Color-Aroused Behavior Need Not be "System-Wide" to be Harmful

A night club owner in Detroit, MI offered a promotion in which light-skinned Black women would be admitted for free to the club while darker skinned women would be charged admission on certain nights. Some of us ask ourselves whether this behavior is "racist," and then, having concluded that it is not "racist," we then proceed to conclude that since the behavior is not "racist" it is therefore benign (not harmful).

Color-Aroused Behavior Need Not be "System-wide" to be Harmful

The term "racist" is not helpful in this discussion because the term means "systemic (system-wide) denigration, subjugation and exploitation on the basis of skin-color and/or ethnicity." Is everything that's not system-wide benign and permissible?

For example, shooting one's self in the head and having sex with children are not systemic problems. It's something individuals do when they want to commit suicide or when they are pedophiles, respectively, but these are not "systemic" behaviors.

Does that mean that suicide and pedophilia are behaviors in which individuals can engage without damage to themselves and their families?

It's much more useful to ask whether an individual's behavior is aroused by color than to ask whether it is "racist" because behavior can be very damaging without being systemic behavior. We must ask, "What is the ideation and emotion that is manifested in a particular behavior? How does the behavior affect the individual, his family and the community?"

In this case, the club owner believed that separating people by color and then giving them privileges and disadvantages on that basis was a good idea. So, he implemented that idea (behavior). That behavior, and the ideation that it showed, infuriated a lot of people, and I think rightfully so. Black people are sick and tired of being divided on the basis of the hue of our skin and being discriminated against and separated from one another on that basis.

Unfortunately, since the beginning of slavery white people have done this to us and, just as unfortunately, we have internalized the oppressor and done it to each other.

When you look at the club owner's behavior in that context, I believe it shows that separating people on the basis of skin color and giving them added privileges and disadvantages IS a behavior that in consistent with and furthers systemic denigration, subjugation and exploitation on the basis of skin color. On the "light nights," dark-skinned women would be asked to pay to enter the club while light-skinned women would be waved in to enter for free.

But, let's lower the bar when it comes to color-aroused behavior that we will tolerate. Aren't we are always insisting, whether we are Black or white, that if behavior is not systemic ("racist") then it is alright? Ask yourself, "If eating arsenic is not pursuant to a system-wide political problem, does that mean it won't hurt you?" If shooting yourself in the head or having sex with children are not system-wide problems, does that mean these behaviors don't harm individuals, families and the community?

Likewise, color-aroused ideation, emotion and behavior need not be systemic ("system-wide) to harm the individual, his family and her community.

I would argue that this club owner's behavior was symptomatic of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder, and here is the analysis that I would engage in to arrive at that conclusion:

1) Is there an evidence of an overt of covert behavior aroused by color or associated with color? Clearly there is in this case. The Club owner was providing privileges and immunities based on color, i.e. who would pay to enter the club and who would not have to pay.

2) Did the color-aroused behavior impair the individual in one or more important areas of life? Clearly this individual's color-aroused behavior has angered many of his clients, many in his community and world-wide. By dividing clients by color and offering benefits to some that were not available to others on that basis, he has infuriated and perhaps even emotionally harmed clients who would have appeared at his club to have a good time, only to be confronted with yet one more instance of color-aroused discrimination. So, the club owner's behavior may well have harmed his reputation, his business and social relationships while causing intense embarrassment to his family, just as public drunkenness or pedophilic behavior would.

This impairment of one's ability to relate successfully with others is one of the symptoms of color-aroused disorder. When it becomes a marked impairment that significantly impairs relational ability then it is a "severe" impairment.

But, notice that I have not and will not attempt to render a diagnosis of the club owner based on news accounts about him. Only a competent psychiatrist could do so, after looking at the patient's history, other relationships, ideation and behaviors.

For example, if this behavior was engaged in only once and is not of long duration (six months or more), then it might be evidence of a mistake rather than of a mental illness. A competent psychiatrist who interviewed the club owner would be able to make that determination and then recommend treatment strategies, if necessary.

