The Idea of "White Supremacy Culture" is Offensive
Anyone with a cursory knowledge of history and cultures knows that all cultures have both oppressive and liberatory aspects. Historically, it was quite typical to conquer, kill, and enslave neighboring groups or nations - just ask the Aztecs or the Mongols. Historically, European and American culture are rife with oppressive aspects, but not particularly more so than any other culture.
Part of the joy of being an Unitarian Universalist for me has been its openly syncretic approach to finding wisdom; that is, we seek great wisdom from all cultures, and at least historically have been able to borrow and build upon such wisdom without apology. In my own personal experience, I have gained wisdom from European, Asian, African, and Native American cultures, among others; as well as Christian, Islamic, Jewish, Buddhist, and Pagan beliefs. To pursue truth and wisdom wherever you find it has historically been one of our great blessings.
With new walls being erected about certain traditional belief systems as being “contaminated” with supremacy culture, as well as walls being erected saying that we should not “appropriate” others’ cultural ideas, being an Unitarian Universalist has suddenly become an anxious and uncomfortable state. Whose wisdom are we allowed to promulgate? Do we have to apologize for the wisdom we find in one culture, if other aspects of that same culture are oppressive? Am I unable to learn from Buddhism if some Buddhists are implicated in the genocide in Myanmar? Do the acts of some contaminate the culture as a whole? Am I unable to learn from Christianity, because some Christians have used their religion as an instrument of oppression?
The “outside” culture I know best is that of American Reform Judaism, my birth religion and culture. There is much to admire within Reform Judaism, but even within this culture, by my point of view, there are both oppressive and virtuous aspects. No culture is morally pure, and it is a folly to judge or categorize entire cultures in this aspect.
I am not an anthropologist, but I have adopted that anthropological sensibility that we should be very hesitant to judge cultures other than our own. It is only by understanding a culture deeply, from the inside, that we can see it in all its complexity. Unless basic human rights are involved, the anthropological point of view suggests that we should be tolerant of cultures other than our own, and seek to understand rather than to change them. I would submit that the only culture we should seek to alter is American culture (although there are clearly many American subcultures), the one we claim as our own from our internal experiences of it.
I do not think that any serious anthropologist or social scientist would claim that there is such a thing as “white culture” that unifies Europeans, their descents, and Americans of European descent. This is not to say there is not such an entity as white privilege in the US. Being white, based on my own experience and reading of social science, clearly confers some sense of deference in contemporary American culture. But that does not mean there is a common white culture. There are massive differences in culture across America and Europe, as well as within Europe. My European friends often joke about the differences between their cultures, English, French, German, Portuguese, Russian and so on. So speaking of “white culture” itself seems to be a questionable enterprise. When we are discussing cultures (as I mentioned before, hopefully with respect and deference) we should be as specific as possible about which culture we mean, for fear of making generalizations that simply are inaccurate. If we wish to speak accurately about the tendency of dominant groups to exclude outsiders, we should speak of tribalism, which is an universal human trait not specific to whites. Ample psychological science documents a likely universal human tendency towards tribalism.
I cannot think of any culture where I would consider it socially acceptable to make a list of its deficiencies and circulate that list publicly. I’m hesitant to provide an hypothetical example because it is so patently offensive. But imagine for a second I developed a list about deficiencies in Latvian culture and then offered a number of suggestions for fixing those deficiencies. Wouldn’t Latvians rightly abhor this judgment foisted upon them? I can’t think of any culture to which I would apply this treatment.
So, in short, the idea of “White Supremacy Culture” is both inaccurate and offensive. It’s not a term I would recommend using in any context.
Part of the joy of being an Unitarian Universalist for me has been its openly syncretic approach to finding wisdom; that is, we seek great wisdom from all cultures, and at least historically have been able to borrow and build upon such wisdom without apology. In my own personal experience, I have gained wisdom from European, Asian, African, and Native American cultures, among others; as well as Christian, Islamic, Jewish, Buddhist, and Pagan beliefs. To pursue truth and wisdom wherever you find it has historically been one of our great blessings.
With new walls being erected about certain traditional belief systems as being “contaminated” with supremacy culture, as well as walls being erected saying that we should not “appropriate” others’ cultural ideas, being an Unitarian Universalist has suddenly become an anxious and uncomfortable state. Whose wisdom are we allowed to promulgate? Do we have to apologize for the wisdom we find in one culture, if other aspects of that same culture are oppressive? Am I unable to learn from Buddhism if some Buddhists are implicated in the genocide in Myanmar? Do the acts of some contaminate the culture as a whole? Am I unable to learn from Christianity, because some Christians have used their religion as an instrument of oppression?
The “outside” culture I know best is that of American Reform Judaism, my birth religion and culture. There is much to admire within Reform Judaism, but even within this culture, by my point of view, there are both oppressive and virtuous aspects. No culture is morally pure, and it is a folly to judge or categorize entire cultures in this aspect.
I am not an anthropologist, but I have adopted that anthropological sensibility that we should be very hesitant to judge cultures other than our own. It is only by understanding a culture deeply, from the inside, that we can see it in all its complexity. Unless basic human rights are involved, the anthropological point of view suggests that we should be tolerant of cultures other than our own, and seek to understand rather than to change them. I would submit that the only culture we should seek to alter is American culture (although there are clearly many American subcultures), the one we claim as our own from our internal experiences of it.
