Racism in Business, Theatre, Beauty, Education, and Anti-Asian Racism
đ”BIZ
Chief of Cherokee Nation Asks Jeep to Stop Using Tribeâs Name
âThe Cherokee Nation, for the first time, has asked Jeep to change the name of its Grand Cherokee vehicle, a move that the carmaker, preparing to release the next generation of the line, has so far resisted.â
Jeep wonât even do the basic. A news site in the New England area has a video that rounds up the ways brands responded to anti-racism.
đTHEATRE
We See You, White American Theatre Accountability Report
Last summer, Black, Indigenous, and People of Color theatremakers developed and circulated demands to white theatre to create âantiracist theatre systems.â Last week, the collective published an Accountability Report with responses from 100 theatres around the country.
Itâs important to recognize the role white media, theatre, and cultural productions have in white racism. For many years, âcreativesâ have been getting away way with whiteness and white racism because they claim antiracism would ruin creativity.
People can say or think what they want about the effort, but I love the language of âdemands.â And the demands by the We See You collective are an uncompromising model:
âWe demand that BIPOC comprise a majority of leadership positions and the majority of middle management, including production department heads and company managers, across your organizationâŠ. You canât be antiracist if your leadership is predominately white.â
That last one is a gem đ. Iâm so tired of people thinking antiracism looks like population numbers; the same population numbers whites rigged. You canât have a history of making people into âminoritiesâ and then claim minority representation per their population numbers is antiracist. Thatâs why Iâve said itâs not good enough for Bidenâs administration to âlook like Americaâ if his administration is majority white.
đȘBEAUTY
Shamed for body hair growing up, Desi women now challenging racist standards
Beauty is an original and ongoing aspect of white racism. In the article above, South Asian women share about their experiences with evolving white beauty standards and its toll.
âAs conversations about beauty, self-love and internalized racism come to the forefront, brown women are confronting what that did to them. White society set the standard that their body hair and face hair wasn't beautiful, Desi women say.â
đEDUCATION
You probably heard that the anti-anti-racists are upset about Dr. Seuss and the decision by the publisher stop publishing six books. This outrage comes from the refusal of whites to accept that their entire existence and history as whites is racist. Dr. Seuss is just part of an old war by whites who wonât call their heritage hateful.
The anti-anti-racists are also mad on Twitter and everywhere else about critical race theory being taught in schools. Many anti-anti-racists donât attempt to refute the material, they just throw out pieces of the curriculum as if itâs obviously inaccurate or ahistorical. An article in Real Clear Politics says Megyn Kelly pulled her kids out of school because it went too hard on race. Bye! Hereâs what I say, if what you read about whiteness seems racist, itâs because whiteness is racist. But all this crying from anti-anti-racist means something positive is happening in some schools, however small it may be.
Also in education, Mashable has a great list of anti-racist courses. The course on parenting looks good, and so does the Anti-Racism Daily newsletter.
The New York Times has a curated list of resources to teach about race and racism. I took a look at the resource on reparations, which includes a student opinion piece. The comments section at the end of the piece is supposed to be for students 13 and up. Itâs worth a read to see what students think.
Tulane University has an opinion piece that got my attention, âWhiteness of Greek life contradicts Tulane studentsâ purported values.â In political polls, we see a difference between whites with a college degree and whites without a college degree. But what role does Greek life have in the production of whiteness?
âANTI-ASIAN RACISM AND HATE CRIMES
UCLAâs Asian American Studies Center shares $1.4 million in state funding to address COVID-19
âThe UCLA Asian American Studies Center and the Stop AAPI Hate coalition have received $1.4 million in funding from California to support community programs and ongoing research that address the impact of COVID-19 on Asian American and Pacific Islander communities, including new research and analysis into hate incidents.â
Brittany Packnett Cunningham shared an instagram post by DearAsianYouth in solidarity against anti-Asian racism and hate crimes.