The Color of Money

Christopher B. Hajib-Niles cniles at wanadoo.fr
Wed Nov 29 10:07:21 PST 2000



>Messsage du 29/11/2000 17:04
>De : <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com>
>A : <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com>
>Copie à :
>Objet : Re: The Color of Money
>
> On Wed, 29 Nov 2000, Christopher B. Hajib-Niles wrote:
>
> > i don't think it is very helpful to call what happens in japan "racism"
> > unless you believe that the victims of social discrimination in japan
> > constitute a different race from the larger japanese population.
>
> Of course it's racism, just a more internalized version (sort of like the
> racism against Irish and Eastern European immigrants in 19th century
> America); Japan is also pretty exclusionary towards Korean and Chinese
> immigrants, of course.

so i guess you do believe that the victis of social discrimination in japan constitute a different race? if they do, what racial group would you assign them to? (do you think that the english can be racist against the french, or the germans, or the serbians? why or why not?) also, neither irish or eastern european immigrants in 19th century america accused anti-immigrant americans of "racism" because the word did not exist then. we are reading a lot back into the past when we use terms that arose out of fairly modern social circumstances to characterise historical relations.


>
> > racialized identities mitigate against any meaningful evolution of
> > culture and identity because they reinforce all forms of privilige,
> > "white" and otherwise.
>
> It's more complex than this,

well, of course it is...

because the core of racialized identity is,
> in the age of capitalism, national identity or an identity-forming state
> apparatus of some sort

huh? i don't think this describes black folks at all...or maybe it's not clear.

(in the sense of something to rally around, as well
> as something to combat). The Vietnamese revolutionaries had to literally
> create a national culture in the midst of a civil war, for example; but
> this meant creating a political and cultural space which excluded certain
> other communities, e.g. the Chinese and the indigenous hill peoples.

but this was not done in racial terms, unless there is something i've missed over the years.
>
chris niles


> -- Dennis
>
>



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