Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags

[sihhi]

sihhi, i'm banning you from the internet for a period not exceeing 48 hours.

As ever you're correct, busy next few days - any response to overcoming racism in the soviet union?

 

[DaveCinzano]

As ever you're correct, busy next few days - any response to overcoming racism in the soviet union?

In intersectional twittersphere, racism overcomes you.

 

[Tom A]

In intersectional twittersphere, racism overcomes you.

In Soviet Russia, intersectionality oppresses you.

 

[seventh bullet]

 

[Firky]

seventh bullet posted a blog of what it was like to be a black guy in Russia, it was years ago but very interesting and scary.

 

[seventh bullet]

Moscow Through Brown Eyes? American bloke from Brooklyn, New York, going by the name Buster. He was staying in Russia for a year while doing research for his PhD.

The blog post.

ADVICE: Should People of Color Go to Russia?

A reader writes in:

​

I'm leaving this comment because since you have lived in Russia and know much more about what's going on there than I do, I was wondering if you could answer a question for me. I was wondering, do you think it would even be smart at this point for a Black student to go to Russia to study? I was planning on going there after the summer for a year-long study abroad program but after hearing about all the racism I'm thinking that it might not be the right thing to do. Did you have a lot of close calls when you were over there?​

This is a painful question for me.

​

On the one hand, I have had amazing experiences in Russia and I have been indelibly marked by the time I have spent with Russian history, literature and contemporary society. I can't imagine my sense of the world outside of my interactions with Russia.​

​

On the other hand, I simply don't know if I can, in good conscience, advise people of Asian or African descent to travel to Russia in light of the continuing problem of racist violence.​

​

In the past ten days, there have been attacks on Bangladeshi and Chinese students in Moscow, in addition to the earlier assaults this year on citizens of Cameroon and Vietnam. Last December, a nineteen-year-old African American was stabbed multiple times in Volgograd on his way home from the gym. While these are certainly the most extreme types of violence, interviews with African students also reveal pervasive everyday racism in Russian society. If you travel to Russia, you are, quite frankly, playing a numbers game with your life and your well-being.​

​

That said, you can do some things to improve your odds.​

​

Personally, I was never attacked and I never experienced anything worse than dirty looks, stupid comments and mumbled threats. A number of factors probably account for my "luck" and I'll share them with you, both as useful precautions and as information that might give you some insight into life in Russia for those of us of "non-Slavic appearance," in case you are still considering your travel options even after the warning above.​

​

First and foremost, I had the gift of genetics and a bad disposition--I am over six feet tall and, generally speaking, not of a soothing appearance; when I would hang out with African friends in Russia, they would joke that I was their bodyguard. To give you a more clear picture, a few years ago my high school students nick-named me "Mr. Buster, AKA Suge Knight." If your friends haven't given you a similar handle, then you should up your worry level a little.​

​

Second, as soon as I got to Moscow, I asked other Asian and African residents about safety and took their recommendations very seriously. I rarely wandered around alone after dark. If there was a major soccer game, I avoided the subways and took a taxi instead to avoid the possibility of running into a crowd of drunken racist football hooligans. In general, I kept an eye out for groups of sketchy-looking young men and walked away from them, even if it meant I would be late to wherever I was going. And, at the insistence of a Russian friend, I typically carried a small, easy-to-reach knife as a last resort.​

​

Lastly, I tried to maintain a serious appearance—I wore a collared shirt and I always carried a briefcase (even when there was nothing inside of it) to look professional. This was mainly to fend off police shake-downs which tend to victimize people who they think won’t have their papers in order and won’t want to take matters to their bosses or to court. I also worked on the assumption that skinheads targeted people that they perceived as weak, poor or unconnected.​

​

In short, not a day went by that I didn’t consider the very real possibility of being attacked. I told myself that it was worth it to get my project done and I coped with the stress of constant worry. I also tried to focus on the positive interactions that I had with people in Russia.​

​

Which is one reason why it hurts me to give such a negative report. Most people in Russia are not violent racists and I really love many things about Moscow: the libraries, the architecture, the museums, the street food, the random folks who chat with you at the market, the landlord who picks up the rent and stays to talk for three hours, the other migrants and foreigners who share the pain and the pleasures of being an outsider... If you read through my posts from the year I spent in Moscow, it should give you some idea of my diverse feelings and experiences in Russia.​

​

But can I responsibly tell a young person of color (who could presumably choose to travel to any country in the world) that it’s advisable to sign up for a year in Russia? Sadly, I just don’t think so.​

​

The world is large and there are many options. You shouldn't have to fear for your life every day.​

 

[JimW]

By following the 'Soviet model,' it was a modification of 1930s Stalinist nationalities policy in the USSR? But also using similar methods of the 1920s, like indigenisation or korenizatsiya to staff regional government and other state institutions with minorities? Affirmative action was eventually stopped by the Stalinist government.

