Sunday, January 09, 2005

From a thread on Orinicus, I saw this piece from Salon linked from Freeperville. An interesting thread is flowing through this article- Savage might have the ever so common perception that white people should just have everything given to them for just existing. Some examples:

I discovered I could not gain a professorship even after applying many times," he writes in "The Savage Nation." "My crime? I was a white male."

[Maybe it's because there's only a limited number of slots for professors and a whole lot of people applying for them? But instead of thinking about that, he starts crying about how he's a poor little white male]

A fee of $40 gets new members a Savage Nation baseball cap and an anti-affirmative action pamphlet called "The Death of the White Male."

[Note how any nod towards actually redressing injustice will cause the 'death' of the white male. The implication is that white people will die if they act like decent people and try to redress wrongs. This is untrue.]

Last spring, Savage told his listeners about a third-grade teacher in San Diego, Calif., who had saved a child from choking, and demanded that the state school superintendent give her an official commendation. "If she was a minority teacher and picked up a paper clip on the floor, then a commendation would be in order," he sniped. He neglected to mention that the "hero teacher," Rebecca Lin Yops, was in fact his daughter, who had changed her last name after her recent marriage.

[Note the sense of envy here- apparently all the minorities are taking all the commendations. Maybe they thought she was just doing her job? But no, it's back to waaah, us poor whites]

Even if Savage doesn't believe this, it's a big obstacle in the face of justice. Blackness is strong, so it's hard to understand how weak whiteness is. Blacks can survive poorer health care, poorer schools and a general lack of respect, pretty well under the circumstances. However, whites are reduced to crying babies if the mere suggestion of human decency is made. I think this is because they feel their position is fragile- I mean, it's just based on some made up misattributions of what people look like, and sure, there is the power of stolen wealth, but once justice is done- their position is gone.

Sure, the actual country would be better- but it's scary to change- to go from thinking that you are special and should get all the best just for living, to understanding that they'll have to work for things. They shouldn't expect professorships to be handed to mediocre whites, the CEO spot to always be occupied by a white, or anything else. They simply aren't entitled to these things, and the sooner they get used to it and stop crying, the better off we'll all be.

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