Race Issues at Hale?
One of the best new reporters in Seattle writes for Crosscut and her name is Liz Brazile. I follow her on Twitter and she had this series of tweets today. Parents, what have you heard about this?
@LizBrazile
@LizBrazile
In May, graffiti saying “White Power” & “KKK” was discovered outside the classroom of an ethnic studies teacher. This painting that had been in the Black Student Union’s space was also vandalized within that same week.
@LizBrazile
Just sat in on a discussion about racism at Nathan Hale HS, organized in response to incidents of racist videos and graffiti discovered around the school. Today is Juneteenth, the day commemorating Black slaves in 1865 TX learning they’d been emancipated — 2 years after the fact.
11:37 AM · Jun 19, 2019@LizBrazile
In May, graffiti saying “White Power” & “KKK” was discovered outside the classroom of an ethnic studies teacher. This painting that had been in the Black Student Union’s space was also vandalized within that same week.
About 8 students took the stage in NHHS’s auditorium to speak to their peers and staff. 1 student expressed disappointment in educators’ responses to such incidents. “Teachers here don’t say sh*t, they don’t do sh*t,” she said. Then there was applause.
Other students described being on the receiving end of microaggressions about their perceived immigration status and feeling underrepresented in social studies curricula.
Comments
Miss Apatos
HP
more helpful
Hale works very hard at inclusivity but it is an ongoing process. Some years are better than others.
HP
The original
Mr. Theo Moriarty
Hate drives their motivations and without hate SWLs have nothing to do.
Get real
Another reader
What a shame.
Hale Parent
I agree with you. Complexities around history are also not discussed, not just with kids but in adult discourse as well. I hear the same information over and over again and again and no mention of what I would call gray areas, complexities etc. Everything is made simple in my opinion, good versus bad, black versus white etc. In reality history is very messy and complex. There is so much to learn that falls outside the scope of narratives and what is commonly taught. Higher level courses taught at universities by historians I assume dig further into history, as well as provide a forum and room for much deeper discussions and learning.
LS
That means there will be guaranteed at least 5 new board members and if Harris loses that will be 6 new members and a new president for the board. (Mack)
Lets hope the district administration doesn't take advantage of the newbies, but I have a feeling they are banking on it.
watcher
HP
ALTF update recently posted:
https://www.seattleschools.org/district/calendars/news/what_s_new/advanced_learning_task_force_update
just fyi
"The manner in which this is currently been addressed in SPS in my estimation has been a frustrated, aggressive, and rigid manner that I think is setting back the cause by letting that frustration lead rather than letting the heart lead and trusting in time and compassion."
I agree.
Get Real, of course, there are black student unions. Most schools are majority white and our culture is based on white European history. Look at the current disagreement with Biden and Booker with Biden casually using the word "boy" in speaking about how he himself was referred to by racist senators from the past and seemingly not realizing how offensive that was to Booker and other senators of color.
Hale Parent, can you give a few specifics? What makes him not want to be there?
Watcher, I didn't "lock down" that thread; I moved onto the one about the 43rd Dems endorsement. You can put that comment there. That said, I agree with your assessment. But if DeWolf clears the primary, he needs to step down.
My AP Juniors also seem thirsty for alternatives perspectives to SWJ/woke/"Anti-Racist" (capitalized because it's a praxis that not all people who hate racism subscribe to). They understand, deep down, that they are only being told half the story and that they are insulated in this little North Seattle liberal echo chamber where the "good whites" are fighting amongst themselves to prove their "good white" bona fides and to show that they are more woke than those "bad whites" over there, and they are aware that they are in a place that is not diverse--racially or ideologically.
The event is similar to what they had going on at Ballard earlier in the year with their whole "Blackface" incident. It totally consumed the school's PD attention for a little while.
It looks to me like these high school student groups and their advisors are copying what has been going on at our post-secondary institutions over the past few years.
This sure does a lot for the movement for Ethnic Studies (I urge you to read that last sentence in both directions).
SP
The "N" was found on the ground just where the wind blew it off!
The whole school needed to attend a briefing over that.
Get smart
DO IT
Really? Are we talking about racism against white folks? At its very foundation, racism is a system created by white privilege. I could write a book about this or at the very least try to educate you. I have no time for either or, but I thought at least I would say this.
Check yourself.
Miss Apatos
Glad you exposed your ignorance.
rac·ism
/ˈrāˌsizəm/
Learn to pronounce
noun
noun: racism
prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism directed against someone of a different race based on the belief that one's own race is superior.
and
@ Mike
Oh, the joy of spewing at others in anonymity! I have actually traveled the world and seen with my very own eyes. Racism in America, right now, is a system created by white folks to oppress people of color. I can also lecture you on white fragility but what for? You are far gone.
