THOUGHTS HAD: I wasn't very conscious of my skin (color) until I was a Junior in High School. I don't know what the exact switch that flipped on was, but you suddenly become aware of these things. How I was one out of seven Black kids that finished the IB program. I think it started when I was going door to door selling cookies for our Cancer Fundraiser with a couple of friends. One friend and I got separated from the rest of the group, and a cop car pulled up next to us. The officer asked my friend for his name. He gave it. Cop turned to me next. "What's your name?" 8bit. "Where are you from?" I live in the apartment complex a few blocks away. "No, I mean where are you really from?" ...Aurora? "No, I mean where are you really from." Oh. Sudan, I guess. Kinda. "And you go to [Highschool]?" Yeah. "So if I talked to the officer that's on duty there, she would know you?" No, sir, I don't think she would. I'm not much of a troublemaker. "I see. Well, we got a call that someone was scared you guys were casing houses, but that doesn't seem to be case." What's "casing"? "...Don't worry about it." And then he drove off. It didn't really resonate with me what had just happened until I told my family what had happened, and they voiced what I hadn't realized. I just didn't really consider the cop asking me these questions because he was a racist fuck as being a possibility. That, and Senior year, when I got a few instances of, "but you're not Black, 8bit!" That's when I realized that people were passing judgements about who I should be because of my voice and attitude and skin. Which is funny, because, like, nobody told me that shit was gonna happen! I did not get the memo. You like computers and you're a White dude, you like Hip-Hop and you're a Black dude. Bonus points if you're louder than most people - the "Will Smith" archetype, as I like to call it. But what happens if you like building a PC while bumpin Flatbush Zombies in the speakers behind you? I think that means you're a person, who has multiple hobbies that aren't tied to a particular racial characteristic. But, you know - memo missed. It is weird to be told that you're too Black to be White, but too White to be Black. It is weird when a girl tells you that their father would not pay for a wedding if she married a Black guy. It is also weird when a girl slithers up to you and tells you she's never been with a Black guy before. I'm either demonized, or a fucking Xbox Achievement. It's weird when the girl in your University that has 643 African Americans out of 29,772 students says that she wanted to be a teacher, until she interned at an inner city school in Chicago. It "wasn't what she was expecting." It's weird to see a girl - presumably an educated person, as she is in a university - say the words "racism isn't a thing anymore, we have a Black President" in that fucking order and not laugh at herself. It's especially weird to be asked if you got into your school on Affirmative Action. I suppose it's possible, considering I'm a part of 2.3% of my school, but shit, man, that IB diploma has to mean something, right? (It doesn't, I don't even know where it is right now.) And all of this is even weirder when I'm told I "make everything about race." Well you fuckers started it first! I'm just carrying your shitty, gentrified torch until it burns out. Please burn out quickly. Am I comfortable in my own skin? Yes, absolutely. For all the bitching I do, I would not trade the experiences I've had for anything. I would not be as thoughtful and introspective and critical as I am if they didn't happen. Are others comfortable with my skin? Huh. What a question.
OH, ALSO. ALSO. EVEN HIP-HOP IS BEING BUILT AND TARGETED AT WHITE PEOPLE NOW. FUCK, JUST LET ME HAVE THIS ONE THING. Edit: And like, I know I was talking about how hobbies don't have to be tied to racial characteristics, but hiphop is so entrenched in Black culture so when you try to get me to hear "this new rapper Macklemore he's pretty good, almost as good as Eminem, the greatest rapper of all time" you're 70% of the time a racist asshole that refuses to listen to any hiphop made by Black people because it only has "sex, money, drugs" in its material (thanks for the quote fodder, crappy roommate) Click the top all time results here for a bit more understanding. And I can talk about this LITERALLY forever so if you have questions just ask. I've got aaaaall day.
Flippant, not correct comment: Didn't that start way back in the mid-2000s with Asher Roth? He's the first memory of a rapper I have where my friends moms were okay with the music. I wouldn't be so quick to attribute to being a racist though, most of the people I've seen that talk about Macklemore or similar artists just don't care that much about music and like him because he's easy to digest, and they didn't have to work to find his music. It's the surface, lowest common denominator artist at the moment.
True enough. Born out of ignorance than anything else. And yeah, it kinda did. Asher, Eminem. The Beastie Boys, if you go back far enough. Vanilla Ice. But Eminem got Dre's stamp of approval in 1999, so he's a little earlier than Asher. My favorite, though, is MC Paul B. Got quoted as making "the whitest EP ever made" by NYT.
