Wasian Ailee: I hate it when white American people are still shamed for slavery and...
I hate it when white American people are still shamed for slavery and the desecration of Native Americans. My ancestors might have done some seriously shitty things but that doesn’t mean I should take blame for it. Now, that doesn’t mean I condone what they did, and that doesn’t mean I think…
But white people today are still benefiting from the genocide and oppression of Native Americans, the enslavement of Black people, and the oppression of PoC. White people still benefit from both past and current oppressions of PoC. White people are the oppressive power, and that can be blamed on all the white people who do nothing to even attempt to change it.
Nothing in the world can be blamed on an entire race of people. Acting like all white people are the cause of so many of the terrible things in the world is just as racist as the past treatments of black and Native American people. While I agree that white people still benefit from past genocide, they are not the only ones who have benefited, just as they are not the only ones who have committed genocidal acts. There have been vast improvements in the treatment of different races, and so long as modern people learn from the mistakes of their/our ancestors and attempt to act respectfully toward other people in their own lives, they should be respected themselves. Not everyone should try to change the world. Just changing the way they act around people should be enough, and they certainly shouldn’t be blamed because they’re not trying to change the world.
If White people are not to blame for the genocide of Native Americans and the enslavement of Black people in the Americas and Britain, who is?
I’m not saying that past white people should not be blamed. I’m saying modern people should not bear the brunt of their ancestors’ mistakes. Besides, white people did not act alone in the enslavement of Africans. It was a group effort among both white and black people, and it was abhorrent in every manner of the word. There were plenty of white people in previous centuries who did really shitty things, but there were also plenty of white people who fought against those shitty things.
No one asks white people to invade Africa and to steal people to enslave.
People of Color are still being oppressed today. White people are the oppressive power.
“I’m saying modern people should not bear the brunt of their ancestors’ mistakes.” White people are benefiting from their ancestors, people of color were and are the ones who are “bearing the brunt”. You are victimizing the oppressors.
(via aileethewasian)