I will however, continue to teach and educate and have civil discussions in real life. And believe it or not I can actually do this in three languages because... I can.
Miss Apatos
You’ve got a good schtick going. If anyone challenges your opinion, it’s proof of their white fragility....haha!
JG
Sure, whatever, but black people can, and do, act bigoted, prejudiced, hateful, and hurtful to white people, so don't call that behavior racist. Call it something else when you call it out.
SP
SP
White people hold the power in this country and have since the beginning. Even if you just got off the boat from Europe yesterday, you still have privileges in the US as a white person. It is similar to the privileges that men have vs. women. The thing about skin color is that you can't hide it or change it.
HP
@HP there are also many brown skinned people who also identify as white, but many N European people outside of certain areas in the US don't view them as white! There are also groups now considered white who were discriminated heavily in the past that led to inequalities in our society that persist even today. This can all get very complicated which is why I have heard many historians call for whiteness studies within ethnic studies.
MK
Of course anyone can be racist. Ask anyone from a country in Africa if there is not racism among citizens of different countries. Ask an Asian if that is not true (see Ali Wong's very funny explanation of how she and her husband each have a "good" Asian background and a "bad" Asian background). Being racist for a black person does not always mean against whites; it could be any group.
Our country is starting a difficult conversation about reparations (which I agree with) but the first conversation should be about reconciliation as they did in South Africa. This will be an ongoing discussion and should happen within our schools. But kids don't have the maturity or tools as adults have and so the discussion should be handled differently.
And yes, I know - many people will be uncomfortable. That's part of the process but that doesn't have to be the purpose of the process.
Miss Apatos, you may be right on some points but that schoolmarmish tone doesn't really help your cause. No one likes to be talked down to or harangued.
MW you are part of the problem. We don't need your handouts!
No thanks
When you say "racism is a system created by white privilege," it sounds like your are primarily talking about systemic racism.
While systemic racism, in this country, is based on white power/privilege, does that really mean that only white people can then hold racist beliefs as individuals? Racist ideas at the individual level would seem to be deeply influenced by systemic racism, true--but also by experiences, observations, and perceptions on the part of individuals, which could lead to racist beliefs of all types. Systemic racism that favors whites may be at the root of racism here, but does that really mean that the individual racism forms that manifest as a result can also only be seen among whites?
Terms like "white fragility" don't help further discourse. While many will agree that "white privilege" is real and has created unfair systemic and institutional advantages that have created many of the disparities that plague us today, this idea of "white fragility" projects a certain unhelpful bias onto white people at the individual level. While many white people may indeed be very sensitive to discussions or racism and the evaluation of racism in our country (current and past), other whites are not. Painting with a broad brush and imply that "all white people are fragile" sounds...racist, doesn't it? (Plus, "fragility" probably isn't the appropriate word in the first place.) If whites are too fragile to talk about race, how do we move forward as a country?
If the goal is to promote understanding, remove barriers, and advance equality, I feel like we need to recognize that things are not always so black and white. We all come to these issues at various points on the spectrum of awareness and education, as well as with various personal biases and prejudices.
let's talk
Well said. Expanding conversations in addition to racial prejudices, we can all learn more about other prejudices we all hold as well as human beings. I seldom hear as much about prejudice against lower income people toward all ethnicities and races, people with disabilities, as well as against LGBTQ people and so many others.
I also don't think terms like privilege, a term which originated from one person & author recently, are as helpful either, as the term privilege already has a meaning inscribed into people's minds. It is associated firmly in many people's minds as those who are very affluent and wealthy. The white lower and middle class have real issues understanding this term in relation to themselves. I am repeating a great academic conversation I heard on NPR, I forget the person who stated this but they suggested using the term "white advantage" instead which makes more sense to me to better reach all white people with your message.
MK
This. Systems of power perpetuate themselves. Beneficiaries don't even see it, and most really don't want to. Does the fish see the water in which it swims?
I could have written what Mike or that laughs person did 25 or 30 years ago. I see more now. A benefit of age is experience and continued learning. It's a long process to take off the blinders and dare to see the world as it is, even when it's painful. Easier to keep thinking what you've always thought, surround yourself with people who think what you do and will never cause you to question yourself.
Be brave
When various groups in society tells black students they can't be disciplined by white teachers it sets up the conditions which lead to more not less black students being suspended for escalating minor issues into major ones.
It's all about a respect for authority and police and teachers are authoritarian for a reason. When kids think they don't have to mind or obey teachers and the police then you have lost control no matter whats printed on your T-shirt.
