1, A white blogger cannot be racist if they can name a single POC blogger.
2, POC bloggers are always the worst racists.
3, Narcissism is the same thing as being gay.
4, The Big Bloggers are all big bloggers through hardwork and writing skill, even Kosimandius and Trexie-bell*, POC bloggers are not Big Bloggers due to their genes.
5, Nitpicking grammar and spelling is the same thing as wit.
6, Racism does not exist in Left Blogistan, that is why Left Blogistan’s Big Bloggers do not need to pay any heed to charges that Left Blogistan is racist from POC bloggers in Left Blogistan, QED.
7, There is no silver spoon.
8, Saying you’re gay makes you immune to all criticisms that you’re a racist misogynistic assbag.
8.5, Especially if you basically accuse your critics of being homophobes in an attempt to shut down their criticism.
9, Real non-racists do not care, to a given amount of care, that the people of color who they use as cheap tokens to protect them from having to actually face any charges that they might possibly have been racist, are people of color.
10, A white blogger cannot be racist if they can name a single POC blogger (via)
And can I just point out that pretty much every single person I’ve managed to piss off in recent weeks did at some point mentioned how “it was about time R. Mildred got a blog” (the fools).
This was regardless of the fact that I had a blog (it was shit, so no linkage), which I lost interest in after all of… 10, 12 posts, because no one (zero) was actually reading it (which was why it was shit), because I can’t pimp myself to save my life.
I’m read by several thousand people these days according to the site-meter-type-thingiemabob. Either I became several thousand times better as a writer since being invited to blog (HAH!), or writing skill has nothing to do with blog circulation (that was a retorical question, Kos already proved that skill has nothing to do with circulation).
Being a well read blogger is all about luck and how much bigger bloggers decide to help you expand your readership, being able to get the right links from the right websites, which relies on other bloggers’ good will (or at the very least, burning hatred), and even then I get the impression that plenty of people still don’t check out the extra-specially amazing bloggers in my blogroll, all of whom are bloggers who are next to impossible to find links to from other sites (Slacktivist is the only place from whence I’ve seen Real Live Preacher, Killing the Buddha, Bellatrys and Veiled4Allah linked to apart from here).
If you want to prove how much of a big bad non-racist you are, then fucking well link you fuckers, don’t piss and moan about how you ‘earned’ your place on a big blog and make your privelaged asshollery undeniable – you’re an idiot, why the fuck the good bloggers at FDL still let you post there is beyond me, I suspect shenanigans personally because it certainly isn’t your writing that keeps you there. If you’re too stupid to even know that this is a community were the size of your readership is dependent on something very close to word of mouth then I suggest you stop blogging until you learn what the fuck it is you’re doing.
Of course, if every wingnut stopped blogging just because they didn’t understand what they were talking about, how would we have ever found out that Jeffy-poo named his alleged child after a device for carrying things in?
* I claim authorial intent that negates all charges of homophobia that could be thrown at me, despite the fact that there is no way on earth the term “trexie-bell” could posssibly be taken as me calling Trex anything other than a fairy.
That’s the neat thing about after the fact declarations of authorial intent – they don’t have to gel at all with reality or common sense, because it only has to give the privelaged people (who get the final veto on whether or not something is offensive to the oppressed group in question, I am straight and Trex is not, ergo what I say is not offensive because I don’t think it is) an excuse to stop caring, and we/they’re never too picky about how good an excuse it is really.
I love you, R. Mildred! Would propose marriage but it would only end in my trying to feed you fattening things, and I know that’s not on.
While everything you say is true, I think it helps if you don’t suck as a writer. I mean, there are great writers nobody knows about, but especially in this saturated market, if you can’t write capably (at least), most people won’t bother to link you.
Meanhwhile, TRex seems to have wrapped himself in Hamsher’s blackface pic. And like Aravosis before him, he’s too egotistical to admit a simple mistake.
Would propose marriage but it would only end in my trying to feed you fattening things, and I know that’s not on.
I think if you eat it first then regurgitate it into my mouth I can pass it off as bulemia, and as long as there’s an eating disorder involved at some point of the gastronomic process it should be okay.
I think it helps if you don’t suck as a writer.
Explain Kos or any rightwing blogger then. Suckage is no hurdle for someone who supports the hegemony in some fashion.
Trex’s bootstrap theory of blogging was disproven by the shittiness of the very post in which he put it forward.
*applause*
I found this offensive. Please tell me I’m not the only one.
Yea, but even if say, I can’t write, there are tons of other people of color who can write, so that can’t exactly get all these white folks off the hook. Also I think the writing skill thing is like this. Do you write in complete sentences, do you not do that annoying ellipse thing, do you not use TyPiNg LiKe ThIs, you know what I mean? I personally am not as good a writer as many people, but I get a few hits on my blog(99 visits yesterday, so not a huge blog) because I have the extra time to be rude to people on the internet by commenting on other blogs, and I post on a lot of subjects that are often googled like porn, hentai and lesbians.
