At These New Old Traditions we talk a lot about reclaiming lost heritages and spiritual traditions (here and here), and how our hyper-capitalist consumer culture has made doing so rather difficult (here and here). Personally, I am, at times overwhelmingly, interested in the myriad of ways in which people of European descent handle these issues without doing once again to other cultures what they have done for quite some time now. How does a descendant of Europe reclaim and honor one’s own heritage without being just a touch racist? Is it even possible?
I start with a quote from Ward Churchill whose take on this discussion I have kept close to home since reading it in Derrick Jensen’s book of interviews Listening to the Land. Churchill states,
“In order for Europeans to do to what they have done to virtually all non-Europeans, all-non-Westerners on the planet, they had to colonize themselves. These colonizers are colonized. They too are indigenous people. Not here [in America]. But somewhere they are indigenous people, with indigenous traditions and understandings of the land…. They need to get back in touch with that, you see. They must recover what was taken from them in the process of colonialization, to find out what went wrong for them clear back in the beginning. And then they can begin to recover knowledge of those traditions, to bring about the decolonialization of Europe itself, most of all the European mind” (Churchill, 161–62).
Lately, the thrust of much of the online debate within the pagan community regarding reclaiming one’s own heritage seems to neglect the idea of a prescriptive “European mind” and how that might influence the discussion entirely. The debates have, however, (and thankfully) dealt quite a bit with race and most recently, political leanings. Politically speaking, the debate often deals with how either so-called liberal- or conservative-leaning people allow their politics to inform their understanding of the vast and varied array of nature-based spiritual traditions, and how not recognizing this fact can lead to naive ideas about the purity of lineages, how being politically conservative, for example, will definitely inform your reading of pagan history. The same can be said for self-proclaimed liberals. For liberals, conservative pagans focus too much on the military exploits of, say, the Icelandic Sagas, and see their history as more communitarian. Conservatives rebut by stating that liberals all too often cherry pick what works for them, discard the rest, and fill in the gaps with an invented eco-feminism. Obviously, to the extent that there is such a thing as a “liberal” and a “conservative” the arguments are often bogus, and at their worst, aggressive and sectarian.
However, why is it that when the “left” dig their hands deep into pagan earth I find it endearing if sometimes naive, but when the “right” dabble in the folk arts I want to grab my blanket, pull it over my head, and shiver myself to sleep?
Conservatives befriending pagan traditions (often specifically Heathenism, also known as Germanic Paganism) hover so close to the ideas of the men’s movement, and to supposedly “post-racial” concepts of racial solidarity, you just wish sometimes they’d take off their Norse helmet and be like, Look. We take pride in being white. We relish in dated concepts of “maleness.” And, we believe ethnic purity is a real thing that should be preserved. Instead, so many PagaCons try and hide their racism beneath the leaves on their Odin altar, burying their bigotry in notions of “roots” and “heritage.”
How does this differ from, say, Starhawk’s idea of reclaiming “our” “native European spirituality” as she does in Listening to the Land? The difference lies in the reasons. Starhawk’s call for us to find “our” roots is not a call to divide and further define the boundaries of where “our” traditions begin and end, as many Heathens seem obsessed with doing, but is rather an act of trying to finally respect the cultural boundaries of other people. This is to say that Starhawk sees the reclaiming of “native European spirituality” by descendents of Europe as an act of owning up to our misappropriation of other cultures and their symbols and practices. She states,
“It’s important for those of us who have European or Middle Eastern ancestry to look to those roots and understand the kind of traditions and richness they offer. Only in that way can we approach any learning we receive from Native Americans in some kind of clearheaded spirit. Otherwise too often people are so hungry for something spiritual and something earth-based they don’t have much sense of the boundaries about what they can use and what they can take” (175).
Compare this to recent comments on The Wild Hunt by Steve McNallen, founder of the Asatru Folk Assembly (AFA), one of (if not the) most visible and ideologically seamless of Heathen “spaces.” With regards to the charge of racism, McNallen states,
McNallen’s stance is an entirely reactive one that positions itself first in allegiance to his “immediate family: not because they are superior or supreme but because…they are my family!” His over-use of statements like “my family” and “my people,” coupled with the proclamations “’Nuff said” and “I have absolutely no apology” come off entirely prepubescent and whiny. This makes sense, for McNallen’s reclaiming of the Asatru lineage is entirely about finding a home for lost souls. And, lost souls tend to be slightly temperamental. A questionable foundation makes for an itchy personality.