I do not think that any serious anthropologist or social scientist would claim that there is such a thing as “white culture” that unifies Europeans, their descents, and Americans of European descent. This is not to say there is not such an entity as white privilege in the US. Being white, based on my own experience and reading of social science, clearly confers some sense of deference in contemporary American culture. But that does not mean there is a common white culture. There are massive differences in culture across America and Europe, as well as within Europe. My European friends often joke about the differences between their cultures, English, French, German, Portuguese, Russian and so on. So speaking of “white culture” itself seems to be a questionable enterprise. When we are discussing cultures (as I mentioned before, hopefully with respect and deference) we should be as specific as possible about which culture we mean, for fear of making generalizations that simply are inaccurate. If we wish to speak accurately about the tendency of dominant groups to exclude outsiders, we should speak of tribalism, which is an universal human trait not specific to whites. Ample psychological science documents a likely universal human tendency towards tribalism.
I cannot think of any culture where I would consider it socially acceptable to make a list of its deficiencies and circulate that list publicly. I’m hesitant to provide an hypothetical example because it is so patently offensive. But imagine for a second I developed a list about deficiencies in Latvian culture and then offered a number of suggestions for fixing those deficiencies. Wouldn’t Latvians rightly abhor this judgment foisted upon them? I can’t think of any culture to which I would apply this treatment.
So, in short, the idea of “White Supremacy Culture” is both inaccurate and offensive. It’s not a term I would recommend using in any context.
Comments
The idea of white supremacy, which is part of the air we breathe today whether we want to breathe that air or not, is a holdover from settler colonialism. The idea of “whiteness” was created then to unify diverse ethnic groups so that together, though they were still outnumbered, they could justify their power over, and exploitation of the enslaved people brought from Africa and the indigenous people living here. Though there is much to be celebrated in the history of our country, this truth is also at its core.
Race itself is a social construct, codified in our early written laws, and in America it was used to justify slavery and the brutal taking of native people’s land and lives at a time when the ideals of equality, justice, democracy and human rights were coming to the fore. We are still very much impacted by our history of slavery, Jim Crow, and segregation. Our systems and our spirits still suffer from racism and white supremacy culture today. Label, divide and conquer is still used by many who currently hold power.
I believe white supremacy culture is what keeps many more people from rising up and working to end the racial disparities which can be found in every realm of our society - health, education, employment, incarceration, policing, the law, the environment, immigration, agriculture, food, and housing. I just read an article in the Sun-Sentinel about infant mortality rates in Florida and the fact that Black babies in Florida die twice as often as White non-Hispanic and Hispanic babies. Just one example among hundreds of the legacy and current effects of racism. Will this article help spur change? Or will complacency rule the day?
I found this explanation helpful as I came to understand that the word “culture” in Okun’s work is used not to describe a certain group of people, but the “water we all swim in”. (This came from a worksheet adapted from Tema Okun and Kenneth Jones’ work):
“In our society, the dominant culture that shapes our institutions, our media, the way we see ourselves and each other is that of the white, middle class. Racial equity trainer Tema Okun suggests that the characteristics of white dominant culture can be harmful not in and of themselves but ‘when they are used as norms and standards without being pro-actively named or chosen by the group…. These attitudes and behaviors can show up in any group or organization, whether it is white-led or predominantly white or people of color-led or predominantly people of color.’”
I am a student of this work. I’ve been listening to some interviews with Tema Okun, who explains that she and Kenneth Jones used this framework: racism and white supremacy are institutional, having to do with policies and procedures and practices, cultural, having to do with beliefs and values, and also personal. She says that they first focused on the institutional piece and then spent more time in later years on the cultural component because, she asserts, if you don’t shift the culture, the progress you make with laws and policies will not last. She believes we are seeing that now with the dismantling of some civil rights law and voting rights.
These ideas are giving me a lot to think about. She also believes we need to start with the personal work and it’s there that we can ultimately (though it is not easy or comfortable) find the healing we need for our spirits. There are a lot of very deep concepts in her work about who we are as human beings and how we are conditioned to be. I think fundamentally her work encourages us to wake up and examine our conditioning and the ways it keeps us apart from each other and to some extent keeps each of us from being fully whole.
I agree with you about the legacy of racism and its ongoing harms in American history. These are also problems I would like to see addressed and ameliorated.
I also agree that race was historically used as a justification for slavery.
Where I disagree is the idea that there is a largely invisible white supremacy culture pervading everything we think and do that perpetuates the dominance of white people. I think when we combat discriminatory policies and institutions, we are under an obligation to be specific and narrow in our claims.
Also the terminology "white supremacy culture" connects a kind of oppression uniquely with a specific racial group. Even if the intent of the authors of the idea was not to label "white culture" as being "supremacist," the authors are under an obligation to find a better term for their idea because the use of the current term unfairly labels all whites with an associated stigma. In other words, even if the idea is correct, the language must be changed before a fair and open conversation can take place.