The Interrelated but Different Problems of Systemic Color-Based Subjugation and Individual Color-Arousal Disorder

Dear Jose Vilson:

I'm sorry I'm not addressing the AfroLatino immigration issue that you raised in your essay, but your essay raised for me another issue that is close to my heart:

I think that we should stop using the words "race" and "racism" and "racist," and instead describe with specificity what we mean, but using other words, to avoid the ambiguity that results from the historic and disproven belief that people are biologically different in a meaningful way based on their "race."

For example, I find that I can express myself just as well by saying "systemic color-associated denigration, subjugation, and exploitation" as by "racism." That description covers for me what happens at the macro level, but I also see a "color-associated emotion, ideation and behavior disorder" in individuals. I think we need to study and look for solutions to both of these interrelated but different problems.

This isn't about "color-blindness." It's about disambiguation. Although you know what you mean when you say " 'race' still exists," white supremacists say the same thing while meaning something entirely different. When every story in the newspaper about Black people uses the word "race," are they doing that to help us in the struggle to free ourselves, or are they doing it in a continuing effort to perpetuate the white supremacy that gave birth to the word "race" in the first place?

If we describe the same concepts using unambiguous words that don't risk conceding that "race" exists biologically, then we'll find out what white people really mean when they use the word "race" and why they enjoy using the word "race" so much. I think we'll find that this ambiguousness was serving them much more than it was serving us.

Francis

Why the "Race" Word is Wrong

We all know that "race" doesn't exist, so why do we keep giving the biological concept currency by using the word that denotes the biological concept? Aren't we perpetuating our own marginalization by engaging in what "Spit" calls "skin-color-based usage, interaction and experience" that has specific effect of convincing whites and us that we are fundamentally different biologically? We are fundamentally different in many ways, but these ways have NOTHING to do with biology and EVERYTHING to do with, principally, structural features and our position in society. It's not our "race" that explains our inability to integrate in America. It's whites' response to our skin-color and their treatment of people with our skin-color that most distinguishes our experience here from that of the Irish and the Polish. Continuing to use the word "race" encourages and enables whites who continue believing to insist that "racism" is mostly about biology rather than all about society.

As I said at Political Fleshfeast,

It will NEVER be possible to teach the public to separate the pejorative denotations of the word "race" from the more subtle but useful sociological denotations, about which there is very little agreement between, for example, Republicans and Democrats or Blacks and whites.


So, everytime you use the word "race" you give currency to the pejorative meaning even while good-heartedly endeavoring to explain the sociological. Political Fleshfeast

If you adopted a little boy whose given legal name was "Bitch," would you continue to call him "Bitch," arguing that it is the only name he has, or would you give him a new name that honors his essence and preserves his ability to make a place for himself in society. The name "black race" is like the legacy name "bitch." For so long as we are known this way, and called this pervasively, this negative propaganda against -- that insists that we are less than human -- is too great for any individual amongst us or all of us together to overcome.

It's true that the word "race" was given to us by others, and we have tried to make lemonaide out of linguistic lemons, by appropriating and intellectualizing this name. But, in the end, a boy called "Bitch" by everyone will be respected by no one.

The rationale given for the continued use of the word "race" is that it's the only word we have for a useful and pervasive sociological phenomenon. This is quite a lot like naming your son "bitch" and then insisting that when you call him "bitch" you are not referring to the pejorative sense of the word (the original sense), but you are only referring to the useful sense -- the only name you have for your son. The simple solution is to rename your son and remove all confusion before any more harm is done to his reputation, his self-esteem and his ability to make a place for himself in society.

"Racialism vs. Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA)

I like the word "racialist" (seen at Field Negro) because, to me, it ridicules the whole concept of "race." Color-aroused systemic and individual discrimination exists. Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA) exists. "Race" doesn't exist and so "racism" doesn't exist, but "racialism" does! It's all around us.

To me "racialism" is the belief that race exists and the use of the fantastically irrational notion of "race" in discrimination against others.

But, I don't see Field Negro as a "racialist," although some people accuse him of it. Field Negro is a realist who focuses his attention on "racialists" and on very real instances of systemic and individual skin-color-aroused antagonism.

