Prejudice
I’ll talk quite a bit about issues of racism, sexism, classism, and other prejudice on this journal. So I thought it might be pretty important to go ahead and clarify what this is:
Racism = racial prejudice + power
Sexism = sexual prejudice + power
Classism = class prejudice + power
That ‘+ power’ portion of the equation is one of the most important parts. This is not to say that the disenfranchised cannot be prejudiced, because many of them are, but without power, they are not actually working within the systematic framework of advantage created by the majority to privilege themselves. Thus it is only “racism” if the person is capable of using that framework; otherwise, it is prejudice.
To own up to my own issues:
I have very strong working class prejudices. Very strong. I try not to let them interfere with my analysis and thinking but it is very hard not to curl my lip up. I’m almost hypersensitive to discussions of class and class oppression, especially when analyzing media. I have my own moments of internalized misogyny as well. You’ll notice I use the word ‘cunt,’ for example. I like to think that this is less because it is exclusively a disparaging word for female genitalia and more because I like the idea of word reclaimation and have always liked my good Middle English four letter hard sounding words. This is really only a polite fiction, I’m sure. And yes, I’ve had my racist moments as well. Some of it comes with being a clueless white woman forgetting to unpack my own privilege and some of it is internalized systematic issues.
I try to be aware of this and check my bias at the door. This doesn’t always happen. I don’t jump all over people or get offended if they call me on this. I may ask for clarification on why you think that, if I’m having a particularly slow day, but it’s not a big deal to me in comparison to the chance to be able to further learn about and change my own prejudices.
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[…] Let’s start off by looking at an explanation of why the “power” is in there (Kristi is discussing racism, but the same argument applies to sexism): That ‘+ power’ portion of the equation is one of the most important parts. This is not to say that the disenfranchised cannot be prejudiced, because many of them are, but without power, they are not actually working within the systematic framework of advantage created by the majority to privilege themselves. Thus it is only “racism” if the person is capable of using that framework; otherwise, it is prejudice. [Kristi (Failure to Communicate): Prejudice.] […]