In contrast to Starhawk’s statements, McNallen’s reclaiming of the Asatru tradition is not primarily an act of accounting for the atrocities “his family” has caused throughout the world, and finding a meaningful way of atoning for and moving beyond them, but is rather an act of defiance. And, as proof that his intentions are righteous and good, he imagines “an Apache warrior having exactly the same feelings,” and naively assumes that because this may be the case, he too should feel entitled to taking such a position. Because, of course, Apaches in the United States of America and descendents of Europe in the United States of America have been, and always will be, standing on similar privileged foundations, right? What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, no? Maybe….
Hidden in McNallen’s Apache statement is the fact that McNallen uses the Apache warrior, someone apparently outside his “immediate family,” as a bar against which to position himself. So, while we can assume that a spiritually lost descendent of the Apache tribe should look elsewhere for comfort when stepping too close to the Asatru lineage, McNallen feels no shame in using an invented idea of Apache warrior-ship to keep Apache warriors out of the clan. We respect and honor your tradition, but please, do not touch the helmet on the altar.
But you know what…I get it! I know the feeling of having been exiled from your ancestors’ traditions. I know what it feels like to see other cultures reveling in traditions, and medicines, and lifestyles passed down to them for thousands of years, while I am given only Advil with which to soothe my pains. So, I get it, white-minded lost souls of the world. Maybe, for you, it starts like this…
You’re politically right of center, maybe slightly libertarian. You’re tired of self-proclaimed liberals telling you what to do, how to talk, where to smoke. You feel lost, as if the entire world is against you. You have no traditions on which to stand. You think, Hey. If black people can reclaim their heritage, why can’t I? So, you do that. Whatever “that” is. (You may even find some African American people saluting our efforts, just like the Ku Klux Klan supported the efforts of the The Honorable Elijah Muhammad’s Black Muslim movement in the 1960s). But, as quickly as you begin, you start hearing over-educated white leftists coming down on you for doing so. All of a sudden you’re being called a racist. You feel like you can do no right. Every step you take to get out of the race debate gets you thrown back in. Naturally, you start fighting back. No one can tell you what to do. Right? [Insert “grey area” here]
It’s not that tracing and reclaiming one’s roots (if you’re a self-professed white person) is inherently a bad thing. Roots and traditions are necessary. As descendents of Europe (for lack of better term) it’s a must, in my opinion, to find out what these roots and traditions are and mean. But, as is one of the consequences of institutionalized racist paradigms, some angles of the reclaiming our indigenous Euro-heritage roots movement just look…I don’t know…off, to say the least. That line between “progressive and revolutionary” and “creepy and secretly racist” is very fine. The differentiation between the two relies heavily on how much of our reclaiming is yet another affectation used only to skirt the real issue. How much of this reclamation is used to create a new social identity separate from the identity of our immediate slave trading forefathers, rather than reconnect us to an ever-evolving earth-based identity that fully appreciates and owns up to our forefathers’ legacy.
As Churchill states,
“[People who appropriate the affects of other spiritual cultures] are attempting to avoid responsibility, to sidestep the heritage they’re a part of. Rather than rectify it, putting it right, putting it back in balance, they want to step out of it and appropriate something else from somebody else so they can pretend to be other than who and what they are” (160).
So, do we as citizens of the United States, having had no culturally familial links more recent than a couple thousand years to the Icy North, have a case to “reclaim” a Nordic identity? Is reconstructing an identity based on the Sagas of Iceland simply another way to avoid investigating the Sagas of Slavery?
I think you’re definitely on the right track on this issue. Being partly of Germanic descent I’ve flirted with Germanic paganism, but the racial aspects have kept me from exploring it in depth. Being of mixed racial heritage I assume I would not be welcomed by a lot folks in Asatru circles…
Being an explicitly anti-civilization anarchist I am compelled to try to reconnect to the pre-civilized ways of my ancestors, “white” and “red”. The practical lifeways are rather straightforward, but the spiritual aspects are harder to grasp, especially considering the wide rift that has been opened up by the events of history. A lot of anti-civ people kind of assume that it is possible to just abruptly resume “primitive” ways. It is demonstrably not that easy considering how far removed this culture is from truly land-based ways of life. The same is true in pagan circles, as you have pointed out. Not only does living in suburbs, traveling by car, getting food from the grocery store separate us drastically from the practical ways of our ancestors, it also separates us from the consciousness they lived in that led them to enact specific rituals.
