One wonders what is culturally “white” and what we used to mean when we would say, “That is so white” or “Ze is so white.” After having some realizations I think two key elements in whiteness are envy and competitiveness. I am not suggesting these elements do not also exist outside whiteness; I suggest only that they are large, and central, within it.
What do you think? Are these key elements in Western civilization as a whole? Are they mere epiphenomena of capitalism? Why do I feel so…Asian in the presence of certain whites? Can one define the narcissistic attitude and poor connection with reality I call “whiteness?”
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
I think the tiring thing about whiteness is having to trumpet your worth all the time. The tiring thing is a kind of crude mechanics concerning identity, and a positivism. I am considered to be “worth” just as much as I am capable of trumpeting my value without others shouting me down. It’s like putting oneself up for auction every millisecond.
1. Others have to acknowledge my worth for me to be conceded to have any worth at all.
2. The pressure on me is to trick them, cajole them, incite them, threaten them, or otherwise influence them in such a way that I get them to concede me my worth.
3. If I fail in this task, then I am to be considered an unworthy person, printed with a seal of rejection by others.
Well, this is the logic of whiteness, according to how I have experienced it. Its premises are thoroughly flawed in my view, both morally and epistemologically.
It is a false equivalence to say that one is exactly how one is evaluated as being. A sales person thinks this way, or a narcissistic politician. But to be down to earth means that you know something different — that the herd can often be wrong, and that your sense of authenticity comes from the inside, and not from external evaluations.
Secondly, it is false epistemologically, because “objectivity” is not a feature of mass consensus. When the hutus decide en masse to murder the tutsis, does that somehow make them the denizens of objectivity in the new world? NO. Mass action, and mass consensus does not carry with it the status of objectivity.
Just received approval for having a bit too long for its boots — so this week I am in submission mode. No pun intended.
I also think of not-listening/not-paying-attention as a characteristic of whiteness.
Sometimes, though, they can feign humility, though, Katie, as in “Oh, yes, my masculine stock of testosterone sometimes overwhelms me with its pure strength, and I cannot help but not hear what you are saying. But let me try. I know that you are desperately yearning to have my ear, so I will show the world that I can listen to the little woman.”
And so, of course, there is a gender element: whiteness is patriarchal. One knew this already, of course, but every new remark also points to it.
Timely! There’s a review essay of Nell Irwin Painter’s new book in a recent _New Yorker_, profacero, that asks some of these same questions.
Thank you, Undine! I really need to read Painter.
March 2010, on white people: http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=5396
2005, on creating Black Americans:
http://www.nellpainter.com/publications/books_authored.html#creating
Her website is really fascinating in its own right. She just got a BFA and is going for the MFA.
I think that having to factor in the culture of narcissism when one is not narcissistic oneself is a huge strain on the system. Even reading the blog on NPD that you have the link to, I find that the cultural and systemic issues of the problem are not adequately addressed on that blog — although it is good in other respects. For instance, the issue of pride in one’s independence as a cultural factor.
In a nominally or actual individualistic culture, assisting somebody too much is felt to injure their pride. That is why narcissists and those trying to obtain power over you often manouever to publically “help” you in some way. It’s a big trap. If you have publically helped then you lose face. But, on the other hand, the solution cannot be not to help anyone at all. So the issue of human solidarity — which ought to be very straightforward — is very fraught. Is someone helping you because they want to humiliate you, or are the helping you to benefit you? When there is an element of competition in the community, you are always justified in entertaining the first prospect as being highly likely.
But then, this puts you into a paranoid mode, which deadens the emotions. And as Kathy points out, this itself has certain narcissistic features — this numbness.
Culture of narcissism, yes. And quite true on the helping. Paranoid, I’m in academia so paranoia is my middle name and I can handle it. It really is possible to watch your back at all times, yet be confident and not deadened. True about contexts for NPD.
