Discursive Responses to Black Lives Matter: White Fragility, Political Correctness, and Respectability Politics Item Type text; Electronic Thesis Authors Winkelman, Jacob Wolff Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 03/10/2021 02:35:27 Item License http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/625251 Winkelman 1 DISCURSIVE RESPONSES TO BLACK LIVES MATTER: WHITE FRAGILITY, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, AND RESPECTABILITY POLITICS By JACOB WOLFF WINKELMAN ____________________ A Thesis Submitted to The Honors College In Partial Fulfillment of the Bachelors degree With Honors in English THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA M A Y 2 0 1 7 Approved by: ____________________________ Dr. Marcia Klotz Department of English Winkelman 2 Discursive Responses to Black Lives Matter: White Fragility, Political Correctness, and Respectability Politics This paper will explore how shame and fragility around whiteness manifest themselves as refutations of the Black Lives Matter movement through two rhetorical strategies: accusing protestors of “political correctness” and utilizing respectability politics to criticize the form of protests without addressing their contents. The poetry pieces of Nikki Giovanni, Audre Lorde, and Claudia Rankine from three different political eras show how different elements of the current Black Lives Matter framework, namely, intersectionality, black humanity, and black love, build off of a tradition of black feminism. This paper will examine why the state and the general population consider some speech to be violent and some warranting protection and how this corresponds, intentionally and unintentionally, with the existing racial hierarchy. Popular culture and the government often consider speech that calls out racism as a violent act while granting constitutional protections and arguments of free speech to the words (and actions) that promote racism. Countering this double standard requires a continued focus on protesting, discussing racism, and recognizing the rhetorical mechanisms that make this line of reasoning the mainstream. According to a Pew study puBlished in 2016, Black people were twice as likely as white people to say that the Unites States pays too little attention to racial issues (58 percent to 27 percent), 41 percent of white people said too much attention is paid to racial issues, and 70 percent of white people believed that individual prejudices played a bigger role than societal ineQuality in the discrimination against Black people (Horowitz and Livingston). The aim of this paper is not to present data on institutional racism in the United States. Rather, this paper will explore the rhetoric of race in the media and popular culture as it stands post-Black Lives Matter and how this can lead white people both to fear discussions of race and simultaneously to refuse to acknowledge the existence of racism. Understanding why Black Lives Matter and other similar movements have faced white backlash can give white allies, and protest movements, if they choose, a better understanding of how to engage other white people aBout racism. White fragility, white privilege, and respectability politics are complicated concepts, but accusations of political correctness and reverse racism often derail what could otherwise Be productive dialogues. Winkelman 3 To understand how rhetoric impacts our conceptualization of racism, this paper will examine the work of Black, feminist poetry, Black Lives Matter, and popular culture. White supremacy, even in its modern manifestations of white privilege and white fragility, is not new to the United States, but neither is resistance through language. What is the difference Between calling out racism and decrying something as too politically correct? When does something constitute hate speech that should Be censored By the government and/or protested (if ever)? And why are current protests aBout racial justice, such as Black Lives Matter, so unpopular while historic civil rights movements are portrayed with praise and esteem? To answer these questions and others this paper is broken up into three sections: white fragility, political correctness, and respectability politics. The beginning of the paper explores why the rhetorical phrase “Black Lives Matter” inspires a mix of shame and fear in majorities of white people that spark a backlash as a result of white fragility. As a counter to accusations that black lives do not, in fact, matter, popular culture, politicians, and the media have weaponized the phrase political correctness as a means of implicit censorship and employed respectaBility politics to redirect conversations concerning race. The recent events surrounding Michael Brown, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Colin Kaepernick demonstrate the workings of these more aBstract, political concepts. As we explore these ideas, I use the work of three Black, feminist poets– Nikki Giovanni, Audre Lorde, and Claudia Rankine– from three different eras to historicize how these concepts and the Black Lives Matter movement are merely modern manifestations of previous fights over racism. My focus on rhetoric of these movements and popular culture stems from the work of Judith Butler and her writings on hate speech. This paper will examine why the state and the general Winkelman 4 population treat some speech as violent and some as warranting protection and how this corresponds, intentionally and unintentionally, with the existing racial hierarchy. Popular culture and the government often consider speech that calls out racism as a violent act while granting constitutional protections and arguments of free speech to the words (and actions) that promote racism. Countering this douBle standard requires a continued focus on protesting, discussing racism, and recognizing the rhetorical mechanisms that make this line of reasoning the mainstream. White Fragility White fragility speaks to the shame, defensiveness, and denial white people often demonstrate when the topics of race and racism surface in conversation. In RoBin DiAngelo’s 2011 essay, “White Fragility,” she coins the term, defining it as follows: “White people in North America live in a social environment that protects and insulates them from race-Based stress. This insulated environment of racial protection Builds white expectations for racial comfort while at the same time lowering the aBility to tolerate racial stress, leading to what I refer to as White Fragility” (DiAngelo 54). The protection and insulation descriBed By DiAngelo speak to an assumption of safety uniQue to the white experience. Whiteness is not merely a skin color, But rather a powerful position in a racial hierarchy that encompasses cultural practices and an aBility to navigate the world as the standpoint for viewing others (Frankenberg 75). Most importantly, racism is structural and systemic and therefore does not change direction. Prejudice and bias can occur against a white person, But societal ineQualities do not harm the white person and the Benefits of whiteness come as a product of hundreds of years of slavery, discrimination, and institutions set up to preserve white dominance. When challenged about whiteness, Winkelman 5 DiAngelo explains how common emotional responses include guilt and anger coupled with arguments, leaving the conversation, or silence (DiAngelo 54). These Behaviors only reinforce the centering of white emotions in racial discourse. In other words, the feelings of white people take a higher priority over the discourse on the realities of racism. In order to understand and suBseQuently challenge whiteness, there must Be an understanding of the guilt, fear, and shame that contriBute to what DiAngelo calls, “white triggers:” • Suggesting that a white person’s viewpoint comes from a racialized frame of reference; • People of color talking directly about their racial perspectives; • People of color choosing not to protect the racial feelings of white people in regards to race; • People of color not Being willing to tell their stories or answer questions about their racial experiences; • A fellow white not providing agreement with one’s interpretations; • Receiving feedback that one’s behavior had a racist impact; • Suggesting that group membership is significant; • An acknowledgment that access is uneQual Between racial group; • Being presented with a person of color in a position of leadership; • Being presented with information aBout other racial groups through, for example, movies in which people of color drive the action But are not in stereotypical roles, or multicultural education. (DiAngelo 57) Winkelman 6 These triggers often exist suBconsciously But can still lead to violence Because of the shame of whiteness and admitting how whiteness Benefits white people. In Chris Linder’s (2015) study on shame and fear among white feminists he studies how shame can prevent white folks from engaging with racism: “guilt and shame fueled their fear of appearing racist, resulting in inaction related to antiracist work” (Linder 544). Shame is Both unproductive and unsafe. Deconstructing whiteness cannot occur with shame still present, and the “triggers” that DiAngelo lays out helpfully explain the situations that may cause