People who are better writers but have lives and families, and also, write on more important issues may get fewer hits, but that doesn’t mean it’s ok to be a racist, you know?
In the post mortem over the Clinton/blogger photo fiasco, the advice offered here has been common — link more black bloggers. A sort of blogger affirmative action, to put it crudely.
Count me a bit skeptical. Blog writers and readers tend to self-segregate by race, the same way they do in society at large. And since blacks make up an extremely low percentage of blog readers (black attendence at Yearly Kos was something like 1-2% of the total — not a fair sample of the entire left blogosphere to be sure, especially given that site’s position on race politics, but probably not terribly distorted, either), that’s a fairly small pool of readers from which to start.
At MyDD, some people mentioned the apparent increase (actually quite visible in the Advertising Liberally rankings) in the number and profile of female bloggers as a model for black bloggers. There are a couple of problems with the comparison, though. One is that men and women, although they do self-segregate, do not self-segregate the same extent as do blacks and whites. Another is that the percentage of female blog readers is nowhere near as low as the percentage of black blog readers. Another is that both of the female-run blogs that are on the undisputed A-List, Arianna Huffington and Jane Hamsher, are people who were famous prior to blogging, which gave them a big advantage entering the game, an advantage not enjoyed by any currently operating black blogger.
I have no idea what percentage of the readership of feminist blogs is ultimately owed to the links to Pandagon and Echidne present on several A-List sites, as well as the occasional link to an article on those sites by someone on the A-List. I would guess it’s a non-trivial percentage. But a link still only gets a person to read your site once. Whether they stay depends on whether they like what they read. And the real cultural gap between blacks and whites insures that a good chuck of that 98-99% of liberal blogs readers who aren’t black and who visit a black blogger won’t stick around.
1) Kos caught fire on the war and came in at a different time than we did with PAB. Nowadays, unless you’ve got some totally unique perspective no one else shares, you’re probably going to be drowned out unless you can write pretty well. Again, you still need to get “in” with some big blogs, but that’s harder to do these days if you can’t write at all.
2) The right is a different beast. In fact, my post today addresses some of the reasons they like shitty content.
animeg,
I’m not sure if you were talking to me, but I do want to reiterate that Trex is being a tool and I totally agree with RM’s post, as I mentioned above.
Kos caught fire
If only.
link more black bloggers.
And what’s worse is that merely linking will become an example of how non-racist a white blogger is. Linking isn’t a solution, it’s the bare minimum you should be doing because these blogs are good and inciteful (not to mention insightful).
Now us white people actually reading those blogs – that’s the start of a solution, and white people actually trying to see issues from POC’s viewpoint for a second or two Before even trying to defend themselves from charges of racism. I’m not too enthused about the idea of better organising as a way to counter this particular problem either (I’m a big fan of organising and the cultivation of solidarity in general though, so note the emphasis on the word particular) because it’s really time white bloggers started pulling our weight instead – POC have done pretty much everything they can by this point and it’s always been long past time that white people accepted that A) if we’re not part of the solution, we really are part of the problem and B) We Need to do something meaningful, not one off token things that leave us feeling happy that we’ve proven how non-racist we are.
Part of that is white people actually speaking up about racial issues, not “oh look at that racist white person over there!” stuff that only serves to bolster the part of our egos that gets fat off the idea that we’re not racist, but actually exmaining, thinking about how they fit in to it all and then – blaming!
It’s like that whole stupid fucking meme I’ve been seeing for weeks now – you know the one that goes “but if a [person from a privelaged group] comments about an issue of [oppressive system] someone will be offended”* As though that’s a reason to shut up and place the entire onus of social change and criticism on the backs of the oppressed – men have a place in the feminist movement because societal sexism is created, first and foremost, through the actions of men, and the same goes for the white people in the struggle against racism, without us taking an active part in it all there’s only half a struggle – and doing nothing against oppressive systems means that you are passively maintaining the default status of society – which is racist, sexist, classist, homophobic and everything else.
We, white people, need to do somthing, not least of which is to stop racially segregating ourselvesso much – we’re concious fucking humans, if we can’t even work to get over our socially ingrained racial hangups then someone down the line was obviously mistaken about that “free will” thing we’ve supposedly got, just don’t ask me for any universal solutions, I always pick the wrong ones.
* And of course the unspoken subtext to that meme (as it is something said between privelaged people more often than not) is that you can’t really argue with a member of an oppressed group becuase they’ll always find something unreasonable to whine about. Their criticisms are never really valid in any sense of the word, what with how oppressed people are always the real oppressors.
