Posted on Sunday, June 18, 2006 - 10:35 pm:

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You should have asked the guy what he meant by "long way from home."

Maybe it was a misunderstanding that he could have cleared up.

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Posted on Monday, June 19, 2006 - 8:12 am:

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But back to the topic at hand...I've felt an increase in tension...we get a HOT set of summer months, you never know. Hell, I thought it was going to boil over LAST year.

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Posted on Monday, June 19, 2006 - 11:12 am:

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I'm pushing 30 and don't see any meaningful progress in the above-stated situation happening in the next ten years. It takes too long to change a culture, and my g/f and I have decided that *if* we ever want to raise kids, they won't be angry, cable-TV watching, bling-wanting, mean, mcdonalds addicted SE Michigan kids. It takes a village to raise a child, and this one is stocked full of some real idiots...

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Posted on Monday, June 19, 2006 - 4:55 pm:

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Detroit by far as some of the worst blatant racism (which many folks around here on both side of the divide seem to think they've cleverly shrouded in a code word or two).

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Posted on Monday, June 19, 2006 - 4:56 pm:

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It is the intent of this work to show how words, symbols, colors and images are used to nurture and sustain the practice of modern racism. Some of these racial codes are exposed, explained, and examined in this book. My objective is to show how words, symbols, colors and images are used in a systematic manner to hide racism. This racialized form of communication is part of a long-running history that has had the affect of an undeclared war on the development of Black people here and abroad.

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Posted on Monday, June 19, 2006 - 6:17 pm:

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The modern racist speaks in code about most things that are racial. It is amazing how innocent-sounding words that seem to have no apparent racial meaning or identity can, over a period of time, become racially derogatory references. ... Why risk calling a Black male or female a socially unacceptable name or direct racial word such as NIGGER when they can be called racial code words using socially acceptable language with terms such as crime INFESTED, lowering the property values, gentrification, Inner City, or social disinvestments.

Code words make life that much better/easier for a smart racist. He/She can talk about and control Black people without them raising hell! Code talkers try to use coded language to call a Black Man a NIGGER to his face and get him to laugh about it and accept it! In the real white supremacist culture, code language is taught and used as everyday communication.

Racial code words are non-racially identifiable words, terms, phrases, and sentences or slogans that are used as surrogate language. The racial code wording process produces perceptions that are generally misleading and racist in context. [Note: read LMichigan's use of "negativity" or your "niceness" = if they act like me.]

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Posted on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 - 9:51 am:

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In a racially coded environment, it is very important to understand that most messages are NOT FUNNY JINGLES or CUTE PUNCHLINES made up to amuse people. These are powerfully effective forms of communication that were developed by experts in areas of propaganda, public manipulation and subliminal communications and are taught as the norm to certain segments of the population to conceal actual intent; hence the term "buzz-words" (not names) and their continual usage.

To give benefit of the doubt, it is possible that the hidden messages/buzz words may have been an accident or an unintended outcome. However, the developers and users of these slogans know or should know the subliminal and hidden meanings of their work. When a significant number of hidden racial trigger words are discovered in a speech, slogan, or writing, it raises the question to whether it is an accident or purposeful.

Racism in plain sight is covered up by a barrage of coded words designed to tell a lie that is supposed to be believable. [Note: i.e; Livedog2]

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Posted on Tuesday, June 20, 2006 - 11:29 pm:

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Vibrant Area, Normally Peaceful Neighborhood ---> translated;
This term is used when anything happens in a predominently white community The goal is to deflect derogatory images. The normal course of events is to ensure that Black people, and others of color, are the real varmints and their communities are where the the criminals reside.

This is also code for the suburbs. The term, when used by white people, area/neighborhood/community means an area where White people live in dominant numbers. The area where the white supremacist has created the impression that they are peace loving, quiet and civilized people. The image is of a white picket fence, which when decoded means a white and protected area with friendly people with no crime, criminals or thoughts of criminal activity. In reality, it's quite the opposite. They pose as civilized wonderful people - the salt of the earth, a progressive society - while they steal, use/exploit, and wreak havoc and destruction/degradation all over the world.

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Posted on Wednesday, June 21, 2006 - 8:14 am:

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Racism in plain sight is covered up by a barrage of coded words designed to tell a lie that is supposed to be believable.