Good day
Attention seekers, activist and especially bloggers should be responsible for committing fake hate crimes and reporting fake hates crimes as real ones.
Going off half cocked for views is very irresponsible and dangerous.
Eyes opened
Good Day, in this state we don't paddle anyone (and thank God for that). The stats show that you can't just say that black kids just don't follow the rules. Too much discipline for one group for that to be true.
Also, look at all the police attacks on black people. Again, no way that volume, that severity is just about "respect for authority." You have people laying on the ground saying, "Don't shoot me" and the cops do anyway.
But yes, students do need to be respectful and do what they are told in school. And the younger you start, the better off they will be. But respect goes both ways.
One timely example, today on NPR, podcast available likely tommorow, Rafael Waksberg shared a history of US predjudice and discrimination against German Jewish refugees including a boat that carried 1000 German Jewish children refugees to the US in 1939 fleeing the holocaust. Allowing them into the US would have prevented them from being sent back to Europe where those who were sent to France, Belgium and other countries were killed in the holocaust. The next year in 1940 in contrast the US admitted christian children from England also feeling the war. President Roosevelt created lots of restrictions that prohibited Jewish immigrants fleeing Germany from entering our country.
In addition, there are a myriad of other factors to talk about when we talk about advantages. However it is not the only advantage in our society. In addition, we assume all people with light skin, who are perceived as N European anglo white as well, do hold a white advantage. There are also people with brown skin who are considered white in some places in the US, but not others. There are also people with white skin who have European ancestry from a Spanish speaking country, who are not considered white by whites in areas of the US because their first language is Spanish. It is quite complex.
MK
Should I remind your readers of the truth and your segregationist views when it come to HCC or charters schools? You support reparations for blacks but not charter schools or vouchers or the AAA.
Is reparations the new theme for your blogs relaunch?
Better delete
That term "segregationist" for HCC is something made up and I reject it. I have no idea what you mean in terms of charter schools.
Reparations have nothing to do with charters or vouchers and I don't know what the AAA reference is.
Yep, the tone police applies only to anti-racist proponents. That's why I was scolded but people saying the following weren't:
"OMG when is the asteroid coming I don't think I can take this level of stupidity much longer"
"Glad you exposed your ignorance"
"Your comments and bragging about writing or teaching are naively self-righteous. If you had lived in other countries or made a scholarly study of history..."
I am not surprised. This IS the place people that share my opinion are called communists, delusional, extreme leftist, useless activists. My (brown) skin is really thick and I don't back up. However, my time commenting here is over. I am going back to the real world where I can make a difference.
Mic drop.
Miss Apatos
I agree with Mr. Moriarty that the current system in Seattle is backfiring by making a significant number of liberal white kids into racists because they're sick and tired of being told that they are the problem and that kids who have much more melanin can yell "white privilege" or "white fragility" at them in any disagreement.
High school students experience the fact that Seattle is a very intolerant place for diverse and/or nuanced opinions. If you don't have the "correct" opinion/politics/historical perspective, your opinion is decidedly unwelcome and may be shouted down by other students and/or the teachers.
Northend Mom
Hey but that was the point, right?
Keep guessing
Keep guessing
Keep guessing
Dad southend
Miss Apatos....you crack me up.
You end your last post with...”Mic drop”.
From Wikipedia: A mic drop is the gesture of intentionally dropping one's microphone at the end of a performance or speech to signal triumph. Figuratively, it is an expression of triumph for a successful event and indicates a boastful attitude toward one's own performance.
That definition certainly describes your attitude.
JG
You use the term “white people”. Haven’t you been reading the posts in this thread?
What you refer to as “white people” is not a homogeneous group!
HD
If you were served food in a segregated restaurant before 1960, then I would, for the sake of brevity, refer to you as white in my comment.
Likewise, if you were allowed to sit in the front of a bus in Alabama, the for the purpose of my comment, you are white.
If you were allowed to buy property in Magnolia before, I think it was 1964, then for our purpose here, you are/were white.
That's the way I look at being "white".
You ever seen those signs on drinking fountains or bathrooms that said "whites only"? If you were allowed to drink water at those fountains or use those bathrooms, then you were "white".
JJ
As to ancestral background, nobody has to imagine anything. Just for a few examples, who do you think the Romans were enslaving, feeding to the lions? Who do you think the Huns were slaughtering? Who do you think Vikings were enslaving? Who do you think the English were indenturing even in colonial America? Who besides Blacks do you think suffered discrimination redlining, and police harassment well into 20th century America? Whether or not you want accept it, if you go back far enough, most racial groups have the background you describe. It might not appear that way now because most of them picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and moved into the mainstream by fitting in rather than trying to differentiate themselves as anything but plain American.
