Question:
would you rather be in the so-called oppressed group than constantly get accused of being an oppressor?
David G
2008-07-07 13:00:06 UTC
it's not my fault i'm white, male, educated and middle class
Fourteen answers:
edith clarke
2008-07-07 20:53:11 UTC
I'm white but I didn't have to live through the segregation that other people my age went through. I'd never want to go through what they have-and you're minimizing what it was like for them by saying you'd rather go through what they did than being accused of being an oppressor. I don't take it personally when people are upset about racism-I get upset right with them-why are you taking it personally-unless you have something to feel guilty about? Your lack of empathy is extremely disturbing. You sound like you need to get a grip on just what prejudice and privilege are-take one of these quick tests to learn a bit about racism or sexism if you dare-watch out-you may learn something: http://www.understandingprejudice.org/demos/



You sound like you need to find out what male privilege is as well-many of the concepts apply to racism and classism as well: http://finallyfeminism101.wordpress.com/2007/03/11/faq-what-is-male-privilege/



I don't think anyone in the US can grow up here and not absorb some racist sexist and classist ideas when we're all bombarded with stereotypes expressed as "jokes" in our society every day.
Zerk
2008-07-08 17:33:33 UTC
The immediate answer to your question is "neither". I would rather people be considerate of each other!



1. Most people on this earth belong to some oppressed groups and some oppressing groups at the same time. And most of us usually experience oppression at some time in our life -- by becoming disabled or old for instance. At some point you will likely know the answer to your question for yourself.



2. It is not your fault your are white, male, educated and middle class. It is your fault if you choose denial about ways the gains you've made in life have not all been just the product of your hard work (though no doubt that is part of it), but also have been at the expense of people of color, poor people, and women. It's a funny situation, since the mechanism that redirects resources from other folks into our lives (i am also white, male, educated, and middle class) are very entrenched -- sometimes hard to see, usually hard to avoid. It is all we can do to try to redistribute our gains more fairly and do what is within our individual influence to change our society. The alternative is a society of selfishness and pain.



Edit to add: Personally, i do not enjoy the anger i sometimes receive from people souly on the basis of my identity (white/male/middle-class), nor do i think i deserve it, but i DO have sympathy for it. Given the large amount of inequity i have witnessed in society, to not expect the occasional person of color, woman, or poor person to get upset and snap at someone who seems to reap the benefits of their hard work seems to be expecting super-human amounts of patience!
tehabwa
2008-07-07 14:15:03 UTC
Thos are NOT the only two choices.



If people have accused YOU, personally, of things you didn't do, then there's no need to take them seriously.



But if you have some problem with all the people who AREN'T white, male, educated, and middle class, then knock it off, and you'll have a lot fewer accusations hurled your way.



Your color and background aren't things that were under your control. Your BEHAVIOR IS.



That's what those of us who oppose sexism and racism have been trying to get across to the bigots and misogynists.
2008-07-07 13:24:56 UTC
Then do not associate yourself with that concept of oppressor. Remember that video that went around with that ditsy blond beauty pageant girl who was like as intelligent as a pink mold? Women, too, have a hard time not being "lumped together" with offensive generalized stereotypes like that. You just keep focused on your own vision of you are. Oh, sure, you're going to hear people lump you together with all sorts of groupings. Part of rising in individual consciousness is learning to separate yourself from those acculturatonal groupings, such as gender, and not to be offended by the behaviors of others. Just be your own man.
2008-07-07 13:23:29 UTC
I no longer care that as a white male that I am always called an oppressor. In real life, I just stay away from the morons that always play the race or sexist card.
2008-07-07 13:24:30 UTC
Well, then it's all my fault that I believe the only oppressors are war, pestilence and famine; other wise in the rest we just have to buckle down and make the best of it.
merrynightwanderer
2008-07-07 13:26:02 UTC
It's not your fault. Anyone who blames you for that is wrong. I don't think it's fair to say white men are -actively- oppressing anyone just because they're white men. What reasonable feminists demand, and what racial activists demand, is that you be aware that things are profoundly unfair and stacked in your favor.