Man, I used to be this guy (except I did listen to black people playing music I LIKED Bad Brains, Fishbone, etc ), and it's painful to look back at it. When I moved to Flint, my roommates set me straight. They gave me Wu-Tang, then Pharacyde, Chali 2na, Hieroglyphics, KRS-ONE (OMG). They made me listen like they'd quiz me about the stuff. When I actually listened to the music and moved beyond my dumb stupid enclosed stereotype I fell in love. I just bought a mid-sized sedan and the first thing I did was blast Blackalicious. Anyway, hiphop helped reflect a mirror on me that I wasn't expecting at the time. I'm really glad I moved past that, I hope your roommate does too.you're 70% of the time a racist asshole that refuses to listen to any hiphop made by Black people because it only has "sex, money, drugs" in its material (thanks for the quote fodder, crappy roommate)
I love that subreddit. It's funny how much music choice is tied to subconscious racism, if "funny" is the right word. Creepy, maybe. How when a White guy raps about death and sex, he's exempt from the Puritanism they then apply to Black rappers. 70% of the time?
Okay, on the IB and race. In my school the IB is free. COMPLETELY. Books, computers, calculators... ANYONE can - if they have the motivation complete it. My class is the class that knows the most languages. In my class we have several who live in the "bad part of town". We have several people who are either first or second generation immigrants.
What I'm trying to say is that without tons of things keeping people out race is less of an issue I guess.
And also that I feel really weird saying all of this 'cause I'm white enough that it is hard for me to find foundation in SWEDEN which is basically impossible.
Haha, I almost use that. I use the whitest one I can find because I have no brown pigment in my skin, so If I put anything brown on it it looks like some kind of slightly racist brownface. So now I look like a ghost instead. More seriously, I'm like an open book (note, I have had very intelligent Swedish people that I trust tell me that I can be VERY hard to read, but that is more because I have a constant resting-bitchface and my natural expression is 'slight anger'. [By the way, a resting bitchface is the best thing ever. If you never smile people treat your smiles like catnip. I am not kidding. I have gotten out of so many situations by just smiling at people. Not dishonestly, just by smiling at them and showing emotions ] eh, where was I...) because of my skin. If I get embarrassed the world WILL know. Even if i spend the whole summer in Sweden my cheeks are a slight red from March to October.
Like fees, administration, tests... (In Sweden if a student has good enough grades the school must admit them. I think admission is blind but I'm not sure)
Yes it is, but when you are given enough support (E.g free books, free meals, free other meal of the day if the school day is long enough, an house that is open from 7-7 to sit in and study, free bus rides around the town, a school that lets you use it's houses to have a party...) That can be negated.
It doesn't. At all. But is does make it so much better. What I mean is that when everyone's footing is more equal it doesn't negatively impact performance.
I'm thinking that it might help more that Sweden doesn't appear to have as much of a history of, ynno, systematic oppression and hate. That might help a bit. Aren't most minorities in Sweden recent immigrants? I remember you talking about some far-right immigrant hating going on over there.
We do. You know those schools where Americans put Indians? We had those for Sami people. We used to sterilize people. Like, nazi Germany thought we were cool. In fact Sweden has a history of immigration and discrimination. A long one. Remember the Vikings? In the 800s? They discovered America, and they raped and pillaged. That is not a figure of speech by the way. They would steal women and children from France and England and hold them as slaves. Trälar, Thralls. They lived in horrid conditions. In fact, I think that the opposite of what you say is true. A country WITH a history of immigration is better at dealing with it.
No, we had an institute for racial biology in the 1930, not everyone in Sweden could vote until in the 1960. It is quite recent. There is still systematic oppression of Roma people. I could go on. For fucks sake someone burned a mosque in my school town this Christmas and I have facebook friends who celebrated. And this is not recent. Sweden was VERY racist in the 1930's.
No, I do agree that racism was present, but the level of oppression in slavery and then segregation is something that didn't exist in Sweden. Almost every Western country had dabbling in eugenics when that fad went around, but (as far as I know) nowhere produced as much hate as America.
Well, no. I mean, Germany? That's Europe, not America.
Yes, but you can hardly say the US is more extreme than that.
Okay. I'm going to be mean now. Don't take it personally. You're being really annoying in a way Americans often are that I can't stand. You are taking the most dramatic moments of American history and calling that the rule, and when I bring up moments from European history you are calling it the exception. And no, it's really really not. Sweden played a part in the slave trade and owned colonies (kind of) in America before America became America. America is a REALLY young country. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swedish_colonization_of_the_Americas
I don't think so, it just adds another chain of cements. guess it depends a lot on how and when and in what conversation it is though.
Fun fact! My school does ridiculously well compared to other IB schools. Like in the Cambridge guide of excellence well. Which makes me all the madder when people talk about private schools like a good thing. AND my school is an "artists school", We have all the fun courses like dance and music at my school. And the IB. I love my school a lot by the way. It is wonderful.