As a country founded on the violence of racial slavery and genocide, the United States has yet to overcome its historical dependence on the ideology of white supremacy. In his new memoir, Inheritance: An Autobiography of Whiteness, author Baynard Woods reflects on the influence of racism and the meaning of ‘whiteness’ through the lens of his own life. Born and raised in post-Jim Crow South Carolina, Woods assumed he had left the prejudices of his home behind when he left the South—until he was accused of discriminating against a Black student at the university he taught at. The experience propelled Woods on a journey to investigate his own roots, leading to the revelation that his own family had claimed ownership of more than 700 human beings in the 19th century. On this episode of The Marc Steiner Show, Woods discusses his new memoir and the ways white supremacy survives intergenerationally, often hiding in plain sight from those who benefit from it most.
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Ideology is buried within us. Much of the present day ideology effect how we see and judge the stories we have been told of the past. Most of us never become aware of our own present day prejudices nor reach its foundations even if we are digging deep. I am not sure why the actions of people many generations ago is necessarily important to us today just because they were biologically related to us. I think we can see here and now that violence and oppression is still happening to most people on this planet regardless of our skin color. Most of it is accepted as normal and not even recognized as violence. It is done by white skinned people to other white skinned people, Indians to other Indians, Arabs to other Arabs, Chinese to Chinese and Africans to other africans as well as between all of us not in history but now. History tells us that the Chinese, Turkic, Mongol, Persian, Greek, Mali, Inca, Aztec, Egyptian, and Americans etc etc all had caste systems of violence, oppression, slavery, and openly practiced or practice now what is suddenly considered "war crimes". In some cases skin color is the excuse, in others, religion, tribe, or access to wealth. If we have to blow up our workers in order to build a railroad, we will do it to irishmen, chinese, or african, doesnt matter.
Most of us know nothing of the lives of those of our ancestors which go back beyond 2 generations and what pressures and oppression they had to face. Its a bit to simple to me to babble on about whiteness. I already find it difficult to communicate with or understand the ideologies adopted by people just 15 to 20 years younger than me, nonetheless with those who lived 200 years ago in Northern Europe, Southern U.S. or Sri Lanka. Am I repeating the patterns of people I have never met and know nothing about who experienced another time and place?`What color would I be considered 200 years ago and would it matter? Whatever this man's personal history would be, he is giving it his own meaning. 500 years ago in Europe almost everyone lived under feudalism, with no property, no freedom of movement, no civil rights, owned by their lords and repeatedly invaded from all sides…..but ok whiteness.
Slavery has changed, it's know employees. But other contributing factors has made it more comfortable. Like choosing who enslaves you.
Well my family didn't participate. And I don't either. And I don't feel the need to apologize for my whiteness . Or how my. white privilege allowed me to break my ass on a construction site. I'm not complaining the money is. fair but we don't have slavery anymore So get over it
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Great Interview…Thank You for your life/legacy exploration!
As a descendent of nazi war criminals I think I can relate to his story . It's not just the heinous acts that for instance my granduncle did in the east (Barbarossa. So everything they did was war crimes ) it's the silencing of his acts and the accompanying mythology that my mother's generation created about him (my granny god bless her soul was pretty open about his political affiliation so I know about it but my family nether talked about him ) . And that's the situation for basically every person in germany . And the worst part is that the nazis are still in power in germany ( not in Parlament (well the conservatives are pretty much the nazi party but not with the swastika ect obviously ) but socioeconomical power is in the hands of the nazi aristocrats still to this day ) and for the last twenty years we have seen a lot of effort to sanitize WW2 and tell this idiot myth about how Hitler seduced us . By the way modern germany created the Apartheid school system in south Africa and we still got this system . And are the most racist culture in Europe . I know that Germany even teaching about WW2 is already seen as a "progressive " act in comparison with the other white cultures in Europe but usually once I explain the school system to anyone not from Germany they are all baffled that we have this fucked up system .
Referring to the german post war experience. Every single generation has to come to terms with it, on its own terms. A young german guy, on a work/study program in the German firm that I work for, from '89 to '14, had a real hard time with being actively reminded of the concentration/extermination camps and german culpability. It rubbed him completely the wrong way. When I told him that it was NOT about distributed blaming, but about recognizing when it starts getting easy to slide back into, so as to avoid that pitfall. He came back to me on the following day, thanking me for the change of perspective.
Just treat everybody with decency and respect unless they wrong you. You start by controlling what you can control and don't lose sleep over that which you cannot control
This is some of the lowest resolution garbage political logic I've ever seen. These idiots conflate a lot of overarching concepts that anyone with a room temp or higher IQ can discern have no intrinsic correlation.
What we're actually talking about is basal behavioral norms and how different societal paradigms parameterize their adherents to function in a large, interrelated human model (i.e.- a society). Behavioral norms that produce better aggregate outcomes are you be lauded while those that do not are admonished. Normal stuff. That doesn't equate to oppression or "hUwYtE sUprEmAcY". Morons.
total Crap.
Yeah there's so much Racism in America you have to make it up when 97% of Racist attacks are proved to be fraught
Whiteness exists because it was how modern systemic racism was rolled out. It should be unravelled as whites in general, have hidden behind their 'whiteness' without doing any souk searching or rigorous examination of what exactly it stands for. A system that posits at its core, a spectacularly false notion of white superiority and an aggressive set of behaviour both institutionally and social to upkeep this myth.
For too long, in racist discourse, negative focus has been put on 'blackness' and all the imagined and invented negativity that goes with 'being black'. 'Black' exists only because 'whiteness' does. It's a polar opposite of 'whiteness' and is imbued with layers and layers of negative and false assumptions and outright lies. A big, fat, lie about some imagined white superiority that is false.
Turning our attention to the invention of whiteness means a different discussion can take place. The inadequacies and evil underpinning of what 'whiteness' is… It's that simple. Whiteness needs to be discussed in white America. African Americans or the 1st Nation peopleor people of odour in general, know and live the challenges of what ' 'whiteness' symbolises. They lived it and still live it. It is white people that need to learn and understand their history of inhumanity. Not us. We lived it…and still do.
I'd love to watch B W and Patina Miller discuss "whiteness" , this book on your program M S.
I wish Woods luck at triggering wokeness in Tucker Carlson's kids.
Truth will always win!!
As a black elderly woman! I could scream FINALLY from the top of my voice THIS man gets living the Jim Crow life especially back then!!. But only TO A CERTAIN DEGREE what it’s like in the skin we’re in!! Love his book!
YaY! Finally. The beginning signs of evolution in the American psyche.
I have to read this book.
Turns out it wasn’t really the KKK, it was me the whole time
If you replace whiteness with literally any word it still works
Sir, you are one of the most important person in America today . Your book is a necessity.