And of course as white people there is the unanswered, often not even given an attempted answer, except by guilt-mongering liberals, of how do we grapple with the historical effects of slavery, genocide, ecocide, etc. that have been enacted and still are being enacted.
Welcome to the jungle O.R. I’ve pondered the points you make here for nearly 10 years with not a lot to show for it. One way I think for WIP to begin decolonizing the mind is to set aside the religious notion that there is a supreme god that exists outside of the laws (or web of relationships) that we call nature and which intervenes in human history. I think most actually existing pagan traditions and the long slumbering ones too express a worldview is cyclical rather than linear. One of the old philosophers said something to the effect of “there’s nothing new under the sun”. No celestial city with streets paved in gold, no paradise with 72 virgins, no dictatorship of the proletariat or some similar happy ending.
What we have is right here in nature and I think that can be “resacrilized” by WIP without some “retribalizing” fantasy. I just finished up a book called ‘Dark Green Religion” by Bron Taylor that traces what he sees is a new spiritual consciousness coming out of the works of folks like Emerson and Thoreau, Aldo Leopold and John Muir etc. Its worth taking a look at.
Enkidu: Thanks for the response. And, I agree, the racial aspects that get thrown in make the Germanic paths hard to appreciate in full. everyone brings their baggage to the party, I just wish some would clean it out a little before hand, know what I mean?
Ralph: Yeah, this jungle seems to pop up everywhere I turn. Although I wonder how dropping the notions of the Uncontainable God help… For me, it’s more about rigid adherence to a particular belief system rather than personalizing God. The idea of an allegiance to a supreme God certainly takes to task sectarian allegiances to racial tribalism. So, for me the problem arises when that Supreme God is handled the way a deity might be as opposed to really relishing in what a truly Uncontainable “thing” would actually Be…uncontainable. Deities are good. God is good. But they are different, I think, and play different roles IMHO.
I defs want to check out the Taylor book you recommended. And I’m intrigued by an sense of resacrilizing!
I would like to point out that you quote Starhawk from a book of hers, while you quote McNallen from a response to a series of belligerent comments from anonymous posters regarding an article of his on a third-party website. The disparity in the sources might be why, as you claim, McNallen comes from “an entirely reactive” place, specifically because he’s reacting to attacks. It might have been more fair to quote from the actual article, as opposed to cherry-picking from comments, especially since the quote you used was taken out of the context of the actual discussion.
For the record, all the major Asatru organizations in the United States (the AFA, the AA and the Troth) denounce racism. I personally find it irresponsible to assume that a folkish stance somehow connotes racism, especially if you’ve never spoken to a member of the organization in question or attended a public blot. This is how scurrilous rumors are not only started but continued. Do not confuse those racist thugs who discarded their “Christian Identity” roots in favor of co-opting and perverting Odinism to their tastes with the non-racist Asatru organizations like the AFA, AA and Troth.
Happily, even if one doesn’t like the folkish stance of the AFA, a prospective Asatruar could simply join The Troth organization, which is universalist. Just like not every coven is a fit for a particular Wiccan, not every Asatru group or national organization is a fit for the particular Asatruar.
On a separate point, it seems this post is, somewhat separately, a bash on conservatives. Do you realize that you’re actually intimating that conservatives should not be members of the pagan community? And I quote:
“However, why is it that when the “left” dig their hands deep into pagan earth I find it endearing if sometimes naive, but when the “right” dabble in the folk arts I want to grab my blanket, pull it over my head, and shiver myself to sleep?”
This entire statement celebrates the left-leaning person and demeans the right-leaning person. Your choice of words (left digs their hands in deep which the right dabbles) demonstrates just how little you think of conservatives practicing pagan faiths. Isn’t that elitist and exclusive?
Or:
“Instead, so many PagaCons try and hide their racism beneath the leaves on their Odin altar, burying their bigotry in notions of “roots” and “heritage.””
