underwater wrote:
I just don't understand why the idea of 'race' survived so long. In the eighties people were more progressive. When you're European, the idea of some common 'white' culture is absurd. Also, most of the black people I know are from various African countries, with different languages, cultures and customs. Just as with Europe there are regional similarities and differences. I know people from Western and Eastern Africa. They are all black muslims, but with very different traditions. Why would anyone expect them to have a commmon culture?
I saw the strangest article in The Guardian yesterday, 'Shedding my whiteness is a work in progress'
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyl ... n-progressThis young woman has people debating whether she's black or Irish. She grew up in Ireland, within an Irish family. She never says where her black father was from, as if he has no nationality. What's wrong with being for example Irish-Nigerian, or Irish-Gambian?
And, yeah, I get that she's been discriminated against, and that her family might stick up for her more. Who on WP doesn't know how that feels? I just don't understand why you have to be one or the other when clearly you are a little bit of both?
I got the sense that much of her Irish family wanted to deny her blackness, not integrate it with her Irishness. I think everyone here can relate to the pain of some random stranger making uninformed or insulting remarks based on some physical characteristic. No one likes to be understood in a false and simplistic way, especially if that way has known negative implications.
It seemed to me like she felt like she had to lose her whiteness in the eyes of her family for them to understand her situation, and also to dispel the racist idea that "real Irish" are exclusively white.
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"I find that the best way [to increase self-confidence] is to lie to yourself about who you are, what you've done, and where you're going." - Richard Ayoade