I can't recall all the details without the texts in front of me (as usual!) but definitely was a conscious aping of the Stalinist model - the Soviet state had that set of principles for determining what constituted an ethnic group that included language, living in concentrated groups etc. Meant some groups went unrecognised and some moans that e.g. Tibetans got sub-divided - no reason why Sherpa are seen as a distinct ethnicity when Khamba aren't I think it goes.
Had a really interesting long internal document written by a retired Mongol cadre criticising the policy and its history from an orthodox M-L position, must have it packed away somewhere.

 

[fractionMan]

hmmmm I may have an ace up my sleave...sometimes on forms under sexuality I tick "prefer not to say" surely that would bump me up a bit?

I sometimes tick white-other because my dads from the states. That probably pushes me down tbh.

 

[frogwoman]

i usually put white british but sometimes put white other lol

 

[frogwoman]

I sometimes tick white-other because my dads from the states. That probably pushes me down tbh.

+10 intersectionality points

 

[fractionMan]

I'm so oppressed

 

[cesare]

i usually put white british but sometimes put white other lol

I don't answer them at all, generally. That's because I know that they're very rarely used for what they're meant to be used for. If they're not doing something reasonablish with it, why should I provide them with my personal data.

 

[frogwoman]

Yeah i always fill them in, I thought you were meant to as part of the job application so they can keep a record of it for the statistics or whatever. But if it's not compulsory then I won't fill it in.

 

[cesare]

Yeah i always fill them in, I thought you were meant to as part of the job application so they can keep a record of it for the statistics or whatever. But if it's not compulsory then I won't fill it in.

They can't force you to disclose these things, it's sensitive personal data which doesn't have a bearing on the (in the job application example) job they're paying you to do. But if all they're doing is building up statistics, I personally don't see why I should help them. I think along these lines ... what are the statistics for? How will you use them? Will the data be used for anything else that I specifically haven't given permission for? Why should I help them carry out a box ticking exercise when I know the likelihood is that they'll be filed away in a drawer and never looked at again? All that sort of stuff. I do know what they're for and how they're meant to be used, but it's very rare that they're used that way

 

[J Ed]

Speaking of Clowns, here's an article on Jacobin http://jacobinmag.com/2012/02/race-war-or-murdering-your-parents-a-left-debate/ with extra tweets by Malcolm "big shoes, bulbous red nose" Harris. Link taken from this, interesting, article http://mattbruenig.com/2012/05/10/purity-leftism/

You could make an argument that Malcolm's calling for a generational war is rational, as an upper-middle-class entrepreneur he wants to get rid of established competition and what better way to do it?

 

[frogwoman]

on the other hand i was just in the high street and there is some mental anti-atheist anti-gay protest going on, some feminists are opposing it with signs saying "oppose rape culture" and argueing with them, so i feel a bit more relieved about the state of feminism.

 

[phildwyer]

This is him rearing boys dedicated to women's liberation without the oppressive psychological pincer of masculinity.

That's yet another of Nıgel Lawson's brood ıf you ask me.

 

[chilango]

i usually put white british but sometimes put white other lol

So do I.

 

[chilango]

So do I.

I also claim to be a Welsh speaker on the census....

 

[JimW]

"White - tearful"

 

[J Ed]

London student politics seems insane. Notice how ALL the back and forth is couched in accusations and counter accusations of isms.

http://www.london-student.net/newspaper/news/you-lost-have-some-dignity-senate-fail-to-sack-editor/

The Senate meeting itself lasted for three hours, and was the most attended Senate of the year. Izaakson’s lawyer was present, and as soon as the meeting began the very basis of it was contested. ULU regulations for the ‘No confidence’ of officers requires any regulations which have been broken to be included in the motion. The proposed motion had none, and none could be added, given Izaakson has not broken any ULU regulations during her term. This then led to the farcical scenario that, in sacking Izaakson, ULU Senate would have to break ULU’s own regulations and so technically, causing far greater beach of their role than the London Student Editor has ever managed. The speech against this was taken by ULU President, Michael Chessum, who said “it didn’t matter anyway”. The Senate delegate from the Institute of Education, the only person who attended the meeting without prior knowledge of the situation or being allies of Cooper, Chessum or Izaakson, said they “could not vote for a motion that didn’t even adhere to the rules of ULU”

Editors of student newspapers have lawyers?

The meeting quickly turned into a forum for allegations which had never previously been raised. Thais Yanez, the seconder of the motion, accused Izaakson of “throwing a wine bottle” at her. When asked where this bottle of wine had hit her, Yanez stayed quiet. Izaakson then offered a choice, paraphrasing a nursery rhyme: “head? shoulders? Knees and toes?” Yanez also accused Izaakson of calling her a “terrorist”, to which Izaakson’s rolled her eyes, commenting: “I only call governments terrorists, what a shit lie to make up about a Leftist.”

 

[J Ed]

Fallout from the Feminist Fightback party bust up

http://www.london-student.net/newspaper/news/ncafc-conspire-to-quash-phd-on-india/

The organisation ULU President Michael Chessum founded, the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts (NCAFC), has conspired on its mailing list to have a student’s PhD place removed.

London Student has been leaked the email thread circulated on the NCFAC Committee mailing list, where members discussed contacting the student’s supervisors. The research PhD is on Indian community organising and based at a department of Oxford University. For safety reasons, we have chosen to not reveal the identity of the student in question. The context of this leaked email discussion was a debate around race politics in the NCAFC ‘black power’ Facebook group.

