Saskatchewan Professor: 'It's Okay to be Against Whiteness'

[mentalfloss]

The Jordan Peterson of the Left.


Sask. professor receives threats over upcoming talk on 'whiteness' at Ontario university

An assistant professor of education at the University of Regina is facing widespread backlash to a talk he is giving Monday titled It's Okay to be (Against) White(ness).

Hosted by Trent University in Peterborough, Ont., the event's title is a response to the "It's OK to be white" posters that circulated around various Canadian campuses last November. Some posters were placed outside the faculty of Native Studies at the U of A and on the door of the Office of Indigenization at the U of R.

There's never been a time when it's not OK to be white. - Mike Cappello, University of Regina professor
"In racist society, statements like that from a dominant group can only be violent," Mike Cappello said. "To then stick it on the door of an Indigenous person, that kicks it up a notch. That suggests that it isn't just about holding up white values...but that it's against something.

"It's never been true here. There's never been a time when it's not OK to be white."

Stories and op-eds on the event have been published in The Toronto Sun, The Calgary Herald, Narcity and The Washington Times.

Cappello said the Trent Central Student Association (TCSA) has received positive feedback from students on the upcoming event, but he's mostly seen a "violent reaction" to its title. He said he has received dozens of hateful emails and abusive and threatening phone calls. One caller even told him, "I know where you live."

Pictured, Mike Cappello speaks to students on the TRC Recommendations. (University of Regina Faculty of Education)

"The person on the phone, and a number of people who have emailed, are just sort of refusing to take up the conversation, insisting that this is anti-white or against white people and not about the ways in which ideas about colour circulate in the society that we're a part of," Cappello said. "That refusal to have that conversation is a problem."

'Whiteness' as an academic term

According to the event's Facebook page, "Whiteness is an academic term for the ideologies that describe the practices, beliefs, habits and attitudes that enable the unequal distribution of power and privilege based on skin-colour."

"This event is not discussing problems with white people, it is discussing whiteness as an idea," said Lindsay Yates, the TCSA ethical standards commissioner via email. "Whiteness is a set of privileges that those of us who present as white have access to.

Sask. professor receives threats over upcoming talk on 'whiteness' at Ontario university - Saskatchewan - CBC News

 

[Jinentonix]

How is this a comparison with Peterson? Peterson is correctly arguing that pseudo-intellectual bullshit doesn't make up for the reality of biology and evolution.

This idiot is merely perpetuating the myth of "White privilege".

 

[mentalfloss]

They're both deliberately controversial academics.

Also, what reality of biology and evolution are you referring to?

 

[White_Unifier]

It's reached a point where academic English has so diverged from standard English that academics and other Canadians don't even speak a common language anymore.

How is this a comparison with Peterson? Peterson is correctly arguing that pseudo-intellectual bullshit doesn't make up for the reality of biology and evolution.

This idiot is merely perpetuating the myth of "White privilege".

Ironically, it's always whites to promote white privilege and white guilt. In fact, I'll check to see the race of this professor. My guess is he's white. Let's see.

Yep, he's white.

 

[mentalfloss]

So you guys are saying it's okay to be against whiteness.

 

[White_Unifier]

So you guys are saying it's okay to be against whiteness.

No, I'm saying that we whites need to stop hating ourselves. Do some ignorant whites discriminate against non-whites? Unfortunately yes and we need to educate people to promote racial harmony. However, the solution to racism is not counter-racism or anti-racism but rather racial harmony.

When I told my wife about the media uproar over a poster that said 'it's OK to be white,' she thought the reaction to such a poster was insane. Apparently some white nationalists started the campaign and the left bit hook, line, and sinker right into it. I prefer racial harmony, but we don't accomplish that by demonizing whiteness.

 

[mentalfloss]

I agree.

Race is becoming more diluted by the day.

 

[White_Unifier]

I agree.

Race is becoming more diluted by the day.

Exactly. How does one even draw the line between races? Where precisely does one draw the line between a white and a non-white person? Just compare a typical Swede to a typical Italian, Greek, or even Persian. I've met blond-haired Persians with blue eyes believe it or not.

I could totally support open borders for example; but if a person is going to have a hate-on against whites, then he's free to just not associate with whites if he doesn't want to do so. I say the same about white nationalists. If a white person does not want to live with non-whites, it's not up to the law to close the borders. He's free to find a mostly white town and relocate there if that's what he wants to do. Just don't impose white nationalist or anti-white bigotry onto the rest of us.

 

[mentalfloss]

Race is evolving from physical features into cultural contexts so using aesthetic descriptors may not be accurate.

 

[White_Unifier]

Race is evolving from physical features into cultural contexts so using aesthetic descriptors may not be accurate.

How the hell can a race be culturally defined unless we're referring to an ethnic group (such as the English race or the French race)? I speak Chinese and have plenty of Chinese friends in spite of our racial differences, yet I'd be stumped if I had to try to communicate with a German in spite of our common racial features.

And if we do mean race in the ethnic sense, then we're not talking about a white or black or red or yellow race ( they those are meaningless terms in that context) but rather an English, French, Chinese, or other race in which case it's being used unanimously with ethnic community and not a group with common physical features.

Common physical features do not guarantee a common culture any more than physical divergences indicate the lack of a common culture.

 

[mentalfloss]

It's defined by common practice which becomes identified as a cultural keypoint.

It could be national or religious based just as a couple of examples.

 

[White_Unifier]

https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/race

This is what I mean when I say that academic and standard English have been diverging ever more over the years.

It's defined by common practice which becomes identified as a cultural keypoint.

It could be national or religious based just as a couple of examples.

So in other words, like so many other English words, it can now mean almost anything.

 

[mentalfloss]

That's why there's a qualifying term like Cultural Racism.

Society takes time to pick up on social trends but we'll get there.

We just have to be a bit more clinical with our understanding of the world.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

It's reached a point where academic English has so diverged from standard English that academics and other Canadians don't even speak a common language anymore.



Ironically, it's always whites to promote white privilege and white guilt. In fact, I'll check to see the race of this professor. My guess is he's white. Let's see.

Yep, he's white.

Of course he is. Nobody listens to non-whites.

 

[Durry]

Being White is great, most colored people would like to be White.

There is a big business in India making people White, I say, why not. You often see colored people with Blonde hair.

 

[mentalfloss]

Genetically, that's certainly possible.

 

[White_Unifier]

Genetically, that's certainly possible.

Never mind Durry. His ideas are the ones that fuel anti-White prejudice.

 

[Hoid]

Whiteness is an academic term because there is no basis for it in science. It is strictly a social definition and varies widely in meaning.

 

[Durry]

Everybody should be proud of their race and color and I am certainly proud of mine and I do not hesitate to tell people what my race has contributed towards mankind and I do not hesitate to challenge other races to match or exceed the contribution of my race.

 

[Tecumsehsbones]

You're proud of a lot of things you didn't earn and had nothing to do with.