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Posted on Wednesday, June 21, 2006 - 9:03 am:

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Your brilliant attempt to offer important social interaction

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Posted on Thursday, June 22, 2006 - 4:27 pm:

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...white supremacists/ racists are "people who classify themselves as 'white', and who generally function as 'white', and who practice racial subjugation (based on 'white'-'non-white', at any time, in any place, in any one, or more of the nine major areas of activity...

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Posted on Thursday, June 22, 2006 - 4:45 pm:

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Hey Sport ..... they keep trying to jump outta the headlights!!!!! (ROFLMBAO)

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Posted on Friday, June 23, 2006 - 11:35 am:

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Maybe you should see the world outside the view of an ignorant "white supremacist"!! Lotas white & Black folk do!!

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Posted on Friday, June 23, 2006 - 10:22 pm:

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I hope the man's resting in a well-deserved peace.

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 - 9:55 am:

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I feel ya Super_d. That "Honest Abe" - "I didn't chop down the cherry tree" schitt is outta-sight!!!

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 - 12:14 pm:

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I'm still wrestling with that one fellow's division of human existence into NINE categories.

I think he's WRONG about that...haven't gone deeper until I consider where he's coming from with them.

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 - 12:31 pm:

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THE CULTURE OF WHITE SUPREMACY

I. WHAT IS CULTURE?

A. A Definition

Culture is a way of life. (Definition by People’s Institute of Survival and Beyond in New Orleans.) Culture is passed on from generation to generation through institutions, groups, interpersonal and individual behavior.

B. FUNCTIONS OF CULTURE

For institutions: Culture provides the matrix out of which institutions grow, and the “glue” which binds institutions together in systems. Culture also provides the legitimacy and justification for the perpetuation of institutions from one generation to the next. (Material provided by Diana Dunn of People’s Institute.)

For example, a local public school can survive as an individual institution because some parents choose to send their children to the school. The school exists within the system of public schools in a particular city because tax payers are willing to continue paying taxes to support that school. And the entire public school system in a country can exist from generation to generation only so long as sufficient adults in the population believe that sending their children to public school will be beneficial.

For groups and individuals: Culture provides a sense of identity — who you are—— and a sense of belonging ——who you are with. It provides a sense of purpose —— your reason for being in the world—— and an orientation ——your sense of where you are going in your life (broadly speaking).

C. CULTURE AS A PROCESS

Culture is a set of rules for behavior. You cannot ‘see’ culture because you cannot see the rules; you can only see.. .the behaviors the rules produce. ..Cultural rules influence people to behave similarly, in ways which help them to understand each other... For example, cultural rules shape food preferences. ..The essence of culture is not these behaviors themselves, but the rules that produce the behaviors.

Culture is characteristic of groups. The rules of a culture are shared by the group, not invented by the individual; the rules of the group which are passed on from one generation to the form the core of the culture...

Culture is learned... What each person learns depends upon the cultural rules of the people who raise them.. .Because culture is learned, it is a mistake to assume a person’s culture by the way s/he looks...Culture can be well learned by some people in the group and less well learned by others...

“Cultures borrow and share rules.. .Cultural rules change over time, and sometimes when two groups have extensive contact with one another, they influence each other in some areas... (Excerpts taken from CULTURE AS A PROCESS by Carol Brunson Phillips; February 27, 1991. Thanks to lntisar Shareef for calling my attention to this material.)

II. WHAT IS WHITE CULTURE?

A. AN HISTORICAL DEFINITION OF “WHITE”

The term white as applied to people was first used by slave—owning colonialists in 17th century Maryland and Virginia to describe poor indentured servants who came from Europe. Originally, these servants had been called “Englishmen,” “Irishmen” or “Christians,” but the colonial ruling class began to use the term “white” to distinguish European servants from African ones, who were often called “Negro,” which means “black” in Spanish.

The Virginia legislature made the term “white” a legal distinction in 1791, after a series of joint rebellions by European and African servants, culminating in Bacon’s Rebellion of 1676, nearly brought down the colonial ruling powers. (Information provided by People’s Institute.) In the slave codes of 1705, especially in the “Act concerning servants and slaves,”colonial rulers gave poor ‘whites’ certain legislated privileges, such as a small plot of land or “freedom dues” (wages) after completion of their term of servitude; the right to sue their masters in court; and exemption from public whipping for punishment! At the same time, the legislature wrote the laws which provided the institutionalized foundations for chattel slavery for Africans.

