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I guess this counts as blogging for International Blog Against Racism Week, although I intended for my contribution to be a post about being an Australian of Chinese descent and it's hardly an uplifting story.
A man just came into the office where myself and colleague are working. I've only just joined this office, working here for one day a week or so. I don't know too many people around here, and they don't know me. As far as this workplace is concerned, I'm a part-time contractor.
The colleague I'm working with is male and Asian, and we're sitting at the same small table in a conference room, laptops out. The entering man, large, white, and wearing a skullcap, comes in to call my colleague to a meeting. He looks at my colleague, looks at me, and makes what's probably intended to be a joke while introducing me to someone else:
"We've got [colleague] here already, and here's Mrs. [colleague], too!"
So. An woman working in an office with a man of the same race is automatically granted the primary appellation of "wife" rather than "colleague". And somehow, even with the massive fail on the scale of "a woman as a thinking being independant of a man", I doubt he would have said anything of the sort if both my colleague and I were white.
I suspect that my blank face let him know that his joke failed. But I doubt he really thought about what he said or why he said it. I didn't challenge him with it; I was too busy being flabbergasted. Besides which, it was hardly the moment to point out that his assumptions that a woman working with a man must be in a sexual relationship, or that Asians should marry other Asians were deeply inappropriate.
This isn't BackwaterTown, BigotState; this is Sydney, Australia - a modern, global city in a CBD workplace of educated people.
Please don't tell me that feminism isn't needed anymore because we've corrected ourselves, or that racism doesn't exist or that it's not your problem as a white person. It's not that easy. This man didn't even think about what he was saying or implying; he just tossed it off, and added to the growing pile of FAIL that this day is turning out to be.
Edited to provide some clarification, add tags, and rejig the title for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
ibarw inclusion.
A man just came into the office where myself and colleague are working. I've only just joined this office, working here for one day a week or so. I don't know too many people around here, and they don't know me. As far as this workplace is concerned, I'm a part-time contractor.
The colleague I'm working with is male and Asian, and we're sitting at the same small table in a conference room, laptops out. The entering man, large, white, and wearing a skullcap, comes in to call my colleague to a meeting. He looks at my colleague, looks at me, and makes what's probably intended to be a joke while introducing me to someone else:
"We've got [colleague] here already, and here's Mrs. [colleague], too!"
So. An woman working in an office with a man of the same race is automatically granted the primary appellation of "wife" rather than "colleague". And somehow, even with the massive fail on the scale of "a woman as a thinking being independant of a man", I doubt he would have said anything of the sort if both my colleague and I were white.
I suspect that my blank face let him know that his joke failed. But I doubt he really thought about what he said or why he said it. I didn't challenge him with it; I was too busy being flabbergasted. Besides which, it was hardly the moment to point out that his assumptions that a woman working with a man must be in a sexual relationship, or that Asians should marry other Asians were deeply inappropriate.
This isn't BackwaterTown, BigotState; this is Sydney, Australia - a modern, global city in a CBD workplace of educated people.
Please don't tell me that feminism isn't needed anymore because we've corrected ourselves, or that racism doesn't exist or that it's not your problem as a white person. It's not that easy. This man didn't even think about what he was saying or implying; he just tossed it off, and added to the growing pile of FAIL that this day is turning out to be.
Edited to provide some clarification, add tags, and rejig the title for
ibarw inclusion.
no subject
:: hugs ::
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(such people make me embarassed to be from any part of the Caucasian phenotype)
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I'm not too good at finding where to post (was looking, but not finding; so sorry for being dumb about the LJ's) so I'm posting here. I wanted to wish you a very Happy Birthday today, hope all your wishes come true.
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Sorry you had a rough day with it. *hugs*
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I finished my Master's Degree in Women's Studies in 2007, and in Women's Studies there's a very big emphasis on the need to examine multiple oppressions simultaneously to really understand how people's lives work and how society in general operates. Gender, race, and class were the big 3 that were always present, but there's also an ever increasing amount of consideration given to lots of other things like sexuality, nationality, (dis)ability, and so on. There were a lot (a lot) of things wrong with my department, especially during my second year, but I really do have to compliment OSU on their very strong emphasis on intersectionality.
So I had a very keen awareness of just how fucked up society continues to be at the same time I had to teach classrooms full of WS 101 students who refused to believe sexism and racism still exist and who believed class never existed in America. So unbelievably frustrating, I don't even have words to describe. Add in my social anxiety disorders and public-speaking-related panic attacks, and that was a wild ride, let me tell you.
