Power and Privilege, Illusion or Not

Although I'm missing the second day of my semi-mandatory Undoing Racism training for work, because I'm out sick with either a bad cough or H1N1, there were some outstanding ideas presented in the first day that will be helpful to me.

Overall, I did not expect the training to be as earth-shattering to me as it was for many others, since I had an apparently unusually high number of critical perspectives and truths presented to me in high school and college, and I have been involved with enough workshops and trainings on community organizing and radical politics that all of the major concepts are already ingrained in me.

However, a couple of points stood out. Most people in the world are not white. By far. Clearly, this is fairly obvious for anyone that takes 2 seconds to think about it, but it is somethign that we, good white leftists (or well meaning white people, as they say in their trainings) in the US, need to keep reminding ourselves of this. It is a truth that is not borne out by the media we see around ourselves, even now that they insert the token African-American, Asian-American, person using a wheelchair, etc.

Second, it was helpful to know some of the details and meanings behind the original classification of races, which only had 4 races, back in the 16 or 1700s, something I can't recall ever learning. When you then think about all of the other ethnicities that have "become" white over the years in the U.S., it puts a really strong lens on the issue of Latino ethnicity/race in the Census, which has been an ongoing difficulty for decades, and it's not clear to me what the right answer is. The right answer needs to be whatever answer will produce the largest number of people counted as Latino via the census. But not being an expert, it is not clear to me what the methodology would be to do so, nor do I know if there is any potential to change it back from what the 2000 Census did in eliminating Hispanic/Latino as a race category. It's much more than just an issue for the Census, since so many other systems in research and human services will base their demographic classification off of the methodology used by the Census.

In preparation for the Undoing Racism training, many of us watched a PBS documentary called Race: The Power of an Illusion, which, for me, was similarly useful for the tidbits of history rather than the overwhelming messages. When one of our trainers, Diana, reminded us that Jews were the last ethnic group to "become" white before the recent "becoming white" of Latinos via the 2000 Census removing Hispanic as a race choice, it reminded me of something in the film.

In presenting the overwhelming foundation of racism that was unequivocally tied to the founding of the U.S., the film noted that for the first time in the history of modern Western civilization, white was used as the higher status rather than Christian. The primary reason this was mentioned in the film, was to point out that it served to pit poor whites against all blacks, by emphasizing their whiteness as something that increased their power, and preventing alliances between poor whites and poor blacks, against the white (unofficial) aristocracy. But what jolted me was that the very reason that Jews have been able to secure more freedom, power and privilege in the U.S. than any other nation-state in history (one could argue), is inextricably connected to the racist underpinnings of the nation. Now how is one to sit with that and what is one to make of that? And how does it relate to white guilt felt by Jews?

Talk amongst yourselves.

"That is the way he lived. That is what he leaves us."

This is a line from Senator Kennedy's eulogy for his brother Robert in 1968, which I have listened to many times to on this YouTube clip, almost compulsively on repeat. Although I had heard the speech before, it feels increasingly moving, its words increasingly salient. There are many other lines from the speech that feel relevant at this time and hopefully can serve as a call to the young generation stirred to action in part by President Obama's rise to power:

The answer is to rely on youth -- not a time of life but a state of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of imagination, a predominance of courage over timidity, of the appetite for adventure over the love of ease. The cruelties and obstacles of this swiftly changing planet will not yield to the obsolete dogmas and outworn slogans. They cannot be moved by those who cling to a present that is already dying, who prefer the illusion of security to the excitement and danger that come with even the most peaceful progress.

It is a revolutionary world we live in, and this generation at home and around the world has had thrust upon it a greater burden of responsibility than any generation that has ever lived. Some believe there is nothing one man or one woman can do against the enormous array of the world's ills. Yet many of the world's great movements, of thought and action, have flowed from the work of a single man. A young monk began the Protestant reformation; a young general extended an empire from Macedonia to the borders of the earth; a young woman reclaimed the territory of France; and it was a young Italian explorer who discovered the New World, and the 32 year-old Thomas Jefferson who [pro]claimed that "all men are created equal."

These men moved the world, and so can we all. Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events, and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation. *It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped.* Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

And:

The future does not belong to those who are content with today, apathetic toward common problems and their fellow man alike, timid and fearful in the face of new ideas and bold projects. Rather it will belong to those who can blend vision, reason and courage in a personal commitment to the ideals and great enterprises of American Society.* Our future may lie beyond our vision, but it is not completely beyond our control. It is the shaping impulse of America that neither fate nor nature nor the irresistible tides of history, but the work of our own hands, matched to reason and principle, that will determine our destiny. There is pride in that, even arrogance, but there is also experience and truth. In any event, it is the only way we can live.

Several years of paying rapt attention as Ted Kennedy debated vigurously on the Senate floor on CSPAN, increasing knowledge about his impact on the trajectory of health care and other legislation, as well as a growing sense of cameraderie for all things New England, have led me to feel extremely tied to the outpouring of emotion at his death, a connection that is perhaps inappropriately great based on the short time I have lived in Massachusetts. However, his record, rhetoric and the New England base from which he comes have struck a chord in me for a long time. I remember how excited I was to be able to vote for him, though he was obviously going to win, just a few weeks after I moved here in 2006.

This evening I was one of thousands who made the brief trek to the JFK Library to pay respects to the late Senator, and was one of many who recieved a hug or handshake from Vicky Kennedy and several of the sons, nephews and grandchildren, a completely unnecessary yet touching gesture.

I also made it into the Boston Globe's headline article tonight (also on Boston.com main page). I think this only happened because the woman in front of me was crying with two cute, small children.

But even if by chance, it served to perpetuate a particularly eery chain of events, beginning with many years hearing my father talk about a special connection to JFK all the time and cry any time his life or death were feature on television, followed by the publication of this article in the Globe, after a spontaneous trip to the JFK library while my parents were visiting.

So I imagine my shock when I arrived home after paying my respects this evening to find a photo of another Wasserman in the Boston Globe with regard to the death of the same Kennedy in the same location....

Clearly, it's some kind of coincidence, but perhaps you have now begun to understand what this connection means to me and why I find the words uttered by Senator Kennedy ring so true and his record and legacy such a model to carry forward.

What's goin on, DNC?

I don't understand. I read that John Kerry, my Senator, has been selling out the public option in Committee discussions, and that Olympia Snowe has said publicly that she supports a public option....

So what's up with the email I just got from Organizing for America/DNC, which reads:

With the health care debate coming down to the wire in Congress, we need every vote we can get. Both of your Massachusetts senators are fighting hard for reform, but the two senators from nearby Maine -- Senator Olympia Snowe and Senator Susan Collins -- are under tremendous pressure to cave to special interests. They need to hear from constituents who want them to stand with the President -- and you can help.

Sheep to Sweater

I never post on this blog anymore, but maybe I will start again. I feel like lately I'm alone in my own head a lot more, especially with regard to thoughts about food, agriculture and more.

I need to go to sleep, but I'm all wound up with excitement over little things and they are too much for the sound bite of a status message. I want to email people and share with them, but I think I often do that too much, when really I just need to sit with things myself and be happy, or excited, or concerned. In the absence of in person conversations do emails suffice? I don't know.

First, I had a pretty marvelous evening yesterday- first hearing Michael Pollan speak at Tufts, in the company of my peers and colleagues from the Friedman School, followed by an Idan Raichel concert at the Berklee Performance Center.

Today, a lunchtime seminar where faculty and students interacted to dissect some of Pollan's arguments was broadcast in an interactive format online for alumni to watch and participate. This was amazing- watching, typing comments on my computer from work--and doing work-- all at the same time.

Long after I should have gone bed tonight, I found on Epicurious that the February 2009 issue of Bon Appetit has a recipe for kale chips. I feel vindicated in my obsession with spreading the gospel of kale chips over the past year or so.

Then I discovered free gardening workshops that BNAN is running at Northeastern this Saturday! as well as a whole day of amazing events going on around the area that Slow Food Boston posted on their blog, including a Soup Swap and....drumroll please....

a Sheep-to-Sweater Interpretative Trail!

I guess happiness from reveling in the small things is what it's all about. At least for now.