The Soul of How We Got Here.

The Teal Deer has been silent over the past... nearly forever, for a number of reasons. But silence, as I have said numerous times, is the enemy. Silence and fear = Problemz. So...

So Ferguson. So Baltimore. So Sal's Pizzeria.

And on the other hand-- so Charleston. So the Confederate Battle Flag. So this fucking election.

So to understand these things, and more specifically, the reactions of most of the black people in this country to what is happening with them, it might help to understand Reconstruction, and what happened after the slaves were emancipated, and the civil war was won by the North. Also, there's a thing we haven't really talked about, because it has a bit of middle child syndrome-- poor white people.

There's some homework to do here: I suggest Black Reconstruction in America and the Souls of Black Folk by Du Bois in particular, but you're not going to go read those right now, so let's get into it.

White and Poor is a distinct racial identity, and it's time to admit it. White and Poor is an identity that is functionally powerless, but which possess the possibility-- the hope-- of becoming powerful one day, if they work hard enough and do all the right things. White and Poor couldn't vote before the civil war, because the planters had property requirements at the polling place. White and Poor in the south were stuck in an untenable position:  the employer class had slaves, so they were only hiring whites to do things like help keep the slaves docile-- overseers, police, bounty hunters. If you could get a bit of land, you could do some sustenance farming, but competition was a laugh. You might be able to get lucky and move into the planter class, but that was a long shot, like the jackpot on the slot machine.

Let's be clear-- I'm not saying that the situation of the poor white is the same as, or comparable to, chattel slavery. But this doesn't mean that we should never talk about the situation of the poor white. And right now, we have to, because it is the reality that informs Dylan Roof, and informs white folks in the South who think that the confederate battle flag is their heritage, and informs white folks who don't get why we can't just move on.

The problem is that white culture, particularly southern, white, poor culture, has been for too long linked and bound with racism, with ignorance, with a certain down home wholesomeness that looks nice on the surface but really equates ignorance with honesty by demonizing intellectualism. "Black Culture"(tm, because seriously, there isn't just one) has something similar, in point of fact; the difference is that you can't really buy your way out of it as a black person, because to be black, regardless of personal wealth, is to be associated with the poor and criminal.

The problem of the poor white has a lot on common with the problem of the mulatto: but it is not the ability to pass for "a white person," it is the ability to pass for rich, or at least, the ability to past for someone who could, legitimately, have wealth.

Now, I can already hear people saying, "but Rabbit, you're making it about class, not race, and that's simplistic." My argument is that the two cannot be separated in America (I can't speak for other nations), and that race fundamentally defines an economic class. The construction of the white race in America was an economic function, but it was also a lie: for the White Property Owner was not about to share anything but a thin label with the white person who didn't own property. Not even the vote, for a very long time.

Anyway, here is a white person, who does a really excellent job of illustrating this here.

What do I think this all means? I think it means that we need to stop shutting down white people, especially poor white people, when they want to talk about race and class, and about themselves in relation to it. I think we need to point out that white people need to talk amongst themselves about it, and also to people of color constructively. But we really, really have to stop treating marginalized white people as if they are invisible, and as if they don't exist. The great trick of reconstruction was playing on the fear of the poor white that black people would be raised above them, and they would be at the very bottom of the pile, and we can see this in the results of this election. One of the first and immediate consequences is that like it or not, white people are now a group for which the actions of one reflect on the whole. The rest of us can relate, and understand exactly how shitty and insulting it is. But it is the new reality, and it's a bad one.

Now, what I am NOT saying here is that black people need to be patient and complacent when we are being actively and physically assaulted and attacked by white people, poor or not, doing the dirty work of this kind of enforcement of white supremacy. Fuck no. What I am saying is that a culture in which, to a white person, being called a racist is the worst, most unthinkable insult, while actually being racist in effect and result is not even noticed is the opposite of useful. And further, we're seeing, in effect, that if white people with no positive identity to adhere to are continually denied one, they'll stop seeing the bad things associated with the negative identity as bad. So I'd expect the white supremacy to get worse, going forward- and people of color, people who aren't white in general- we are not going to be the ones who are going to be able to stop it.

Starting on Hard Mode.

So, this has been the week of A Senate guy running in Missouri saying things about rape that are wrong, and The American Family Association backing him up on the wrong, and him making an apology that didn't make it better.

So I says to myself, I says, "Kainenchen, this is it. Can you talk about this without losing your shit, and going off the deep end of explosion and the like?"

So, here I am, and we're going to talk about it, and yes.

