Racism and classism
are related, don’t get me wrong, but they aren’t the same. The similarities are
striking, but black men are treated with a kind of mass violence and
incarceration that no one else is in the US. Now if we’re talking on a global
scale, we shouldn’t compare oppression, but instead acknowledge the
differences, but Palestinians, ethnic minorities in China, etc. have some parallels.
Often, we talk about class instead of race. It is easier in a lot of ways. Race
brings up conflicts of conscious and feelings of discomfort that class doesn’t.
And of course with the exception of a few (Sterling, Snyder, Koch brothers,
Trump, etc.) most people don’t wear their racism so overtly. People of color
are disproportionately impoverished. We have economic policy that has been used
as weapon against black Americans. All black people aren’t poor, nor are all
poor people black, but there are reasons a disproportionate number of black
Americans are poor, and to say “Classism is the new racism” dismisses a history
of racial, structural, and systemic oppression.
That said, I do
think the oppressed are in this together, that would be solidarity.
Additionally, when those in power are done with one group, when they have
oppressed, repressed, and incarcerated one group to the point where they can’t
target this group anymore they will move onto the next. Those in power target
the most vulnerable (rooted in systemic structures and institutions), but when
they have decimated those they have to move on to the next group. That is out the
exploitation of people works (see capitalism for further examples).
I always wonder
about how solidarity forms between people. I think those with less privilege
have an easier time seeing how oppression can be similar, and those with more
privilege, intentionally or not, struggle to keep their privilege and advance. I
want to grab everyone and shake them, yelling, THIS IS ONLY A ZERO SUM GAME IF
YOU LET THEM (the power holders) DETERMINES THE RULES.
As for The-Dream’s
video (below), I’ve been listening to it a lot since it hit the internet. A
couple of things to think about when listening to it: “I’m feeling real black
right now” is a powerful statement when solidarity building—meaning using a
historically oppressed group of little privilege to signify what it feels like
to be oppressed is incredible. He is shifting the identification of oppression
to a specific and well known imagery. There is something very powerful in
saying, “oh yeah, you’re being oppressed, well we have t-shirts so come on over
so we can get shit done.” The narrative is being changed by those with traditionally limited power. Now, I don’t know if
that was the intention or not, but damn.
Secondly, there is
a line that says “Since then ain’t been a lot going on” with an image of
President Obama showing mourning for those killed in a shooting. The image is
striking, and yes, it could just be the shootings that The-Dream is referencing,
but if we’re talking about solidarity in oppression, then an image of President
Obama has a lot of meaning while we use drones to kill children and deport more
people than ever before. So maybe, a lot has been going on, but nothing good? Or maybe nothing to change structural oppression has been going on? There is a large sentiment that President Obama represented substantive change, but his supporters have had little evidence of that actually happening.
There is another
line in the song where The-Dream says in reference to his mother, “Never be
impressed with a man with no message,” where images of powerful men are shown.
It is just powerful; of course, an image of Donald Sterling is included, which
might be a bit much. The man is a racist, but he doesn’t have power over a
country. There is also discussion of Chicago as a place of violence and not being
specific to the US, which leads into lines about escaping poverty, which is
chance and luck. I’m bias here, but there is something that resonates so much
with me around how to exit poverty, or rather, how difficult it is to exit
poverty.
The video closes
with text that makes it clear what The-Dream is trying to, which is similar as ThinkProgress
pointed out to something Kanye
West said, “Black isn’t just a color. Black isn’t just a race anymore. It’s
a feeling and a place from which one feels isolated by the world of the
governing elite. Classism is the new racism. That is what black feels like.”
