I come across a lot of people who take the firm stance that not talking about things is the best way for those things to not be an issue.
There are lots of people who believe this about issues of race and culture and there are also people who believe this about mental health (i.e. people are more depressed because we talk about depression) and even neurodivergency (i.e. everyone is neurodiverse because it is all anyone ever talks about) ...
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There are also many psychologists who teach that talking about problems and trauma actually makes them worse. The idea is the more you talk about something, the more it re-traumatizes you over and over ... and the same theory applies to discussions of mental health, race, culture, even history according to these same people ... the more you talk about things, the more they become deeper wounds instead of leading to any kind of healing ...
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If there is one thing that I am sure of ... it's that I don't believe silence has ever made anything simply go away. There are many cultures that have systems of coping that include silence or physically burying things in the ground or not even having the vocabulary to discuss painful things ... and I can't see any scenario where this would result in better health for anyone who practices this ... unless out of sight out of mind is the intent and they're trying to forget something.
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I grew up in a time when race, mental health, and neurodivergence weren't ... "things". I didn't think about those things much ... no one talked about them much and when they did come up it was maybe someone was called the n-word or someone was "sad" or someone was "retarded" and needed special classes. There was no sensitivity or true awareness of differences between people ... at least none that was spoken about freely. Everyone was "the same" or they were "other" ...
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But the thing is ... that reality isn't true. Just because you don't talk about things doesn't mean they don't exist ... it doesn't mean they don't exist in people's minds of belief systems. They just aren't saying them out loud. All of the racism and otherism and fatism and homophobia and all of those destructive beliefs SO exist in people's minds ... and they go unchecked, undiscussed, unmeasured ... they are free to develop into deep beliefs and ideologies without any challenge ...
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Donald didn't "create racists". He just gave them the freedom to speak what they have always felt and act on all the feelings and beliefs that they have been carrying around. He made it ok for people to say what they deeply felt and act on those feelings without fear. So all those decades of not talking about things ... only allowed them to fester silently and secretly until they were allowed to fly free. There have always been awful people, you just didn't know or talk about it.
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I don't believe in making a completely neutral society ... there is no way to do that unless you acknowledge there is no such thing as neutrality. Everyone would have to have the exact same opportunities. Everyone would have to have the same freedoms. Everyone would have to have the same access to things. Everyone would have to live equality for there to neutrality (absence of decided views, expression, or strong feeling.) The world is not like that ... there is no balance in the world.
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Right now all the power is held by one group of people who are primarily one "ethnic group" and one "sex". There are certainly other sexes and ethnicity that are a part of the power holding majority but that's not the norm, but the exception. So to have any kind of neutral understanding of the world that would have to shift significantly ... to be able to say these things don't matter, the world would have to operate 200% differently and power would have to be equally distributed.
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To say "race" and "gender" are social constructs but then say that they also "shouldn't matter" and "shouldn't be discussed" and just need to be "forgotten" so that things can be more neutral ignore the reality that has been created by NOT addressing those things in the first place. By allowing society to create categories for everything and use those categories to create an imbalance of power so that one "race" and one "gender" have most of it. But now we shouldn't talk about it?
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It's kind of obvious to me the people who are on the side of "let's stop talking about x,y,z" ... and it's the people that stand to gain or lose significantly based on those conversations and revelations surrounding what society has become ... and also because there is no clear solution to how to solve the problem of imbalance and unfairness so long as a small percentage of people hold all the power. Since there is no solution people just want to stop talking and re-traumatizing themselves.
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I can understand that ... especially for HSPs and others who are highly sensitive to the greater energy of the world ... it seems like there is a lot of talking, arguing and fighting and no solutions to be found in all that madness. It just sounds like children all screaming at each other and no one is willing to listen to or consider the viewpoint of anyone else. It is because people are inherently selfish and don't truly want change if it effects their livelihood or alters their reality.
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I don't believe there can be change when all you have is silence.
I don't believe there can be change if no one is willing to accept responsibility for their part in the destruction of other people's lives.