The discussion begins with a series of insults levied about the student, with LSE General Secretary Alex Peters-Day calling the Indian student “nasty” and the Alliance for Workers Liberty (AWL) national organiser and non-student Edward Maltby referring to him as a “specimen”. The whereabouts of the student are discussed, with Chessum confirming that the student is a “Fulbright scholar at Oxford” and Peters-Day commenting: “I think he’s still in India for a couple of weeks.” International Students NUS NEC place and ex-SOAS sabbatical Arianna Tassinari writes back that the student “is not in oxford atm and never is btw, otherwise I could also try to have a word.”

Birkbeck student and ULU Senate member Faithais Yanez then added that the student “MUST face expulsion”. The Committee then discuss if the student is a member of their organisation, with ULU Trustee and UCL student Luke Durigan interjecting that the student “isn’t a member of NCAFC”. NUS NEC officer Roshni Joshi then refers to the student as “a disgusting little pile of shit”.

Durigan continues by accusing the Indian student of holding a view that “misidentifies anglo-Indian”, to which recently elected NUS NEC officer James McAsh asks for evidence of this “misidentifying” occurrence and asks “someone copy and paste it in”.

The conversation thread then returns to the students’ studies. AWL member and NUS NEC officer Rosie Huzzard suggests taking some comments off the student’s Facebook, stating “could we not collate all these comments and send them to his PhD tutor?” Who the tutor is is then researched, and Huzzard emails the found information stating that the tutor, “is one internationally renowned Craig Geffery!”

At this point, Roshni Joshni states: “I quite like this idea.

This identity politics stuff is taken very seriously in London SUs it seems! Wine bottles being thrown, attempts to throw people off their PhDs... what's next? Drive by shootings? Do I need to check my privilege for suggesting that?

 

[Nigel Irritable]

Judging from that it doesn't seem as if there actually was any attempt to have anyone thrown off any course. It looks like a bunch of student lefties muttering about someone who pissed them off and saying that someone should complain to somebody about something or other until someone else told them to calm down and get over it.

Those articles are pretty clearly just the people who control London Student using the paper to slag off the people they blame for trying to end their control of London Student. There doesn't seem to be anything "political" involved at all. Clique squabbles.

 

[sihhi]

Take care out there in them private liberal arts colleges people, it's tough out there. And remember - you own all these issues

Why did you not want to own this issue when asked?

Laurie Penny @PennyRed20h
So today I'm asking male-identified people on Twitter: who were and are your role models for 'masculinity', and why?

The offering today is a bit weak - here's the conclusion of the 726 words :


"Traditional masculinity", like "traditional femininity", is a form of social control, and seeking to reassert that control is no answer to a generation of young men who are quietly drowning in a world that doesn't seem to want them. There can be no doubt that men are in distress. Society's unwillingness to let go of the tired old "breadwinner" model of masculinity contributes to that distress. Instead of talking about what men and boys can be, instead of starting an honest conversation about what masculinity means, there is a conspiracy of silence around these issues that is only ever broken by conservative rhetoric and lazy stereotypes. We still don't have any positive models for post-patriarchal masculinity, and in this age of desperation and uncertainty, we need them more than ever.

There's literally no one now or from the past to have as a positive male model for us to look up to - it just doesn't exist.

 

[el-ahrairah]

the thing is, in the end, this whole white skin privilege is for middle class people. it is completely indicative of a movement where no-one is actually oppressed (because all the non-middle class people have fucked it off or been alienated completely) and the rest of them are squabbling for points so that they can claim their movement represents The Oppressed - and of course, so they can stop trying to appeal to people they neither like nor understand (i.e. working classes or truely oppressed minorities). IMO, obv.

 

[seventh bullet]

I don't quite know how I would react in a real life situation where I could get screamed at by a class inequality-denying middle class arsehole, wanting to use me as a punchbag to assuage their own poisonous, deep-down pathetic guilt.

 

[J Ed]

I don't quite know how I would react in a real life situation where I could get screamed at by a class inequality-denying middle class arsehole, wanting to use me as a punchbag to assuage their own poisonous, deep-down pathetic guilt.

I don't think that there are many who actually deny class inequality, they just ignore it.

 

[sihhi]

they can stop trying to appeal to people they neither like nor understand (i.e. working classes or truely oppressed minorities). IMO, obv.

Some of them - outside the student arena - have professional 'roles' in being charity types or providing custodianship over support for 'oppressed minorities' - w/c, women, immigrants, sexual minorities.

Note: Of course not all charity workers are like this, but that trend can develop within the third sector (and its progressive wing) and influence things.

 

[sihhi]

I don't quite know how I would react in a real life situation where I could get screamed at by a class inequality-denying middle class arsehole, wanting to use me as a punchbag to assuage their own poisonous, deep-down pathetic guilt.

They never scream, they imply by quiet, steadily building accusations that you are psychologically racist, disablist sexist, and heteronormativist.

 

[ItWillNeverWork]

Maybe these people will all just grow out of it when they leave 'uni'.