What's Worse Than Vomiting for a 7 Hour Flight?
Along with fighting over the window seat and puking my guts out from plane food, I also found time on my flight to Thailand to watch Hidden Figures. If you haven't seen it I would highly recommend it, and I'm usually annoyingly picky with films, stubbornly favouring a select few nauseating rom-coms and a couple of heart-aching tear-jerkers like A Beautiful Mind. But Hidden Figures had me rooting for its heroines from the get-go, feeling inspired by resilient and resourceful women, and crying for 9-year old me, who desperately wanted to be an astronaut, before she realised how much knowledge of theoretical physics was required to get to the moon. However, more than anything, of course, it had me squirming in my seat at the casual, tiresome, that's-how-things-are racism.
The racism in Hidden Figures had me squirming not because it was awful then but because it's still happening now. And as a white girl from a white family in a predominantly white area, it's only in the last few years that I've realised how much I have ignored my white privilege while believing that I believe in equal rights. I read a thread on twitter recently by Ashley Ford that documented her realisation that an alarming number of white people genuinely believe that black people get to go to college for free, just for being black. This is, of course, absolutely not true. In America, POC are eligible for minority scholarships, low-income scholarships, sports scholarships and attainment scholarships, but even if they were awarded one of those, they obviously would never make college completely free. This story struck a chord with me not because I was appalled that people believe that, but because I've been in that position of blind and racist belief before. When I was about 10 I heard that there were more places held open for minority students at universities and was turned indignant by how unfair I considered that to be. Privilege works so slickly because the privileged are so blind to it they don't realise they possess it. Hearing that there were extra places for minority students made me think something was being taken away from me, rather than something was being given to those who didn't have the opportunities I took for granted.
Last night, I watched Jay-Z's Moonlight video by total accident, because a friend liked it and it showed up in my feed. It features a group of black actors recreating a Friends episode. The video itself is really great and you should watch it here, but what made me go stone cold was actually in the comments. To summarise, someone had written 'I actually do want that though, a black Friends' and someone else had replied - 'there already is one. Friends is a white version of Living Single, an African American sitcom originally aired in 1993'. I know that a lot of white culture has appropriated black and other minority cultures, and I'm aware of recent and blatant instances of this like Kylie Jenner ripping off the black-owned boutique she ordered from in her own clothing line. But Friends has always been one of my favourites. That's how comfortable in my well-I-support-equal-rights half-assed opposition to racism I am, that it took having the rug pulled out from beneath me, in the form of Friends turning out to be a rip-off of an African-American sitcom, for me to write this post that I've been thinking about and shying away from all year.
I'm very conscious of being all 'then I educated myself about racism and how the media marginalises..' blah blah basically the racism version of that Instagram curvy wife guy, so I'm gonna shut myself up here and just make my point. We, non-POC's, just need to work harder. It's not enough to say 'I'm ready to listen' because then we're asking POC to explain it to us. We have to teach ourselves, we have to think ahead, we have to research. We have to amplify the voices of the racially marginalised rather than assume we can speak for them because we've felt the (entirely different, and not as harmful) marginalisation of being a female, or being disabled, or being LGBTQ
.
The line that hit me hardest in Hidden Figures was when Vivian (white supervisor) spoke a few words to Dorothy (constantly denied supervisor title and pay).
Vivian: Despite what you may think, I have nothing against y'all.
Dorothy: I know, I know you really believe that.
Because that's the kicker. We can believe we have nothing against minorities, but it's there. In our inadvertent exclusion of them in our spaces, in the fact that Adele won Album of the Year when even SHE thought Beyonce deserved it, in the recent deaths of black men in London at the hands of police, in our ignorance that POC's face more difficulties than us in attending things that are supposed to liberate the marginalised, like the Women's March. And we have to work hard to break down these barriers, because these women are working so hard, and have been working hard for centuries, to break them down alone. I'm not saying I know it all, I'm not even saying I'm a passable example. I'm saying I want to be better, and I'm holding my hands out for any and all help I can get along the way. To open my eyes, to amplify other voices. I get it, we don't know how to be allies, how to be better, how to talk about this, but we can learn. We can try. I've spoken to some friends about this before, and I have't written this post because I think that everyone else needs a wake up call. I've written it because if this website is all the things that are important to me, that I want brought to attention, that I want us to discuss, then this issue has to be included. Even if I don't know the best way to include it. Because the realisation that so far I've shied away from just picking up a pen and writing about it is more painful than vomiting for the entirety of a 7 hour flight.
Below are a few articles that I have found useful in widening my awareness of feminism and race, including wonderful writer who say all of the above much better than I do.