In this quote, you dispense with the niceties altogether and simply state that you feel conservatives who are Pagans (or alternatively, depending on how one reads the paragraph, all conservative Heathens) are racists in hiding. Isn’t that also elitist and exclusive, not to mention one heck of a rude accusation without any factual data to back it up?
For the record: I’m a Heathen who is also a member of the AFA. I’m also politically independent (fiscally conservative, socially moderate). Thanks for the post – hope my comment is useful to the discussion.
Hi memler. Thanks so much for your comments! Race is a complex issue. Here’s my response:
“I would like to point out that you quote Starhawk from a book of hers, while you quote McNallen from a response to a series of belligerent comments from anonymous posters regarding an article of his on a third-party website.”
To start, I didn’t find the comments against McNallen to be necessarily belligerent, though they were definitely accusatory. McNallen was being called out on his stance, which, I might add, he reinforced by responding the way he did and using the language he did.
Secondly, as stated in the piece, the quote from Starhawk came from a book of interviews with a number of people including Starhawk, and not from one of her own titles. While the interview was no doubt edited, it was most likely done so by Derrick Jensen and not Starhawk herself, though I don’t know for sure.
However, this is slightly irrelevant. McNallen is a spokesperson for an (international) organization that represents the interests of predominantly white-identified people. As a representative of AFA what he says matters. If McNallen can’t (but attempts to) field softballs from the anonymous masses, I’m not sure what that says. His continuous references to “my family” show that the issue for him is less about respecting the cultural space of others–a space that has been desecrated (as I said) by dead members of “his family”–and more about using the struggles of actually oppressed peoples to validate his own cultural pride.
“It might have been more fair to quote from the actual article, as opposed to cherry-picking from comments, especially since the quote you used was taken out of the context of the actual discussion.”
I don’t think this was taken out of context nor do I think I cherry-picked from the comments. He only said about 150 words. I gave ample links back to the source for people to check in to see what was what. Other than reprinting the entire conversation, I gave all the necessary information people would need to decide for themselves.
“For the record, all the major Asatru organizations in the United States (the AFA, the AA and the Troth) denounce racism.”
I link back to the source so people can read this for themselves. I hope they will as the sites are all very interesting (at least to me). It’s wonderful to see them denouncing racism, and telling that they need to do so.
“I personally find it irresponsible to assume that a folkish stance somehow connotes racism, especially if you’ve never spoken to a member of the organization in question or attended a public blot.”
I agree, which is why I do not consider the entire folkish stance to be inherently racist. Why you think that by my questioning some trends of it equates to me slashing the entire traditions may say more about how you view the tradition than me. I know quite a number of anti-racist Heathens. They are not who I am talking about. Perhaps I could have made that more clear. Noted.
“This is how scurrilous rumors are not only started but continued. Do not confuse those racist thugs who discarded their “Christian Identity” roots in favor of co-opting and perverting Odinism to their tastes with the non-racist Asatru organizations like the AFA, AA and Troth.”
Now whose being belligerent? Not all Christians are racist thugs.
“Happily, even if one doesn’t like the folkish stance of the AFA, a prospective Asatruar could simply join The Troth organization, which is universalist. Just like not every coven is a fit for a particular Wiccan, not every Asatru group or national organization is a fit for the particular Asatruar.”
I’m not saying that every private organization in the world must be open to every person. Not in the slightest. I’m challenging inconsistencies in the anti-racist claims of the AFA (which they go at great lengths to state) and the statements of the members when directly challenged. As I always say, “Push a white man hard enough and you’ll find your racist.”
“On a separate point, it seems this post is, somewhat separately, a bash on conservatives. Do you realize that you’re actually intimating that conservatives should not be members of the pagan community? And I quote:
‘However, why is it that when the ‘left’ dig their hands deep into pagan earth I find it endearing if sometimes naive, but when the “right” dabble in the folk arts I want to grab my blanket, pull it over my head, and shiver myself to sleep?'”
This is a question/statement about my own prejudices. That’s why I ask “Why?” at the beginning. I’m not trying to bash conservatives as whole. To the extent that I identify with the two-party system at all, I find points of interest on both sides of the debate. The post is in part a humorous look into my own political prejudices.
“This entire statement celebrates the left-leaning person and demeans the right-leaning person. Your choice of words (left digs their hands in deep which the right dabbles) demonstrates just how little you think of conservatives practicing pagan faiths. Isn’t that elitist and exclusive?”
