White Bonding and Halloween

I was struck by the passage about white bonding, which Wise referred to as when in a all-white situation some individuals will "take the opportunity to to make some kind of overtly racist comment, or tell a racist joke, as if it were perfectly acceptable to do so, as if no one else  else in the group would mind" (193). The assumption that fellow whites will hold the same racist opinion or brush off racist jokes based upon their humor, seems to speak volumes about white privilege. When Wise pretends that he is half black, the man who tells the racist joke at dinner is immediately apologetic and embarrassed, therefore proving that he knew what he was saying was offensive and wrong, but he felt as though it were okay to tell it due to his white audience. I have had conversations about the very same phenomenon with my mom and she has always expressed her incredulity, wondering why people feel as though she'll agree with them simply because they are both white. For example, I attended a private, Catholic school for my first few years of school, and one time my mother was talking with a few moms  in the schoolyard after dropping us off. One of them was an au pair and recently married. Somehow the conversation got onto biracial couples and the au pair said she  hoped to send her future to a private school as well, as she didn't want them to be around "niggers". Another mother chimed in and said something along the lines of it being natural for blacks and white to be separated on the basis that "God didn't intend for elephants and monkeys to mate." My mother immediately retaliated, saying that her choice of animal was particularly indicative of her racist views and they shouldn't assume that she'd be okay with their use of that word and their statements. The au pair was embarrassed and apologized to my mother, but all conversation shut down after that.My mother was so taken aback by the overt racism and the hypocrisy of these supposed good, Christian women. And although some could argue that this statement  was much more offensive than a racist joke, it's important to look at the everyday, "little" things that contribute to and perpetuate racist ideologies. Micro-discrimination contributes to the larger structure of racism and keeps those who are oppressed in their place by attacking and discouraging them in small ways. As Wise astutely pointed out, putting people on the offensive and asking for them to not say those kinds of things around you doesn't tackle the racism behind the statements. Questioning  assumed white solidarity would be more effective in understanding how racism operates and allows for people to consciously take stock of their views and ideally interrogate the source of these feelings. Or at the very least, having people check them on their jokes and the like will make them realize that it isn't okay in any crowd.

This gets me to another point about black face and Halloween, and more specifically, the use of black face last year at Ursinus. A group of students dressed up as the US women's gymnastics team, and one student, dressed as Gabby Douglas, wore black face. After the incident was reported and the USGA held a meeting about it, following a a seminar on the history of black face,  I recall hearing many white  students complaining that the school and the students who reported it were being "too sensitive." The responsibility was then placed on the people who were offended by the student's costume, not the student himself. White students complained that they felt restricted and that we weren't allowed to have any fun anymore, especially when this was followed by the administration's condemnation of sombreros and mustaches at a Tequila party. Rather than taking the lesson from this situation, many white students saw themselves as the victims and the administration's requests for cultural and racial sensitivity when it came to party themes as a form of oppression. I recall one student saying that it would be better if we just didn't talk about race, because it only got people upset, a statement that could only come from someone who has never experienced racial oppression or discrimination. Such reactions showed me how white privilege allows us  a great degree of ignorance and obscures the non white realities and perspectives of black students at Ursinus. It reminded me a lot of the reactions the University of Illinois students had in the book when their racist mascot was changed. Ignoring the history of black face, as well as the issue of race itself, only perpetuates racist behavior and trivializes the mocking and damaging effect of certain costumes and the ubiquitous cultural appropriation on Halloween. These harmful representations allow the continuation of  racial stereotypes, and we should be forced to examine our practices and understand the reason why it is not okay to dress up as a caricature of another race, such as Trayvon Martin, just as it is not okay to dress up as a dead Boston marathon runner as evidenced by the recent uproar on social media. How can one of these costumes be unacceptable, while the other is just a "joke"? These costumes are dehumanizing and although the intention may not always be racist, we have to understand the underlying social and cultural meaning of them. Just because it was a thoughtless costume doesn't mean that we shouldn't think about it and identify it as wrong. I think this quote sums it up well: "To avoid dealing with the legacy of white supremacy, we will change the subject, blame the victims, play the victim" (240).