The Unacceptable Whiteness of Being

Yesterday (26 January) was Australia Day, a public holiday Down Under, when many people surf, swim, picnic in the parks and on the beaches, and of course chuck another shrimp on the barbie.  And talking of beaches, here's a snapshot that's just gone viral on social media, attracting numerous adverse comments:

I don't know what beach this sign went up on, nor who made it.  But one thing's certain: it's not a sign under official auspices, for there are no official bodies by the titles given.  It's a fake.  So all the people getting their budgie smugglers in a twist can relax.

Far more worthy of condemnation was the violence and  anti-white racism on display at some of the indigenous and pro-indigenous rallies demanding an end to Australia Day each 26 January in commemoration of the First Fleet's arrival in Botany Bay on 26 January 1788, marking the beginning of European settlement.

Many Australians have sympathy with those who believe that celebrating Australia Day on what indigenous people consider and dub "Invasion Day" is divisive.  Many Australians take the point entirely of people who believe that 1 January (the day in 1901 that Australia became a federated nation) is more appropriate.  One of the numerous supporters of the latter view is respected political figure and aboriginal leader Walter Mundine, a member of the Bunjalong people of northern coastal New South Wales, but he was not slow to condemn some of the participants in yesterday's Invasion Day marches as extremist troublemakers.

Take, for instance, the "Invasion Day" rally in Melbourne yesterday which degenerated into an anti-white hatefest at which the organiser ranted "F**k Australia, hope it burns to the ground" and at which spectators at the official celebrations were jeered at, insulted, and spat upon.

The history of aboriginal-European relations in Australia is fraught with controversy, with historians (Geoffrey Blainey, Keith Windschuttle) who have dared to present a view at odds with the prevailing view of white-inflicted deliberate genocide castigated if not virtually demonised.  It's become fashionable to deride Captain Cook, the gifted British navigator who "discovered" Australia in 1770, as a harbinger of genocide and the post-1788 settlers as colluding in genocide, in a way that smacks of anti-white racism and holds up the British collectively as a race of villains.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-42813211

It's a component of that anti-white racism that, as seen, inter alia, in the Black Lives Matter movement, continues to gather pace.  Indeed, this presentation of whites as almost inherently evil is becoming odiously common.  (With some left-liberal Jews on the bandwagon. They should look at this Australia Day video and think again.)

As popular conservative columnist Andrew Bolt wrote here, universities are subscribing to the perfidy.

In July we learned that in Connecticut

'Serious explorations into race should focus on the problem of whiteness and be grounded in the claim that it’s a hegemonic “power apparatus,” a Fairfield University professor suggested at a recent conference aimed at pushing “radical social change” in higher education.

The remarks from associate professor of philosophy Dr. Kris Sealey, who spoke about her strategies for discussing race in the classroom, were presented at a diversity conference for employees of Jesuit colleges.

“So more and more, the courses that I teach on race have become courses in which I expect my students to engage in the hegemonic power of whiteness,” said Sealey, who’s taught courses such as “Black Lives Matter” and “Critical Race Theory.”...'

 In August California's Stanford University foreshadowed 

'a class this fall called “White Identity Politics,” during which students will “survey the field of whiteness studies” and discuss the “possibilities of … abolishing whiteness,” according to the course description.

Citing pundits who say “the 2016 Presidential election marks the rise of white identity politics in the United States,” the upper-level anthropology seminar will draw “from the field of whiteness studies and from contemporary writings that push whiteness studies in new directions.”

Questions to be posed throughout the semester include: “Does white identity politics exist?” and “How is a concept like white identity to be understood in relation to white nationalism, white supremacy, white privilege, and whiteness?”....'

In October Australia's Deakin University held this exercise in reverse racism, flushed out by Bolt:

'Don’t Talk to white People: On The Epistemological and Rhetorical Limitations of Conversations with white People for Anti-Racist Purposes:

Productive dialogue with white people for anti-racist purposes is precluded by the political limits prescribed by the “principle of interest convergence,” (Bell 1980) occluded by the epistemological condition of “white ignorance,”... Nevertheless, much popular effort is spent—dare I say wasted—in attempts to talk white people out of their racism... Consequently, I propose that we stop talking to white people—or as I will describe them throughout this paper, following James Baldwin, ‘those-who-think-of-themselves-as-white.’ (Baldwin 1998). This paper examines why we should refrain from engaging in such conversations, noting the difficulties and problems associated with the discursive orientation toward whiteness.

[and]

Playing Michelle Pfeiffer in Dangerous Minds: Racist Anti-Racism in Academia:

This paper examines anti-racism in academia by way of a close reading of popular tropes around the epistemic liberation of people of colour in academic contexts. To this end, I examine several films, beginning with Dangerous Minds, and deconstruct their narratives, which I argue are all reducible to a variation of ‘the white saviour’ narrative...

With action deemed to be white, anti-racism is taken to be dependent on generous or virtuous white action. Even in academia, I argue, the dominant understanding of anti-racism is predicated on a racist white messianism - a more just future is taken to be predicated on white administration, white theorisation, white publications, white generosity, white patronage. I offer in its stead a model of epistemic justice that rejects white salvation.'..."

Last month the University of Michigan held

'A two-day professional development conference [which] aimed to help white employees deal with their “whiteness” so they could become better equipped to fight for social justice causes, according to organizers.

The whiteness session utilized the “Privileged Identity Exploration Model” to help white participants explore the “discomfort” of their “white identity,” according to organizers....

[University of Iowa professor Sherry]Watt states there are eight defenses people use to avoid recognizing their privilege. Examples of defenses include “denial,” where someone simply refuses to admit their privilege, and “minimization,” where someone trivializes the impact of their privilege.'

 And there are a lot more where those came from, including this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1XDWn0Q7tqg

Here's recent social media post by an (anti-Israel) Australian academic:

 

Nobody on the left calls it out for the prejudice that it is. People who dare to point out that misogyny and wife-bashing were and often are characteristic of what used to be termed "Third World" cultures  risk obloquy.

 And, of course, anti-white racism directly informs sections of the anti-Israel movement:

For a variation on which theme see Dr Mike Lumish's article here