Elitist and exclusive? No. I’m not setting up an organization for people to join. If I was and included that language in the missions statement, then of course, yes, I would be excluding people based on their political interests. But, I am not. That said, there should be no question which way I “lean” on this subject. It’s not like I’m trying to hide anything. I quote, at length, Ward Churchill and I just got back from the Anarchist Book Fair. I make no absurd claims at being politically neutral on all (or any) issues. None of us here write without a bias. We simply try to be transparent. Look around our site, you’ll get an idea where we stand. Nothing hiding here.
“‘Instead, so many PagaCons try and hide their racism beneath the leaves on their Odin altar, burying their bigotry in notions of ‘roots’ and ‘heritage.’
In this quote, you dispense with the niceties altogether and simply state that you feel conservatives who are Pagans (or alternatively, depending on how one reads the paragraph, all conservative Heathens) are racists in hiding. Isn’t that also elitist and exclusive, not to mention one heck of a rude accusation without any factual data to back it up?”
You are right. I have no actual data to back this up, because the words “so many PagaCons” are almost impossible to support. That is why, however, I chose them as opposed to the word “all.” As in, “Like, oh my God! Sooooo many Conservative Pagans love guns.” Flippant? Yes.
Again, thanks for responding! Stop by soon.
Oh, and in case you still think I’m being too harsh on Mr. McNallen feel free to read his views on Immigration and the “browning of America”, along with some of the comments from his fans and foes within the White Power “Stormfront” community, etc. etc. etc.
Although, I shouldn’t really have to defend myself here…. Do the research on Steve. All seems pretty straight forward to me…. Close the borders, protect European whiteness, join the AFA… Anything I’m missing?
Blond Europeans with long skulls brought China the wheel.
http://asatruupdate.blogspot.com/2010/05/blond-mummies-from-central-asia-touring.html
To be completely clear, I just wanted to say that I represent only myself and my personal opinions, not that of anyone else or any other organization (should have put that in my first post).
You’re certainly entitled to your opinions on Mr. McNallen, and I’m not here to defend him (I’m sure he’s quite capable of that on his own). I still think that it would have be better, from a journalistic perspective, to quote from similar sources (Starhawk in structured, edited interview and McNallen in a structured, edited article seem to be on similar ground moreso than a structured edited article versus comments). However, it’s your article and your editorial decisions – I’m just raising what I see as an issue of fairness in source material. You are, in my opinion, correct that Mr. McNallen is very prominent as the founder of the original and current AFA and that his writing and comments, therefore, have added weight.
My perspective is that discovering, respecting and celebrating my culture and heritage does nothing but increase my respect and appreciation for other people’s cultures and heritages. I don’t think this is an unusual viewpoint, either. I think it would be incredibly small minded of me to take pride in discovering and working to reconstruct the spiritual folkway of my ancient ancestors and somehow claim that other people shouldn’t do or feel the same with their own folkways and heritage.
I too find it sad that Asatru organizations have to state publicly that they denounce racism. However, I don’t credit this to the structure of Asatru itself so much as I find it has become a necessary evil because of the racist organizations that have perverted and co-opted Asatru and Odinism. I think what’s worse is that the reason we have to continually defend ourselves is because so many people in the larger pagan community are so quick to jump on the bandwagon and assume all folkish heathens are racist – at least this has been my experience. I’m glad to hear that you don’t feel this way. And luckily, I’ve got some wonderful Pagan friends who understand and support me and my Asatru practice, as well as fantastic support in the Asatru community itself.
But then, you have a quote that I find disturbing: “Push a white man hard enough and you’ll find your racist.” Doesn’t that mean you’ve already made up your mind that all white men are racists? By this very logic, I’m guilty of being a racist in your eyes and you’ve never even met me. How does that make sense? Assuming this logic is correct, then the same would apply to all races. So basically everyone is a racist in this world view. Kind of a cynical way to think, isn’t it? Hopefully I’m misunderstanding.
For the record, I did not claim all Christian’s were thugs. I claimed the racist thugs from “Christian Identity” were racist thugs. 🙂 Christian Identity was a sect created and populated by white supremacists (Google it and I’m sure you’ll find history). When it came crashing down, they reinvented themselves and latched onto Odinism and Asatru as their new “faith”, perverting it much like they did Christianity formerly.
