Why do I lack the ability to trust white people who claim to be progressive or leftist?
When a person of color, especially if they're black like me, affirms their support for causes such as queer liberation, feminism, animal rights, or socialism, I immediately feel that I can believe, with minimal doubt, that they're truly convicted and principled in what they're advocating for.
However, when a white person claims to support leftism, until my skepticism is proven wrong, I immediately assume they're a dishonest and performative libshit. I then proceed to interact with them with hefty amounts of caution. If my assumptions are proven true, I'm never shocked.
I’m a white communist and I sometimes feel like a vampire who’s trying not to be a vampire. White people in the west have so much to lose (at least in the short term, until the destruction of whiteness) from communism that it’s not unusual at all to distrust us. I don’t trust us either.
2020 is on my mind all the time actually, and I think a lot about how many people were marching at one point, and then how most of us stopped marching. Like…the problems are still there. They’re even worse than they were in 2020. Marching didn’t solve them, marching by itself is not going to solve them, but a lot of people were marching for a left cause (even if a lot of it was fucking lib shit), and then we stopped.
My friend you fucking know why, it's the same reason why I don't trust self-proclaimed "progressive/leftist whites" until they prove themselves also, and it's also the reason why I tend to go out of my way to prove myself early on too. Like, I have touched grass and I have been to predominantly white activist spaces, I have seen white bullshit and I have done white bullshit. I have learned through all practical experience not to trust whites for even a second, especially not those who refers to whites as a """we""" or in any way identify with whiteness, as if "white" is an actual meaningful group identity rather than a fucking Indiana Jones sandbag of a """culture""" whose continued existence is inherently destructive and antithetical to decolonization, anti-imperialism, Black liberation, and socialism.
You do not have to ask "why" you lack an ability to trust whites, you are in fact very wise to do so. It is not something you should feel guilty about, as if you're being racist by "judging books by their covers", it is in fact whites who are racist and it is on whites to prove themselves to you.
When you grow up white in America, there’s so much that you have to deprogram from your brain before you can even move left. I had some really shitty views as a kid and I know I held to those just because it was coconut tree in which I fell out of. And beyond that, so much of society is geared towards privileging whiteness, you have to actively work to break out of it.
That said, I am grateful for people in my life who have called me out of stuff and have helped me be better. This is a reminder to all the white folks, if you get called out on something… apologize, understand - actually understand - where you went wrong, and be better.
From experience, it feels to me that white people can never fully understand what racism means. I mean, they understand it on a cognitive and intellectual level, but perhaps never on an experiential level.
It’s gotten to a point where I don’t even blame my white friends for not grasping certain issues anymore. It’s something that is very hard to internalize if you have never experienced it. As long as they promise to do their part of anti-imperialism from within the imperial core, I’m fine with that.
When a person of color, especially if they're black like me, affirms their support for causes such as queer liberation, feminism, animal rights, or socialism, I immediately feel that I can believe, with minimal doubt, that they're truly convicted and principled in what they're advocating for. However, when a white person claims to support leftism, until my skepticism is proven wrong, I immediately assume they're a dishonest and performative libshit.
It depends, I do not trust any person of any race immediately when it comes to topics like LGBT rights or feminism for example. There are many homophobic and sexist people of all races. There are many performative people of all races. People are people, after all. However, when it does come to issues around race, I agree with you. I think most white people simply do not understand the concept of structural racial discrimination as they have no experience with being on the side that gets discriminated against because of their skin colour and/or ethnic group. Obviously there are exceptions, but as a whole Eurocentric thought, which includes white supremacy, has been dominant throughout the past couple of centuries.
With regards to socialism, I find that in South Africa black people in general tend to have a much better understanding of what socialism is. I would say that is because part of the struggle against apartheid was based on socialism, and people from other racial groups, in general, have been influenced heavily by red scare propaganda or a comparador mindset.
All I know is when over half of these white "progressives" I met throughout my life in the west openly mock east and southeast asians and at the same time telling us that we are somehow the most racist group while also saying that they love and support the minorities to other non asian minorities, all that trust was immediately gone. Malcolm X's comment on liberals pretty much confirmed to me with regards to my experiences with them.
With all the white people self flagellating in this thread it does make everyone seem less sincere which validates op question lmao. This thread is just a dumpster fire, people arguing if interracial marriage or having Black friends makes you racist or not, are asians poc?
