Recently in the JCR a friend described an incident where he was approached without provocation and told, “You are a white male. You have never experienced oppression,” followed by a second member of the group who added, “and neither have your ancestors.” In a discussion on oppression, I too was told, “You are white, you couldn’t possibly understand.” The ignorance of these comments not only shocks, but appalls me.
The definition of being white has changed so many times, one cannot quantify it. There was a time when the Irish were oppressed, called black, and left to starve and die. Multiculturalism has complicated the easy identification of races. My white, male, allegedly non-oppressed friend is Ukrainian, and from a Jewish family. If you don’t know your history, that means that the Turks tried to wipe his ancestors out, and then the Germans had a shot. If his forbears survived that, then Stalin took a crack at them too. I’m not even going to discuss the problems in telling a Jew that his family has never felt oppression.
Why must this even be expressed? Why is it that someone has to defend that yes, indeed, their ancestors did suffer? We pretend to strive towards a goal where race doesn’t matter and where we eliminate oppression from our society. This should not mean that those whose families did in fact suffer in the past should feel entitled to completely disregard the opinions of those whose families did not. Ignorance is an ugly thing, regardless of where it comes from, and people have no control over who their ancestors were and what they did. I am in no way trying to suggest that the suffering of one ethnicity is more valid than another. Nor am I trying to suggest that we should forget history. I am saying that basic manners and civility cannot be forgotten. There is no excuse for confronting someone over their race, regardless of the concentration of melanin in their skin.
For argument’s sake, let’s say I need to be a minority to have this opinion. I’m a Latina who grew up in the United States, where I personally experienced racism. Imagine, when expressing an opposing opinion to someone, being called a spic, as if that was reason enough for why what you had to say was invalid. I remember regularly being called “a goddamned Mexican” as if it was a slur. (I’m Colombian, for the record.) Imagine going to dinner at your boyfriend’s house, only to be insulted as his mother berates him for not finding someone good enough, horrified when she finds out your ethnic background. was even accused by an alleged friend of stealing, regardless of any possible link to the crime, with the only reasoning given, “Well, you are poor. You probably sold it for the money.” Yes, racism can be that overt.
In the United States, every time you fill out the census, or a school or job application, you are asked to clarify your race. The option, “Latino (non white)” as well as “White (non Latino)” makes it very clear, written out for you, that if your ancestors were from the Americas and spoke Spanish, you are not white. If I wanted to, I could have joined the National Association for the Advancement of Colored Persons. I’m a very pale swarthy at best. The makeup I use is either the lightest shade of medium available, or the darkest shade of fair, but I don’t identify as white.
So now I live in Canada, as does my Ukrainian friend. Does living somewhere where we pass for white suddenly take away experiences with oppression? Is my opinion less valid because here, people identify me as white? Should my friend be confronted because someone else’s ancestors, with similar skin pigmentation to his, committed injustices? For that matter, should someone trying to enjoy their day be confronted because somewhere down the line one of their great uncles did in fact own slaves?
Why is it that in the name of fighting oppression, people must oppress others? We go to class and have debates on sensitive subjects and arguments about the past, but at the end of the day, someone is called out for amazingly, their skin pigmentation. It baffles me that this is the point we have taken things, where discourse cannot be had because of the colour of someone’s skin. It’s insane! We are all better than this.