I read your “why” in the comment of left versus right pagans as a rhetorical why, as opposed to an actual question, hence my response. However, I stand by my comment. I don’t think one requires an organization to be elitist and exclusive – I think outright dismissing a large segment of the population because of their political viewpoint is the very definition of elitism and exclusivity. There’s a bunch of irony in there too, I think. 🙂
Thanks very much for posting my comment and for the response. I believe we’ll have to agree to disagree on many subjects (and I know there’s a lot of deeper subjects that we’re just scratching the surface of here). I do hope that you’ll work to keep your mind open, and I’ll try to do the same thing. Thanks again for posting this and for letting me take part in the discussion.
Hi memler. Thanks again for your comments. And please feel free to stop by any time and point out what you find questionable.
I’ll just touch on a few things:
1. I used the quote from McNallen, and not his other material, because I was responding to his quote and not his printed literature. It’s really that simple. Though, I get what you are saying. However, the piece was not a biopic on McNallen, but rather an op/ed on my current relationship to what I see as racist under/overtones within some strains of Heathenry. If I were to write a piece on McNallen proper, I could easily pull from his published lit for ample examples of what I feel are rather white-pride-laced statements. If a person were to simply connect the dots of his published work, (I believe) that person will find someone very much trying to “protect” white identity, from brown identity. That to me is questionable, to say the very least…
2. Please know that I am not making claims about Heathenry as a whole, nor your relationship to the tradition. As I said, I am well aware of anti-racist stances within Heathenry, and am always happy to see them. Like many traditions, Heanthenry is interesting to me, and, judging from what I have read from other, truly anti-racist Heathens, seems to have a lot of potential.
3. Thanks for clarifying the “Christian Identity” statement. I totally missed your reference, but unfortunately know the group well (at least from afar).
4. Unfortunately, you’ll just have to live with the “Push a white man…” comment, as that is my way of speaking. Yes, it’s a generalization, however, one that both I, and any number of white-identified people I know, can attest to. Racism is a psychosis. It infects, in my opinion, EVERY white-identified person I have ever come across, even in very subtle, very buried ways. It is something we as lineage holders of the so-called “white race” (which is a fabrication) need to own up to and deal with. Not walk around feeling guilty, but stand up to it and confront it wherever we see it. We must be proactive, and not passive in this regard, to the best of our ability, whatever that may be for every person.
See http://wyrdmeginthew.blogspot.com/2009/04/volkism-is-fucking-insult-to-mutts.html
I reference this because the faux-innocence of folkism assumes a singularity of ancestry that discludes a great number of people. It assumes discrete “folk”, when in fact, there are just people. Tribes form and dissolve and reform and interact and exchange ideas and genes and dances. It happens all the time. I don’t want to be part of a perspective that respects “another people”, because there is no “other” people. That doesn’t mean I’m homogenizing humanity. It means I acknowledge others as common to my humanity, with differentiations in cultural, political, familial history that are far too nuanced to be divided up into discrete political units.
I am very glad to see Churchill referenced here. You’ll notice I include a very similar quote on my site :
http://wyrdmeginthew.blogspot.com/2008/04/reclaiming-faithkeepers.html
I’d really like to ratchet up the discussion of just what decolonization means in terms of the material being worked. It’s a discussion that is sorely needed. Even Churchill’s quote is sorely fleshed out and lacking in many ways. He mentions Irish and Basque nationalists, which again ignores the question of mutts who may share many of what were once “nationalities”.
People who distrust mixing are scary.
We are very pro-mutt around here, which is why we take very seriously the “new” in New Old Traditions. We’ve read too much Hakim Bey to think and feel otherwise. So, your presence is very welcome (and desired) ’round these parts.
With regards to respecting “another people”… I think what’s meant by that is respecting another people’s cultural identity. While, of course, the boundaries of identity are crazy blurry, there are some edges that might help being at least noted. Wouldn’t you agree?
So this was the article you were talking about.
I think that there is one thing you either seem to not know or are skirting. Please correct me if I’m wrong.
What it seems that you are saying is that WIP are inherently racist. This inherent part of their nature is something that they cannot remove and cannot control. They can mitigate it somewhat but it is still an indelible part of their being.