Here Are Some Ways to Help Build a More Intersectional Feminism - Fader
5 ways you can make your feminism more intersectional - Hello Giggles
Black People Don't Get to Go to College for Free - Refinery 29
Ashley C. Ford - just a brilliant writer who is incredibly popular in my twitter circle, and I would love to see people quoting her closer to home.
gal-dem - a staple.
The racism in Hidden Figures had me squirming not because it was awful then but because it's still happening now. And as a white girl from a white family in a predominantly white area, it's only in the last few years that I've realised how much I have ignored my white privilege while believing that I believe in equal rights. I read a thread on twitter recently by Ashley Ford that documented her realisation that an alarming number of white people genuinely believe that black people get to go to college for free, just for being black. This is, of course, absolutely not true. In America, POC are eligible for minority scholarships, low-income scholarships, sports scholarships and attainment scholarships, but even if they were awarded one of those, they obviously would never make college completely free. This story struck a chord with me not because I was appalled that people believe that, but because I've been in that position of blind and racist belief before. When I was about 10 I heard that there were more places held open for minority students at universities and was turned indignant by how unfair I considered that to be. Privilege works so slickly because the privileged are so blind to it they don't realise they possess it. Hearing that there were extra places for minority students made me think something was being taken away from me, rather than something was being given to those who didn't have the opportunities I took for granted.
Last night, I watched Jay-Z's Moonlight video by total accident, because a friend liked it and it showed up in my feed. It features a group of black actors recreating a Friends episode. The video itself is really great and you should watch it here, but what made me go stone cold was actually in the comments. To summarise, someone had written 'I actually do want that though, a black Friends' and someone else had replied - 'there already is one. Friends is a white version of Living Single, an African American sitcom originally aired in 1993'. I know that a lot of white culture has appropriated black and other minority cultures, and I'm aware of recent and blatant instances of this like Kylie Jenner ripping off the black-owned boutique she ordered from in her own clothing line. But Friends has always been one of my favourites. That's how comfortable in my well-I-support-equal-rights half-assed opposition to racism I am, that it took having the rug pulled out from beneath me, in the form of Friends turning out to be a rip-off of an African-American sitcom, for me to write this post that I've been thinking about and shying away from all year.
I'm very conscious of being all 'then I educated myself about racism and how the media marginalises..' blah blah basically the racism version of that Instagram curvy wife guy, so I'm gonna shut myself up here and just make my point. We, non-POC's, just need to work harder. It's not enough to say 'I'm ready to listen' because then we're asking POC to explain it to us. We have to teach ourselves, we have to think ahead, we have to research. We have to amplify the voices of the racially marginalised rather than assume we can speak for them because we've felt the (entirely different, and not as harmful) marginalisation of being a female, or being disabled, or being LGBTQ
.
The line that hit me hardest in Hidden Figures was when Vivian (white supervisor) spoke a few words to Dorothy (constantly denied supervisor title and pay).
Vivian: Despite what you may think, I have nothing against y'all.
Dorothy: I know, I know you really believe that.
Because that's the kicker. We can believe we have nothing against minorities, but it's there. In our inadvertent exclusion of them in our spaces, in the fact that Adele won Album of the Year when even SHE thought Beyonce deserved it, in the recent deaths of black men in London at the hands of police, in our ignorance that POC's face more difficulties than us in attending things that are supposed to liberate the marginalised, like the Women's March. And we have to work hard to break down these barriers, because these women are working so hard, and have been working hard for centuries, to break them down alone. I'm not saying I know it all, I'm not even saying I'm a passable example. I'm saying I want to be better, and I'm holding my hands out for any and all help I can get along the way. To open my eyes, to amplify other voices. I get it, we don't know how to be allies, how to be better, how to talk about this, but we can learn. We can try. I've spoken to some friends about this before, and I have't written this post because I think that everyone else needs a wake up call. I've written it because if this website is all the things that are important to me, that I want brought to attention, that I want us to discuss, then this issue has to be included. Even if I don't know the best way to include it. Because the realisation that so far I've shied away from just picking up a pen and writing about it is more painful than vomiting for the entirety of a 7 hour flight.
x
Below are a few articles that I have found useful in widening my awareness of feminism and race, including wonderful writer who say all of the above much better than I do.
Here Are Some Ways to Help Build a More Intersectional Feminism - Fader
5 ways you can make your feminism more intersectional - Hello Giggles
Black People Don't Get to Go to College for Free - Refinery 29
Ashley C. Ford - just a brilliant writer who is incredibly popular in my twitter circle, and I would love to see people quoting her closer to home.
gal-dem - a staple.
You are sharing your experience, I think many people should easily overcome this issue after read this post.
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