To their credit, though, my students were actually really good. I was very, very lucky. They were all very thoughtful, open minded and open to learning whatever I threw at them, even if it wasn't something with which they personally agreed. And by the end of the quarter, pretty much everyone was able to look around them and start to see for themselves the things I was telling them in class. I was very proud. There were no plagiarism or behavior problems and if they didn't hand things in on time they generally had a good reason. I hear about all this bullshit that my friends and other academics routinely had to put up with (and still do, if they are currently teaching) and I don't know how I was so lucky to get such good groups of students for all three quarters I taught.
But really, this makes the lack of awareness or even outright denial of sexism and racism even more distressing. Because they are thoughtful and intelligent people and they are genuinely nice. And they don't/can't/won't acknowledge the deep injustices still present in our society, even though women and people of color are speaking out against these things every freaking day!
[To Be Continued...Post Too Long...]
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This does give me a bit of hope, though, because even though white folks have thought everything is peachy keen during each of those periods, improvements still got made in spite of that. We don't have slavery anymore, we don't have (legal) segregation, and incredible gains have been made during the civil rights movement. So even though things still aren't perfect (or even all that good), and even though the majority of white folks don't think it's really needed, we'll still get there. It's hard, it's not fun, but we have to do it. And we have to fight sexism and homophobia and economic injustice and everything else that degrades any living being, even though those things are so much harder to get people to recognize and address when multiple oppressions start intersecting (like race and gender in what happened to you at work). But we have to, there's no other choice. Either we're all free or none of us are.
Ew, look at me being all impassioned and optimistic! It's been so long, I almost didn't even recognize optimism anymore!
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I work at my local YWCA as the co-coordinator of our racial justice program and our focus is on eliminating racism and empowering women. Racism and sexism are very much alive. The latest thing we noticed locally was an article in Wednesday's paper in which an inspector of a church that was vandalized referred to the church as a "colored" church. First, who says colored anymore? And how is his diagnosis that the vandalism wasn't race oriented (several incidences of church vandalism in this area has been race related) valid if he's still calling people colored?
I also attended a racial justice event earlier this year in which an elderly white lady felt fine throwing the N-word out. I know she's older, but noooooooo. This wasn't an event on which we were focusing on people's ideals on racism or asking questions, or a place in which many anti-racism activists call a "safe space" to air out un-politically correct thoughts in order to get to the root of racist thoughts, it was an event in which to celebrate black people during black history month.
And the anti-mexican rhetoric around here is crazy. I mean people said at a building meeting that they thought mexican people, working on Visas, were going to kidnap their children from a nearby school and harm them, even though the program has been in the area for years without a blip of criminal activity from the workers.
I am certainly sorry you had to experience this. As Lena Williams claims, "It's the little things" that makes racism so brutal. Did you get a chance to talk to the colleague that was addressed as your "spouse"? If it happens again, you should address the situation along with another colleague that has experienced one of this guy's "jokes" and I'm more than positive it has happened before. It's like verbal diarrhea from people like that.
Sexism and racism should be faced head on by everyone.
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No, I didn't, unfortunately. He went out to the meeting the guy was calling him to, and I wasn't entirely comfortable addressing it - I wasn't sure that he noticed the slur at all.
I read an essay (or perhaps an excerpt?) by Tim Wise on Wednesdays' IBARW, I believe. (Or maybe it was a link in a link in a link...)
At any rate, it was excellent argument, excellent points, and very eye-opening. More white people who say they don't benefit from racism really do need to read it.
The lessons of history, when unlearned, are doomed to be repeated.
no subject
Also, I don't know the atmosphere or industry where you work in Australia, but if there is a people of color "support"-that's really a bad word, but I'm too tired to grasp the right one-group, it might not be bad to join one. It's even better if you can find a women run one.
Racism and sexism would be closer to being eliminated if more white men (white feminist too!) realized how the two isms burden society and tried to fix it because no matter how much women or people of color shout it from the rooftops, sometimes one white man's voice is more valid to other white people than a million women or people of color's.
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It's a lot better than it was. That doesn't mean that it's close to done.
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Your coworker's behavior was gross. I have been sitting here flabbergasted at his utter disgustingness for a few minutes. I don't even know what to say.
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Gnnnh. :kicks guy:
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:: hugs ::
no subject
(such people make me embarassed to be from any part of the Caucasian phenotype)
no subject
I'm not too good at finding where to post (was looking, but not finding; so sorry for being dumb about the LJ's) so I'm posting here. I wanted to wish you a very Happy Birthday today, hope all your wishes come true.
no subject
Sorry you had a rough day with it. *hugs*
no subject
I finished my Master's Degree in Women's Studies in 2007, and in Women's Studies there's a very big emphasis on the need to examine multiple oppressions simultaneously to really understand how people's lives work and how society in general operates. Gender, race, and class were the big 3 that were always present, but there's also an ever increasing amount of consideration given to lots of other things like sexuality, nationality, (dis)ability, and so on. There were a lot (a lot) of things wrong with my department, especially during my second year, but I really do have to compliment OSU on their very strong emphasis on intersectionality.
