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Underground > Head Shop >

Where is the colour in our lives?

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17:44 / 02.04.02

I'm interested in this idea that people can represent themselves as 'who they really are' with race etc excised as an issue. I don't think that if I didn't bring in my sexuality as and when appropriate to the debate on the board that I would be acting as who I really am or being perceived as 'who I am' - in fact I'd be concerned that I was 'passing' for straight. Which I think would worry me...

But that's not really the main issue I'd like to think about more - instead I'm interested in the idea that when you strip away the things that people most immediately latch onto when they are trying to categorise you (sexuality / race / gender / age etc) do you really free yourself from their preconceived notions, or are you pretending to be something you're not - something more easily socially assimilated?

18:11 / 02.04.02

do you really free yourself from their preconceived notions

See, I'm thinking that being a poster on Barbelith makes you subject to other preconceived notions. I may be of limited imagination, but I can't conceive of someone as raceless; I revert to a default race & for whatever it says about me, my default is set to white. So basically unless people tip themselves off through text, I just assume white--a vague nonspecific white, but white nonetheless. What I actually find interesting --and sometimes annoying-- is when people apparently tip "ethnic" in their text & it turns out they're white after all --for all of the above, cf. the thread by [monkeys] on whiteness.

However, I must say, it is an awful lot like freeing yourself. I did not feel that I myself was "passing" until I became conscious that this default could exist. So for a time I was in a period of blissful ignorance. Once I became conscious, it wasn't so much that I felt I had to declare myself as much as I became hyper-aware --or maybe just aware-- at how much race could be encoded in just text. After which it was only a short time until I felt that I couldn't not respond --to put it as tortuously as possible-- to that coding.

18:30 / 02.04.02

Assimilation is a very loaded term, and often used against people who deviate from societal stereotypes. It is not constructive criticism in any way.

If a nonwhite person behaves in a manner that is not consistent with how nonwhite people are typically percieved by society, s/he is accused of assimilation or "acting white." When a woman behaves in a manner inconsistent with how women are viewed in her society, she is accused of assimilation or "acting mannish." A similar situation concerning a homosexual would be considered, as Tom mentions above, "passing for straight."

What is particularly fustrating about being accused of "assimilation" is: WHO decides how nonwhites are supposed to act? WHO decides how "gay" is gay enough? WHO defines "male" and "female"? It's not all the people toeing the various party lines.

19:03 / 02.04.02

Personally, I'm more interested in nationality than race, and I think that's the kind of difference you see here on Barbelith, divorced from bodies. (And yeah, I picture the Brazilian-syntax posters as having darker skin than I do, but I notice things like strange verb tenses and modifiers first. And I like that.)
There's certainly a few different colors of language on here. Skin? Yeah, from the people I've met in person, but it doesn't show unless explicitly mentioned within posts or user IDs.
Should it show otherwise? I don't think so.

I don't think that if I didn't bring in my sexuality as and when appropriate to the debate on the board that I would be acting as who I really am or being perceived as 'who I am' - in fact I'd be concerned that I was 'passing' for straight. Which I think would worry me...

What if the posts didn't have names next to them?
What if this space *really was* just about ideas rather than identities?
Some ideas might be "gayer" or "straigher" than others....

when you strip away the things that people most immediately latch onto when they are trying to categorise you (sexuality / race / gender / age etc) do you really free yourself from their preconceived notions, or are you pretending to be something you're not - something more easily socially assimilated?

Well, I think this is the problem with language and context, then, isn't it? I mean, is it socially dishonest to be semantically clear?

I suppose once you're reduced to an online avatar, you're free to be whoever you are internally - but that physical/body concerns (like race, nationality, age, sexuality) will subtly shape that. I like to think that there are more fun games to play then guess-the-ethnic-background. Or maybe not - maybe I like to think that it's a fun game, nothing more. Hmm.

I'll also throw this out: access to Barbelith (or anywhere online) is much more a function of economic status & geographical location (colleges, cities & companies where computer access comes with the turf), which will in turn "select" for race, indirectly.

19:04 / 02.04.02

I see it less as pretending to be something else and more as checking default settings. I agree that it feels sort of freeing in that I have a chance to sit back and examine why I think black or white, male or female, et cetera. One of the things I learned posting here that surprised me was how often I assumed a poster was male. Of more interest was the fact that I was completely comfortable divorcing sexual orientation assumptions to favor gender. If a poster talks about a boyfriend, I will still generally assume gay male before straight female. (I'm still working out the troubling implications of this as far as my gender stereotypes goes.)

In my minds eye, pretending can only take place if it's clear what assumptions are being made and you don't seek to correct it. I'd like to think that the board is diverse enough that everyone's default 'lither is a unique construct and I just can't see how clear that basic assumption can be, textually speaking. Especially that it could be so clear that I need to declare my race, gender, or orientation. That's something I try to limit to times I feel it pertains to the point or topic at hand. Which is close to never for me simply because I try to avoid making arguments based primarily on what I perceive to be my limited personal experience.

Of course, my default 'lither is shaped by those who do declare themselves so perhaps I should think about this a bit more...

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