That sounds a whole lot like the old Christian concept of Original Sin to me. The difference, of course, is that we don’t have the luxury of washing off our racism. We are innately as bad now as we will be the day we are put in our graves and there is nothing that can be done to fully undo that.
This goes into another thing.
Much of the anti-racist rhetoric that I’ve seen(which you seem to subscribe to) usually ends in a morass that doesn’t really help anyone. Once you get past the really significant parts(“don’t hate people that aren’t WIP”), it seems to rapidly degenerate into nitpiking to the point where the only end result is a sullen acceptance by the POC(“Well, even though you are a racist, I guess you’ve done as much as you can. Kindof.”) and clincial depression and neurosis on the part of the WIP(“I’m inherently racist and that means that the only difference between me and the guys beating bums to death is degree but maybe if I constantly obsess over everything I say and do and totally abnegate everything in favor of POC and work just on race stuff and NOTHING ELSE, I might be almost not racist.”)
And I think that’s why a lot of people who get into spirituality don’t really get into this.
To quote what you said.
“The differentiation between the two relies heavily on how much of our reclaiming is yet another affectation used only to skirt the real issue. How much of this reclamation is used to create a new social identity separate from the identity of our immediate slave trading forefathers, rather than reconnect us to an ever-evolving earth-based identity that fully appreciates and owns up to our forefathers’ legacy.”
The thing is, owining up to it only ends in one place and that is a dark place that is very hard to come back from. There is no way to make up for it, there is no way to “bring it back into balance” without a time machine. It happened. It was terrible. But other than resolving never to do it again, unless you have massive money or influence, that’s all you can do and this is the part where my generalization comes in.
I was involved in anti-racism for close to a decade and I have never met a single WIP person who was had been seriously involved with anti-racism than a month that didn’t end up either on meds for depression, neurosis or both. Period.
Thanks for the comments JJ. I’ll try to speak to them the best I can.
1. WIP. I use this term intentionally to describe people who identify specifically as “white” as a cultural identity. I am not referring to any and every “light-skinned” person. This is very important. Identifying as white, in response to, say, black, is very different than recognizing how the identity of whiteness is place UPON a person, and how when we accept this identity as our own inherent “true nature” we accept a whole slew of historical problems. What I am suggesting is that people who have been and continue to be identified as white, recognize that A. the concept of whiteness sets up a false dichotomy that can only end in strife, B. recognize that living off the privileged back of this false dichotomy will lead to inevitable racist lenses through which a person will ultimately view the world.
2. Anti-racism. I’m not sure what you’ve been involved in, and I don’t pretend to have been involved in any organized form of anti-racist work, but what I have seen from light-skinned people around me who have been involved in, say “owning your racism” workshops is not promising and looks to lead to a number of dead ends. As in, there MUST be some recognition that being born INTO a racist culture, does not necessarily mean that you cannot challenge that racist culture. That said, I do feel that WIPs, when backed into a corner, will show their racist infections, and that nothing less than serious self-reflections can unpack this. And, yes, I see racism as somewhat of a mental condition that might be dealt with through psychological channels.
3. With regards to owning up to racist legacies and making up for it…I don’t think these are the same thing. I also don’t think there’s a prescription. I also, REALLY don’t think an article on the subject will change the situation. Racism, identity, these are all social constructs, meaning: we invent, maintain, and diminish these IN COMMUNITY, in the social, face-to-face, person-to-person. That’s where I think the real work is done. Not in a workshop, not in an article, and certainly not on a blog.
4. White guilt is a form of paralysis.
5. Recognition of inevitable and inherited legacies; awareness; and moves to confront, unpack, and move on from this legacy are good things.
First, thank you for your response. If I am in any way offensive, I apologize. I have tried to catch any inflammatory remarks but I might have missed one.
Now, in order.
1. It seems that that would give someone a very easy “pass card”. If I just don’t identify as white anymore, then I don’t have to worry about the baggage(which I’m guessing by your statements further down is not the case at all). Also, that brings up another point. If someone doesn’t identify as white, then what are they on a mundane note? What do you put down when you are asked your race for census forms and stuff like that?
