video clip “Is the white race under threat in America?” the guest who is the founder of White only students union expressed his thoughts on discrimination against white. He thinks that white is the race which is taken over by “minorities” (colored people). Based on the discrimination experience his ancestors had gone through, he states that everyone has experience with racism. Yet, he failed to connect that to the common problem of new immigrants. In United States, immigrants from all over the world face different extent of discrimination. The discrimination against their ancestors of Ireland is actually not due to racism, indeed it’s due to their inability to blend in with Americans and adopt their custom. At the end of the day, they have the ideal skin color in local community and we can see that all white immigrants “blend into” American society way better than any race of color after some time. It’s just that their cultural difference triggered the hatred against new immigrants. “After all, from the anti-immigrant camp one regularly hears yelps and screams about how Mexicans in particular refuse to learn “our ways” or assimilate to “our culture” Apparently, white race wasn’t a dominant factor of so-called experience of “Discrimination against White” in local Americans’ mind.
Gordon Wang
10/19/2014 04:47:52 pm
I like and agree with your analysis of the difference in discrimination towards different ethnicities of immigrants. It definitely seemed like the student was grasping at straws in a sense when he tried to indicate he was as affected by discrimination from being Irish as black people were due to slavery. His use of affirmative action as an example was a laughable as its very need (not to mention that ironically it is mostly benefited by white woman) is a prime indicator of white privilege.
Nelson Chuang
10/16/2014 03:48:38 pm
It is true that all races face some sort of discrimination but for one to argue that whites are being more oppressed than people of color is throwing the fight for equality totally out of proportion. Matthew Heimback, the founder of White Student Union, argues that white individuals are being openly discriminated by people of color through affirmative action and hiring processes that attempt to promote diversity. Heimbacks ignorance fuels his support for succession and believes that all individuals should have the ability to openly discriminate, which contradicts his reason for creating a White Union to combat open racism. He believes that choice should be available to everyone. That if a black store owner wanted black individuals only, they should be allowed to do so just like whites have openly done during the Confederacy.
Tiffany Le
10/17/2014 09:53:59 am
Hi Nelson! I agree that he doesn't have good perspective on the issue of racism. If one google searches "who does affirmative action help most?", he/she will see that the first article that pops up is "Affirmative Action Has Helped White Women More Than Anyone". Although certain groups of white people have faced discrimination in the past, they are not systematically oppressed today. The opportunities that white people have will not be affected by "reverse racism". This is why it's necessary to have politics courses and discussions on this matter.
So Chun Kiu Ryan
10/19/2014 03:40:47 pm
Hi! I totally agree with you. He has good intentions that he wants to protect white people, but his lack of experience and knowledge about racial inequality make his argument too subjective and biased. He failed to show how discrimination is really oppressing white people, and unable to support his stance by examples at the same time. Thus he was unable to connect his ideas well and sometimes make them self contradicting.
Niloufar Pirkhezri
11/10/2014 10:46:49 am
I agree. Heinbach was not very knowledgable on facts and statistics when he was asked about it. He ignored the question about white privilege, which obviously proves Wise's point about denial and he also dodged questions he did not have answers for with ridiculous statements. I agree with freedom of speech but Im not quite sure where he thinks exactly this union is going to take him.
Gordon Wang
10/16/2014 03:58:23 pm
The video I chose to look at was "Rachel Maddow - Racist streak exposed in Republican immigration reform debate ". Three elements that can be seen in this video are white supremacy, the idea of reverse racism and the power of the media.
Jason Do
10/16/2014 04:48:45 pm
It's hard to describe the video “Is the white race under threat in America?” It is definitely an eye opening experience to see that there are people out there who feel the same way as the guest speaker. While watching the video, I couldn't help but notice the themes of white privilege, paranoia, and denial. It is quite obvious that the speaker was deep in denial about racism, and even going so far as to believe that white people themselves are experiencing racism. His denial stems from his paranoia about colored people rising above white people and taking away the white privilege he was born with, but refuses to recognize. He claims that because his ancestors immigrated to the US, they too faced discrimination and were victims of racism. However, he fails to realize or recognize that no matter how hard his ancestors had it in America, no one had it harder than black people. He didn't even get into slavery, and wrote it off like it was just a minor thing, but emphasizes the hardships his Irish forefathers had trying to make it in a white society. He fears that minorities will take over the nation and that white people will be discriminated on the color of their skin. "Fact is "nigger" is still the first word in most white people's minds when they see a black man being taken off to jail in the evening news," states Tim Wise. Though the speaker fears for a future were whites are a minority, he refuses to acknowledge the present where minorities are still actually minorities. Wise says that "no one is unaffected by the daily socialization to which we are all subjected-specifically with regard to the way we are taught to think about persons of color in this society." The speaker claims that he is at risk of being denied entrance to a university because of affirmative action, when many colored students were already being denied entrance before affirmative action even took place, and were denied entrance into public schools even a century ago. This history of white people taking power over colored people is the institution on which racism is based. But white people don't need to know that. According to Tim Wise, white people have the privilege of not needing to know about racism. They don't need to know about the history of grievances experienced by people of color. In fact, every month not designated to be a different people's history month is white history month, according to Tim Wise.
Dominic Allred
10/19/2014 12:05:13 pm
White people being a minority is an interesting fear. The issue with this is, even when white people become a minority they will still dominate the social structure and ideology of the US. This because the white-supremacist society we live in has been the norm for generations, and it's bonds are challenging to break. Additionally white people being a minority is only true if you clump all the current minorities into one group. However these minorities are not one group since they each have their own experiences and challenges.