It makes a BIG difference whether you believe in "racism" or in skin-color-aroused disorders. If you believe in "racism," you will probably believe that "racists" have an ideology that is inbred and not subject to being changed, regardless of whether they are ten years old or seventy years old.

If you believe in Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA), then you understand that "racism" is really a complex and interrelated cluster of extreme color-aroused ideation, emotion and behavior that is the result of socialization and that can become more acute based on circumstances, like all other cognitive behavioral disorders.

If you have this understanding of ECA, then you realize that we need to create societal and social circumstances in which there is less reinforcement for ECA behaviors and less socialization toward ECA behaviors. We also need greater deterrents and more opportunities for treatment and recovery. You realize that a child who shows ECA behaviors under some circumstances can also learn NOT to show those behaviors.

If you believe in "racism," then you believe that the white mind is beyond the reach of scientific understanding, diagnosis, treatment and recovery. It is one thing to believe that cancer is incurable now. It is quite another thing to believe that cancer can NEVER be understood, and that even if it is understood it can NEVER be cured. That is really magical thinking that is not based on our experience with the cancers that already can be cured with early diagnosis and treatment. Likewise, the belief that racism cannot be treated successfully ignores our experience with alcoholism, drug addiction, anorexia and bulimia, which are sometimes treated successfully with competent diagnosis, treatment, and societal support and deterrence.

If you believe in ECA, then you believe that if individuals who are motivated to recover and are offered competent services can CAN make progress, particularly when society reinforces that progress.

If you doubt that individuals and society can make progress, then how do you explain the fact that Blacks and whites eat at the same lunch counters and ride the same buses in the American South today? Behavioral change IS possible, but we need a better understanding of what makes people sick and we need better tools for making them well again.

Fighting Blog Apartheid in the Whitosphere

This comment is about the ongoing fight between Black and white progressive bloggers over the issue of blog apartheid at whitosphere blogs.

I love to write and I love to share my thoughts with others. But, I'm sick and tired of the constant grumblings about banning me at the whitosphere MyLeftWing blog, for criticizing the blog apartheid practiced at DailyKos. For example, in response to my essay of yesterday, Gottlieb said in comments:

"My interpretation of MSOC's remarks was she has tried to gently guide the 'editorial' direction of this board, and part of that direction is not to become known as a 'kos bashing' site. Simple. What's not so simple is where to draw the editorial line between 'free speech' and 'bashing'. Assuming, the journalism is sound.If the journalism isn't sound and you're making wild accusations on the slimmest of evidence, then you should be banned forthwith."

Our of sheer self-defense, we Blacks have learned over the years to know just what whites say and how they behave when a lynch mob is forming.

Let's see: If I "cross the line" into "bashing" America's foremost blog apartheid site, which was "bashed" in the Washington Post this week about this very issue, then I should be banned?!

That's like saying, "It's alright to blog about Apartheid, but you MAY NOT bash P.W. Botha." And don't be a Nelson Mandela "shill" either! I's like saying, "Write about the Klan, but don't 'bash' the Klan!"

This is what happens to white people's minds under the influence of color-aroused emotions, ideation and behavior.

And if we're not careful, they make US responsible for making sense out of all of this crap.

Blacks subjected to these mental games are at risk for color- aroused emotional, ideational and behavioral disorder, unless we stick together and refuse to play along.

There are constant suggestions that "if this and that were to happen" then that would constitute a valid reason to ban Francis L. Holland, and this discussion is, in and of itself, a kind of constant oppression that warns ALL Black that we MUST NOT aggressively argue for our own liberation in the context of the whitosphere. At whitosphere blogs, we're "always outnumbered and always out-gunned."

But, maybe if we stick up for each other through the AfroSpear Black bloggers movement when this grumbling begins, then we can impress upon white bloggers that, in addition to the handful of whites demanding Black bloggers' expulsion and our heads on a platter, there are at least five dozen Black blogger opinion-makers, with significant Democratic-leaning voter audiences, and these Black bloggers are organized, angry and tired of the bullshit!

