Black Lives Matter: You Can Save Yourself Your Embarrassing Symbolism [comment]

2023 Author: Sheila Hailey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-11-26 15:18

On the other hand, the path to hell is paved with good intentions and if you look at the digital censorship excesses that the legitimate protest against police violence and racism has led to, it is difficult for me to turn a blind eye. "Gone with the wind" is removed from the program, the legendary "Don't mention the war" episode from the cult comedy "Fawlty Towers" as well and "Little Britain" also falls victim to the red pencil. It is nothing more than digital book burning. The fury of the new Jacobins knows no limits.

If you see racism hidden everywhere, from harmless advertisements to IT terms such as "blacklist", then that's not particularly considerate, it's just one thing: paranoid. On the other hand, I was told that there should be medication.

By the way, the iPhone manufacturer Google is in no way inferior to the “renaming” of a Scottish Apple store.

Equality, not equality

As the son of Turkish immigrants, I too have had my experiences with racism and expect more than useless symbolism in the fight against it. I expect equality. Not equality - that's what I value. Many use the two terms interchangeably, but they could not be further apart. Equal rights mean that everyone has the same chance of getting through the finish line - whether they can make it in the end is another question. This is due to intelligence, talent, perseverance and sometimes simply luck. Equality, on the other hand, does not look at the individual, at individual strengths and weaknesses, but leads tally lists: "4 percent Turks live in Germany, so 4 out of 100 board members must be Turks." That is absurd and has nothing to do with freedom anymore. At this point, a greeting to the colleagues from Deutschlandfunk Sport, who literally took the tally lists:

And if in the end the vacant board position is filled with a white man again, that's perfectly fine if he was objectively the best candidate and everyone else - regardless of skin color, gender or sexual orientation - had the same chances.

Gestures of humility are completely out of place

Therefore, no one has to "check their privileges" or write embarrassing blog posts that you are now "critically dealing with your whiteness" - as if your skin color was a political direction that you had chosen. Gestures of humility are completely out of place. This implies a perpetrator-victim group relationship, which is utter nonsense and has nothing, but nothing to do in a modern society. I don't want to be taken into custody if Murat stole Jürgen's iPhone. And in return, I do not take Stefan in custody if Hans Ali berates him as "lousy Turks".

We are all individuals and only responsible for what we do ourselves.

Note: The opinions expressed in this article represent the views of the author only and are not necessarily the position of the entire GIGA editorial team.