white priviledge

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I've pretty much been a colored gal since way before I even knew I was colored. Mom and Grandma taught me their survival skills since I was old enough to climb onto a step stool and reach the dishes in the sink. There's a whole sensibility to being poor, southern and colored that just doesn't bleach out from marrying white.

I know, for example, that, if I'd ever said, "nigger," I'd have had my teeth knocked out. I know Mom damned near killed me for immitating an Indian war whoop, like I'd heard on tv.

Now, techically, these sensibilities are not "colored," per se. But they represent a combination of values one sees in this country among, particularly, southern Black and Native American peoples.

Some of the specifics were: work hard; don't whine; never apologize for dirty work clothes; always dress for town, church, weddings, funerals and revenuers; fear God and politicians; never trust the wealthy, because they're lying to you; education is the fastest way out of a pig pen; never tell family secrets because they'll be used as weapons against you and yours; never tell the boss, the sherrif or the pastor the truth; blood is thicker than water, but money is thicker than anything; die trying to do it yourself before asking for help; try to be invisible at all times; live without before going into debt; never act or look like the trash down the holler.

It has been over a decade since I have been treated with any white priviledge. The possible exception is when I'm talking to some official on the telephone. But, when people see me in person, I lose all my priviledges.

See, I'm short. I'm fat. I'm almost fifty years old. I have bad teeth. My skin shows wear. My hair's always a mess because I'm rarely in a car. My clothes come from trash and aren't stylish. I wear comfortable shoes, because I'm not in a car. My poor nutrition shows.

So, even though I'm a pale face, people often mistake me for a bag lady. Even people who read my blogs get confused and think I'm homeless! I don't know why; I guess it's just their prejudices and stereotypes. I guess they think homeless people are trash pickers. I pick trash to KEEP my home!

I don't know why they think like they do. I just have to deal with the consequences.

My neighbor, Rowen, across the alley, refuses to leash her dogs. She leaves her back gate unlocked, so they can come into the empty lot to poop all over my garden, chase my cats and attack me.

The last time, they pushed open their gate and came at me! I was just trying to throw out my trash. I barely made it back in, because they'd charge me every time I moved. I finally ran for a board outside her gate and propped the gate shut with it, after throwing another board at them to scare them back into her yard. I called animal control on her.

Next day, there they were, WITH HER, loose, attacking me and Porky as we tried to go to the MLK march.

I said, dammit, Rowen, does my dog poop on your food? I have $2/day food stamps; that's why I grow the garden! She refused to acknowledge me.

I said, dammit, Rowen, CONTAIN YOUR DOGS! She looked right at me and did NOTHING to control them!

Finally, I said, well, Rowen, you just let me know when I have your permission to live my life!

So, she put the dogs in her car, windows half unrolled, in the middle of the alley...they were packing for something. I had to walk RIGHT NEXT To that car full of snarling, snapping dogs with my wide cart and my dog, in order to leave!

See, I'm crazy. She's not an irresponsible, spoiled hippy; I'm crazy. I'm angry, so I'm not politically correct and peaceful enough for her tofu butt!

And now I'm scared to death she'll retaliate against me and I'll lose my home! It might not have even occurred to her to do such a thing, but I know how people are. She won't end up homeless over this, but I could!

Because she won't take responsibility for her own dogs!

Where's the white priviledge? She knows I'm powerless to stop her from endangering my health and safety. She could drop a dime on me for letting my cats run around the empty lot.

I can't see worth a damn. I can't out run a vicious dog. If they're out there and startle me, I could easily fall and hurt myself.

So, because she's too lazy to pick up dog crap, I get to be tormented.

When I walk to the store with my cart, people at the bus stop move away as they see me coming.

Security in stores I don't shop frequently follow me around.

Bus drivers and passengers abuse me over my clothing, my cart, whatever.

People throw things at me from passing cars. They call me horrible things.

On the internet, I get called a crack whore, a welfare cheat, a bum, a dead beat....

See, that old racism stuff has been cleverly covered up. Some idiot was talking on the net about how Bush has done more for Blacks than any other prez, cuz of Rice and Powell. When was the last time you heard of Rice and Powell in a civil rights action?

O, we aint racist now; some of our bestest friends r colored ppl. It ain't about all that no more.