So I had a very keen awareness of just how fucked up society continues to be at the same time I had to teach classrooms full of WS 101 students who refused to believe sexism and racism still exist and who believed class never existed in America. So unbelievably frustrating, I don't even have words to describe. Add in my social anxiety disorders and public-speaking-related panic attacks, and that was a wild ride, let me tell you.
To their credit, though, my students were actually really good. I was very, very lucky. They were all very thoughtful, open minded and open to learning whatever I threw at them, even if it wasn't something with which they personally agreed. And by the end of the quarter, pretty much everyone was able to look around them and start to see for themselves the things I was telling them in class. I was very proud. There were no plagiarism or behavior problems and if they didn't hand things in on time they generally had a good reason. I hear about all this bullshit that my friends and other academics routinely had to put up with (and still do, if they are currently teaching) and I don't know how I was so lucky to get such good groups of students for all three quarters I taught.
But really, this makes the lack of awareness or even outright denial of sexism and racism even more distressing. Because they are thoughtful and intelligent people and they are genuinely nice. And they don't/can't/won't acknowledge the deep injustices still present in our society, even though women and people of color are speaking out against these things every freaking day!
[To Be Continued...Post Too Long...]
no subject
This does give me a bit of hope, though, because even though white folks have thought everything is peachy keen during each of those periods, improvements still got made in spite of that. We don't have slavery anymore, we don't have (legal) segregation, and incredible gains have been made during the civil rights movement. So even though things still aren't perfect (or even all that good), and even though the majority of white folks don't think it's really needed, we'll still get there. It's hard, it's not fun, but we have to do it. And we have to fight sexism and homophobia and economic injustice and everything else that degrades any living being, even though those things are so much harder to get people to recognize and address when multiple oppressions start intersecting (like race and gender in what happened to you at work). But we have to, there's no other choice. Either we're all free or none of us are.
Ew, look at me being all impassioned and optimistic! It's been so long, I almost didn't even recognize optimism anymore!
no subject
I work at my local YWCA as the co-coordinator of our racial justice program and our focus is on eliminating racism and empowering women. Racism and sexism are very much alive. The latest thing we noticed locally was an article in Wednesday's paper in which an inspector of a church that was vandalized referred to the church as a "colored" church. First, who says colored anymore? And how is his diagnosis that the vandalism wasn't race oriented (several incidences of church vandalism in this area has been race related) valid if he's still calling people colored?
I also attended a racial justice event earlier this year in which an elderly white lady felt fine throwing the N-word out. I know she's older, but noooooooo. This wasn't an event on which we were focusing on people's ideals on racism or asking questions, or a place in which many anti-racism activists call a "safe space" to air out un-politically correct thoughts in order to get to the root of racist thoughts, it was an event in which to celebrate black people during black history month.
And the anti-mexican rhetoric around here is crazy. I mean people said at a building meeting that they thought mexican people, working on Visas, were going to kidnap their children from a nearby school and harm them, even though the program has been in the area for years without a blip of criminal activity from the workers.
I am certainly sorry you had to experience this. As Lena Williams claims, "It's the little things" that makes racism so brutal. Did you get a chance to talk to the colleague that was addressed as your "spouse"? If it happens again, you should address the situation along with another colleague that has experienced one of this guy's "jokes" and I'm more than positive it has happened before. It's like verbal diarrhea from people like that.
Sexism and racism should be faced head on by everyone.
no subject
No, I didn't, unfortunately. He went out to the meeting the guy was calling him to, and I wasn't entirely comfortable addressing it - I wasn't sure that he noticed the slur at all.
I read an essay (or perhaps an excerpt?) by Tim Wise on Wednesdays' IBARW, I believe. (Or maybe it was a link in a link in a link...)
At any rate, it was excellent argument, excellent points, and very eye-opening. More white people who say they don't benefit from racism really do need to read it.
The lessons of history, when unlearned, are doomed to be repeated.
no subject
Also, I don't know the atmosphere or industry where you work in Australia, but if there is a people of color "support"-that's really a bad word, but I'm too tired to grasp the right one-group, it might not be bad to join one. It's even better if you can find a women run one.
Racism and sexism would be closer to being eliminated if more white men (white feminist too!) realized how the two isms burden society and tried to fix it because no matter how much women or people of color shout it from the rooftops, sometimes one white man's voice is more valid to other white people than a million women or people of color's.
no subject
no subject
It's a lot better than it was. That doesn't mean that it's close to done.
no subject
Your coworker's behavior was gross. I have been sitting here flabbergasted at his utter disgustingness for a few minutes. I don't even know what to say.
no subject
Gnnnh. :kicks guy: