To succeed in politics today requires precision and artistic skill. Within the tip of the societal iceberg, how does the influential network of wealthy, white elite tactfully weaponize insecurities and resentments, especially around race, to delineate between American in-groups and out-groups?
To the white people reading this, what tools have you harnessed to chip away at the top and uncover all that exists beneath your “wage of whiteness?” Before becoming defensive, please 1) read the below article and watch the Stanford webinar on Race & Power then 2) share these resources with another white person in your community.
a manufactured sound that resonates at frequencies that canines can hear but humans cannot.
a technology - a secret signal - that allows for something uttered publicly to be heard and understood privately.
When people criticize racist dog whistles, they’re not just objecting to a specific coded speech act; they’re calling out a system that makes such acts of coded power possible. And when people knowingly use dog whistles to spread racist messages, they show contempt not just for the people they’re speaking past, but to the people they’re speaking to. Even if those who leap at the dog whistle revel in the insider knowledge that makes them the intended audience, this still places them not in the role of the master, but the dog - “The racist roots of the dog whistle,” Adam Shapiro
To white people, it is presumed that we cannot talk about the effects of structural racism on our well-being. This idea is false and must be challenged.
White people, it’s time to start some serious introspection. It’s time to start serious introspection so that we can step up and assume responsibility for a better future. It’s time to introspect so that we can subvert the dangerous, prescribed racial stereotypes and spark radical empathy for all American children, regardless of zip code.