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1. munchb+(OP)[view] [source] 2020-06-18 22:15:45
I completely agree, and I'm grateful there are activists to organize these efforts.

Since this is such a sensitive topic, I think I need to elaborate a bit more on the individual vs. systemic perspective. When I was growing up, I was told that the game is rigged against me, and I was going to have to dig deep. I had to make peace with the idea that, for example, I needed better SAT scores for the same college applications. (I didn't pick the example for its severity, I picked it because it's a measured phenomenon.) That's just the reality of racism/sexism/ageism/whatever. That's the individual perspective: game's rigged against you, deal with it.

But where this line of thinking becomes racist is when, for example, one of the Chinese immigrant parents in my community asks "why don't black people just work harder?" How do you know how hard they work? If it was just about working harder, the problem would be solved by now. In that case saying that black people should work harder comes from a place of ignorance of the real problems, which proves the point that it's important to make noise about systemic problems. That's the systemic perspective.

I don't think either point has to invalidate the other, but I've personally experienced both people saying "work harder" as a form of victim-blaming out of ignorance as well as people blaming personal failings on the system holding them down, and everything in between including real role models who are just venting. So I tend to just keep my mouth shut about it in my personal life.

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