White Privilege

In Flint, Michigan -- home of Michael Moore, who made a couple of his early documentaries on the hardship of the factory workers and other urban and rural poor in the area -- Bernie Sanders declared that poverty is an ethnic issue. "When you are white, you don’t know what its like to be living in a ghetto,” he said. “You don’t know what it’s like to be poor.”

Go tell it in Appalachia, Bernie.

12 comments:

douglas said...

Moore from Flint, lead in the old pipes... well, that explains a few things maybe.

Anonymous said...

To be applicable to 21st century USA, What Sanders should of said was:

"When you are JEWISH, you don’t know what its like to be living in a ghetto,” he said. “You don’t know what it’s like to be poor.”

How did American Jews get so rich?
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4099803,00.html

MikeD said...

Wow, way to let the anti-Semite flag fly there, Anonymous. And if you'd like to actually educate yourself, why not start by learning where we even get the word "ghetto" from:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghetto

I am pretty sure, the Jews have a MUCH better understanding of what it is like living in a ghetto than anyone else does:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warsaw_Ghetto_Uprising

Grim said...

Well, hang on, Mike: Ynet is a Jewish/Israeli site. I don't think they're trying to be anti-Semites in raising the question. In fact, looking over the article, it appears to be an important feature of the answer that American Antisemitism collapsed and Jews were allowed to participate in American society without prejudice.

Not that you're wrong about the origins of the word. Obviously it would be strange to say that "Jews" don't know anything about "ghettos." But that's not what Sanders said: he said that "whites" don't. Well, maybe. But some of the poorest people in America are white, all the same.

Grim said...

(Although I can see how, if one did not know that Ynet was Israeli, the report would read like an Antisemitic screed -- it plays with a number of the traditional tropes about Jews in all the centers of power, Jews being unusually wealthy, etc. But it does so in celebration of 'Jewish genius,' and later on tries to explain why Israel doesn't enjoy the same prosperity as the American Jewish community.)

Anonymous said...

What in the hell does anti-semetic mean anyway? What a vague undefinable term.
My thinking is if you leave a term loosely defined, the better to club the baby seal with.

Grim said...

I myself like Arendt's account of it in the first third of Origins of Totalitarianism. But not everyone does.

MikeD said...

Well, hang on, Mike: Ynet is a Jewish/Israeli site.

Immaterial where the source is from, the statement I took exception to was:
To be applicable to 21st century USA, What Sanders should of said was:

"When you are JEWISH, you don’t know what its like to be living in a ghetto,” he said. “You don’t know what it’s like to be poor.”

How did American Jews get so rich?


With the strong implication that Jews in the US have no concept of what it is like to be poor, because they're all so rich. Which is as stupid a blanket statement as made by Sanders himself (which we are rightly mocking him for).

What in the hell does anti-semetic mean anyway? What a vague undefinable term.

No, I'm pretty sure it is a very easily defined term. But I will summarize:
"Antisemitism (also spelled anti-Semitism or anti-semitism) is prejudice against, hatred of, or discrimination against Jews as an ethnic, religious, or racial group. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite."

I will use it in a sentence for you. "Anyone who believes all Jews in the US are rich because... you know, JEWS, is an anti-semite." If you prefer, we can stick to the more general term "racist", as that's what I'd use to describe someone who claimed "all Scotsmen are cheap" or "all Asians are good at math" or "all Italians are Mafia connected."

Grim said...

"Anyone who believes all Jews in the US are rich because... you know, JEWS, is an anti-semite."

What about the article cited as evidence, though? It doesn't claim that all Jews in America are rich, but 70% of them -- a disproportionately high number -- are well-off. Why? "Jewish genius."

That's a closely allied claim to the antisemitic one, but it's clearly not antisemitic. The first part of the claim is factual, and the second is flattering.

Ymar Sakar said...

It's like he thinks there aren't any white ghettos...

Anonymous said...

Now is this article anti-semetic and if so, why?

Jewish overrepresentation at elite universities explained

http://www.theoccidentalobserver.net/2010/07/kevin-macdonald-jewish-overrepresentation-at-elite-universities-explained/

Grim said...

Participation in such Red State activities as high school ROTC, 4-H clubs, or the Future Farmers of America was found to reduce very substantially a student’s chances of gaining admission to the competitive private colleges in the NSCE database on an all-other-things-considered basis. The admissions disadvantage was greatest for those in leadership positions in these activities or those winning honors and awards. … Excelling in these activities “is associated with 60 or 65 percent lower odds of admission.”

"Found to reduce very substantially a student's chances" should be phrased "found to be correlated with a substantially lowered rate of acceptance." The causality isn't proven by the correlation, although the correlation is so strong as to be suspicious.

Legacy admissions may be important here. Jews were discriminated against heavily at elite universities at one time, but when the doors swung open there was a real focus on getting in. We may be seeing the second and third generations taking advantage of their improved opportunity as legacies, while perhaps fewer of the old WASP elite still bother.