What do you call it when diners are attacked at a Woolworths lunch counter merely for sitting and wanting to order and eat food?
The YouTube videos of those incidents seems to show some very fragile egos.
They show "white" people pouring food on well-dressed polite men and women, in some cases high school students, who only want to be treated as citizens with equal rights.
Young "white" men also beat them in some cases with their fists.
Was this backlash from too much Social Justice teaching in their schools?
JJ
No my good friend there are more uneducated poor white people than there are black people in America, that's the illuminati's trick
Mason
-Cynic
Magnolia is just now getting to where you might see a black person every day, if you get out a fair bit.
Last I checked, the effects of red-lining were continuing in Los Angeles, here, San Jose, Palo Alto(East Palo Alto).
I think if you asked an honest "white" person who grew up on the West Coast who's over 50 they remember Sambos
and if they're over 60 they'd remember the Coon Chicken Inn right here in Seattle.
Imagine how that feels?
JJ
BB
Another SWJ gets it wrong.
Just WOW
BB
Another SJW gets it wrong.
Just WOW
Another SJW gets it wrong.
Just WOW
Teresa
True story
There was no "hate crime" mentioned. A couple of incidents happened and Hale had a community discussion.
MK, that was an excellent - if depressing - radio piece about Jews fleeing Europe during WWII.
Miss Apatos, I think the comments show the ignorance without anyone commenting. You're right about having thick skin in this world.
"Hell I'll settle for a box of ezells."
Thanks for that laugh - a sense of humor is a good thing.
"What happens when you make the same calculations after eliminating both white and black millionaires?"
"No my good friend there are more uneducated poor white people than there are black people in America, that's the illuminati's trick."
Also funny but in a sad way. I can't take this kind of thinking seriously.
We'll end this discussion here.
Just a high five from another Seattleite with hillbilly ancestors.
Fairmount Parent
Thank you for herding us cats for as long as you have.
Racism, hate, intolerance is ignorance, fear, and anger rolled up in a destructive, wounding mix. I believe the solution is curiosity, contact, and thinking.
We all need to be capable of holding multiple contradictory truths at the same time, acknowledge that no one person or philosophy either has all the answers and is entirely correct or is the problem and must be rejected. And we also need to hold that there is a universal morality that can be valuable to consider because there is wrong and right, and silence does help oppress the victims while supporting the bullies.
Defacing a poster students made that celebrates beauty, their beauty, is awful and stupid and hurtful and menacing. That action was a wrong, and while some may see it as a relatively harmless prank, others may see it as malevolent threat that the belies the deeper desires of those vandals to strike with violence against the actual persons depicted in the poster. Both are right.
We must be able to hold the truism that everybody is welcome to here along with the responsibility that everybody is accountable here. These are not mutually exclusive. Making informed compassionate decisions when difficult situations erupt requires commonsense, common decency, as well as mindful empathy of our collective histories.
Right now it feels like we can’t have centered, grounded conversations because the pendulum is swinging too wildly both right and left. It sets us up for lose-lose. Throwing out baby with bathwater type answers to complex problems don’t solve anything and in fact, in my opinion, they make things worse and set up a destructive feedback loop to exacerbate the worst of the worst - pulling us apart and isolating productive dialogue because to engage in that dialogue risks one’s reputation.
https://www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2019/06/21/fdr-anne-frank-world-war-ii-visa-quotas
frustrated centrist
-there are no white people [who] understand what 400 years of racial injustice has done to people of color in our country;
-there are no white people [who] agree with you that "wealth accumulation by whites compared to African Americans shows clearly the effects of slavery, Jim Crow and continued discrimination;"
-"whites can only see their 'persecution' and can never just close their eyes and imagine what it would be like to come from a background where your great-great grandparents were whipped, shackled, worked to death, raped and your grandparents and parents were humiliated by segregation and redlining and police harassment."
Your comments are such generalities that you undermine your message. If you don't want to spend your time rebutting the individual beliefs and personal family histories of posters, maybe try being a little more open to the idea that all "whites" are not exactly the same.
Also--discussing the matter here, and even disagreeing with you, is not evidence that "white people feel that they deserve to be angry!" There's a big difference between anger and disagreement, or, in many cases here, anger and simple corrections re: your overgeneralizations. While you do not seem so inclined, many here are trying to have an honest and thoughtful conversation about race and discrimination...which actually flies in the face of the "white fragility" argument. If you're going to assume it's a given that "whites" are too fragile and educated to talk about these issues, while you are simultaneously presenting yourself as too aggrieved to be able to engage in such conversations until you feel white have already come around to see things as you do, I'm not seeing a lot of hope for moving forward. What's your goal here--just to vent?
