Quotes from Desiree Adaway:
“White supremacy refers to a racial hierarchy in which whiteness sits at the very tippy top. This country was founded and built upon this system—legally, culturally, economically, and politically—of white male upper class supremacy. We want to believe that it only reflects extreme images of terrorist organizations like KKK members or the modern day Nazi movement.
- This hierarchy manifests itself legally when the government finally admits that the war on drugs was created to bring down leaders and destroy communities of color- so they created sentencing guidelines to support this narrative.
- This hierarchy manifests itself culturally through internal bias, assumptions and norms that teaches Black cultural is “bad” and white cultural is “good’. A black boy in a hoodie is a thug but a white boy in a hoodie is the next Mark Zuckerberg.
- This hierarchy manifests itself economically by maintaining class inequalities by determining which neighborhoods are “good” or “bad” and determining which of these communities have access to housing loans and capital.
- This hierarchy manifests politically when every President but one in our history has been white, male and upper-class.
The word “racism” waters down this structural reality. Let’s call a thang, a thang. So call it what it is- white supremacy”
….
“Fear of onflict helps keep the status quo. The need to equate raising a difficult issue like white supremacy with being impolite or rude or out of line helps keep white supremacy securely in place. When people on the margins don’t speak in a language or tone that the dominant group finds acceptable they use that as an excuse to not address the issue at all. You have been fed the lie that you have the right to emotional and psychological comfort over my freedom from an oppressive system.”