2. So, just to be clear, you think that someone who is a WIP can, by lots of work and no longer being a WIP, become not racist at all? Also, I think that this goes into a big part of the problem. The reason that we as people can’t really do anything isn’t because we were or were not born into a racist culture. It is because we don’t have millions of dollars to spare, most of our populus have no appetite for the sacrifices needed for change(not even the non-violent sacrifices), and the decision making apparatus, in the US at least, is safely removed from the common person. You can do all the work you want to do, dedicate your spiritual pursuit in any way you feel is appropriate, hold all of the meetings, have all of the community, and whatever else you would want. In the end, unless you are one of the 1/10th of 1% that have all of the “stuff” it won’t change anything and that is one of the classic ways into depression. Wanting something that there is absolutely no way you personally can attain.
3. I think I see where we differ, on a personal level at least. As someone who went from the subtle racism that all WIP have to out and out misanthropy, the idea of doing anything in community makes me fairly frantic. That, however, is more a very subjective statement on my personal feelings and experiences than an objective assessment.
4. It is and I would say that it is inevitable once you realize the full enormity of the wrongs done by WIP.
5. With respect to your views, I have to disagree. From my experience that path produces very few positive results and those are so costly that they might have well not even been gained.
Hey Jim. My guess is that we actually agree more than disagree, and that if we were genuinely interested in connecting personally on this matter we would simply call each other or meet up to discuss. But, as we are doing the text thing, let’s see what’s what.
1. You’re right in assuming that I wouldn’t give anyone a pass card. Denying whiteness is only a step in a direction of unhinging oneself from a binary that has been placed on us by others before us. I didn’t ask for it, but here it is.
2. Not sure really. There are no hard and fast rules. My feeling is that if a person first checks the whole idea of being a WIP in the first place, as in really checking the whole idea of whiteness as an actual race of people, good can possibly come from that. My feeling is that it must, but I can’t speak for every person in every situation.
3. I think we are very much on similar pages. I’m by no means a person who believes in some form of “idealized community,” and I can feel misanthropic at time too. Anyone who knows me knows this. Even our use of “Community” in our tag (which I put there), is a lot more charged than one might think, and there were a number of questionable smiles when we agreed on it. We are VERY skeptical of the community fad found in leftist circles the country over.
4. I think there’s a way out of guilt for each WIP. It starts with loosening the attachment to in fact being a WIP. Again, people need to remember, and place right up front with every other discussion: WIPs inherited this BS. It’s how they deal with it that matters.
5. And, you know what? I might disagree too. These ideas are constantly changing. I live in the most culturally diverse city in the world. Make no mistake. I don’t think just one set of buzz words strung together will solve any/everything. I do, however, think my string of words is decent enough to begin with.
Ralph: Thanks for the article. I just can’t believe people try to stick up for this guy.
“If this is the mettle of the Germans in the Twenty-First century, they will not be long among us. If this nonsense reflects the temper of the times, Germans will all be brown and will be named Mohammed in another century. However, I suspect these quotes are the message the media wants us to get, and not the words in the hearts of ordinary Germans.”
You know, ’cause who knows the German people better than a guy living in the US?
2. So, just to be clear, you think that someone who is a WIP can, by lots of work and no longer being a WIP, become not racist at all? Also, I think that this goes into a big part of the problem. The reason that we as people can’t really do anything isn’t because we were or were not born into a racist culture. It is because we don’t have millions of dollars to spare, most of our populus have no appetite for the sacrifices needed for change(not even the non-violent sacrifices), and the decision making apparatus, in the US at least, is safely removed from the common person. You can do all the work you want to do, dedicate your spiritual pursuit in any way you feel is appropriate, hold all of the meetings, have all of the community, and whatever else you would want. In the end, unless you are one of the 1/10th of 1% that have all of the “stuff” it won’t change anything and that is one of the classic ways into depression. Wanting something that there is absolutely no way you personally can attain.
+1
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Very thought provoking. I think we need more dialogue regarding the relationship between Asatru, which is my chosen path, and racism. I spent a few years with some internal conflict over this issue. We can’t correct injustices like slavery and the genocide of Native Americans by pretending it never happened. Also I think it might be helpful for those of us non-racist Asatruar to think of ourselves not as “white” because the definition didn’t exist until , relatively, recently. Europeans thought of themselves as British. French, or whatever nation they came from, not as white. My family are , mostly, Anglo-Saxon. I celebrate my heritage without putting down anyone else’s, because every heritage has it’s own richness and value.