Pirate's Cove

Do you think you’re a pretty inclusive kind of person? That you aren’t a racist? Well, sorry, if you’re White, you are a major racist, because of your unconscious mind. Of course, this apparently only applies to White Men

Straight Talk for White Men

SUPERMARKET shoppers are more likely to buy French wine when French music is playing, and to buy German wine when they hear German music. That’s true even though only 14 percent of shoppers say they noticed the music, a study finds.

Researchers discovered that candidates for medical school interviewed on sunny days received much higher ratings than those interviewed on rainy days. Being interviewed on a rainy day was a setback equivalent to having an MCAT score 10 percent lower, according to a new book called “Everyday Bias,” by Howard J. Ross.

Those studies are a reminder that we humans are perhaps less rational than we would like to think, and more prone to the buffeting of unconscious influences. That’s something for those of us who are white men to reflect on when we’re accused of “privilege.”

White men sometimes feel besieged and baffled by these suggestions of systematic advantage. When I wrote a series last year, “When Whites Just Don’t Get It,” the reaction from white men was often indignant: It’s an equal playing field now! Get off our case!

Yet the evidence is overwhelming that unconscious bias remains widespread in ways that systematically benefit both whites and men. So white men get a double dividend, a payoff from both racial and gender biases.

It’s apparently not just White Men over Blacks, but over White Women too. So, shame on you, you evil White Men. You must prostrate yourself and strive to be mediocre in the face of what you do not even know your brain is thinking. It’s a good thing Mr. Kristoff is here to tell us these things. Otherwise I’d be concerned that the NY Times is doing nothing about their Editorial Board, which features one Black person (and he’s a man, too!!!!!) out of 17 members. Even the women on the EB are about as lilly white as can be, so, at least the EB isn’t misogynist, too.

It’s not that we white men are intentionally doing anything wrong, but we do have a penchant for obliviousness about the way we are beneficiaries of systematic unfairness. Maybe that’s because in a race, it’s easy not to notice a tailwind, and white men often go through life with a tailwind, while women and people of color must push against a headwind.

See? You should definitely strive to be mediocre and blah. Because fairness, ya know.

None of these examples mean exactly that society is full of hard-core racists and misogynists. Eduardo Bonilla-Silva, a Duke University sociologist, aptly calls the present situation “racism without racists”; it could equally be called “misogyny without misogynists.” Of course, there are die-hard racists and misogynists out there, but the bigger problem seems to be well-meaning people who believe in equal rights yet make decisions that inadvertently transmit both racism and sexism.

Whew! I feel much better that my unconscious mind doesn’t make me a hard-core racist and misogynist. I shall strive to be more inferior. Whoops! That’s certainly an unconscious word which exposes that I think I’m better than Blacks and women. Instead, I shall attempt to be unexceptional. Whoa! Yet another unconscious word.

This is Liberal World, where instead of people striving to be better, certain people must be treated in a biased manner to bring them down, everywhere from people who are rich to White People to, especially, White Men. White Men are fair game to be treated in a manner that would be out-of-bounds for any other group. Could we term that unconscious racism and sexism? For all their talk about loving people, Liberals are extremely intolerant, and must always find someone/some group to demonize. I’m not even going to get into their race baiting game at this time, beyond saying that everyone has biases and discriminations. Those can be good or bad. If you like certain foods and wines, and dislike others, you are said to have a discriminating palate. It’s the same in life. But, apparently, only Certain People are allowed to think them.

Let’s be clear: this kind of talk is meant to put White People, and especially White Men, on the defensive, in the same manner as the good old question “when did you stop beating your wife?”

Crossed at Right Wing News.