People need to feel some sort of pride in their lives. Traditionally this has been pride in their accomplishments or their contributions to the community or to society.
But in today’s hyper capitalist society, what is there to be proud of? Most jobs are a single redundant cog in the wheel and one’s absence either wouldn’t be noticed or quickly backfilled. And we spend the weekends doing the chores we couldn’t get done during the week, or just existing and recovering, so we don’t have the time previous generations had to contribute as a member of society, go to our clubs or church gatherings and bring a potluck meal or whatever.
So in an absence of pride based on accomplishments, people sometimes turn to pride based on identity - there’s no criteria to meet, you were simply born and you can be proud of that. And that can be twisted and mutated into a feeling of superiority over people who aren’t the same identity as you.
A widely shared type of video, created by Africa-based Chinese social media influencers, portrays Africans as impoverished and dependent, while Chinese people – often the content creators themselves – are shown as wealthy saviors who provide them with jobs, housing, food, and money.
Another common type of racist content reviewed denigrates interracial relationships. Black people married to Chinese people are accused of “contaminating” and threatening the Chinese race. Perceived relationships between Black men and Chinese women are particularly vilified.
This isn’t just China, it crops up everywhere in different forms, and it’s distressing on all fronts because it speaks to a failure to address a critical need of society - the ability for people to meaningfully contribute and feel accomplished.
This hits pretty hard. Looking at the bigger picture is depressing: what the fuck is humanity’s end goal? Because it looks like it’s the heat death of the planet, all so a bunch of narcissistic fucks can pretend they’re royalty, and lord it over the rest of us who weren’t as lucky and see stepping on others for your own desires as cruel and morally reprehensible.
As Lyndon B. Johnson once said, “If you can convince the lowest white man he’s better than the best colored man, he won’t notice you’re picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he’ll empty his pockets for you.”
They’re really pulling an America, aren’t they?
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Oh look another race of color hating another race of color. So dumb
You know, saying that everyone except caucasians are “people of color” itself reeks of inherent racism.
Racism is quite common in the world. It always has been. It’s just that in most of our history our out-groups were still local so racism didn’t manifest.
Right now we’re at a point in the human journey where we see people of different races quite often, but we don’t interact often enough that it is no longer relevant for anyone. It’s improving.
Totally anecdotal, but I teach at an international school and I have many Chinese students who have talked about this with me. They say this attitude is present throughout advertising as well. They very frequently mention this ad
Maybe a big asteroid will hit the planet soon and we can all just call it a wrap. Almost feels like it would be a small comfort to go out in the style of a 90’s action thriller apocalypse. Apologies for being doomy, but Christ, everyone everywhere just fucking sucks. Thanks for sharing this, I’m not sure I would have let myself believe it existed otherwise.
I’m kind of sad this got 6 upvotes. You’re right, lots of people do suck, but there are also a lot of people in the world trying to do good (some right here on Beehaw even). They just don’t get the attention they deserve because doomscrolling and negative news gets more clicks and interactions.
Also an asteroid would also wipe off a lot of other non-human species on the planet, and honestly they don’t deserve that.
