In the same way that a lot of people who want to increase equity and freedom are finding their voice, a lot of white men who feel differently are finding theirs too.
Erica has a great thread breaking down the particulars of this issue. The short version is Armstrong uses a lot of words to say "don't talk about politics, get back to work".
I've seen people say Armstrong stands for nothing. I'd say this is a strong statement of what he does stand for. It's just not what you wanna hear. A lot of white men have been conditioned that amassing fortunes is both a personality and a morality. Nothing else really matters.
We need to start believing them. I know it's difficult. It's easier to be incredulous. To pretend you must be misunderstanding something. You're not. When they tell you that this is what they care about more than anything else, believe them. Everything else flows from that.
A lot of "good white people" need to start grappling with the reality they choose to do business with sociopaths and white supremacists. It's going to become increasingly difficult to pretend that's not true or pretend you didn't know. They are telling you. Believe them.
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I'm getting serious about finding a new home online. Nothing else has been particularly appealing to me so far.
I can post my own bullshit anywhere. And I'm not all that concerned with who shows up to follow it. I do want more community though. I wanna be where people are. People express themselves on Twitter in a specific way that I've found gives me energy and inspiration.
I have a lot of feelings about being labeled gifted as a child. My story feels a little different though. I never wanted gold stars, and I still don’t care about “accomplishments” the way other people do. This came up recently in a way that I’m still processing.
I often tell people that I identify with Gen-X more than millennial. (Even though people insist on putting me the latter category based on my birth date). For me it’s the messages I internalized growing up. Gen-Xers were “slackers”. Not living up to their potential. That’s me.
Then @operaqueenie hit me with a bomb not too long ago. I used to try to identify as a “loner”. A person who was reluctant to lead but also resistant to being a follower. But loner didn’t feel right either. Instead my wife says that I insist on personal agency above all else.
I keep hearing people say this. And I believe it. But maybe I just don't use Google the way other people do. It seems fine to me. What kind of searches are bad?
I also wonder if some people are having very different experiences depending on their personal algorithm. Google has been learning about how I search, and what I'm looking for, for a long time now. Maybe it's just dialed in for me?
It never felt like magic to me. Nor do I want it to be. I still look at the results and use my judgment to decide if they're any good. That's not meant to sound judgmental. But expecting tech to feel like magic can only lead to disappointment.
I'm glad to see you're engaging with the material. Even if it hasn't quite hit home yet. We don't have a lot of practice with actually examining Whiteness. It can feel uncomfortable at first. I'm happy to answer any questions you have as long as they're honest and not asinine.
The infographic in the OP requires context. We shouldn't get stuck in simplistic ways of looking at this. The idea isn't "only white people have these traits". The idea is "Whiteness uses these traits to create a culture around their own superiority".
I used to work in the same office with this white woman who is thinking "I wish we could go back to vigilante groups that could just go around hanging people."
If you can't be bothered to read the screenshots, this is the highlight: She's scared. As a white woman, she's scared all the time. And instead of examining where that comes from, she wants there to be institutions dedicated to roaming around doing violence on her behalf.
We didn't work closely together. I can't say anything about what kind of person she was. I try to stay out of white women's way at work. Just as a rule for survival. I have so many stories of how I've broken that rule and regretted it.
Small personal life update. Since being laid off, I've been dusting off technical skills and spending more time typing. It has been a journey of finding out how long I can be at the computer each day.
I was having a hard time as a remote-only manager. The sheer amount of hours staring at zoom screen was too much for me. But I used to be able to of uninterrupted time coding. I enjoyed it a lot too.
I've realized a few things during this journey though. I wouldn't actually spend all my time with hands on keyboard. Coding for me included all of activities around thinking, planning, and researching as well as actually producing the code.