There's a lot here to talk about, you see. The misconceptions and what exactly is wrong with what Akin said, why he said it, the greater issues of rape, and the greater issues of abortion. Let's start with rape, in the interest of Silence is Not So Good, and rape being one of those things where silence is still again (though less than it was), the status quo.

I knew that when Todd Akin said, "legitimate rape", he was referring to violent, forcible rape. I do not know the specific image in his head, but I can guess, and I know what image this evokes in the part of my brain what is tapped into the conventional wisdom. Rape by a stranger. by a degenerate in a back-alley or a skeever in a bar after a girl's had a few too many. The kind that dominates the popular idea of rape, but is actually fairly rare.

And you know what? I know at least two people, personally, who got pregnant from exactly that kind of rape.

As for the rest of the kinds of rape out there... Here, have some statistics from RAINN.

I know a lot of people who have been sexually assaulted or raped. As do you. The number for women is 1 in 6. Fortunately, the numbers of people being raped have dropped dramatically since 1993. Awareness is a Thing. Talking about it is important. So that you who have been raped/assaulted know you're not alone, and those of you who think you don't know anyone who has know that well... you haven't been told about it.

And the same thing, frankly, about abortion.

On abortion, I'll step away from statistics a moment, because I don't actually want to talk about the facts about who, in abstract, has them, who doesn't, and why. I want to talk about me, and about belief. Specifically, things one believes about oneself. Like "I would never, ever, for any reason have an abortion."

Which is something I believed about myself, up until the moment I didn't any more.

To spoil the ending, I didn't get pregnant the time in question, so I didn't have to make the choice. But you see, the sex that made me worry about this was not sex I had wanted to have. The only thing that stopped the sex in question from being rape was a final, last minute "Okay" that came out of my mouth because I didn't want my friend, who was doing this to me, who was not hearing that I didn't want to do this, to be a rapist, and I didn't have the wherewithal to fight him or get angry. So I put up with it, and when it was over, he left, not realising why I was upset.

(Something to remember, folks: Trust is very, very delicate. If someone betrays what they want to give into you, you may have won your way this once, but there's a very good chance you've lost something much more important. I will never trust this particular person again, even if we still, on the surface, remain friends.)

The circumstances surrounding what happened, however, were insignificant next to the circumstances of his life and mine at the time. So when I missed the first period after this, I about panicked. If I were pregnant, this would be devastating to way, way too many people, and I would not be in any condition to raise it, besides. And at that point, I knew that if I _were_ pregnant, in this circumstance, I would have the abortion. I couldn't ever give up a child for adoption... carrying a child to term would be a commitment to raise it, for me. But I couldn't have it, not like this. And the realization made me incredibly sick. But.

The lesson here, as I learned it during the couple of weeks before my period finally came, is that you don't know what deeply held beliefs and values you will sacrifice when and until you are faced with the decision. Yes, there's always the, "I hope you never will be!" and that's important, and I am not saying that you can't speak to things you haven't experienced. But please be careful, when passing judgement on something like abortion, or what you'd do if someone tried to rape you, or whether you'd leave an abusive relationship/family situation, that you don't make speculations that diminish the experiences of those who actually have gone through these things, and did not make the choice that you- let's face it- hope you would make. And frankly, the people I know who did make the choice to keep a child, who fought off the rapist and stopped them, who called the police, who left their abuser- those aren't the people I've seen judging their opposite numbers.

And this is the thing that I would like Todd Akin to understand, when he talks about punishing the rapists instead of the unintended children of rape. It isn't that easy (I am not here getting into the difficulties of rape prosecution, though they're manifold), nor that cut and dried. Even when it is rape, there's no talking here about the punishment of the women who have abortions: that they inflict on themselves, for making the decision, that they get from abortion advocates who are terrified that a woman who regrets it (or doesn't regret it, but is still broken up and upset) will look bad politically, from anti-abortion activists who now believe that the woman in question is an evil murderer, whatever her circumstances. And that's a silence that isn't cool. People need support, and to know that there are resources there for them, and my personal feeling on it is that a woman who has chosen to have an abortion has done the right thing, because actually going through with it, as I know from many women who have, is not easy. If you do it, it is because having it- or in some cases, anyone knowing that you were pregnant at the time- needed to not happen. Right then. In that instance. With no judgement on what happens in the future.

There are a lot of stories like mine, a number of which end in making the hard choice one way or another, and a number of which I know, but they're not mine to tell here. And there's a lot of documentation of women, even, who are violently opposed to abortion, even as they're on the table, even after the fact. Doublethink is a real thing, as is, "my situation is different" syndrome.

As we have these conversations, especially lawmakers who seem to have, for various reasons, to make legal decisions about medical and personal things, I sincerely hope we can keep these things in mind.