Article on Painter is very interesting, discusses other interesting bibliography, and is available online: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/04/12/100412crbo_books_sanneh
P.S. I’ve never read Christopher Lasch’s book on the culture of narcissism but clearly should:
http://www.reviews.ctpdc.co.uk/lasch.html
Lasch seems to have discussed some aspects of “Reeducation.” His later book _Revolt of the Elites_ appears to go further in that direction. From the review linked above:
“He certainly did not spare his criticism of the self-awareness movement (though in his post-humus book: The Revolt of the Elites he went much further). Lasch argued that instead of liberating the personality, instead of helping the individual to understand the world and society around him or her, the self-awareness movement suggests an even more extreme defensive stance, a momentary relief, tranquilliser. It is not the issue, Lasch points out, that people take therapies (psycho-therapy, counselling, health food, purifying courses, belly dancing, etc.), but that these became a programme for solving a huge problem for which they offer no remedy (While Lasch did not name any of the counselling schools, there is one that can be identified easily and it is transactional analysis.). In fact, just the opposite: they reinforce anxiety and de-personalisation of social relationships. In his own words: The importance of such programs, however, lies not so much in their objectives as in the anxiety to which they appeal and the vision of reality that informs them – the perception that success depends on psychological manipulation and that all of life, even the ostensibly achievement-oriented realm of work, centers on the struggle for interpersonal advantage, the deadly game of intimidating friends and seducing people.’ (p. 66)”
Yes, survival may be possible, even for me. But deep down I am certain that my approach to things is not the same as those brought up in this culture. It is not automatic for me to mediate every single experience through my ego. If I did that, I suppose I would remain in synch with most evaluations, which would make me seem much more sensible –insofar as consensus is allowed to determine what is objective and therefore true.
My actual sense of things is much more phenomenologically based than it is ego based. I operate and respond on the basis of perception. Do I have a need? Does somebody else have a need? It’s very direct, and rarely calculated to give some kind of impression.
But I think my approach can seem intemperate to those who are adjusted to following the rules of ego and its need to maintain public face. I lack sufficient poise to make the finer adjustments in relating to the world in this way. I find it foreign, and the more I reflect upon how I would prefer to do things, the clumsier I get.
In a way it is like trying to treat ego and its projections as if they were the only reality, when I am not so sure that they are even all that real.
This is why I couldn’t be a school teacher. I’m not “seeing” this ego construct out there, and adjusting for it. I don’t feel it and I don’t see it, and in a context where it is the ultimate (but invisible) reference point, I feel very clumsy.
I’m not good at that ego construct thing either, and it’s a liability not to be in the short term. Ultimately it’s better not to sacrifice oneself on the altar of that, though, and one can muddle through without it.
Good old Sam Vaknin doesn’t think much of Lasch and points out that his use of the term “narcissim” isn’t the clinical one. http://samvak.tripod.com/lasch.html
I really wonder if I can muddle through, as you say. It may be possible, when dealing with adults.
I’m sure you can. In terms of higher ed, though, depending on your institution, you have to realize that not all the official adults are adults. After the first year, the students are really not too bad on the adulthood scale.
You just have to remain very poised and remember your identity and objectives. You have to trust instincts on whether you have a manageable situation or not. You have to NOT get caught in those ego games, they’re the big trap. A lot of places may not love you initially for not doing this, but will end up respecting you for it. If this is not going to happen (and in some places, it isn’t), you’ll sense it soon.
If you work in a place where the faculty is rather international (and I don’t mean just several European countries, I mean truly international) AND has some wise locals, that helps a lot because you have different perspectives and some feet on the ground. Problematic is when everyone is a transplant from their region, but comes from the same kind of culture. That creates a hothouse.
My ideas about America are second hand. I cannot say if Lasch is accurate about it. I have only noticed that many people whom I’ve engaged with over the years via the Internet do seem to have that perspective on ego that I’ve mentioned. People in Australia, Britain and the US seem to share it pretty much. It even seems like it could be a functional construct to rely upon if one is male in such societies, since the expression of an ego-based perspective is likely to be supported by those around as being justified — and therefore would be efficacious. But when women relate in this mode, they are denied efficacy. They are invisibly but assuredly penalised. So the ego construct paradigm does not give us any power in society, but rather subtly works to undermine any power we might obtain. This is because of the other principle at work that the consensus of the majority is objective and right — and most people, men and women, are patriarchs.
“But when women relate in this mode, they are denied efficacy. They are invisibly but assuredly penalised. So the ego construct paradigm does not give us any power in society, but rather subtly works to undermine any power we might obtain. This is because of the other principle at work that the consensus of the majority is objective and right — and most people, men and women, are patriarchs.”
This is all true but at some point one just has to laugh and try to evade it! I have recently been called “resigned” because of this attitude, but I do not agree.