It is reasonable to have these suspicions. In my everyday life I feel infuriated hearing the racist shit the white people I work with may bring up around me, since they assume that I'll agree with them since I'm white too. Most of the shit they talk about is their callous obsession with the oppressed migrants at the southern border. If that's what those people do openly and outwardly express, I can imagine just as well that there are white leftists who have not examined and gotten rid of all their prejudices. It's reasonable to think they have just used their knowledge of left norms and attitudes to hide it way better than the chuds I see irl. I'd say your vigilance is warranted.
I hate how the continued existence of these racial hierarchies poison the minds of so many white people, teaching them a multitude of ways to be alienated from their fellow human beings. The task of the left in dismantling these oppressive hierarchies is a Herculean one, requiring massive socioeconomic changes and I at times despair when thinking of its chances of success in the heart of empire during such a turbulent time in human history.
Yeah as a white person, don't believe anything I say. Please judge me and other white "leftists" by our actions. Look at what we actually do and care about, only then can you tell if we're communists or socialists or anarchists, or if we are just using the words and performing. I know real and fake white leftists - the good ones do lots of great organizing and the bad ones talk a lot and end up derailing plans.
ah 165 comments, surely its all just us dunking on the MLK quoting lib from yesterday? right? right? oh, struggle session too? most predictable hexbear thread.
This is how I feel about French people, unless they've explicitly clarified that they've read works by anti-colonial writers and have read the history of their evil empire and recognize the current imperialism of it today, they're a Nazi in my eyes.
Because that's how it keeps going. I have tried time and time again to ignore the little danger signs from White people and kept getting burned by some, even by self-professed leftists. Not by all, of course, but by enough to be wary. It's unpleasant; this hypervigilance around White people is a real burden and I wish it hadn't been forcibly inflicted on me, but that's what living in a White Supremacist society does.
I find it helpful to differentiate between "White" and "white" people.
Capital-W "White" means the person exhibits a lot of the toxic settler-colonial, imperialist, and casually racist behaviors that Amerikkkan society perpetuates.
Lower-case w "white" means the person has skin tones that make them look like the Capital W's but they don't do that shit. They're actively antiracist, they're vigilant and purge any trace of white supremacy from themself, they're learning, and they support people of color in our fight against white supremacist fascism.
It's not about skin color, and it's not even essential to who they are -- White people who rehabilitate themselves can become white people, that is, people whose skin is light but aren't being toxic or shitty in any way.
A pretty basic litmus test I've found is checking how they feel about American Imperialism. If I say, "Joe Biden belongs in prison for what he did to Iraq" and they agree, then they probably understand on a visceral level that brown people are people. If they argue, that tells me they don't actually value our lives -- because it is fundamentally impossible to care about nonWhite lives and also be ok with any of these genocidal fucks.
Don't worry it's a good thing lol means you've been paying attention to how they will always choose their whiteness over anything else, unless proven otherwise.
In any case I feel more comfortable around other Black people in general 🤷🏿♂️
because most white leftists/progressives, in my experience, have not killed the plantation overseer in their brain. colonialism is the mind-killer, it's the little-death. understanding it and learning to hate it, to see it seep into everything in society is the difference, I think, between the progressive that wants to strengthen the settler-colony by keeping it's racist systems intact and making small changes, and the leftist who seeks to destroy the settler-colony and uproot it
that's a hard thing to want to destroy something that benefited your ancestors and yourself to this very day- to want to end something that your told is your culture or your identity, maybe there's a bit of capitalist realism in there; you can't imagine anything else... but if there is evil in the world that would be it, the project of "whiteness".
in the last few years I've come to challenge that internally, I guess. Why would I want to self-identify with a project that I think should be destroyed? I have a hard time trusting other white people in organizing if they haven't also come to that conclusion, or are at least working towards it, doesn't matter if they are a ML or a succdem
Easy, don’t trust anyone unless they call themselves a communist explicitly. “Progressive” and “leftist” are perverted terms in (assuming your location) Amerika. Oh also if they use MSE u might be able to let your guard down too. Fact of the matter is that most ppl don’t really have a coherent ideology cuz why would they?
I grew up in an area that was mostly black and hispanic.
I'm at the point where I hate other white people and I'm in a contradictory position of hating white people but also I definitely grew up white. I hate whiteness but not myself.
Like I don't expect to be trusted because I see it, I understand that reaction, I don't trust white people either but the alternative is being by yourself all the time which I don't think is good either and itself kind of white.
Nah, that's fair. Not all white leftists are grifters or liberals, but it's good practice to assume a baseline of distrust until proven otherwise. Source: I'm white.
I had a big long thing on how POC Jim Clyburn DSA DNC loyalists are the worst and held back progress. But as. I am afraid to critize POC here for many ignoring the warnings of the White Moderate so I'll just say I'm skeptical of everyone and and trust is earned.