From that time on, throughout U.S. history, to be “white” has meant to have access to certain forms of preferential treatment, and exemption from racial oppression, solely on the basis of European ancestry and (allegedly) “white” skin. Thus, the concepts of “white people” and “white privilege” share the same historical and institutional roots. And both terms are artificial, historical constructions to serve political purposes: creating separations among oppressed peoples on the basis of skin color and ancestral origin so that they would not unite against a common oppressor.

(For more on the historical origins of the terms ‘white’ and ‘white privilege:’ (1) Theodore William Allen, Class Struggle and the Origin of Racial Slavery: The Invention of the White Race. 1975 pamphlet. (2) Theodore Allen, “Introduction,” The Invention of the White Race: Racial Oppression and Social Control. Vol. 1. London: Verso Books, 1994. (3) A. Leon Higginbotham, Jr., In The Matter of Color: Race & the American Legal Process: The Colonial Period. Oxford University Press, 1980, especially pages 53—57.. (4) Lerone Bennett, Jr. “The Road Not Taken,” in The Shaping of Black America. Chicago, 1975.)

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 - 10:54 pm:

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B. A DEFINITION OF WHITE SUPREMACY

White supremacy is an historically based, institutionally perpetuated system of exploitation and oppression of continents, nations and peoples of color by white peoples and nations of the European continent; for the purpose of establishing, maintaining and defending a system of wealth, power and privilege. (Definition by Mickey Ellinger and Sharon Martinas)

C. A DEFINITION OF WHITE CULTURE

White culture is an artificial, historically constructed culture which expresses, justifies and binds together the United States white supremacy system. It is the cultural matrix and glue which binds together white—controlled institutions into systems; and white—controlled systems into the global white supremacy system. Since World War II, the white culture of the United States has been the center of the global white culture.

D. WHITE CULTURE IS A DOMINANT CULTURE

White culture is not the only culture in the current territory of the United States. There are numerous others: many kinds of indigenous, African— American and African— Caribbean, Chicano and Latino with regional variations, a multiplicity of Asian cultures, indigenous Hawaiian, many Arabic cultures, and expressions of many European peoples.

But white culture is the dominant culture. What are some of the characteristics of this dominant culture? In thinking about these characteristics, please recall Dr. Wade Nobles’ definition of power: “Power is the ability to define reality and to convince other people that it is their definition.” (See “Definitions,” Political Perspectives. Exer. Manual.)

1. It defines who you are, and who “others” are in relation to you. For example, a white culture term for ‘people of color’ is ‘non—white,’ i.e., non—people.

2. It shapes your attitudes, thinking, behavior and values. For example, a white woman shrinks in fear when passing an African American man on the street; yet the great’ danger to white women comes from white men in the home.

3. It consciously and unconsciously suppresses and oppresses other cultures. For example, slave owners consciously suppressed African spirituality and taught Africans Christianity to make them ‘docile.’ Or, employers fire workers for speaking Spanish in a restaurant, but promote workers who speak French.

4. It consciously and unconsciously appropriates aspects of oppressed cultures. For example: every form of African American music: gospel, blues, Jazz, rhythm and blues, and rap, has been copied by white musicians with no credit given to the creative sources of the music. Or, white New Agers become instant healers, charging hefty fees, by appropriating ancient indigenous healing practices.

5. It is normative: the standard for judging values and behavior.

6. It is assumed, unquestioned, not on the agenda: the ways things are.

7. It is hidden -- not at all obvious to the dominating or oppressing practitioners, but often painfully, obvious to peoples whose cultures have been suppressed, oppressed or appropriated.

E. WHITE CULTURE IS A DEADLY BREW

White culture in the United States is complex. Because white supremacy is fundamental to the existence of this country, white supremacist culture is intertwined with other major cultural manifestations that make up the fabric of the U.S: the greed, competition and individualism of capitalism; male supremacist fear and hatred of the power of women; historical Christianity’S hatred and fear of sexuality, and its compulsion to divide humankind into the “saved” and the “damned;” and militarism’s glorification of war and conquest as proofs of manhood and nationhood that has roots an European culture going back thousands of years.

White culture is a melting pot of greed, guys, guns and god. It is a deadly brew.

(For a comprehensive critique of European culture, see Marimba Ani, Yurugu: An African—Centered Critique of European Cultural Thought and Behavior. New Jersey: Africa World Press, 1994.)

