Heh.

Now we know what color white people are.  They are “cream” colored.  Not “beige,” not “pinky white,” not “pinkish beige.”  The lovely color of cream.

Here’s Mrs. Obama at the state dinner.  Here’s the AP’s description:

First lady Michelle Obama chose to wear a gleaming silver-sequined, flesh-colored gown Tuesday night to the first state dinner held by her husband’s administration.

Funny because that gown is showing a lot of Mrs. Obama’s flesh, and it doesn’t appear to be the same color as the gown.

‘Police: Census worker staged death to conceal suicide’

From USA Today:  The Kentucky State Police reports that part-time census worker Bill Sparkman, who was found hanging from a tree with “fed” written on his chest, committed suicide.

I remember.

After September 11, there were many documented cases of hate crimes against people who were vaguely brown:

The FBI data suggests a 1,600-percent surge in anti-Islamic hate crimes in the days following the Sept. 11 attacks. The research also found a similar increase in hate crimes against people who may have been perceived as members of Islam, Arabs and others thought to be of Middle Eastern origin.

“We knew that followers of the Islamic faith were victims of hate crimes, but other groups suffered just as badly,” Byers said. “That is the nature of prejudice. People perceived as being different because of the color of their skin or dress, or perhaps mistaken as Islamic, were immediately considered outsiders. They became the new enemy for some Americans.

“Some people reacted to it by physically attacking or harassing any person who they considered to be different, he said. “Only when there were calls for tolerance did the attacks decline.”

Source.

Remember 9/11!

Remember Pearl Harbor!

And now, Remember Fort Hood!

(Link is to a billboard posted by a Colorado auto dealership that reads “President or Jihad?  Birth certificate?  Prove it!  Wake up America!  Remember Fort Hood!”  You gotta feel sorry for another dealership called “Wolf Auto Group,” which has been receiving messages intended for the other idiots.)

This weekend

This weekend I saw a little Asian girl I’ve known for approximately the past seven or eight years.  I know her parents as well, although I always have the sneaking suspicion her mother can’t tell me apart from the other hordes of my people.

This little girl never speaks to me.  And I’m not really surprised, because I’ve had a number of interactions with her white parents that make it pretty clear she’s not supposed to speak.  Once I attended a community event and there were several tables.  One table was completely filled by white adoptive parents and their Asian kids.  Another table had an Asian kid with an Asian parent and many open seats.  So I went to sit there.  While I was sitting there, the mom came up and I greeted her and her daughter by name. 

Once a year

Non-native people in the United States think about indigenous peoples.  At Thanksgiving.  When we hear the whole lovely story about how the Pilgrims invited the “Indians” to have a feast with them.  Then they all held hands and sang “kumbaya.”

In the past couple years, I am given hope by school districts who are changing history.  They teach a more realistic version of that “first Thanksgiving.”  And they teach their kids it is not appropriate to dress up like indigenous people.  Because it is not appropriate to use somebody’s identity like a costume.

But if your school district is still a bit behind the times, here are some links:

Rewrite, rewrite!

So Anita Tedaldi has reached over the ocean to spread her pablum.   (Thanks, I think, to graculus for the link.)  She has republished her blog post from the New York Times.  Only this time “D” or “David” is now “Dan.”  He’s still from “South America,” however.

Let’s look at the additions first:

Yes.

Edited to add: If you came here from a blog called “Rexie Maximus,” be advised that several sections of a post called “Racism on the Internet” were directly lifted from a post here called “Internet Racism.”  I commented on it here.

I saw this image used as a click-through button from the Evan B. Donaldson site.  (I was reading the article about identity formation in adopted persons.)   Apparently Spence-Chapin (an adoption agency) uses this as their Facebook logo as well.

How can people be so clueless?

Edited to add:  Sang-Shil over at the Land of the Not-So-Calm reports that Spence-Chapin has replaced their racist Facebook logo. But it’s still on the Donaldson site.

Whoa.

Short summary:  Christian publisher Zondervan released a book full of Asian stereotypes.  You know, the “Asian font,” the ninjas, the bamboo, Japanese gardens, kimono, random Chinese characters, etc.  Plus the website promoting the book used an old martial arts movie in which the speech was dubbed in the white people’s racist conception of how Asians talk.

You can read more about the book here.  It’s also still available on Amazon, bonus points for those of you who can read all the characters.

Now Zondervan has agreed to pull the book.  You can read its statement on Prof. Soong-Chan Rah’s blog.  Zondervan notes that Stan Gundry has been named editor-in-chief, and “will be responsible for making the necessary changes at Zondervan to prevent editorial mistakes like this going forward.”

So that  begs two questions:

The browning of disease

Part IV.  Links to I, II, and III can be found here.

So I went to the library, and saw that in a couple of places there are signs indicating that if your kids are sick, you should keep them home.  Which is all well and good.  Except the picture on the sign is that of a sick-looking Asian kid.

The CDC’s H1N1 informational site also has a picture of a sick-looking Asian girl.  As well as a brown family.  And there were two pictures in the newspaper recently illustrating stories about H1N1.  An Asian woman holding vaccine vials.  And Asian kids getting inoculated by Asian health care workers.

I’m off to cough on folks at the library again.  Back later.

My white friend

My white friend grew up in a very racist, segregated environment. My white friend has parents and family members who hold very racist views.

My white friend has a partner who holds very racist views. Who opposed adopting a child from Korea because “I don’t want one of them in the house.”

I’ve been in the house.

They’ve been in the house.

My white friend has never taken anti-racism training.  Hasn’t attended diversity workshops.  Doesn’t read any of the literature.  But my white friend knows one thing:  My experience is real.