Within 72 hrs. of Bush's drive by wreath laying at MLK's tomb, he appointed a segregationist judge, while Congress was out of town! A guy they'd refused to confirm, because the guy's such a reactionary skank! uh huh.

No, it aint about race no more. It's about class. Sorry to use such a Marxist word, but it's true. IF you can't afford to whiten your teeth, wear the latest trends, drive an air conditioned and heated car to keep your hair in place and the right kinds of impractical clothing on your back, you're marked as trash. You're an untouchable. You're a joke.

Women with whiskers. George Lopez threatened to BEAT his sit com mother, if she showed any whiskers! That's supposed to be HUMOR! Women with arm pit hair and leg hair.

I have MS. Sometimes, I can't bend down in my coffin sized shower to shave my legs. SOmetimes, I can't see well enough to risk shaving my pits and face. So I'm a joke. Cops literaly laughed at me once because my legs were unshaved!

And your damn clothes better not have any sweat, dirt, stains or rips! If they do, throw them out IMMEDIATELY!

ONLY ride a bike for recreation, not out of necessity! And do it wearing all the right athletic clothing. BUt if the bike is motorized, you're the target of abuse. They'll throw things at you, chase you, sic their dogs on you.

Never limp or they'll stare at you. ANd the cops will harrass you, thinking you're under the influence.

White priviledge???? Maybe in the deepest, darkest south that's still true: the ONLY thing your trash butt has better than your Black neighbor is skin color. Cuz neither of you has a pot to piss in, you both owe your life to the land lord, the mining/sharecropping/millwork/factory labor is going to kill you, etc.
But this ain't the old days, before voting rights and civil rights.

Now, they're much sneakier. They can point to the colored faces, tokens, on their boards and cabinets and say, "see? we believe in equal opportuinity!"

As they erode the middle class by sending jobs oversees. As they make it harder to find health care and decent schooling. As they make it harder to vote or hold office. As they degrade and demoralize us. As they bring in their fundamentalist "preachers" to propogandize us and teach us to hate, calling it religion.

Racism aint the OVERT agenda anymore. Now, it's class. YEah, a higher proportion of colored people get lumped into the class bind; of course, that's true.

Because it's all just an excuse to have a disposable, surplus population to work the factories and fight the wars.

BUt the factories are oversees now. And the wars are being fought on computer screens, for the most part. Not that our low class and colored butts aren't in grave danger, in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. But the Pentagon has created war technology that isn't as labor intensive as it was in Viet Nam.

So, here we are: the left overs. We aren't necessary to the economy. The economy is play money on wall street. That's why we can say the economy's improving, even though there are no new and DECENT jobs. Unless you think a McJob is "decent."

WHat do you do with the left overs? Get em addicted, so they're desperate and easy to control. Put them in a ghetto, segregated from the affluent. Feed them fascist propoganda, masuqeraded as religion. Make sure they're ignorant, overwhelmed and angry, but that they take their anger out on each other. They'll be so busy, fighting each other, they'll never turn on the affluent.

In fact, they'll revere the affluent! They'll actually think that, someday, they too can win the lottery and become Enron! Lying, cheating and stealing are qualities to respect, after all!

WHite privilege?

Last time anybody gave me slack for being so-called "white" was in Pekin, Indiana, a Ku Klux town. They decided to merely scare the crap out of me and let it be known I was a "nigger lover," rather than actually killing me! That is, when they found out I was mixed race. But those ignorant hillbillies are dinosaurs; they haven't gotten the message that those overt tactics are considered gauche now.

Now, you call people, "ma'am and sir" to their faces, while destroying them and leaching off them in MUCH more subtle and genteel ways!

White priviledge? Where do I sign up? I'll get me some of that, let it build some interest, and give it all away to my fellow trailer trash, whatever color they are!

Over in the War Zone, it didn't matter if you were Black, Native, Latino or white; you were garbage: to the cops, social workers, paramedics, predatory lenders, preachers, slumlords....and any of the other rare people of affluence who came by ONLY to exploit us!

Nobody cared what color you were, as long as you had some pussy, crack, a cigarette, a dollar, or whatever else might be useful.

White priviledge? Maybe in the yuppy subdivisions and boardrooms that crap still goes on.

But among us gutter snipes, we're all in the same melting pot, being rendered for dog food!