III. SHININ’ THE LITE ON WHITE

In this section, I will try to highlight some of the ways in which white culture manifests itself in our daily lives. As you read this, please remember that this is a very tentative beginning of a new effort by many white activists in the U.S. to explore the meanings of white culture. Most analysis on white culture has been done by activists and scholars of color. Their work has inspired me to begin to do my own homework.

A. THE CULTURE OF RACIAL OPPRESSION: (CULTURAL RACISM)

1. White culture perpetuates the ideology that people of color are morally and mentally inferior to white people. Throughout the history of the United States, white culture has characterized people of color as ‘‘savage, ‘‘ignorant,’’ ‘‘depraved,’’ ‘‘bestial,’’ “lazy,” “dirty,” “illegal” and “criminal.”

This ideology continues unabated today. For example, white students and white workers assume that the only reason a person of color gets into college or into a good job is because of affirmative action: that is, the people of color could not have competed with the white person were the playing field “level.” In these examples, the white people cannot imagine that the people of color might be equally or more qualified than the whites for the positions they achieved.

2.. White culture stereotypes figures and behaviors of peoples of color. A common method is to take some cultural attribute forced on people of color by conquest and continuing racial oppression, and making that attribute into a symbol of the whole people. For example, the film Ethnic Notions by Marvin Riggs delineates a history of white stereotypes of African Americans in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Stereotypes such as the “minstrel,” the “mammy,” “coon’ illustrate forms of assumed behavior that is carried into contemporary stereotypes of African Americans embodied in terms like “criminal,” “gang member” and “welfare mother.” Forms change; meanings stay on.

3. By defining reality as white, and convincing peoples of color that white reality is their reality, white culture actively promotes internalized racism and inter—racial tensions among peoples of color. Internalized racism disempowers a person and a people. Inter—racial hostility prevents different peoples of color from uniting for their common purposes and against their common oppressors.

In this way, white culture expresses a successful white ruling class strategy of “divide and conquer.” Imprisoning a person’s mind is more thorough and long—lasting than imprisoning her body.

4. White culture labels the cultures of the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Arab world as inferior to cultures that have evolved in Europe. Furthermore, white culture actively promotes the historical lie that the culture that evolved in ancient Greece was the “fountainhead of western civilization.”

In fact, most of the great Greek scholars and poets went to Kemet (the name for ancient Egypt), which was an African culture and civilization, to study for years before they returned to create their own forms of wisdom. And the “renaissance” of Europe did not begin in Italy, as our textbooks say, but in Spain and Portugal which, under the African and Arabic Moorish Empire of the 8th through the 15th centuries~ preserved and recreated the wisdom of the ancient world, and developed the technology which allowed the Spanish and Portuguese to embark on their voyages of exploration and conquest of lands outside Europe.

Today, there is a white cultural war against African—centred research and scholarship. White academics call this scholarship ‘self serving.’ Yet few white culturalists would call traditional historical and anthropological research, “White Studies.”

5. White culture suppresses and oppresses the cultures of peoples of color as part of an ongoing system of conquest, colonialism and racial/national oppression.

For example, the movement, now a law in many states, of “English Only” is a specific form of cultural conquest of peoples from Mexico, Central and South America and Puerto Rico, which has its historical origin in the U.S.’s 1848 war against Mexico; and the 1898 invasion of Puerto Rico. “English Only” is cultural colonialism: the peoples of colonized nations are forced to speak the language of the conqueror.

6. White culture appropriates elements of the cultures of people of color in order to mask the underlying power relationships of dominant to dominated cultures.

For example: Rhythm and Blues is an African American musical creation, but one of its most famous exponents was Elvis Presley, a white working class man from the south. Many rhythm and blues artists die impoverished. Elvis is worshipped like a god.

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 - 11:54 pm:

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Can we please have our mental health system back? we desperatley need it.

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Posted on Sunday, June 25, 2006 - 3:03 pm:

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B. THE CULTURE OF WHITE PRIVILEGE

White privilege is the other side of the coin of racial oppression. Therefore, it should not be surprising to see that the culture of white privilege is a mirror image of the culture of racial oppression.

1. White culture perpetuates the ideology that white people are morally and intellectually superior to people of color. For example, many suburban white women and men think they get into college because they are “more intelligent” than Chicanos, Native Americans or African Americans; when, in fact, they get into college because their high schools prepare them more effectively for college boards than do most high schools in urban areas.