Yes, I think when you realise that these are actually not transcendental principles, as they are made out to be, but are actually wholly arbitrary, you can try to get along despite it all.
My friend Naomi Dagen-Bloom, who runs the blog, A Little Red Hen, (on my sidebar)was in a relationship with Christopher Lasch before she married her husband, Ron. She’s now in her mid 70’s.
She is a great woman.
I only vaguely remember reading The Culture of Narcissism, and I did not think highly of it, as I recall. But I can’t remember why.
According to Neil Gotanda, whiteness has the following elements:
1. Creating a distanced “otherness” by demonizing those who do not fit into its schema.
2. The most striking element of whites’ concsiousness of whiteness is that most of the time *we* don’t have any.
3. Whiteness pretends color blindness
4. Whiteness is characterized by unselfconscious
maternal/paternalism.
(From “A Tale of Two Judges” in The House that Race Built)
All of these rang a bell with me. What do you think?
Adelante — I need to read Gotanda! Yes, those all ring a bell but I think there are more elements. The maternal/paternalism is a big one, and so is the distanced “otherness.”
Hattie — the world is so small! First FGV, now this! Lasch, yes, my impression is that on the whole he might be sort of off but that he makes some good points. The ideas quoted above on the self awareness movement are very good, for instance (although those aren’t his words but the commentator’s).
[Having forgotten we mentioned this before — N.Ed.] You knew F? Holy cow! I went to high school with her. She was always a star, and I was just a dorky nerd. I wonder if she would even remember me. Probably not. The last time I saw her was on the “F” train (that long ago!) going over the Bay Bridge. She was married to a policeman at that time and had a child. We were probably about 19 or 20. That’s all I know. I tried to look her up once, even left a note in her cubbyhole in her Department at Berkeley, but never heard from her.
Married to a policeman?!
I have trouble realizing she is your age now, I think of her as being about 40. I had a couple of classes from her, she was nice/smart/pretty, I don’t know if a star, I am not convinced the pressure of UCB as it was then did her a lot of good. All of this was around the era in which JW, another smart person, graduate of our program, woman on tenure track, refused even to come up for tenure. F served really superb coffee in her office.
It is amazing how small the world is.
You don’t get away with claiming white superiority around here, that’s for sure.
Re: F: I don’t think ze ever made full professor. But she had the advantage of being from a very well thought of family. Her father was the football coach at SF State.
She was very beautiful as a teenager.
I can’t believe I’m my age either!!!
She was still good looking when I knew her. She also had tight jeans, high heels, flowing blouses, and Farrah Fawcett hair, and she smoked Mores. All of this was very elegant then. And it was before she got those health problems or whatever it was she had later. No, she didn’t make full, I don’t know that I will, either, although I really ought to get up and jam so I can. She was, however, the first woman ever to be tenured in Classics at UCB and that is MAJOR. I think it exhausted her; can imagine how it would.
[Note: I tend to forget that when I was in college there were whole departments which had never hired a woman, much less tenured one. I was very much aware of it at the time, however, and it is why I did not expect an academic career.]
Didn’t know about the football coach father, either, but it makes sense that she was from the area. The football man and the policeman are interesting added elements.
It is all so odd to think back. Let’s see, she would have been a small child in the Bay Area in the 40s, when my parents were there in college, and a teen in the 50s, and when you saw her on the F train it was around 1960. That’s already amazing as it means she was in her 20s for all of the 60s. If I remember correctly her PhD is in CPLT and is from UCB, so she is from the days when that department still hired its own … what a cozy little town it was then.
It is so much another world, and her life is so much a generation ahead of mine, and I hadn’t realized she was actually *from* the Bay Area so this life seems very much related to mine and yet very much not. Now having pieced together so much I am half tempted to seek her out although one does not necessarily want to find what one finds in such initiatives.
I can’t believe my own age.
P.S. She was 54 when she retired. This would be a really good short story prompt: imagine either the early landscape (phantasmagorical to me, she’s 20 years older but 20s and 30s Bay Area, of my parents’ childhoods, seems more familiar than 40s and 50s) or the post retirement one, about which I know nothing. I am now slightly envious of the idea of being in academia at a big fancy school where one is from, having had a life there before then, and then in the same place moving into the next phase, as she did.