It’s like that whole stupid fucking meme I’ve been seeing for weeks now – you know the one that goes “but if a [person from a privelaged group] comments about an issue of [oppressive system] someone will be offended”*
guilty as charged – but is it helpful, I wonder, to examine that a little more closely:
“someone will be offended” because, as you mention, “they’ll always find something unreasonable to whine about”
vs
“someone will be offended” because I (or any random leftish whitish blogger) know I have difficulty expressing myself in a way that is not patently offensive on its face, due to my own ignorance and the fact that I’m steeped in privilege?
I don’t think that’s always a “stupid fucking meme” – I think there can be a sincere desire behind it and an acknowledgement of one’s own shortcomings, as opposed the assumption that members of the oppressed group are too sensitive to be capable of rational discussion.
someone will be offended” because I (or any random leftish whitish blogger) know I have difficulty expressing myself in a way that is not patently offensive on its face, due to my own ignorance and the fact that I’m steeped in privilege?
Try harder, you can figure out what is and isn’t offensive, but you have to actually try – and you have to be able to actually accept that part of the learning process will involve you fucking up occasionally. If a person is really sincere, then they can apologise for actually offending people through bad wording, recanting and rewriting as neccesary and do their damndest in the future to not do it again, while the people who aren’t sincere won’t feel a need to, so the entire saying is, at best, pointless, and at worst a way to abdicate any responsibility a whtie person has to deal with shit.
Fear, like all emotions, is useful up to the point where it interferes with you being able to do stuff you need to do.
I think if you eat it first then regurgitate it into my mouth I can pass it off as bulemia,
I just threw up a little bit into your mouth.
but especially in this saturated market, if you can’t write capably (at least), most people won’t bother to link you.
Oh, I dunno.
Four words: John Aravosis. John Amato. Two of the most-linked blogs around (in fact both linked at FDL), and neither of those guys can write for shit.
Wow, nothing like saying “Please. Stop. Whining” to show contrition. Ugh.
kactus,
again, as i understand it, they were around before the blogosphere really blew up, right? if they were starting their blogs now, they might not be so popular.
That’s partly true, marc, and of course with both those blogs the fact that they’re so widely linked lends them legitimacy. Now I have nothing against John Amato, even though he’s a horrible writer, because he seems like a nice enough guy, but Aravosis makes me want to tear my hair out. Combine poor writing with enormous ego and you get the abomination known as Americablog.
Incidentally, and sorry I didn’t say this before but life changes are aggravating my ADD:
Can I get in the marriage-proposing queue?
* applauds*
Most importantly long as you say I’m sorry iwth love in your heart any complaint after that is just them being mean.
I think you’re great Mildred, fun honest and angry are tops with me, thousands of people should be reading you. I’m a fan of Real Live Preacher myself, found him last year, while he was writing his amazing depression posts, been a fan ever since.
All I have to say about T.Rex is it pretty much came together for me when he acknowledged that he loves Jane Hamsher. He said so twice in that thread, and I’ve read at least a dozen smackdowns of him this week and no one has taken that factor into account. When I see someone I love attacked I go apeshit all over the attacker, and let the chips fall. I half expect anyone who loves me to do the same.
This is not to make excuses or deny whatever damage he’s done, but I’m tired of seeing love left out of the infinite motivations ascribed to his conduct.
Has the link to TRex’s post stopped working for anyone else?
It works for me, but it’s slow.
His update is by far the worst part for me. If you say something obscenely racist, and people call you on it, the fault is not THEIR’S. This reminds me far too much of the conservatives who seek to silence all dissent, particularly in the media. If a newspaper reveals that we’re waterboarding people, then the problem isn’t that our country is waterboarding people, but that the media talks about it. Likewise, the problem with people calling you on your racist shit is that they dared to mention it.
UPDATE: Okay, let’s get something straight here. By using the word “betters”, I meant people who are more talented than Liza, and they are legion. If you’ve decided that there’s racial baggage in that statement, it says a lot more about your issues than mine.
Ah yes, because there’s NO racial baggage to telling a woman and a person of color not to get uppity towards their betters. The same way that calling someone “maccaca” has no racial baggage to it, because I mean, it just means monkey, and any racial baggage to that is what you give to it. You know, I kind of wonder if he’d get offended if I called him a honky cracker. I mean, those words don’t really MEAN anything. If he gets offended, he really ought to learn not to bring his issues into things like that.
The really sad thing about this is that there was an opportunity here to address some really important points, but that opportunity has flown as an army of shameless attention-whores have jumped on the bandwagon and attempted to get their licks in.
Ah yes. Damn those bloggers of color calling out racism when they see it! And here we white people had this amazing chance to discuss the topic until the damned attention-whores jumped in by making incisive points from a perspective that, I dunno, actually understands racism. Those bastards. Look at me! Look at me!