2. White culture stereotypes figures and behavior of white people. A common method is to take some cultural attribut~ which is the result of hundreds of years of institutionalized white privilege in the United States, and projecting this attribute as solely the result of the person’s individual, heroic efforts.

For example, the son or daughter of a European immigrant is portrayed as having risen to wealth and power from initial poverty solely as a result of moral fortitude and hard work. But, in fact, European immigrants historically have both worked hard and received privileges from the U.S. government that people of color (whether they were immigrants, indigenous or kidnapped) have been historically denied at different times.

European immigrants (differentially for men and women) had the right to become citizens, the right to own land, the right to bring and to live with a family, the right to travel in search of work, the right to vote, the right to practice their own language and religion without interference, the right to organize mutual self—help societies and small businesses without being broken up by white mobs, the right to a public school education, the right to bring suit and testify in court, and the right to hold public office. 3. By defining reality as white, and convincing white people that it is their reality, the culture of white supremacy is portrayed as universal, applying to all humankind.

For example, a “History of Western Civilization” begins with Greece, then moves to Rome, then Europe, ending with the United States. But this is a course on Europe, (which is fine provided the course begins with the contributions of Kemet to Greece), but it is not a course on “western civilization.” Another example: ABC network tells its reporter covering the elections in South Africa to put an “Americans in South Africa” spin on the story, otherwise U.S. readers will not be interested in the story!

Or, white feminists create brilliant analyses of patriarchy coming from their European cultural experience, and then try to generalize this analysis to the relationships between men and women whose ancestral cultures originate in Africa, the Americas, Asia or Arabic world. And, we call the white women s movement, “the women’s movement.”

4. White culture provides a normative standard of behavior for one living in a system of white privilege. These norms are usually manifested in the arrogance of white entitlement —— an assumption of how a white person expects to be treated in the world.

Some examples: Getting angry when we have to wait in a line too long; speaking with authority, as if we are sure of correctness; talking as long as we wish, often interrupting others; getting outraged when our First Amendment rights to peacefully gather and protest are violated by police (when police violate similar rights by people of color every night, just for gathering in a group). Note: white feminists often call these forms of behavior ‘white male arrogance,’ but I believe it’s a feature of white culture which white women, now that we have more ‘equality’ with white men, practice often.

5. White culture creates white bonding, that is, the cross class allegiance and sense of commonality that non—ruling class oppressed white men and women have with the white ruling class, on the basis of “white skin” and European ancestry.

White bonding covers up the class exploitation of poor, working and middle class whites by the ruling class, by deflecting the problems of oppressed whites from the ruling class to people of color. White bonding prevents white women from using the potential power of their vote as women because they usually support the interests of middle class and rich white men more than the interests of men and women of color.

White bonding is at the core of the Christian right’s ‘family values’ ideology. It evokes an image of a white nuclear family in a 1950’s suburb: a suburb that practiced legal residential apartheid. White bonding is the cultural basis of racist jokes and language; it assumes of the white listener, “You know who I mean.”

White bonding is at the core of the attacks on multi—culturalism. It assumes that the only culture that should be taught in schools is white culture. White bonding calls the U.S. “America,” a term which properly applies to all the nation—states on this continent.

White bonding is one of the bases of the current anti—immigrant racism sweeping California. The bonding is a reaction to the terror that most white people feel at the prospect that the majority of California residents will soon be people of color. I doubt that anti—immigrant ideologists would be using the phrase, “drowning in a sea of immigrants” if the immigrants were coming from Canada.

In my opinion, white bonding is the most significant cultural barrier preventing oppressed whites from challenging the interrelated systems of oppression in the U.S.

C. THE CULTURE OF WHITE NATIONALISMS

The culture of white nationalism is the expression of the historical fact that the “founding fathers” intended this nation to be one of, for and by white people; and that the struggle to make it a nation “of, for and the people” goes on to this day.

1. The culture of white nationalism provides an identity, purpose, orientation and sense of belonging for people who immigrate to the United States from Europe. The term for this process is usually called assimilation. What it means is that a person of European descent agrees, consciously or unconsciously, to give up parts of her/his European ethnic heritage in exchange for becoming white, that is, accepting and expecting white privileges, and a sense of superiority over peoples of color, especially African Americans.

