Can white people ever experience racism?

[LittleRedCourgettes]

Following a discussion on this topic with some students, I was reading this article and am interested to hear your honest thoughts on this question.....

https://www.nas.org/blogs/article/wherediddwegetttheideaathatonlyywhitepeopleecanbeeracist

What @CaraDuneRedux said is really great.

I was the target of sexual harassment as a white woman in India - but i could always fall back on my white privilege to threaten to call the police etc, which was very effective in stopping the behaviour. This is a privilege Indian women don't have.

Fundamentally, and on the evidence, a person with white skin in 2021 will be taken more seriously than a black or brown person.

@Ugzbugz

I was in a school in england where there was only a few white people, racism was rife as I'm sure it is vice versa.

Also I was walking along the road and some men drove past, opened the car door and shouted racist abuse at me

Similar for me. My brother was attacked in the street as a teenage boy for being white (at least that's what the attackers said), I was called "white trash", and there was a "white girls are easy" "white whores" kind of attitude, which I found really scary as a teenage girl.

@Student133 '19th century Irish peasants often had a poorer diet than enslaved African Americans, so the idea that being white meant you couldn't be discriminated against is ignorant of history'

Ummmm except African Americans were slaves during this period. The Irish weren't.

It is not comparable, legally or morally.

Technically, racism is a systemic thing - that the system is broadly prejudiced against a group.

White people don't face that, as the system is not broadly predjudiced against them.

White people can definitely face prejudice - but that isn't racism per se, as it's not systemic.

White people of various nationalities can also experience xenophobia (e.g. the Irish, Polish, Romanian examples up thread).

"I get what you mean by the power balance in history maybe that's true. But I don't think it is today. ( it's never happened) but surely if a black teen and a white teen. Both go to the same school. Both live on council estates. Have the same education then surely there is no power balance?"

Yes, there is.

The case of Kriss Donald is a tragic example of a young white male experiencing racism.

" but you'll never find your job application routinely going into the 'reject' heap simply because of the colour of your skin or the way your name sounds.""

Why not because of the way your name sounds? This can affect anyone with a non-conventional name.

@MyNameForToday1980

Technically, racism is a systemic thing - that the system is broadly prejudiced against a group.

White people don't face that, as the system is not broadly predjudiced against them.

White people can definitely face prejudice - but that isn't racism per se, as it's not systemic.

White people of various nationalities can also experience xenophobia (e.g. the Irish, Polish, Romanian examples up thread).

Systemic racism is one type of racism.

@chookie89 The Irish were very often put in to indentured servitude and sent to the new world. Though they may not have been chattel as enslaved Africans were, they often had shorter life expectancies than enslaved Africans. This this is not an argument about which appalling state of historic abuse groups endured, this is about whether being white means one can't be discriminated against. This is clearly not the case for the Irish. I believe that morally the genocide that has led to Ireland having a smaller population now than in the 1850s exists in the same moral sphere as the triangle trade.

@Babdoc

Try being English in Scotland, OP! One of the consultant surgeons from my hospital had an SNP supporter spit in his face, shouting “Bloody English” - for daring to chat (to his own wife!) in an English accent in a shopping street in broad daylight. I have been intimidated by a Scottish van driver while campaigning against the independence referendum. I have been warned to stay silent by Scots friends, and hustled out of a cinema for my own safety during a screening of Braveheart, where the atmosphere was turning distinctly ugly. And when I was a newly qualified junior doctor, I overheard two of the nurses on my ward discussing me: “How’s the new doctor?” “ Well, she’s English.” Said in a tone of disgust. Before adding grudgingly: But she’s all right.” My DD had to report one of her high school teachers for anti English racism, and suffered regular abuse from pupils during the football world cup. So yes, white people can also suffer racism.

none of that is racism

I grew up as a white girl in a majority Asian populated area. Experienced a lot of racism!

@MyNameForToday1980

Technically, racism is a systemic thing - that the system is broadly prejudiced against a group.

White people don't face that, as the system is not broadly predjudiced against them.

White people can definitely face prejudice - but that isn't racism per se, as it's not systemic.

White people of various nationalities can also experience xenophobia (e.g. the Irish, Polish, Romanian examples up thread).

Technically, no it’s not. Racism can operate at all levels from individual up to system level. And white people can be subjected to systematic racism. The history of Jews in Europe and Persia would tell you that.