I find it weird to racialize this. Minority westerners are overwhelmingly lib too. I simply don't trust any people from the west to be actual leftists (myself included).
Whites can claim to be leftist or progressive or inclusive or whatever and then do nothing about dismantling the racist system that exists here (I mean why should they, considering that it benefits them the most).
Assume all whites are racist until proven otherwise.
I don't trust what people say or what labels they apply. Many people don't understand what words mean, or worse they are intentionally deceitful. I instead watch their actions and form my own opinions.
all i know is I love this discourse from the same crowd that is all "race essentialism in dungeons and dragons is fascist, you can be a good goblin, frieren is a fascist show because literal demons are shown as evil"
I don't feel offended that I have to be so explicit that I fight against all forms of oppression and especially racism
People of color generally have no margin for error with these things, because someone could say the exact same shit I do and then support Biden's border policy. I don't see myself as a "good white person" because I recognize that they don't really exist in our everyday lives. I defer my judgement to people with different perspectives because I know I will hurt people otherwise.
Maybe you wouldn't have as bad of an issue if every white person acted similarly, but for a lot of people I feel like those attitudes never go away, so it feels more like the preparation for the start of progress rather than an actual step forward.
I apologize if I'm overstepping or offering my opinion when it is undesired.
I feel like this is just how it goes as a symptom of the inescapable perpetuation of oppressive ideology within our society.
I only ever really feel safe around poc, socialist, queer non-men. I feel a natural kindred and love for everybody and especially the people of these categories but I also tend to notice when somebody is for instance a queer poc non man that is not a socialist and also a socialist poc who is not a queer or non man etc.
It's the sad reality of the nature of ideology within a capitalist society that every single person will internalize the hegemonic discourses, and as we all know oppressed people will oftentimes even internalize the discourses about themselves.
It's not an unwarranted assumption either as experience may prove, but we should and (clearly you do) still struggle to find unity with all who can be united!
If it was easy to overcome the hegemony of a society we wouldn't need to be revolutionaries in the first place, and none of us are free from brain worms. Freedom is a constant struggle etc
Your experiences and opinions are completely justified. I'm white, and white people have a shit ton of unlearning to do by default, as others have mentioned. I'd like to believe that a lot of white leftists genuinely support and believe in progressive, socialist, or communist beliefs/movements, but it takes a lot of work to shift from always viewing everything from a white lens.
I'll admit that I was a bit of a shithead until about 7 years ago when I got introduced to new ideas and began to truly listen to other people's experiences. When you're growing up in a primarily white suburban bubble, that kind of curbs social development if there isn't a lot of exposure to other peoples' and cultures experiences.
Granted, it is a very common phenomenon that white leftists put on the air of revolutionary thought & rhetoric, but they're still more white than leftist. A lot of these folks never grow beyond just saying the right things, and the mask can slip off and they'll show their ass. That does make it difficult to sus out whether a white person is genuine or not, and I've run into it plenty of times myself.
I don't know how else to say this but if this is real you sound like such a weird person, do you actually get anything done in the organization where you practice this or do you only organize (and talk) with people who don't pass as white?
I don't think it's so weird or unusual to be at least a bit distrustful of the people that benefit the most from a country built off racism and colonialism. Fwiw I'm white, so I don't think it's my place to say more than that, but I have similar feelings to cishet allies who have shown their ass over the years. Of course it's not 1:1, but I feel like you can only be let down so many times before there's an asterisk next to ally* that doesn't go away for a while.
If you do not trust them just because of the colour of their skin, then you might just be a racist. That is literally the definition of racism, friend. If I made the same example you provoded but switched skin colours around, people would say that's racist, and they would he correct. I cannot be the only one who can see that.
Focus on the content of their character, at the individual level, not the group, that is what MLK stated and he was quite right. It's has not been 1979 for 45 years. Times change. Statistics prove this.
like in an org or online? Also, do you find someone who is more bold in their stance i.e. outright identifies whether they are a marxist or anarchist to be more trustworthy?
That’s how I feel with self-proclaimed leftists in NATO countries. It’s almost always a radlib who wants to be politically daring. Online they’re mostly cool though. Most of the saner Marxist-Leninists from those countries are mostly found online.
I've congregated with white self proclaimed leftist/socialists who are aware of their "privilege" but still have weird views about "bad" neighbors that borderlines into fear. How white people talk about crime or "bad" areas is my litmus test.