I have to own up to that fact in regards to my race. I may have grown up poor, but my white grandparents allowed me to go to college without burying myself in debt. Many blacks, living in a self-perpetuating system that denies them resources like these, don't have this privilege. There's similar mechanisms in play with regards to gender.



Nobody's saying white heterosexual men are having meetings about how they can oppress someone today (though a few are certainly actively and knowingly doing so, most aren't). But their ignorance is certainly perpetuating matters.



I think it's harder to be part of the oppressed group with a bunch of ignorant, defensive, privileged people whining about how you're hurting their feelings all the time, honestly...
2008-07-07 13:08:25 UTC
Go ahead...try it.



I am white, male, educated and middle class, but I don't feel opressed. What I feel is ashamed that a country that once fought tyranny and evil is now full of whiners and whingers who wouldn't know an injustice if it bit them.
2017-01-04 12:58:28 UTC
you're thinking approximately it the incorrect way. that is unfair for a solid person to hit somebody weaker than them, as a results of fact the weaker person could be too liable to take the attack. you be attentive to who's often maximum useful? adult males. permit's in basic terms not hit susceptible human beings, because could wreck them. If the girls you be attentive to are susceptible, then do not hit them. or in basic terms...do not hit each and all people. i like that greater powerful. additionally, you're incorrect approximately abortion. there are a number of repercussions, as much as and including demise from vaginal hemorrhage. So there is that. meanwhile, women folk are in danger of being raped for ambitious to stroll relating to the city. while you at the instant are not conscious, being raped feels rather like being chopped in 0.5 with a lightning bolt. in the event that they do adventure such unfavourable violence, human beings will tell them that that's their fault, extremely if that they had the audacity to have a intercourse existence till now their attack; as a results of fact they are not a virgin, we declare that they are impure, that there is not any distinction if somebody rapes them. We tell them that in the event that they are warm, they're going to turn somebody on, and in the event that they turn somebody on, then they are obligated to end what they (unknowingly) began; in different words, we punish them for being fascinating. adult males, on the different hand, are predicted to count selection up what number women folk they have slept with. Praised, even. and that may not even counting each and all the pay hollow stuff that i don't be attentive to approximately. Sexual violence is greater my field. EDIT: Dunno in case you will see this, yet i've got had no person doubt the legitimacy of what got here about to me, OP. it is why it is so important to me that girls folk be taken as heavily as i became, that they not be blamed for what got here about to them, an identical way i became never blamed for what got here about to me. removing rape way of existence is so extreme on my precedence checklist as a results of fact i became fortunate adequate that I never had to handle it, and no person else ought to ought to the two. And consistent with a element human beings have made: penal complex rape is a huge situation. So is penal complex each little thing-else. Our penal complex device is insane and turns human beings into violent, broken wrecks. It must be thoroughly overhauled so as that it may truthfully mindset its reported project of 'rehabilitating' convicts, rather of turning them into desperate murderers and rapists.
2008-07-07 13:12:56 UTC
Men on here are constantly accusing feminists of oppressing them. So what's it like being in the oppressed group?
2008-07-07 13:51:30 UTC
I know exactly what you are saying... Its always easier to be the victim in America and enjoy some "govmint cheese" or some affirmative action crap.
niki
2008-07-07 13:07:43 UTC
Sorry to admit it, but White men are now the most prejudice against and oppressed of all. What the hell makes us think they should spend eternity making up for mistakes in history when we were not alive to be their victims?
La Belle Dame Sans Merci
2008-07-07 13:10:28 UTC
It's not my fault that I am a woman who knows her worth and is constantly jeered by threatened men. I would rather live in reality where people are created equal, and build a reality where people have equal opportunity.
2008-07-07 13:09:48 UTC
More hypocrisy. While I have a latin background I still have to deal with the hypocrisy of feminism.



It doesn't matter. Feminists think men owe them something just because they were born female. They deserve FREE respect and shouldn't have to prove themselves to ANYONE. I have been called a racist white man by some of them while I'm NOT white, so I see your point.....



Hypocrisy, Hypocrisy, and MORE Hypocrisy....


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
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