The other is that under the definition of racism = "prejudice + power" -- making the power the prerogative of white people -- means that my father can't be racist when he's being racist, because he's not white. But considering that culturally, we're not Surinamese/Chinese but Indonesian Dutch (pretty integrated into the dominant paradigm, I think), and that's how we're seen.
*nods* For me, I think there's a difference between being racist and being racially prejudiced; heaven knows my own family is often the second, even though we're Chinese. Also, I don't think it's quite as easy as saying that POC can't be racist; I think that's often the starting point for discussions as a shorthanded way to establish that white privilege exists. If that makes sense?
I wrote a post on racism in POC; I'm not sure if you will find it helpful or not. Because I do think there are ways for POC to be racist in the institutionally racist sense, not just the racially prejudiced sense, but I generally think it's tinged a bit differently because it's often a means of self-protection ("Look white people! Asians aren't that bad; look at black people!").
Um. And that isn't to say that all POC racism is motivated by the hierarchy of racism, but just... it's really hard to be racist without being influenced by that hierarchy and by white privilege, because it is so pervasive.
I'm not sure if that is helpful, sorry =(. And like you mention in your post, things get even more complicated with multiracial-ness and the ability to "pass," particularly when passing can be associated with the loss of heritage and culture, so that even while taking white privilege by passing, multiracial people can also be racist against a part of themselves. Er. Sorry! I do not mean to say all multiracial people do that, but attempting to imperfectly extrapolate how being multiracial might complicate things.
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The other is that under the definition of racism = "prejudice + power" -- making the power the prerogative of white people -- means that my father can't be racist when he's being racist, because he's not white. But considering that culturally, we're not Surinamese/Chinese but Indonesian Dutch (pretty integrated into the dominant paradigm, I think), and that's how we're seen.
*nods* For me, I think there's a difference between being racist and being racially prejudiced; heaven knows my own family is often the second, even though we're Chinese. Also, I don't think it's quite as easy as saying that POC can't be racist; I think that's often the starting point for discussions as a shorthanded way to establish that white privilege exists. If that makes sense?
I wrote a post on racism in POC; I'm not sure if you will find it helpful or not. Because I do think there are ways for POC to be racist in the institutionally racist sense, not just the racially prejudiced sense, but I generally think it's tinged a bit differently because it's often a means of self-protection ("Look white people! Asians aren't that bad; look at black people!").
Um. And that isn't to say that all POC racism is motivated by the hierarchy of racism, but just... it's really hard to be racist without being influenced by that hierarchy and by white privilege, because it is so pervasive.
I'm not sure if that is helpful, sorry =(. And like you mention in your post, things get even more complicated with multiracial-ness and the ability to "pass," particularly when passing can be associated with the loss of heritage and culture, so that even while taking white privilege by passing, multiracial people can also be racist against a part of themselves. Er. Sorry! I do not mean to say all multiracial people do that, but attempting to imperfectly extrapolate how being multiracial might complicate things.