Honestly this but cis people. Honestly this but trans/nb people that can't easily hide it. I don't trust anyone fully unless they have no choice in the matter but to fight back or die. I bet most of the people here would sit back as Trans people got exterminated if it came to it.
Would I fight and die for a minority I'm not a part of? I would like to think so, but when the time to die actually comes that's gonna be fuckin' scary and I bet a lot of us won't pass that test, so POC not fully trusting white people like me makes a lot of sense even if it feels bad.
I know this is you venting, but it's because they're white, and in this racist settler colonial society, whiteness always comes first regardless of their professed ideology or whether they belong in any other marginalized community. A white fascist cishet man and a white socialist trans woman are just two white people when push comes to shove. I suspect you found this out the hard way.
I only trust white people who either:
Have biracial kids with a POC partner (although they're plenty of white fetishists and some biracial pairings like white dudes with Asian chicks are so filled with fetishists that I no longer find this reliable)
Exclusively hang out with POC as the token whitey
If a white person does both, then there's a good chance their anti-racist views are genuine.
I fully relate even though i'm white. I listen to my PoC and immigrant friends, and i know how whiteys talk when nobody listens, and it's just gross to see what's going on once you start to question all the racism that's normalized. I obviously lack the direct experience of being at the business end of racialized opression, but as a trans person, i also see way too much performative support falter once it causes the tiniest bit of controversy to be on my side, and as a woman i've seen way too often how even hardcore leftist orgs let misogyny fly, including protection for people who've committed SV and turning them into "missing stairs" that keep endangering people in that community because nobody removes them from their position. Wouldn't bring that up in a conversation about race normally, i'm not doing this to center my experience here, not equating anything either, just saying that there's paralells that make me distrustful of certain lib and leftist people as well.
There's a fine line between caution and paranoia, ofc, i find that it takes a toll on you when you don't check in on yourself once in a while and question your MO, but at its core it's a necessary survival strategy to watch out who you can trust.
Depending on where you are in the world, changes the definition of Leftist... and Progressive isn't really much of a coherent thing outside of incrementalism and reformism.
Just from wallowing in the USA liberal/progressive/lefty spaces on the internet for the last 20+ years, most of us white folks use Leftist/Progressive as a very shallow and vague descriptor/aesthetic label. So when somebody says they are "Progressive" it means one thing to them and can mean something else entirely different to you. Simplest example I can think of is when a liberal/BlueMAGA/Democratic Party cheerleader labels themself as Socialist because they believe in a not for profit healthcare system. The only definition of Socialist they've ever learned is "when the government does something" instead of "the workers own the means of production and the profits, if any, are spent keeping society functioning instead of being siphoned off to make a few people disgustingly wealthy at the expense of everybody else.
Like... it would shock me in my younger more liberal days when a woman would repeat a misogynist talking point or when a gay man would say something homophobic about a gay woman and in both cases they were being serious. It would short circuit my brain a bit because, I had fallen into the default state of "You're of minority group X in a society that shits on minority group X, of course you'd be aware of it and against it" and that not always being true.
So having the privileges of "whiteness" drastically changes the boundaries of what the words "Leftist" and "Progressive" mean. Until you've felt out what those ideas mean to another person, you are probably more right than wrong in viewing us whites with skepticism until our actions have shown you what those terms actually mean.
Not saying the people in here who wouldn't trust me immediately are wrong to do so but it does make me sad because frankly I am extremely cool.
I have erased like an entire essay in this post three times now, I guess I really don't know what to say but I feel there is some worth in making it known that hidden away in strange places there are sometimes whites to be found who have done the reading (and drugs!) to be an ally, even if it means being an ally from a distance
I’ve had this guy’s book on my shelf for awhile now. He concludes this piece with:
We have our work cut out for us, but fortunately we aren’t starting from scratch: there’s a rich history to draw from. In the 1960s, feminists held regular group meetings, in houses and apartments, to discuss gender injustice in ways that would have been taboo in mixed company. A set of such “consciousness raising” guidelines by Barbara Smith and fellow activists Tia Cross, Freada Klein, and Beverly Smith provides an example of identity politics work as the Combahee River Collective envisioned it. The exercise starts by asking participants to examine their own shortcomings (“When did you first notice yourself treating people of color in a different way?”), but ends by asking how they can use an element of shared oppression as a bridge to unite people across difference (“In what ways can shared lesbian oppression be used to build connections between white women and women of color?”). Because, in the end, we’re in it together—and, from the point of view of identity politics, that is the whole point.
Seems like it might have some answers. I like leftist spaces because it’s like one of the only places where you can say “read a book” and people will go out and do homework. It’s rad.