This assimilation process began in the 17th century, when the European colonial elite in Virginia began to call European indentured servants “white,” instead of “Christian” or “Englishmen” or “Irishmen,” in order to give them a sense of distinction and separation from servants of African ancestry. Each subsequent generation of European immigrants has gained acceptance into the white mainstream when they have begun to act in accordance with white bonding, and the majority of their organized ethnic sector have consented, by silence or action, to the oppression of peoples of color.

(For example, see David R. Roediger, The Wages of Whiteness: Race and the Making of the American Working Class. Verso Press, London, 1991., Chap. 7 “Irish American Workers and White Racial Formation in the Antebellum United States.”)

2. White culture appropriates elements of European ethnic cultures in order to increase the ethnic grouping’s sense of assimilation. For example, pasta became “spaghetti” and is now available in your local super market.

3. The culture of white nationalism has transformed pride and love of country (patriotism) into a glorification of the military conquest of nations of color. Historically, this military conquest has always been justified by religion: Pilgrims took the land from the “heathens.” It was “manifest destiny” for the U.S. to conquer Mexico in 1848. It was “God’s will” to make the world “safe” for democracy. God was on the side of the “smart bombs” that obliterated a hundred thousand Iraqis.

4. Under the guise of the imperial we, white nationalism assumes that the United States can interfere in every nation of color in t,he world, and that somehow that intervention will be beneficial to the residents of that nation. The current justification for this national arrogance is “bringing democracy” or the “free enterprise system” (i.e. capitalism) to the invaded nation.

(* The term “white nationalism” is used by the noted African American historian John Henrik Clarke. I first heard it in an interview by Dr. Kwaku Person—Lynn taped in 1991, and aired during KPFA’s African Mental Liberation Weekend of May 17, 1992.)

D. THE CULTURE OF WHITE HISTORY

U.S. “history” is based on a lie. Neither children’s nor adult textbooks tell us that the United States was created by invasion, conquest, land theft, genocide and slavery: that, in its foundations, it is a white supremacy state. Instead, history writers fabricate an “America” as a land embodying the Declaration of Independence: a nation based on freedom, justice and equality for all its peoples.

The historians also ignore, or trivilialize, the continuous history of resistance by peoples of color against this unjust foundation. Young people learning about the African American freedom struggle of the 1960’s are taught that it all rested on Martin Luther King having a dream, and not the massive organization of millions of African American people and their allies.

Without a thorough understanding of the U.S. past, there is no way we can adequately understand how white supremacy works today, or to plan strategies to challenge it. Our political vision gets framed in a thirty second sound bite.

E. DENIAL OF RESPONSIBILITY

Absence and falsification of a nation’s historical memory fosters a personal and collective denial of responsibility for racial injustice and oppression, past and present. White people say, “I didn't own any slaves,” as if living in a system whose wealth was created by enslaved African labor did not directly benefit their ancestors. Liberal whites assert, “I don't see color; I just see people;” a statement of unwillingness to look at reality. Whites of conscience justify their unwillingness to protest racial injustice by complaining that, “I have no power,” when any accurate reading of history indicates that organized protest creates the power to effectively challenge racial injustice.

Denial of responsibility for racial injustice takes many forms. Among the most common are: + Blaming people of color, the targets of racial injustice, for the effects of that injustice; + Promoting “equal responsibility” theories for addressing the effects of racial oppression; + Hiding the centrality of institutional promotion and perpetuation of racial injustice (the ‘one bad apple’ mythology); + Focusing “blame” on one individual’s behavior, rather than looking at the institutional and cultural context for that behavior; + Tokenism: the effort to overturn racism in a white institution by hiring one person of color in a leadership position, while leaving the racist politics, practice and power intact; + Judging racial oppression by the intent of the oppressor rather than effect on the oppressed; + Speaking and writing with racially color—coded terms, such as “criminal,” “illegal alien,” “welfare mother,” “drug dealer,” “gang,” etc., instead of the racial epithets that were common before the end of legal apartheid in the 1960’s.

How can you tell when a white person is denying personal responsibility for racial injustice? Listen for the “but.” “I'm not a racist, but...”

How can you tell when a white person is denying collective responsibility of white people and white institutions for racial injustice? Look for the passive or inactive voice in the verbs. Such as, “The indigenous people died of many diseases.” or “The young man was made homeless...”

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