You are all racists and sexists!

I would like to talk about some taboo subjects, as they at times hinder meaningful collaboration. I talked today in my presentation about the “feminism pill” being hard to swallow because men feel they are unfairly being cast as the enemy, but in reality often face the same challenges women do. The truth is, both men and women often stand in the way of fair treatment across the gender border, even women against women and men against men. Women often support hurtful stereotypes such as displaying themselves provocatively in their media sources such as their publicity packages and facebook pages, using this to try to allure more patronage. I see this as very different as sexuality being a form of self-expression. It’s a matter of where you would like to put your control border…do you want to control only yourself, or do you want to extend your borders out to control other people? When I conduct my interviews to round out my term paper, I will be asking the following questions:




“How do you feel men are affected by issues of sexuality and marketing? What kinds of choices in self-representation do you see with male artists and do you think this fundamentally differs from the stereotypes afforded to women? “


It would be silly to say that oppression is equal for men as it is for women, or for white people as it is for black people. However, we shouldn’t dismiss their less-voiced complaints. But are women judged on different criteria, or just more harshly on the same set of criteria?


I heard an Ethnic Studies professor give a lecture during my undergrad, which she started by saying, “If you are white, you are a racist.” I am white and became obviously offended by this remark, but as she spoke she clarified and redefined the word “racism” to include many subconscious acts. Racism doesn’t have to be intentional to be wildly hurtful. She talked about “white privilege,” which is the concept that through generations of cultural stigma and whites enjoying more wealth than blacks, white people have had more opportunities and incentive to pursue education, lucrative jobs, and status (this not a groundbreaking idea, but I use it to set up the next concept.) By simply holding on to white privilege, white people support this inequality, although it is natural and presumably healthy to want to preserve the greatest opportunities for oneself. Unfortunately, white privilege is impossible to escape as it is impossible to escape your skin. We are not even fully aware of the opportunities afforded to us due to skin color, or gender, and thus support harmful systems without realizing it.


No, I don’t mean anything hurtful when I say, “you are all racists and sexists!” I don’t mean just men, or just white people; even those of us with the best intentions should become aware of what’s really going on.


Posted by UrbanDiction