Recently I was watching a docuseries recently that used the term “anti-white” to describe Louis Farrakhan. It seemed applicable at first glance, but it was used alongside other accurate representations about his comments that have been antisemetic and homophobic. I was struck by how these ideologies simply aren’t the same. Even under the guise of centrism, they don’t add up. I bring this up not as a defense of LF, who I am largely indifferent to, but to show that the comparisons are entirely unfounded.
Whiteness as a construct was the invention of racial hierarchy that was first articulated in the 1500s, as the ideological West waged wars for dominance of the newly “discovered” West. This shiny, new justification for dominion and subjugation of Black and brown indigenous people, deemed by Europeans as inferior, held much sway in race to manifest Western destinies in the Americas, Oceania, and beyond.
The first ideological defense raised in this war was, of course, Christendom. After all, humans absolutely needed salvation from eternal damnation, and they weren’t using their land anyway. If Europeans happened to accumulate unimaginable wealth in the process of the slaughter and torture of millions of human beings, that was merely proof of god’s blessing on their endeavors. God would bless those who were brave enough to spread his kingdom to the savages. What mattered to god was SOULS. God rewarded hard work, and killing all the Natives was sometimes hard work. (And other times, it wasn’t.) https://www.livescience.com/39238-hernan-cortes-conqueror-of-the-aztecs.html
The colonization of the West was the first iteration of the prosperity gospel. “If God be for us, no one can stand against us,” the scripture says in Romans 8. Armed with the justification that god had indeed chosen them - per papal bull, no less - to enforce his will on the planet, there was nothing that could stop Europe from their endeavors. If you believe that god is on your side, you will not stop a war, even if you are losing. See: the Crusades.
It was rather quickly that the exploitation and ethnic cleansing occurring in order to advance the kingdom of god (via the financial markets in London) came to be condemned by a few people who had actually seen these atrocities being committed on the ground.
Whiteness is a marketing scheme developed to stunt empathy for human beings and it still has astounding resonance, even without being explicitly taught or even mentioned to Americans. White Americans have less mirror neuron activation when watching a Black person be harmed than when the same harm is inflicted on a white person. (I must add here that many nonwhite study participants are also more likely to empathize with white pain because white pain is what we are culturally taught to empathize with.)
https://academic.oup.com/scan/article/9/4/454/1628694
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2014.00179/full
Whiteness exists to accumulate and concentrate power. And, contrary to what Trumpers and white evangelicals believe, Judaism and the existence of queer people… don’t.
___
I am obsessed with trees and spending time in the forest as often as I possibly can. The dire projections of the future of forests as the impacts of a warming climate take their toll is something that troubles me on a near daily basis. The planet needs forests, contrary to what the capitalists and their shareholders would have us believe. Because of this I am constantly doing research on trees, forests, and their impacts on human mental health and wellbeing, both as individuals and as a species.
As a lifelong Oregonian, I am surrounded by the ghosts of trees and silent reminders of the fire-ravaged forests and sun-seared canopies. Clear cut forests with ecosystems that can never be replicated.
In my research I have become deeply frustrated with the assertion that “planting a tree” was a solution to offsetting your personal carbon footprint. (My personal carbon footprint could disappear entirely and the US military would still be the largest polluter on the planet. What’s good?) Advertisements for “plant a tree with every swipe” of your credit card, or buying a product that’s had its carbon emissions “pre-paid” by replanting forests.
These replanted forests are not able to do what the original forests did. When land is clear cut, the diversity is removed and the entire forest is replaced with one specific type of tree. The data shows us that these monoculture forests do not have the ability to capture and store CO2 that their predecessors had. Cutting down an entire forest and replacing it with a single, uniform crop is, it turns out, very bad. In fact, those who research forests sometimes refer to monoculture replants not as forests but as “green deserts”.
It has the appearance of life, but is really the after effects of capitalism.
___
In order to be considered white, many newly arrived American immigrants had to reject their cultures. Irish, Italians, Russians, Greeks, and Jewish people were all treated as second class upon arrival. In the US, being second class meant being denied jobs, shelter, legal protections, personal safety, education, and more. In a capitalist society, the tradeoff - rejecting your culture for inclusion into whiteness - had a pretty decent payoff. After all, when you have tiny humans to feed, being able to feed them generally takes precedence.
___
I try to always be learning about trees and forests. Yet, my brain is always taking measurements of the impacts of whiteness on nonwhite and or poor communities. I’m in a constant state of data collection. So when I stumbled onto the phrase “green desert” I was startled to realize that the traits of monoculture could be picked up and transferred almost wholesale to the construct of whiteness.
Monoculture never occurs naturally. It gives the appearance of health - access to protections, political power, and opportunity, but doesn’t provide the benefits. I constantly talk about how whiteness is also bad for white people. True, there is certainly a monetary payoff. There is a payoff in terms of power and access. Data shows us this quite clearly. But at the cost of the destruction of your own empathy and via the extension of capitalism - constant consumption and permanent growth - the destruction of the planet.
Monoculture mimics nature, but never actually connects with the plant diversity around it. It’s artificial because under normal circumstances, it would never occur unless something was seriously wrong. Monoculture is distinct from nature and nature knows it. This distinction is organized, uniform, and predictable. It requires less care because to treat one plant is to treat them all.
“It’s important to treat everyone the same way!” is one of the most common defenses of whiteness when someone is trying to prove that actually no one is responsible for racial injustice.
But consider this example.
Imagine if your chest starts hurting and you head into the emergency department to hear the doctor announce, “In the interest of fairness, today we will be treating everyone for cancer. It’s unfair to the other patients if we treat you differently.” It’s important to treat everyone the same way, right? You’d be pretty displeased with such a nonsense policy and treatment regimen. There’s a pretty good chance you won't even survive it.
Whiteness is monoculture. It is not flourishing. The most important forests on the planet are the most diverse. A lack of diversity is not proof of superior health. It is, in fact, proof of the opposite. Even within the construct of capitalism the most diverse teams have better outcomes than those without diversity. Any area where there is a lack of diversity is more susceptible to disease, destruction, stagnation, decline. The healthiest ecosystems are the most diverse ecosystems.
Someone should tell Americans.
Hi there, thank you so much for taking the time to read this essay. You support means the world to me. If you’re able and you find my work valuable, please consider making a small donation to help me continue to share and educate. You can give instantly on any of your normal apps or better yet, join White Homework and become a patron. Whether or not you can give, would you take one minute to share this post with your friends, family, and colleagues? Thanks again.
Xx, Tori
Venmo: @Tori-Douglass
Cash app: $toriglass
PayPal: www.paypal.me/toriglass