Vanessa Fernandez
10/16/2014 04:59:04 pm
I chose to watch the video called " Is the White Race Under Threat in America" which shows a student stating his opinion on why there should be a whites only student union. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, freedom of speech exists for a reason right? But a good opinion requires you to be knowledgeable about what you stand for. By the way this student was talking about minorities as if they have an advantage for getting a job or being accepted to a university shows he clearly has not been paying attention to statistics. The news caster asks him "do you know what white privilege is?" and he is quick to dismiss it and change the subject. This is the definition of white denial. Tim Wise asks in his book, "Why do people seek to rationalize their biases, either with reference to limited personal experiences or by appealing to ostensibly objective data?". This student has felt, or believes that he is being left out of the advantages that he claims minorities have and to put it into simple words, he needs a reality check. He also mentions that he believes whites have the right to have an "only whites" sign in their business just as much as blacks have the right to have a "colored only" business. This way of thinking is taking a million steps back from where we are now. I like what Wise implies when he says, "It's not about intolerance and a need to love your neighbor, hold hands, and sing Pete Seeger songs." Rascim is not a matter of feeling pitty for those who have been oppressed by it, but it is about people being worth the same in someone's eyes regardless of race. If this student feels the need to have a so called "whites only union" then I say let him have one. Let's not deny this student from something that other students of color have. The things that this union will do, and the things that they will partake in will speak for itself.
Karla O'Connor
10/17/2014 06:38:13 am
The quote that you included is so important to shine the light on because this student is feeling left out from these advantages that people of color are taking away from him, therefore, he is rationalizing his bias based on his own personal experiences and only victimizing minorities, thus shifting the blame on them instead. This is called victimization which Wise explains being one of the reasons for White Denial. I really liked your ideas in this response!
Dakota Bramer
10/19/2014 01:18:52 pm
I like your point saying "it's not a matter of feeling pitty" rather it being about treating everyone equal regardless of race. It is so true becuase feeling sorry for someone or yourself, does not do anything. Regarding the union, I think everyone has the right to create what they want as long as they are not hurting anyone or anything.
Hakwoo Kim
10/23/2014 05:24:08 pm
I really agree with you that he needs some reality check x) I felt pretty much the same while I was watching the video. He seems to be too drawn to his ideas that he can't really look around and see the true reality. I also like the quotes you used, especially the one that says it is more about regarding everyone as equally worth. I think it's very humanistic and an important attitude to have open mind, and it is lacking of this openness that leads such a student to feel that way. It just makes me frustrated that some people are so willing to use their "freedom" for misleading causes. Like you said, all we can do is to let them do it, and hope they will learn the lesson.
Niloufar Pirkhezri
11/10/2014 10:44:12 am
I completely agree with your points. I feel that Heinbach does not have all the knowledge and statistics he needs to be going to such extreme measures. The fact that he groups all colored people as being any race than white, shows his ignorance on the topic and lack of knowledge. I also love the quote you used "It's not about intolerance and a need to love your neighbor, hold hands, and sing Pete Seeger songs." It really isn't about showing pity, but actually seeing someone as the person they are rather than their skin tone.
Nicole Cheng
10/16/2014 04:59:14 pm
Gordon Wang
10/19/2014 07:32:59 am
I do agree with you the interviewer did not seem very interested in actually discussing the subjects and was more interested in just shooting down his statements. But if you notice the video is only about six minutes long and with these short interview segments now on talk shows it seems like modern day media is more interested in provoking some sound bites than actually having formative debate of any kind.
Hakwoo Kim
10/17/2014 04:16:37 am
These series of videos of this week touch upon many systemic racisms prevalent in this society. First theme I drew from these video is how stereotypes limit people from their rights and power. The video “South Asian Americans Continue to Face Racism, Intimidation, Ten Years After 9/11” largely covers how South Asian Americans are still going through racial profiling, scapegoating, hate crimes, police brutality and many other disturbing actions resulting from that formed stereotypes. This kind of phenomena is not just an issue of South Asian Americans but of many people of colors. A more troubling issue is that there has been not much done to prevent and minimize such racists culture and system, and it is evident in Rachel Maddow’s show, how racists comments and consciousness are cultivated even by politicians, who are supposed to work hard to address people’s voices and concerns. Just watching how racism is still prevalent raises deep concerns of our society’s progress towards more liberating society.
Hakwoo Kim
10/17/2014 05:03:45 am
(Sorry these parts were cut out)
Niloufar Pirkhezri
11/10/2014 10:41:01 am
In this weeks blog post I chose to watch the video "Is the white race under threat in America?" This video stood out to me because of its ridiculous title. The first theme that stood out to me was white denial that Time Wise speaks a lot about in his speech. The news caster asks Matthew Heinbach, the leader of the whites only union, what he thinks white priviledge is. Heinbach immediately changes the topic which shows that he is in denial of the white population. Heinbach also categorizes "colored people" as anyone who is not white. To me this shows his ignorance towards other races other than his own. The fact that Hainbach is setting a union of only whites shows that he is threatened that the white race is under threat by other races. Thinking that eventually whites are going to be extinct? His views are completely against statistics and shows paranoia. I like Tim Wise's quote when he states "It's not about intolerance and a need to love your neighbor, hold hands, and sing Pete Seeger songs." It isn't about feeling guilty for someone who might have been oppressed, but rather seeing them for who they are regardless of their skin tone. Heinbach should set up his white union and see how far it takes him. Maybe then he will start to do some self evaluating.
Bojana Cvijic
12/1/2014 06:37:28 pm
The videos I chose to analyze was "Is the white race under threat in America?" and "Rachel Maddow - Racist streak exposed in Republican immigration reform debate" Leave a Reply. |
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