"White people can definitely face prejudice - but that isn't racism per se, as it's not systemic."

Are you arguing that Irish Travellers in the UK don't face systemic racism?

As the white mother of a mixed race child I experienced racism from white people in the 80s.

Most definitely. My parents and grand parents did for being Irish. E.g. grandma living in England had issues with someone parking their car across her drive and blocking it. She asked the police what she could do about it and was told that one of her family could blow it up That was only in the 90’s and for clarity no, she had no IRA connections

Whilst doing training for a professional role then l was often the only white member of staff on the shift and someone called me white girl. Like it was my name, needless to say l ignored them. During the same phase of my life then l was asked why most white women couldn’t cook, there was much surprise when l bought it my own food that was clearly homemade. I wasn’t doing that to prove a point but often it was so busy, that going out to buy food wasn’t possible

No, because they have boon told they can't by people who are woke.

I agree that racism has different levels. One can't be said to not have experienced racism simply because it wasn't on a systemic level.

Also, that a white person experienced racism doesn't negate the fact that black people face systemic racism to a larger extent or that there isn't more of a power inbalance when a black person experiences racism in the western side of the world than a white person.

Yes. Experienced in Scotland often. It was very bad during the 2014 referendum

Imo I think white people can be discriminated against in certain places or contexts, but they don't experience racism as that has its roots in structural and historical oppression.

I get what you mean by the power balance in history maybe that's true. But I don't think it is today. ( it's never happened) but surely if a black teen and a white teen. Both go to the same school. Both live on council estates. Have the same education then surely there is no power balance?

Because both are not viewed as equals because of the colour of their skin. It is very naive to say that nowadays there isn't a power imbalance, that is still very much the case.

[quote Chookie89]@Student133 '19th century Irish peasants often had a poorer diet than enslaved African Americans, so the idea that being white meant you couldn't be discriminated against is ignorant of history'

Ummmm except African Americans were slaves during this period. The Irish weren't.

It is not comparable, legally or morally.[/quote]
Many Irish people were shipped to America and the Caribbean were in 'indentured servitude' rather than 'under contract'. Some went voluntarily but the majority were forcibly captured and shipped as one of the methods for Cromwell to subdue Ireland. The indenture was supposedly for a fixed term but was often extended for technicalities and they couldn't quit. Leaving your employer was punishable, sometimes by death.

African slaves were more valuable than Irish servants and so Irish women were bred with African slaves to bear higher value children, until this practise was outlawed after pressure from slave traders who feared a reduction in their profits.

So, not slavery but very much not a choice either. They did benefit from being white in the sense that their descendants could disappear into the general population in a way that the descendants of African slaves couldn't.

dementedma, absolutely agree. But according to whyyyyyythough, it isn’t racism! Presumably she thinks the Scots should get a free pass to racially abuse the English.

@Student133

The Irish were not being transported as indentured or unfree labour in the early 19th century. This occurred in the 1600s, but was wound up by 1700 when the trans-Atlantic slave trade was structured entirely around African chattel slavery.

The Irish have every right to feel aggrieved. I am not disputing this at all.

However, questions of structural racism come down ultimately, to social mobility.

To suggest white Irish people are faced with racism in the same way as descendants of African slaves is totally ahistorical. One group is able to enter the privilege of whiteness, particularly in 'New World' contexts; the other, not. Irish migrants and their children in places like the US and Australia were - with lots of hard work - able to enter positions of political and economic influence in the 19th century. This sort of social mobility was impossible for Indigenous groups, and descendants of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

There are documented miscegenation rules across the US and the Caribbean that explicitly prevent people with African 'blood' from entering society on equal terms with whites.

Black people in the States, and Aboriginal Australians in Australia, have been explicitly excluded from colonised spaces, polities, economic systems.

Eg: www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/06/07/when-portland-banned-blacks-oregons-shameful-history-as-an-all-white-state/

There is NO comparability for Irish migrants.

False equivalence.

@dementedma you are describing xenophobia, not racism.

Yes. I'd imagine a lot of Eastern European people have in the last decade or so for example.
But if you mean in the sense of British people experiencing racism from a minority group in Britain I think that has been decoupled from the idea of racism because it's unhelpful.
Use of racial slurs is not really what people are talking about when they experience racism as a societal issue, in the same way that calling some a "bitch" is not a major issue when it comes to sexism.
It's just the most visible and undeniable aspect.