This is the e-mail address of Maryscott O'Connor, the owner of the MyLeftWing whitosphere blog who has publicly threatened to ban me for "bashing" the blog apartheid practiced at DailyKos. Please write her a e-mail and tell her that bashing apartheid is precisely what we should be doing at progressive blogs.

myleftwing@gmail.com

"Mary,

Is it true that Francis Holland may get banned from your site MyLeftWing?

If so, why?

Regards,

Adrianne George
Black Women in Europe Blog"
Francis

UNICEF Ad Campaign on Africa May Be Symptomatic of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA)

Adrianne George, of the Black Women in Europe AfroSpear Blog, has brought to our attention an instance in which color-aroused decision-making has led to disgrace for individual employees and for an international non-government organization whose purpose is supposed to be to help Black people rather than insult and demean us.

This UNICEF ad campaign is an example of where the color-aroused antagonism of individuals within a corporation (UNICEF) has caused a major international embarrassment for the corporation itself?

The question arises whether this color-aroused antagonism is so widespread within the corporation that it really represents the position and policy of the entire corporation. That is precisely what Adrianne George has sought to discover by contacting UNICEF directly, to see whether it will screen and offer appropriate services for its workers who show signs of Extreme Color Aroused Disorder (ECA) or, alternatively, endorse the workers' behavior and thereby demonstrate that the UNICEF as an organization is an ECA-aroused organization?

Adrianne George has contacted UNICEF and their response will help to distinguish whether this reflects a group of individuals within a corporation manifesting color-arousal, or the entire corporation itself.

I think that if the corporation takes this seriously and realizes that this campaign has damaged it reputation and credibility, the corporation will want those responsible for this campaign to be screened, and then diagnosed and treated where appropriate for Extreme Color-aroused Disorder (ECA).

We strongly suspect that the disorder is "extreme" in this case, because the behavior includes insulting strangers unprovoked (always a symptom of an extreme disorder) and because the behavior has led to significant negative professional consequences for individuals and also for their corporation. They are being discredited. If someone who was under the influence of alcohol insulted strangers unprovoked and this caused themselves and their corporation to be discredited, we would certainly suggest that person be screened for alcoholism.

As such, the people responsible for this color-aroused UNICEF campaign really do need to be professionally evaluated for Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder.

Is D.L. Hughley's Nappy-Headed Comment an Example of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA)?

Anonymous said at the Francis L. Holland Blog,

I am an American woman of African descent who does not agree with the boycott of DL Hughley. I was offended by the term "ho" not the term nappy-headed. I proudly wear my hair natural as do most of my friends. And though a couple of us have soft curls, most have nappy hair. I am more offended by the fact that African women in American are ashamed to wear their hair natural for fear that they will be what God intended women of African descent to be, and that is "nappy headed."

July 11, 2007 12:46 PM

Francis L. Holland Blog said...

Anonymous, I agree with you that there is nothing at all wrong with having nappy hair. "Nappy" is the natural state of many people's African hair and "natural" is a good thing.

What is wrong is to use the phrase "nappy-headed" as an epithet, because that behavior shows antagonism toward our natural African hair.

People who have extremely antagonistic attitudes toward the immutable physical characteristics of others are people (e.g. toward the skin-color or natural hair of others) are people who suffer from Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA).

In this disorder, just seeing and perceiving the immutable skin-color or other immutable color-associated characteristics of oneself and/or another person is enough to arouse extreme ideation, emotion and behavior in the sufferer of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder. The behavior of publicly ridiculing strangers about immutable color-associated physical characteristics is one of the symptoms of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder (ECA). We know that this behavior is extreme because it often leads to physical fights, legal liability, loss of job, loss of family contacts, loss of social status, lost income and loss future prospects for the perpetrators of this extremely color-aroused public epithet behavior.

Such behavior in the workplace often leads to expensive and time-consuming legal claims against both the offending employee AND the employer. With so much at stake, clearly making strangers the subject of color-aroused epithets in public, for no logical or rational reason, clearly is an extreme behavior symptomatic of Extreme Color-Aroused Disorder. No fully rational person would willingly incur so much trouble for the sake of insulting a stranger.