By the way, I do remember Sambos. I even ate there as a smile child, when I was too young to understand. Does that make me inherently racist or fragile, because I remember it? Do my actions and beliefs as an adult have any bearing on my racist-ness, or am I undeniably racist simply because of the color of my skin? If I'm more than willing to acknowledge that being white has provided me, and my recent ancestors, some advantages, does that have any impact? What if some of my earlier ancestors were similarly mistreated in this country because they were not white or not white enough? What if my immediate family members are not white? This tendency to lump anyone who appears to be white into the same group, regardless of other factors, doesn't help. You can argue that anyone appearing white gets certain benefits, and that may be true. But not everyone appearing what has the same background, beliefs, context, relationships, education, etc. Many of those you malign as "white" are actually your potential allies, but the message you send is that they are not wanted. Is it all just hopeless?
let's talk
WOW
When one describes a society one must generalize, there are millions of different stories.
But take for example lynching.
Not everyone was lynched.
And not every white person participated or gawked.
But our society, our nation, created an atmosphere of terror and intimidation against African American families.
The society as a whole, political, business, labor, sports and entertainment, they all allowed this climate of fear for one's life by extra-judicial killing to exist for generations.
So of course there have been strong anti-racists among the whites in America. John Brown comes to mind.
But he would be the first to condemn the sideline sitter who does not exert their utmost to eradicate all forms of racial bigotry and oppression.
JJ
@ JJ,
"I think that deflections and bullying and revisionism demonstrate exactly what is meant by fragility."
If you see simple questions and attempts at discussion as "deflections," "bullying," and "revisionism"--and thus fragility--then all hope is pretty much lost, since we're not going to get anywhere without some difficult conversations. Accusations of white fragility pretty much shuts those conversations down before they can get going.
I'm curious to know what part of my post you consider deflections, bullying, and/or revisionism. If acknowledging racism but asking questions is not acceptable, what is ok in your mind? Is full-throated agreement with you the only course of appropriate action--and even then, what change comes from that?
It would seem disingenuous to claim complain about white fragility while at the same time not being willing to really engage in some of the more complex questions asked here, no?
let's talk
These days black on black crime using guns has sky rocketed in Seattle. Are you going to try and blame the violence on whites? I hope not.
Are you foolish enough to think reparations would stop the killings?
It's like a cosmic partial has entered liberal's skulls and can't escape. It's just zig zaging around and around making more and more holes. I'm sure it all started on November 8, 2016
@JJ You know history and ancestry is much more complex for so many people who may even be unaware of their own history.
One example, Sicilians, although a small minority in the US, were once not considered white and were also subject to Jim Crow laws & had to attend different schools in the south as well. They also were lynched and the largest mass lynching was of 10 Sicilians. Southern Italians, including Sicilians were also along with Asians and Jews subject to housing and many other forms of discrimination. Sicily was not much better for them as they exploited heavily when Italy unified by Italians from the north, and there was terrible slavery of children that occurred there as well in the Sulfur mines.My G grandparents were from one of those towns and endured more hardship than you can imagine.
I also urge you to read Booker T Washington's account of time he spent in Sicily which was also during the time when most were emmigrating to the US.
A Quote from his book:
"The Negro is not the man farthest down. The condition of the coloured farmer in the most backward parts of the Southern States of America, even where he has the least education and the least encouragement, is incomparably better than the condition and opportunities of the agricultural population in Sicily.”
― Booker T. Washington, The Man Farthest Down: A Record of Observation and Study in Europe https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6pr85793
In addition, I know personally white people with black ancestors who intermarried with white ancestors long long ago, and are now white. Their poor white and black ancestors married before it was made illegal and things intensified in the civil war era in the south. They are white and have both free black, as well as enslaved ancestors. http://www.freeafricanamericans.com/foreword.htm
I also know of whites as far back as the early 1600's, who organized the first resistance to slavery and also fought against other whites advocating for fair dealings with Native Americans objecting to colonists taking their land. See this link for example about Roger Williams https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Williams
So history and ancestry can really be more complex than just lumping in all white people together. Much of our history is rarely touched upon in mainstream media or school coverage of historical events.
And please don't mistake me as trying to argue that some whites had it harder than Blacks or other people of color. That is not my point. My point is that I think these gray areas in our history are so very important for people to better understand the facets of racism and how it develops and manifests in our society. In addition, "white" is not a monolithic homogeneous group historically in the US or elsewhere.
JK
It's TRUE