Cockburn on slavery

[Brett Knowlton]

Perhaps this is nitpicking, but there really isn't such a thing as an
oppressed black race.  There are lots of individuals who are oppressed that
happen to be black, many because of the color of their skin.  But there are
also wealthy blacks who oppress poor whites, other blacks, etc.  The fact
that this is the rare exception to the usual pattern is cold comfort to the
victims.

Also, this whole discussion of "black" and "white" bothers me.  Even when
used to describe patterns of thought and behavior, it puts an uncomfortable
label on these things - people will invariably make disturbing associations
that perhaps can't be strictly logically justified, but will nonetheless
take place.  Why don't we just call things by their real names, i.e.
economic exploitation and racial hatred and/or prejudice, as opposed to
"white" or "black"?

Brett

At 04:49 PM 11/17/98 -0500, you wrote:
>I'm not sure what the response
>is to me in this, but I am not running
>a contest on "oppressed peoples".
>A poster with the name Snitgrrl
>tried to argue that my pro-Black
>argument ignored other oppressed
>groups beside Black people. I 
>responded that not only are
>pro-Black arguments not in
>conflict with pro-Mexican 
>and other groups other struggles
>, but that I am
>the member of more than one
>oppressed group. I said that to
>give the poster a hint that I am
>in solidarity with the whole
>range of oppressed peoples.
>
>
>Charles Brown