>
>
>careful now: this was not about JUST getting stopped because you sport
>that bumper sticker, it was about getting stopped MORE than you would if
>you had the anti-racism sticker. that was shat this was about. from what
>you wrote above, i'm not quite sure what your answer to that query is.
you honestly think that after everything i've typed it would be anything other than yes, of course, i agree? i don't know what to say to that chris
>also--and again, you might think of this as unnecessarily looking for a
>fight--why do you feel compelled to add the points about the abolish
>masculinity and capitalism stickers?
i minored in black studies, a program i made up on my own b/c i went to nontrad program. we made up our course of study and then had to defend it in writing and verbally to a committee, the degree program rationale. i pursued those studies because i read the literatures of black men and women because nothing else i came across, in terms of literatures of struggle, ever spoke to my own experience like this literature did. in the course of those studies i met people who introduced me to the women like maria lugones, bell hooks, gloria anzaldua, patricia hill collins, etc the grad program i went to specialized in theory and was committed to building one of the only programs in the country that studied what they are now calling "intersectionality" --they were committed to the study of , in other words, race, class and gender (sexuality) because our theoretical position is that they are inextricably intertwined and must be understood in terms of the other: because you bet that i'd be treated differently were i black woman with an antiwhite bumper sticker and still differently were i a black man. and quite differently still in my neighborhood, which is minority white, than were i living in some white suburb.
but i made that comment quite some time ago and also did so in my discussion of my friend R. AND, to add insult, i also noted in closing the following:
>but, more importantly, i DO think that the use of the term racialization
>does elide the experience of being thought a little crazy by my
>colleagues, etc. "Abolish Racialization" on my bumber sticker wouldn't
>get me firebombed, yes?
by pointing out that "abolish racialization" on my bumper sticker wouldn't get me firebombed, i WAS answering you in the affirmative.
i am finding that you are asking me to jump through hoops or pass little tests.
there's a reason for my insistence on analyzing race/class/gender/sexuality together, whenever possible. there are good reasons for doing so.
but, please, don't let me stop you from perceiving things any old way you'd like, to wit:
>is it because you think that the police would stop you just as much if you
>drove around with abolish the white race bumper sticker? if that is what
>you are suggesting, then i don't think so. or to put it another way, who
>is more likely to get harrasseed MORE by the police, a white woman with
>anti-capitalist/anti-masculinist stickers or a black woman? i think we all
>know the answer to that.
>
>also, one of the annoying habits of a lot of white radicals is to start
>talking about class and gender as if to suggest that a black person
>talking about race is "obsessing" on racial matters and forgetting the
>other forms of repression. i'm sure you know what i'm talking about. it is
>clearly a form of defensivness. you are clearly a women who is committed
>to understanding racial matters but i have say to that to bring up the
>class and gender stuff in this context feels vaguely defensive to me. i
>really don't mean that as an attack and i am not trying to diminish your
>committment. but with white folks who are trying,
i have a long way to go to work on anti-whitism and i'm surely far behind a lot of folks in my willingness to address certain issues in my research and teaching or substantive interests revealed on this list. i think several folks here read my analyses and comments and suspect i'm a racist, partly because they reject intersectionality as theory and partly because of who i am. white middle class people are good at calling other whites the racists: e.g., i was once asked to speak at a conference to represent the "white, working class" point of view. that is, they wanted me to talk about race and gender so i could address why white working class men were racist and sexist.
now, i could call you on something similar--your refusal to address gender issues. as you must know, there is an entire literature devoted to this problem in black feminist thought. but would that be fair to you? to assume, with so little to go by, that chris is a black man who prioritizes anti-whitism to the exclusion of anti-masculinity? would it be fair to point out that i think you are running away from the issue, defensive? would it be fair to point out that there are ways in which driving around with an "anti masculinist" bumper sticker would be problematic in my personal life in ways that you've probably never imagined, given that i have a son, a father, a step brother, a lover, and many friends --all of whom are men with varying degrees of understanding re sexism? should i point out to you that while being targeted by the cops sucks (and i am intimately familiar with police brutality) but it sucks just as much to try to maintain my integrity as a feminist and still love the men i love?
>i really believe in being straight about my feelings about these matters,
>whether or not they are grounded in reality so...
thank you. i wouldn't want anything else. i typically call it like i see it, as well. therefore, as you've gathered, i'm a bit insulted. but in the process of typing and working through this i'm becoming less so. i think my friend R once told me that she really had a hard time with smiling whitey, pleasantly agreeing with everything she said and walking on eggshells trying not to upset her. she didn't like that. i could be wrong, but i took that to be something on the order of what another colleague once told me: that whites were quick to perceive blacks as getting inappropriately angry, as if simply criticizing were irrational anger on their part -- which is a way in which racism emerges in academia, because academics are trained to be highly critical, but blacks are seen to be inappropriately critical and emotional if they speak up and out. i know you don't have to be told this, but i'm working thru my experiences and what i've learned to understand the dynamics here.
i will chill a bit and get back to the rest of your post.
kelley
kelley