I have now said absolutely everything I intend to say about the topic. Thank you for your time.
Well at least that’s done.
UPDATE 2
Goddamn it.
Due to widespread misinterpretation, the word “betters” has been struck from this post
Ah yes, widespread misinterpretation. Clearly, when one is being a racist ass, the problem is all the people misinterpreting it. What he actually meant was that he’s sorry he called a woman of color inferior for daring to call out racism, and he apologizes for then ignoring the content of her post to complain about her spelling.
and replaced with something that more accurately conveys my authorial intent
Certainly the apology is about to come rolling in wherein he acknowledges that he was in the wrong, and Liza is a better person than he, since Liza is not a racist gasbag. Right?
Please. Stop. Whining.
Jesus. H. Christ. On. A. Pogo. Stick. *facepalm* After about a page of whining that he got called a racist, calling anyone who dares to criticize him attention whores, and calling people of color racists because they prefer content to extensive spellchecking as the measure of good writing, he has now told people of color to stop “whining.”
[...] No no no, I have no intention of delivering a national address on the subject, but a comment on the TRex meltdown that R Mildred discussed really through me for a loop: One need look no further than the cracks about blond hair and tits from self-described “feminists” to see the reason for the sad state of feminism in this country today. [...]
[...] Punkblog.com: 10 ThingsI Have Learned in the Past Few Hours (In No Particular Order) at Punk [...]
Was he this much of an ass before he started writing for FDL? I could’ve sworn i liked him back when i was only reading him at Shakes Sis. then again, i expect this particular situation probably hadn’t come up; people don’t suddenly start talking about “your betters” out of a clear blue sky.
I don’t think the kind of thing that emerged from TRex’s keyboard a couple weeks ago springs from a vacumn (I thinking of that Senator who thought the internet runs on vacumn tubes!). If he is “suddenly” revealed to be an ass, now (and at his age) then he has always been one, which is likely part of why he has become so integral to FDL. It was there (in both he and Hamsher and I am beginning to suspect Pachacutec – in spite of his gay half-latino, but looks white [as he himself has put it] ass. Just read the Rovian whisper campaign that he tried to launch agains Liza at MyDD) all the time. Just not really noticed.
It is human nature to overlook flaws in those with whom we feel some sympathy –ie, they are on our side and we would be sabotaging them/ourselves/our relationship to call them out. We do it with friends and family and bosses and co-workers and neighbors all the time. We have to in order to be bearable, in order to bear them. So we go into “don’t nitpick,” “don’t be too critical,” mode and we end up not seeing the pattern. BAnd up until the Liza, Liza, Liza moment, it was easier to over look the very clear pattern which was forming behind all the “good works” (fundie churches do a lot of good work too, btw, they raise money and fund this and thay, they take care of their own). I mean what is not to hate about the likes of Kate O’Beirne and Michelle Malkin and John Yoo. (I don’t get the anomosity toward Ana Marie-Cox, but then she was never on my radar, but from what I do know, it seems like there is more than a little projection at play on Hamsher’s part.) But if you go back and read some of the stuff that most people basically skimmed more carefully (and that is one of the problems with reading on a screen, we don’t read attentively anymore), you will see that it was always there. Like the cute little bunny rabbit who is really the fierce old lady in a hat.
Sorry — I meant to add one more thing. TRex showed up in the comments at Republic of T (and Terrance’s approach certainly was about as Buddhist as one could be!) and sniped at him for being a whiner as well. Apparently Terrance and TRex are personally aquainted from college or some such.
Its classic bully stuff. Call people who object to abusive behavior whiners and girlie men and pussies. So it seems that being gay hasn’t prevented TRex from developing some extremely misogynistic attitudes re: the feminine dimension of life (be tough, don’t whine, be a man, etc).
Yeah, pretty classic, innit?
>Ah yes, widespread misinterpretation. Clearly, when one is being a racist ass, the problem is all the people misinterpreting it.>
“If you’re walking down the street and someone kicks you, they have a problem. If you’re walking down the street and -everyone- kicks you, -you- have a problem.”
–author unknown
[...] UPDATE: Go read Rmildred’s wonderful post on the topic. People who get on a high horse and think it’s because they are so great are just plain clueless as to the world around them. When they and others ignore the fact that they had a lot of help getting there, I’m even more disgusted. The myth of meritocracy drives a lot of the ideological blindness among white people in this country. It is a dynamic that underpins, at its core, racism. Hamsher and others who pretend that they didn’t have money, or friends in high places, or even the fucking cachet of being someone with a career and rep from Hollywood peddle an ideology that ultimately fucks over a lot of other people in the process. That’s where the ‘isms’ lie, in the end, and they won’t go away, they’ll just take on new forms that none of us see, until we get at that problem: the scarcity problem that’s built into our economy and society from the get go. [...]