I don't believe there can be change if no one is willing to acknowledge other people's reality.
Silence isn't golden.
Silence = death.
We're talking about entire groups of people ... entire ethnicities ... entire cultures and "races" that have not had any balanced, fair, or even reasonable access to things in the entire history of colonization.
What makes anyone think they will have equal opportunity in this country or any country that has a foundation of colonization or ethnic cleansing practices?
You have to be completely delusional to believe that re-balanced access = special privilege.
You're also probably racist.
The ONLY reason for the elimination of these programs by primarily white, wealthy males is to ensure that no members of the community who aren't white or who don't have access to tremendous privilege are able to ascend in education and employment to a place of significant power. They don't want "others" to be in positions to take power from them. If they weren't worried about it, this would be a non-issue. If they weren't threatened, they wouldn't create barriers and remove access.
Black parents often tell their children that they have to be 200 times better, work 200 times harder, make NO MISTAKES, code switch, and make sure they are above reproach to be able to have ANY CHANCE to succeed in this world.
Why do members of the #GlobalMajority have to work 200 times harder than everyone else?
Why do they have to make NO MISTAKES? Why do they have to be PERFECT?
Why can everyone else be mediocre, make horrendous mistakes, be AWFUL and still be accepted and succeed?
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Why do poor, undereducated white males get hired more often than middle class, well educated, Black males? Why do white males with a criminal record get hired over a Black male with NO CRIMINAL RECORD?
If you think being neutral is going to ensure that everyone has fair and balanced opportunities for success you're delusional.
If you think Black people have unfair advantages then you're also delusional.
If you think being silent will change reality, you're insane.
𝘗𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘦 𝘪𝘴 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘬 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰𝘵 𝘢 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘣𝘭𝘦𝘮 𝘣𝘦𝘤𝘢𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘯'𝘵 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘢𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘤𝘵𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘪𝘵.
𝘈𝘯𝘥 𝘸𝘦 𝘈𝘓𝘓 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘦 𝘪𝘯 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘮, 𝘪𝘯𝘤𝘭𝘶𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘩𝘢𝘷𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘧𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘐𝘯𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘯𝘦𝘵 𝘢𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘣𝘦𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘥 𝘰𝘯 𝘊𝘰𝘚𝘰 𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘶𝘵𝘦𝘳.
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘰𝘪𝘯𝘵 𝘪𝘴𝘯'𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘦 𝘢𝘴𝘩𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘥 𝘰𝘧 𝘰𝘶𝘳 𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘭𝘦𝘨𝘦.
𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘨𝘰𝘢𝘭 𝘪𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘢𝘤𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸𝘭𝘦𝘥𝘨𝘦 𝘪𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘧𝘪𝘨𝘶𝘳𝘦 𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘸𝘦 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘶𝘴𝘦 𝘪𝘵 𝘪𝘯 𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘷𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘰𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘴.
I will happily stop talking about race and gender:
When I no longer have to check those boxes on every form I fill out. When women start getting equal pay for the same jobs as men. When women aren't getting sexually assaulted every 60 seconds. When Black people stop getting killed for simply existing. When the #GlobalMajority have equal access to jobs and education with no restrictions or discrimination. When healthcare stops discriminating. When there are reparations for ALL colonized people.
Until then ... SILENCE isn't going to fix anything or change any of the things I mentioned.
SILENCE is only going to keep those who are allowing and causing those things to happen in power.
Not talking about things won't make them go away.
SILENCE makes people unaffected by those problems more comfortable and who gives AF about the comfort of oppressors and those who benefit from oppression? I sure don't.
But hey ... do you.
/END (I Promise)
A variation that I like is "When you're used to dominance, equality feels like oppression."
There are members of all "races" that believe that Black and Indigenous people have an unfair advantage because they get special treatment ... that the elimination of Affirmative Action programs and DEI is good because it doesn't give preference to anyone and everyone is on a level playing field ...
You know very well that isn't true.
Anyone with any sense and any ability to perceive reality knows that that no playing field has ever been level for any member of the #GlobalMajority.
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